While Sonoma Valley Visitors’ Bureau and Saddles’ “Martini Madness” is sold out for tonight, Olive Season fans have an opportunity to sample fine foods at the Feast of the Olive dinner on Saturday, Jan. 28 at Ramekins Culinary School.
Guests can look forward to many courses prepared by 18 of Sonoma Valley’s top chefs including Bruno Tison of the Fairmont Sonoma Mission Inn and its Michelin-stared Santé restaurant, Jeffrey Lloyd of Café La Haye, Jason Rose of Ram’s Gate Winery and chefs from the girl & the fig, La Salette, El Dorado Kitchen, Estate, Carneros Bistro, Sonoma Meritâge, Saddles Steakhouse, Depot Restaurant, Epicurean Connection, Carneros Caves, Hot Box Grill, and Ramekins itself.
Usually guests also receive bottles of olive oil from The Olive Press and Figone’s of California Olive Oil Company.
Akoma Zoume, Benziger, B.R. Cohn, Cline Cellars, Gloria Ferrer, Imagery, Jacuzzi, Landmark and VJB will pour their wines generously. $150. 5:30 p.m. 450 W. Spain St., Sonoma. Reservations: 996-1090, Ext. 108.
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Ramekins Culinary School has a few spaces left for the fabulous Lisa Lavagetto’s “Tour of Italy: Tuscany” hands-on workshop Thursday, Jan. 19. You will make focaccia stuffed with prosciutto and Parmigiana Reggiana, pasta stuffed with pork, pasta with veal tomato sauce, braised meats and vegetables, and an almond torta with bittersweet chocolate. $95. 6:30 to 9:30 p.m.
The next hands-on classes with openings include Christa Resing Colardo’s “Custards and Mousses” on Sunday, Feb. 5 ($85, 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.) where guests will make crème brûlée, espresso pot de crème, vanilla bean panna cotta, and chocolate chunk brioche bread pudding.
Diane Hom’s “My Heart Belongs to Chocolate” on Friday, Feb. 10 features Aztec hot chocolate, truffles, cocoa powder soufflés, French macarons, and salted caramels. $80. 6:30 to 9:30 p.m. 933-0450.
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Sonoma GayDar holds its first 2012 event Friday, Jan. 20 at the HKG (Hop Kiln) Estate Tasting room, featuring rare wines and paired food tastes. 6:30 to 9 p.m. 13647 Arnold Dr., Glen Ellen. 938-7622.
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Benzinger Family Winery just named Jeff McBride as its new Vice President of Winemaking. McBride comes to Benziger via Washington’s St. Michelle Wine Estates and Napa’s Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars, combining degrees in biochemistry and philosophy. The winery’s previous winemaker, Rodrigo Soto, left in late 2011 to return to his native Chile.
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Terin Ignozzi, winemaker and proprietor of Bryter Estates, which will open a tasting room in Sonoma Court Shops before Valentine’s Day, just won Double Gold, Gold and Silver medals in the San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition, the first competition she has ever entered.
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Rob Larman will make his annual cioppino dinner at Valley Wine Shack on Friday, Jan. 20 to include Caesar salad, fish and shellfish cioppino with polenta, and fruit crisp with whipped cream. Owner Windee Smith’s wine collection will be available. $35. Seatings 5:30 to 8:30. 525 W. Napa St., Sonoma. Reserve at 938-7218.
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Olive authority Don Landis will again offer his free olive curing workshop on Sunday, Feb. 5 at B.R. Cohn Winery, describing olive history and Greek style olive curing done with no lye. Olive and wine tasting with wine discounts available. 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. 15000 Highway 12, Glen Ellen. Reservations at (800) 330-4064, Ext. 124 or brcohn.com.
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The Epicurean Connection now carries full lines of specialty beers and wines, the latter including wines from 16600, Beltane Ranch, Claypool, Estraie, Hanzell, Idell Family, Kendall-Jackson, Muscardini, Pamelita, Parmelee Hill, Sabella, Spann, and Wildhurst.
