Hi SoCal Berserkers,
Long time lurker and never poster (I have lurked back into ebob days), based in South Bay LA. Though I have lots of friends I drink wine with, I’ve spent far too long without a group of wine friends. I’ve decided to change that situation by organizing some dinners/tastings. Right now, I’ve labeled this thread as “planning” just so that I can start to get a sense of who (if anyone) is interested and go from there. I have some thoughts on locations, themes, formats, etc below so please let me know your thoughts, interest level etc.
If there is interest and it comes together, my goal is to have this become a semi-regular South Bay tasting group…A shining beacon among a sea of Rombauer perhaps. I can only speak for myself, but I have a distinct lack of nerdy wine friends to drink, talk about, and share great wine with, so hopefully some others out there are interested too!
August Dates:
I’d like to try and organize this on a Friday or Saturday evening. The first two dates I’d throw out there as possibilities would be the 16th or 17th of August.
Potential Locations:
I’m definitely selfishly trying to keep this close to home… Of the spots in the area that I’ve personally visited, two stick out as potentially good venues, both in Manhattan Beach. I’m certainly open to other ideas.
-The Arthur J. Excellent wood fired dry aged steaks and I had great service from my one visit. I brought a bottle of ’09 Dom and a bottle of ’83 Poyferre when we ate there, and one of the managers immediately came over and provided interested and engaged wine service. I shared some of each bottle with him and got his card, mentioning I was potentially interested in setting up a tasting dinner there, and he seemed keen. I’m not a huge pairing guy, but based on the fare here, this seems well suited to Bordeaux/Cab Based wines, Northern Rhone/Syrah, etc and less so Burgs.
-Love and Salt. California Italian, though I believe that we could make this work for a variety of wines, potentially including burgs depending on how we ordered.
I would need to do recon at both restaurants on stemware, corkage, their willingness to deal with something like this etc. I’m also open to other ideas in the Manhattan/Hermosa/Redondo area and would happily go to check out and recon any suggestions!
Formats:
In my head it feels like around 8-10 people is the right max group size for this, so that it doesn’t start to get too large and unwieldy. I’m game to see what the response is and go from there as far as group size goes. We would commit to a theme and everyone would propose a couple bottles to bring to make sure we’re not stepping on each others selections.
If we get a group that clicks and this continues, in the future I’m also interested in a format where we bring bottles according to a theme and in addition contribute funds to source bottles that we otherwise wouldn’t purchase individually.
Themes:
All the themes I’m throwing out there represent things that I am specifically interested in and can also materially contribute to. Though I don’t have a total baller cellar full of Roumier and 1st growths, I do have a decent selection of some interesting stuff and I need people to share it with!
Potential 1st Dinner Themes
-Bordeaux 1990 and earlier
-Bordeaux 1982 and 1983
-Burgundy 1999 and earlier
… Let’s see what the responses are from people and we can go from there.
Potential Future Tasting Themes
-Leoville Poyferre Vertical
-Specific Vintage and Village Burgundy tastings
-Pre 1995 White Burgs
-Any older bordeaux tastings, whether verticals, vintage specific, other themes.
-Northern Rhone
-Rhys and Cayuse Syrah
-Rhys Pinot Check-In
-Sine Qua Non
Logistics:
I’ve never planned an offline before, so I may (read: will) be finding my way through some (read: all) of this. That said, I’ll be checking with the potential venues about pertinents, wrangling the attendees and selections, coordinating communication etc. I’ll definitely have questions that will come up, so bear with me!
Absolutely hoping that this interests some folks and look forward to hearing your thoughts! Let me know if you’re interested, dates that could work and themes you’d be keen for.
Thanks!
Josh