I’m very excited to be attending the Wine 2.0 San Francisco Expo tonight at Crushpad! I first mentioned the event in my precap a week ago and since then, many more details have been added. I’ll be blogging throughout the event in the WineLog.net sponsered Bloggers’ Lounge, that the WineTwo folks have again provided for this event (thanks Cornelius, Smoke & Co!). Watch this space for further details and updates through to 10pm tonight!

It’s that awesome time again when the Wine 2.0 (Twitter) folks gear up and take over San Francisco! Wine 2.0 San Francisco Expo is taking place on Thursday April 2nd and if it’s anything like the past events…it’s going to be a killer wine shindig!

OK. So…what the heck is all that stuff in the title?? Don’t worry…all shall be revealed by me, your wine geeky host! I joined a group of 8 wine enthusiasts at the kind behest of Luscious Lush Thea (Twitter) at Crushpad (Twitter) last Saturday for a custom wine blending session, replete with winemaker Tom Leaf. Following this event we had the latest Twitter Taste Live: Open That Bottle Night.

Another year means another crazy adventure in the world of California’s “home” grape! The Zinfandel Advocates and Producers (ZAP) are having their annual ZAP Festival at Fort Mason on the San Francisco waterfront this weekend. Many events have already occurred in leading up to today’s press and consumer grand tasting. Over 275 wineries, 400 wines, countless other food and wine specialists and 10,000 attendees will participate with food and Zinfandel wines, again making this the largest single varietal wine festival in the entire world!

I will be posting in real-time throughout the event today until about 5pm from the Wine 2.0 Bloggers Lounge (Thanks so much to Cornelius and Abdi from Wine 2.0 (Twitter) and Lisa (Twitter) from Hahn Estates for coordination!). The post will be on the fly and mildly edited for content (especially later ;-), similar to the now famous, Live (Speed) Wine Blogging event at last year’s 1st Wine Bloggers Conference.

Morton’s Steakhouse and Riedel “Flow” stemware is quite the match in the coming months. Celebrating their 30th anniversary, Morton’s along with Riedel Crystal, is highlighting the difference a proper wineglass can have on a wine’s aroma and taste. Titled “From the vine to the glass”, It’s a great deal, for $65 you receive some really nice hors d’ oeuvre’s ( Filet mignon sandwiches, Broiled Sea scallops wrapped in Bacon, Chicken Goujonettes, and Key lime pie), four kick-ass wines (thanks to Jeff Yeck , at Southern Wine & Spirits), and four different pieces of crystal stemware from Riedel’s new “Flow” series ($60) to take home with you!

Jason and I had the pleasure to attend the Morton’s King of Prussia event Monday August 18. Nicole Morgenstern, Sales & Marketing Manager was our host, and did a nice job of coordinating the event. Doug Cohn, Regional Sales Manager for Riedel gave what ended up to be the best overall explanation and demonstration of how a wineglasses shape affects your ability to smell and taste all the aromas and flavors the winemaker intended to be there.

[more details on the wine and glasses after the break]

OK, so I wasn’t off gift shopping for some flowers to take to the Pope, I admit it. His continent was involved, however. A few weeks back, my sister and my mom headed off into the skies towards a three week trip in London and Paris. Freed from familial ties, my Dad and I decided that it was time for another Pops & Son Wine Trip, this time in the Summer. Previous wine trips taken during my week off from the day job during the holidays have included Glen Ellen and surrounding Sonoma wineries, Healdsburg and surrounding wineries and wineries in Napa that we had yet to visit. This time we were planning on doing a hybrid of both valleys.

Earlier this year, Jason and Kim sent me this really great wine gift package to review, from Giftybox.com. I figured that this would be a great time to use my Winery Tour & Tasting package.

I was first initiated into the innovative world of Wine 2.0 when I attended their NRO event at Varnish last November. What I found was an extremely thriving movement of loosely knit and mainly younger wine aficionados, producers and entrepreneurs that were expanding upon the path set down by the original Wine Brats…they also tend to throw a party with a little more enthusiasm than your average wine event!

With those thoughts in mind, I geared up for some serious wine-drinking, networking and, well, partying last Thursday night. I was keenly aware of how the night would unfold and so I decided to BART and cab it to the event, held at the 3rd street warehouse of Crushpad in San Francisco. Crushpad is a custom crush facility, meaning that they provide equipment, bonded space, reagents and even fruit for boutique wineries and amateur winemakers, alike. They are one of the most well-known companies where winemakers can go to make their own wines with as much or as little hands-on participation as they might choose. I’ve been hearing about them for years and have been rather intrigued by their facilities, so I was quite happy to check out the space when I first arrived, just before the event opened.

I made my first visit to the latest “castle” in Napa this past weekend, in honor of my sister Shauna’s birthday. Saturday morning Beth and I made the cruise up from the East Bay and into the Valley, meeting up with everyone at my parents’ house in Browns Valley.

Now…when I say “castle,” I don’t mean some overgrown McMansion built by the latest tech wiz from San Jose, I mean a real and ginormous Italian castle! Daryl Sattui, family patriarch and proprietor of the enormously popular V. Sattui winery destination on 29 just before St. Helena proper, has spent the last 14 years and over US$30 million building an obsessively authentic Italian castle on Diamond Mountain.

At 121,000 square feet, 8 stories and 109 rooms, this painstakingly-designed replica of a Tuscan medieval-era castle, while ostentatious, is so well executed that one cannot come away from visiting the grounds without a sense of awe and inspiration. Most of the stone, artifacts and other materials were imported from Italy, as were many of the artisans that worked on the building. The building is replete with a dungeon and even a torture chamber!

Ever since The Cash Money Millionaires rapped about their “Bling Bling,” fine people across the globe have used the term in reference to anything expensive and flashy. Thanks to HipKraft.com, you can now be a blinging wine lover.

Brian sent over some Fabolous shirts for Beth (Drxeno’s birthday plannin’ wife) and myself to try out, and we think they are G-R-R-R-R-E-A-T! The cute-sy sayings are written in white, red, and yellow rhinestones (think 6th grade bedazzler) and actually don’t look as showy in person as they do on the site. You could wear the shirt with pride to a jazz club or a southwestern hoedown. Witty designs in the “wine” realm include such phrases as “got wine?“, “Wino” (with a red or white wine glass), and my personal favorite “Therapy” (with the “y” letter replaced by a glass of red or white wine).

We all know that a bottle of wine can absorb the aromas in its environment (more about cellaring here). So what do you do when the place you’re hoping to store your wine has a funky smell? A WL user recently emailed the following question and we’d love your help in finding an answer…

Any suggestions? Post them below - thanks!