The Northern California chapter of the Rensselaer Alumni Association sponsored a lunch and wine tasting at Tesla Vintners in Livermore. I tweeted mini-reviews via iPhone as I tasted:

• started with “singing winemaker” Sherzando – nice and sweet, would be better with dessert than as the first sip of the day
• Red Skye Sauvignon Blanc – nice, lots of body, long finish
• Singing Winemaker Raspberry Sparkling – I could easily drink too much of this!

Then it was time for lunch. All I could eat was the pasta in Alfredo sauce and the bread, since everything else had pork, which was a shame, because there was a lovely garlic aroma that wasn’t in my food. But the wine and the tweets kept flowing:

• Patty’s Passion goes well with pasta
• Red Skye Chardonnay – good for a Chardonnay, unoaked, but not gonna make me a fan
• Red Skye Zinfandel – smoky, would go nicely with beef. Long finish, nicely tannic.
• Patty’s Passion is good without pasta, too – I think the trunk is going to be loaded on the way home. I’ll have to wait to be sure I’m not!
• Singing Winemaker Framboise – good by itself, but even better with the chocolate tasting cup.
• The “serving size” on the chocolate cups is 2 cups, but I’ll restrain myself

After the raffle (we didn’t win anything), we adjourned to the tasting room, the cash register, and home:

• Con Amore port – tawny, 4 years barrel-aged, being released on the 19th…we shall return!
• Home again, with a case of yummy wine (1 Raspberry Sparkling, 2 Sauvignon Blanc, 2 Sherzando, 2 Zinfandel, 4 Patty’s Passion, 1 Framboise)

Definitely a nice way to spend the day, and writing my notes via Twitter meant I didn’t have to worry about losing them! (Though I’m not sure they got posted in exactly the order I sent them, which is odd)