Every January, San Francisco wakes up from its post-holiday sluggishness and hosts the Specialty Food Association’s Winter Fancy Food Show. This is an industry-only affair in which more than one thousand purveyors of packaged foods display more than 80,000 specialty foods and beverages. That’s right; more than 80,000; everything from chips and dips to olives and […]
Events
Havana Cuba’s Nighttime Entertainment

Cuba is an island of music. We took advantage of every opportunity to explore different elements of this musical heritage. We spent many hours in cafes and lounges, selected primarily on the basis of the music they offered. Although this mandated many, many drinks, we made the necessary sacrifice to enjoy a broad range of […]
Latin American Wine and Spirits Tasting in San Francisco

We had a recent treat: A chance to reacquaint ourselves with hundreds of Latin American wines and spirits without even having to travel to South America. The San Francisco Trade and Media Latin American Wine and Spirits Tasting provided an opportunity to taste dozens of wines from countries including Argentina, Chile, Mexico and Uruguay. As […]
A Taste of Mendocino in San Francisco

Mendocino is always a great place to visit. The scenery, food, wine, hospitality are first rate. But even better is when we don’t have to travel to taste the foods and wines of the region. Taste of Mendocino provided such an opportunity in San Francisco recently. There, we had an opportunity to taste dozens of […]
Howell Mountain Spring 2016 Wine Tasting

Napa Valley is well known for its excellent wines. But high in the northeast side of the Napa Valley, above the fog, is the lesser-known Howell Mountain AVA. This region’s wines are produced through a combination of its nutrient-deprived soil (a combination of volcanic ash and red clay), high elevation (above 1,400 feet), generally lower, […]