Our Tasting Room and retail shop carries some of the best cookbooks out on the market today. Summer is a time when cooking is at its simplest. It is a time when fresh produce is available at its peak. Farmers Market stands are bursting with color and promise flavorful ingredients that can be served as they are without a fuss. Who wants to sit in front of a hot stove when you can be outside enjoying a BBQ and glass of wine on the patio? We just got in a large shipment of a variety of different seasonal cookbooks perfect to inspire your family’s summer menu.
The new books are listed in no particular order, but the Donna Hay Simple Essentials books are my absolute favorite.
Good Day for a Picnic
Lorna Sass’ Complete Vegetarian Kitchen
Donna Hay Simple Essentials Chicken
Donna Hay Simple Essentials Salads and Vegetables
Build a Better Burger
Summer Gatherings
Rick Stein’s Complete Seafood (step by step recipes and 550 pictures included)
Anybody can be a good cook during the summer months as long as you make sure to always use fresh ingredients. Never choose dried herbs over fresh. Take advantage of your local Farmers Market. Always use fresh cracked pepper and flavorful sea salt crystals. And quality olive oil makes more of a difference than you know. I actually heard of a great tasting room up in Los Olivos where you can taste locally grown and produced food products, olive oils grown in Los Alamos, and fruit-infused vinegars. The retail store and tasting room is called Global Gardens (www.oliverevolution.com).
Joanie Hudson, Assistant Tasting Room Manager, Santa Barbara Winery
In addition to the Solstice Parade and Festival this weekend, the Sta. Rita Hills Winegrowers Alliance will host the 2008 Open House weekend (June 21 & 22) to showcase the burgeoning appellation. Numerous events and morning vineyard walks will allow guests to get an in-depth and close up look at the region.
Two-day passports are available for $75 and includes:
*Access to Open Houses at participating wineries
*A picnic box lunch created by Lafond Bistro (pick up your lunch at Lafond Winery between 11:30 and 1:30)
*Gala Reception at Sanford and Benedict barn on Saturday evening
*Morning Vineyard Walks
For more details, including wineries that will hold open houses, see the events page at www.staritahills.com. There are additional events going on, such as winemaker dinners and a golf outing, available at additional costs.
Lafond Winery will have an Open House on Saturday from 10-2:30pm and on Sunday from 10-5pm. On Saturday winemaker Bruce McGuire will offer 2007 barrel samples and select library tastings in the barrel room. Light appetizers will also be served. The Open House will continue on Sunday.
This event only happens once a year and provides a unique opportunity to meet the winemakers and increase your knowledge of Santa Barbara’s wine country.
Joanie Hudson, Assistant Tasting Room Manager, Santa Barbara Winery
In the wake of the Bistro’s upcoming Solstice wine pairing dinner I wanted to make sure to mention that the celebration will continue through the week, culminating in the Solstice Parade and Festival. Santa Barbara’s largest single-day arts event will be held at noon on Saturday June 21, the weekend following the longest day of the year. The parade begins at noon on the corner of State and Cota St. and continues into the evening with a festival held at Alameda Park (Anacapa and Micheltorena St.). Part of the proceeds for our Solstice Pairing Dinner on Tuesday evening will go towards this wonderful local celebration.
Summer Solstice Parade began in Santa Barbara in 1974 and has increased in popularity with every passing year. Handmade floats, decorative costumes, and jewel adorned masks whimsically weave their way up State St. where a crowd of over 100,000 spectators gather. In addition to the enthusiastic throng of people who show up to watch-sitting on curbs, beach chairs, standing, or walking along-over 1000 people participate in the parade.
The procession of people and floats end up in Alameda Park, where the Solstice Festival awaits their arrival. The Festival actually opens on Friday evening and runs from 4-9pm, and prepartiers eager to begin celebrating can enjoy energetic drum beats, live world music, and dancing. After the parade the Festival runs from 12:30 to 8pm and will house a Beer Garden, a special children’s area, food, and again, plenty of music. The floats and costumes that appear in the parade are made by community members at the Soltice Workshop, in which anybody can participate in and bring their creative ideas to life.
To find out more about the Santa Barbara Solstice Celebration visit www.solsticeparade.com.
Joanie Hudson, Assistant Tasting Room Manager, Santa Barbara Winery
We are completing a new patio which, for lack of a better name, we are calling our VIP Patio. But stay tuned, we will certainly need to come up with a better name.
We built on the side of the winery as you approach from Santa Rosa Road. In Santa Rita Hills you are almost guaranteed to have wind. It you usually comes up before noon and lasts until late afternoon or until the fog rolls in. We think of it as invigorating but for many it creates havoc with tablecloths and light plastic or paper tableware. The wind brings in the ocean breeze and cools the vineyard and makes possible the fantastic Pinot Noir and Chardonnay that we grow here.
The Patio is connected to the production winery through what we always referred as the VIP room, thus the name of the patio — for now. The Patio is surrounded by a wall and since it is on the leeward side of the winery it affords a great deal of wind protection.
We hope to use it for small groups, that can be catered, of up to 50 people, preferably less.
Call Mirella Valdez, our Tasting Room Manager, for additional information 805.688.7921.
Click the images to enlarge:
Gardener Rose Moradian has written on this serious and contentious rivalry in the Bistro Restaurant & Wine Bar Blog. Rose is the creator of our organic vegetable garden at the Lafond Vineyards.
She writes…
In terms of vegetable growing, much emphasis is made on the number of days needed to produce. Many of the same vegetables need different times to produce. Thus, “Early” tomatoes, “Baby” beets, etc. In terms of squash, Summer and Winter squash need to be planted around the same time. What are some winter squashes, 
you may ask. Pumpkins, Kabocha, Hubbard, Spaghetti, Butternut, Acorn and Buttercup squash are some, to name just a few.
Here is a link to good visual website for more. Some winter squash are blue, like the Hubbard. “Kaikai” is another, known for its striped outer hull and delicious black seeds, full of healthy oils and vitamins! I’m growing most all of these at the Lafond Vineyard for the Bistro. Winter squash needs 100+ days to bear a full size fruit. Summer squash, like Zucchini, Crookneck and Patty Pan squash, to name a few, need only 50+ days to produce.
To read the Rest of the article…
We start leafing when the folliage begins to shade the young grapes. Crews go through the vineyard hand-pulling leaves. The bottom photo shows a vine that has been ‘leafed’. The large quantity of leaves pulled off can be seen on the ground. This process is repeated at least twice during the summer and sometimes three or four times.
By opening the canopy the grapes are less susceptible to mildew and benefit from the natural air currents. Leaves, of course, are responsible for photosynthesis and a canopy must be maintained. In order to expose the grapes and yet maintain photosynthesis the canes are trained upwards and restrained by pairs of wires. The fruit lives on the bottom wire.
This process of training begins during pruning by selecting new spurs that are positioned to grow upwards. These are the fruit bearing canes.
A view of the Lafond Vineyards taken today June 7, 2008. In the foreground our older vineyard on the north side of the Santa Ynez river And in the background on the south side of the river the newer vineyard and the winery. By clicking the image and enlarging it you can barely distinguish it up against the hills. In between our neighbor Hilltop Vineyards which supplies us with Chardonnay and some Syrah. The Santa Rita Hills have turned brown, as they always do in June, and the river, although there is a flow, is easy to cross with our tractors and ATVs.
Click image to enlarge:
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