Yesterday’s LENNDEVOURS Wine Bar event at Roanoke Vineyards was a great success… and a lot of fun to boot.

I should know in the next couple of day just how much money we raised, but we had 45 or so people join us and I think (hope) that everyone had a great time. I have a short list of "thank yous" to offer:

  • To Roanoke Vineyards for letting us hold the event in their newly renovated back room. It’s a great space and I hope to host (and attend) more events there in the future. Thanks Rich and Soraya.
  • To Lieb Family Cellars for bringing and pouring both their 2005 and 2007 Pinot Blanc. The soon-to-be-released 2007 vintage is going to be popular with fans of Alsatian pinot blanc. Thanks Melissa (who delivered the wine just in time) and Gary.
  • To everyone who came out to support Peconic Land Trust. It’s always great to meet my readers and fellow Long Island wine fans. It was especially nice to finally meet Sasha Smith (who writes for LENNDEVOURS), Steve Shaw Jr. of Shaw Vineyard, and Philip and Mark from Snooth. And as I said, it’s always a lot of fun to meet readers, so Jay and John, great meeting you too.
  • Last but certainly not least, a heart-felt thank you goes out to my always-supportive wife Nena who really pulled together all of the last-second (literally) details and manned the door, bar and register with skill and patience.

If you were at the event, I’d love to hear what you liked and didn’t like. You can either leave a comment below or shoot me an email.


We ended up pouring tastes of 5 different wines, including two of my wines, a 2007 Rose made at Sannino Bella Vita Vineyard and a 2007 Cabernet Franc made at Raphael. Both were well received. In fact, I think I could have sold a couple cases of both if I had that much left (and had a license to do so). For me, the wines of the day were the Lieb Cellars 2007 Pinot Blanc and the Roanoke Vineyards 2006 Gabby’s Cabernet Franc, which needed to be decanted, but really showed nice ripeness, structure and spice. It should be released 9-12 months from now. 

Thank you again… and I hope to see you all there again next time.