Temecula Adventures... August 31, 2015

Did You Know? - Do you know what a Tastevin (or tâtevin) is? You may have seen sommeliers in Europe wearing one around their neck on a chain. It is the tasting cup used by tasters and wine producers. This silver cup is concaved and faceted, allowing winemakers back in the days of candlelight to catch as much of the light as possible to evaluate the wine. It is also used to appreciate the color of the wines, especially the reds, and to test the quality and clarity of the wine, to see if it is ready to drink.

Did You Know? - Chile grown in the Hatch Valley, in and around Hatch, New Mexico, is called Hatch chile, but no one type of chile is specific to that area, which is smaller than the acreage used to produce chiles with the "Hatch" label.

The peppers grown in the valley, and along the entire Rio Grande, from northern Taos Pueblo to southern Isleta Pueblo, are a signature crop to New Mexico's economy and culture.

The chile pepper is New Mexico's state vegetable, and the official New Mexico state question is "Red or Green?".

Did You Know? - The French didn't invent wine; in fact, the oldest known wine making was in Iran back in the Neolithic period. These Zagros mountain villagers were making and storing wine around 5400 B.C. in some of the earliest pottery jars archeologists have found. The Nile Delta established a royal wine making industry around 3000 B.C., with the Pharaohs of Egypt enjoying wine so much that they took thousands of liters of wine into their tombs with them.

Did You Know? - "Sleeping Beauty" (French: La Belle au bois dormant "The Beauty Sleeping in the Wood") by Charles Perrault or "Little Briar Rose" (German: Dornröschen) by the Brothers Grimm is a classic fairy tale written by Charles Perrault, which involves a beautiful princess, a sleeping enchantment, and a handsome prince. The version collected by the Grimms was an orally transmitted version of the originally literary tale published by Charles Perrault in Histoires ou contes du temps passé in 1697.

This in turn was based on Sun, Moon, and Talia by Giambattista Basile (published posthumously in 1634), which was in turn based on one or more folk tales. The earliest known version of the story is Perceforest, composed between 1330 and 1344 and first printed in 1528.

Did You Know? - Many years ago before developers discovered Temecula, the valley was dotted with small family owned farms, orchards and vineyards. In the 1970′s, Beldon Fields purchased land in Temecula and built replicas of Snow White's cottage for his wife. Beldon worked for Walt Disney and was one of many artisans who built Disneyland's Fantasyland and Toon Town. The fairy tale cottage was celebrated as the first home showcased on the Temecula Valley Women's Club Holiday Home Tour in 1984. There is an old olive tree in front of the cottage that was a gift to Beldon Fields from veteran viticulturist John Moramarco. The olive tree relocated from the Calloway Winery – is one of the largest and oldest olive trees in Temecula, if not in the entire State of California.

Did You Know? - A wine press is a device used to extract juice from crushed grapes during wine making. There are a number of different styles of presses that are used by wine makers but their overall functionality is the same. Each style of press exerts controlled pressure in order to free the juice from the fruit (most often grapes).

The pressure must be controlled, especially with grapes, in order to avoid crushing the seeds and releasing a great deal of undesirable tannins into the wine.

Wine was being made at least as long ago as 6000 BC; in 2011, a wine press was unearthed in Armenia with red wine dated 6,000 years old.

Did You Know? - The Briar Rose Winery has created a unique and charming wine experience for guests and wine lovers. We invite you to come and "Taste the Enchantment" and enjoy our wines from the Ultra Premium, Premium, and Standard Tasting Menus. Briar Rose is the premiere wine experience in the Temecula Valley Wine Country.

Property Size: 40 acres with 23 acres used by the vineyards.

Location: 41720 Calle Cabrillo, Temecula, CA 92592

Open: Tuesday – Sunday 11:00 a.m to 5:00p.m. – we take our last appointment at 4:00 p.m.

Closed Holiday Schedule: Closed Halloween, Thanksgiving Day, Christmas Day and New Year's Day

Services: Daily hosted, seated wine tastings with wine education by our staff sommelier. Tastings usually last about 45 minutes to an hour.

Food: Bourbon-infused smoked cream cheese, apricot brandy smoked salmon, and crackers are available for purchase.

Reservations: Required. It's recommended to call at least one day in advance for an appointment, especially for a Saturday. During the week, you may call the morning of to make an afternoon appointment. Our tasting room can accomodate up to 28 people. We also have outside seating areas available.

Did You Know? - A cottage is, typically, a small house. The word comes from England where it originally was a house that has a ground floor, with a first, lower storey of bedrooms which fit within the roofspace. In many places the word cottage is used to mean a small old-fashioned house. In modern usage, a cottage is usually a modest, often cosy dwelling, typically in a rural or semi-rural location. In the United Kingdom the term cottage denotes a small dwelling of traditional build, although it can also be applied to dwellings of modern construction which are designed to resemble traditional ones ("mock cottages").

In the United States the word cottage is often used to mean a small holiday home. However there are cottage-style dwellings in cities that were built primarily for the purpose of housing slaves, and in places such as Canada the term generally exists with no connotations of size at all (cf. vicarage or hermitage).

Did You Know? - Where could you find the largest consumption of wine per capita in the world? California's Napa Valley? France? Italy? Well, almost. The Vatican is the winner. According to the Wine Institute, more wine is drunk per person in the Vatican City than in any other country in the world. Not only is there the regular consumption of ceremonial Communion wine, the Vatican's residents are also more likely to be elderly, male, highly educated and eat in large groups—and these are all factors that indicate a propensity for greater wine consumption.