Be sure to check out her current art work display by Kareem Assab, loaded with colors of his native Morocco. The opening party last weekend was a huge success.
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Janet Fletcher, San Francisco Chronicle cheese columnist and author, who is often featured at Sheana Davis’ Artisan Cheese Fair, will give a series of five cheese tasting classes billed as “World Cheese Tour” at Sonoma resident Elaine Bell’s Napa catering kitchen. The five Thursday evening series begins Thursday, Jan. 19. Participants can attend one, some, or all of the classes.
Attendees will enjoy hors d’oeuvre and aperitifs before sitting down to the guided tasting of seven different cheeses and appropriate wines each evening. Schedule includes cheeses of France on Jan. 19, Italy Feb. 2, Spain March 1, East of the Rockies April 5, and West of the Rockies April 26. $200 for all five sessions. 6 to 8 p.m. each evening. 776 Technology Way, Napa. Reservations at janetfletcher.com, click on cheese classes.
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The Ladies Auxiliary of the Veterans of Foreign Wars host their annual pasta dinner at the Vets Building on Saturday, Jan. 21, featuring meat or veggie pasta, salad, French bread and dessert for $15 or $5 for kids four to 11, free under four. Tickets at Eraldi’s menswear or call 235-3300.
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Sonoma Valley High School’s Music Department presents its annual Pancake Breakfast, organized this year by Lauren Popenoe, called “Taste of Star Quality,” Sunday, Jan. 22 at the Vets Building, to include multi-grain blueberry pancakes, live music, silent auction and raffle. Whole Foods Sonoma and Rachal Cyphers will donate the food, as usual. This year’s funds will help students get to Disneyland to play along with an animated feature. $10 adults, $8 children. 8 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. 299-8492.
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Sonoma Valley Vintners & Growers Alliance announced that the Gingerbread Competition winners are Nicholson Ranch (Charles Whittaker) first, Chateau St. Jean came in second, and third place went to Gundlach Bundschu.
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Nibs and Sips:
Café 522 chef Alex Boduc competes this weekend in the Mac-Off at Healdsburg’s Thumbprint Cellars, entering a Liberty Duck Confit Mac ‘n’ Cheese…Amy and Fred Groth host a HelloCello Limoncello Big Peel Party on Saturday, Jan. 21 at their “laboratory” where you can laugh and help peel 4,000 lemons, eat lots of good food, dance to music and win contests. Free. 1 to 4 p.m. 21877 Eighth St. E., Sonoma. 721-6394…Papa Murphy’s Pizza has donated loads of pizzas for WillMar Center’s kids and teens.
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Coming up:
Margie Brooke’s Community Café has a busy time approaching. Next Saturday, Jan. 21, the Café hosts a “pop-up” restaurant called “Ragazzi” featuring a four-course tasting menu paired with wine and conceptualized and prepared by Lovin’ Oven and Sonoma Teen Center teens.
The evening begins with a music and art reception with samples of Lovin’ Oven’s hand-crafted soda syrups. Dinner taps into the flavors the teens have enjoyed growing up from varied Mexican kitchens.
Expect an amuse bouche of a chili, cilantro and lime marinated prawn wrapped in crisp fingerling potatoes; and appetizer of butternut squash and chorizo soup with pan dulce; green corn tamales with Puebla chicken and potatoes, cilantro rice, frijoles de fiesta and Jalisco slaw; followed by a prickly pear sorbet with cinnamon and cajeta tuilles. $50 toward Skills for Life programs. 6 p.m. Tickets: contact Rebecca Hermosillo at 939-1452 or at SVTeens.org.
On Friday, Jan. 27 Community Café hosts a Winemaking Dinner with Peter & Betsy Spann to include coconut tempura shrimp, five lily soup, rib eye roast with horseradish Duchess Potatoes, cauliflower and broccoli, and a cheese and chocolate course, all a bargain at $39.95 including Betsy Spann’s wines with each course. 6:30 p.m. 875 W. Napa St., Sonoma. 938-7779.
