Fitness, Food, Wine & Travel

beer

28th Annual Curtis Park Wine Tasting, Silent Auction and Beer Garden Set for October 6th, 2018

The 28th Annual Curtis Park Wine Tasting, Silent Auction & Beer Garden returns on Saturday, October 6th, 2018 from 4-7pm. I am honored to be a part of this year’s planning committee, helping to organize some of my favorite local restaurants and wineries for my Curtis Park neighbors and for my husband, who I met at this event in 2011.

This year’s event will feature a special ticket for VIP is available (which includes admission at 3pm for an extra hour of wine sipping and tasting galore). We are proud to announce our VIP Restaurant sponsor will be one of Sacramento’s newest and (hottest) restaurants, The Diplomat, located directly across from our State Capitol building! The VIP wine sponsor will be Ironstone Vineyards.

Purchase tickets for the event HERE.

Returning to support this year’s event are Curtis Park Wine Tasting veterans Selland’s, Dad’s, Espresso Metro, Miso Japanese, La Famiglia Catering, Gunther’s Ice Cream, Casa Garden, Sugar Plum Vegan, and Oak Cafe as well as the culinary students from American River College (under the tutelage of the amazing Chef Roxanne O’Brien).

New to the event this year (so far!!) are Cellar Door Platters (a custom charcuterie, fruit, and cheese platter creation service), Seasons 52, Sacramento Natural Foods Co-op, Burgess Brothers BBQ (Antojito’s), Thai Farm House BBQ & Bistro, Buffalo Pizza and Cornflower Creamery, and Adamo’s Restaurant!

Wineries set to participate are Revolution Wines, Moniz Family Wines, Tryphon Vineyards, Matchbook Wines, Seka Hills Winery, Steiner Family Vineyards, and Via Romano Vineyards. If you’re a cider fan, we’ve got Two Rivers Ciders coming, and as always Pangaea Bier Cafe‘s Rob Archie will coordinate his fabulous Beer Garden for all the brew lovers out there.

I have intentionally tried to reach out to restaurants that produce food that not only pairs with wine, but restaurants that will give this event more variety and make it more culturally diverse. If we all have one thing in common, it’s that we need to eat to live. Food can be a great connector to people who have different backgrounds. I feel this event is a great way to taste and get introduce Curtis Park residents to restaurants they might not normally seek out on their own. As one of my favorite travel hosts (and star of Netflix show “Somebody Feed Phil”) Phil Rosenthal says, “Food is the great connector for me, laughs are the cement. It’s all about getting to know people.” Yes!

Proceeds from the SCNA Wine Tasting, Silent Auction and Beer Garden help support upkeep and maintenance of the historic Sierra 2 Center and Senior Center, community events like the Spring Egg Hunt, Music in the Park and Curtis Fest. Additional funds go toward Bret Harte’s 6th grade Nature and Science Camp and the McClatchy HISP program and the debate club.

We are still looking for restaurants and wineries who want to showcase their food at the event, and particularly restaurants/wineries to represent different cuisines/wines throughout the world. If you are interested in participating, please contact me by calling 916-612-0035 or email me: misscavegrrl at gmail.com!

For information about participating, donating or volunteering, you can also contact Terri Shettle at the Sierra 2 Center, 452-3005. No prior event planning is necessary, and it is a great way to connect with neighbors and support your community.

Click —-> donate an auction item, or here to purchase tickets for the event. See you there!


Taste of History Dinner at Sutter’s Fort = History Tastes Delicious!

On September 25th, the Annual Taste of History Dinner at Sutter’s Fort was held. I attended with a fellow food blogger and we enjoyed an evening of music, conversation, and eating a multi-course dinner outdoors at a beautiful table settings inside the fort walls.

The evening began with a reception with appetizers by Whole Foods and Selland’s Market. Whole Foods made pear “hand-pies”, cider with sparkling water, and also sampled pistachios and yellow watermelon. Selland’s offered little cups of corn soup, cheese and honey served on cedar planks, and tiny pot pies with vegetable filling. Around the corner, Ten22 was serving fresh fried corn tortilla chips and mole sauce.

Well OK, I don’t think there was a Selland’s catering van back in the day… 😉
Vegetable pot pies from Selland’s.
Cheese and honey from Selland’s.
Corn soup from Selland’s.
I was THRILLED to get my hands on a slice of watermelon since my diet is gluten-free, corn-free. I was also snacking on pistachios from the Whole Foods booth.

While we were waiting to be seated, we ventured off around Sutter’s Fort and looked into some of the exhibit rooms. There are recorded guides to inform you of your surroundings and the purpose of each room.

