Wining and wining and wining...

It's been a crazy couple of months. Lots of projects at the day job getting in the way of the Goddess' wine plans, but we still managed to get to a few places. We'll start with the most recent and fill things in as we go.

My dear friend, Rico Mandel of Miz en Place, invited me to cover the opening of a new wine bar in Malibu, Malibu Beach Wines. MBW is the brainchild of Jim Palmer, proprietor, grower and winemaker of Malibu Vineyards wines. It's a lovely space, right on Pacific Coast Highway, where you can taste and purchase boutique wines grown in the proposed Malibu AVA and Central Coast. When I say 'boutique' I mean small production, lovingly-tended and passionately-made. The winemakers and wines being spotlighted for this opening event were Jim Palmer and Malibu Vineyards, Carol Hoyt of Hoyt Family Vineyards and Shawn Shai Halahmy of Shai Cellars.