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Also on Jan. 21, Presentation School presents a yummy crab and pasta feed with Drakes Bay oyster bar, with donations from Sonoma Market, Rich Little Band and Drakes Bay Oyster Company. All crab and oyster fans are welcome. $60. Opens 6 p.m., dinner at 7 p.m. Reserve at 935-0122, Ext. 202.
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Sondra Bernstein, proprietor of the girl & the fig, Estate, the fig café and the girl & the fig caters, will talk about her new book, “Plats du Jour: The Girl & the Fig’s Journey through Seasons in the Wine Country” at Readers’ Books on Tuesday, Jan. 24. Learn how to easily recreate many of Executive Chef John Toulze’s recipes at home. 7:30. 130 E. Napa St., Sonoma. 939-1779.
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Santé, the Fairmont Sonoma Mission Inn’s Michelin-star restaurant, will host a dinner featuring B.R. Cohn wines to benefit Sonoma Valley High School’s thriving Agriculture Program, school garden, orchard and educational vineyard. Five hundred students are now involved with agriculture at our high school.
Much awarded chef Andrew Cain will create the special dinner on Thursday, Jan. 26 to feature a canapé reception in the hotel lobby. Once seated, guests will enjoy a salad of Dungeness crab and hearts of palm and Hass avocado mouse served with B.R. Cohn’s 2009 Sangiacomo Vineyard Chardonnay; roasted Sonoma duck breast with winter root vegetables and crispy croquette of duck confit leg with Cohn’s 2009 Russian River Valley Pinot Noir; a saddle of Cervena venison with water chestnut purée, mushrooms and butternut squash with Cohn’s 2008 Olive Hill Estate Cabernet Sauvignon, and white wine poached Granny Smith apple and almond tart with ice cream and 2008 Herrick Vineyard Late Harvest Semillon. A delicious way to help our schools. $145. 6:30 p.m. Reserve at 939-2415.
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Sonoma Community Center re-launches its Community Table dinner series with a five-course dinner by the Beltane Ranch family on Saturday, Jan. 28 at the Community Center’s Rotary Kitchen. Expect a Moroccan-inspired dinner featuring Beltane’s organic beef, produce and sustainably produced wines. Dinner will be prepared by Alexa Wood, her daughter Lauren Benward Krause, and recently married ranch chef Joy Wesley and husband, winemaker Kevin Holt.
Expect trout cakes, homegrown arugula and figs, with Kunde Ranch walnuts, dry-aged grass-fed beef with polenta, Swiss chard, local cheeses, raspberry pie and Barking Dog coffee, all paired with Beltane and MacRostie wines. $55. 6:30 p.m. 276 E. Napa St., Sonoma. Call 938-4626 or visit sonomacommunitycenter.org.
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Plan ahead:
Sonoma Valley’s Boys & Girls Club will honor the fabulously generous Lise Sonnen for its 27th annual Sweetheart Gala & Auction on Saturday, Feb. 11, launching the club’s 50th birthday celebration and “The Golden Age of the Boys & Girls Club.” Sonnen and her Sonnen BMW support many Marin charities as well as our Becoming Independent, Pets Lifeline and many others.
Erin Riley and Lisa Cavalli co-chair the event. Staffer Katie Holden says that guests will dine in a replica of “The Brown Derby Restaurant” in Hollywood with an overall theme of “Old Hollywood Glam.” The late gossipists Louella Parsons and Hedda Hopper supposedly hung out at the Brown Derby to be seen and see a variety of movie stars.
Our Boys & Girls Club serves 2,000 individual children each year at five locations, and it serves 35,000 snacks and 7,000 breakfasts to augment our children’s needed nutrition.
Fairmont Sonoma Mission Inn will cater, with dancing and a casino to follow the usual auction. $200 (sells out). For tickets call 938-8544, Ext. 118.
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