This was the beautiful set-up for dinner, just before dusk.
Each patron got a beautiful mini-lantern, and a goodie bag from Whole Foods,
filled with discounts and information on local vendors.
Most of the chefs used old fashioned preparations to make their food. Right over the fire.
This was another appetizer available. It was from Ten22, and was an absolutely
delicious mole sauce. They had fresh fried tortilla chips to dip in the sauce.
There was also live music in the style of the era being played before dinner as we walked around to look at Sutter’s Fort and to sample the foods and wines available.

This was the first course, a Chicken Mole Salad prepared by Chef Jay Veregge of Ten 22 in Old Sacramento. It was paired with a River City Brewing Vienna Lager.

The second course was a Grilled King Salmon with Tomato Salsa and Creamy Polenta, prepared by Patrick Mulvaney of Mulvaney’s B & L. It was paired with a wine from Railbridge Cellars.

The third course, was quite possibly my favorite and sadly I don’t have a better picture of it. It was a slow cooked Beef Brisket with shell beans, corn, and Del Rio Farms herb salsa prepared by Scott Rose. For those of you in Paleo land, I didn’t eat the corn, but did have a few delicious beans. 😉 This course was paired with a wine from Bogle.

You can find Sutter’s Fort on Facebook here. The have a fun event coming up this week called The Haunted Fort. It will be on October 28th and 29th. Sutter’s Fort, once a portal for weary pioneers, again serves as the gateway to their restless spirits, who return to tell the tales of their lives and melancholy deaths at this special family friendly event. Tours leave every 10 minutes, tickets available here. For more information please call phone 916 445-4422.

This Saturday, Oct 1st, Curtis Park Celebrates its 21st Wine Tasting & Silent Auction


Yard House and Train at Thunder Valley = Love

The newest place to be in Roseville is Yard House, which recently opened in the Fountains at Roseville shopping and dining strip.

I visited last Saturday with my roommate before we headed to Thunder Valley for an AWESOME Train concert.

Yard House is a chain restaurant that began in Southern California. The restaurant was founded by Steele Platt (along with partners Harald Herrmann and Carlito Jocson) who wanted to create a restaurant that would offer one of the largest selections of draft beers, and a vast menu of American fare. The first Yard House opened along the Long Beach waterfront in Southern California in 1996.

The restaurant takes its name from the 3-foot-tall glass containers originally designed in Great Britain and used to hand stagecoach drivers after a long journey by horse drawn carriage. Each Yard House location features a center island bar and an endless fleet of tap handles ranging from classic lagers to more obscure ales. The glass-enclosed keg room is essentially the pulse of the operation housing as much as 5,000 gallons of beer at a time. Three to five miles of individual beer lines stretch overhead from the keg room to the island bar maintaining a constant temperature of 34-36 degrees keeping the beer consistently fresh and chilled for every pint.The extensive menu of American fusion cuisine features more than 130 items including appetizers, salads, pastas, sandwiches, grilled burgers, individual-size pizzas, seafood, steaks and ribs. There is also a kids menu and a gluten-free menu.

Yard House is obviously famous for all those beers on tap, but here is a quick snap of the wine they serve by the glass. (You can click on the picture to enlarge it).

The view from where we were seated… in a booth large enough to lie down in.

This Caesar salad came out with our entrees (we each got one this size). My favorite part of it was the parmesan crisps. I didn’t even need my croutons or dressing.

It was one of the best concerts I have ever seen. There were several factors contributing to this. One was that the weather was just perfect. Another reason is because the venue is great. Thunder Valley’s outdoor  stage is literally built on part of their parking lot and every seat is close enough that it is worth the ticket price. Also, the sound is great no matter where you are sitting. I know because I have seen two shows there this year from two completely different areas in the amphitheater.
You still have time to catch some great shows, but a lot of them have been selling out, so if you see an act you want to see, buy your tickets sooner than later. Here’s a link to the rest of the summer’s lineup.
Also, every Sunday at Thunder Valley they will be having “H2O Sundays at the Pool”, an outdoor playground of sorts featuring poolside music, cabanas, drink specials, giveaways and contests. Tickets are $35 and $25 for Thunder Valley members and you get two specialty drinks with your admission. For more information or to buy tickets, go here. The pool parties begin today and run every Sunday through September 25th.
You can find Thunder Valley on twitter here and on Facebook here.

Splash Roseville 2010 to be Held Saturday, September 11th


Northern California Blues Festival this Saturday, August 7th!


Hail to the Chef: David Hill, Chef/Owner, The Chef’s Table


Inspired Dishes Line The Chef’s Table