Alder Yarrow at Vinography is again organizing the wine donations this year’s Menu for Hope event.  Here is information about this event from the Vinography blog:

This is the fourth year of A Menu For Hope, the grassroots charity event for wine and food bloggers that started in response to the horrible Tsunamis of 2004. Last year’s event raised more than $60,000 for the UN’s World Food Programme, which set the stage for this year’s remarkable event. Because of our success last year, the World Food Programme essentially told us to figure out what we wanted, and they’d make it happen.

Our dear leader, Pim, sat down with them and arranged the perfect donation scheme. 100% of the donations go directly to the people in need. We get to choose exactly where every cent goes, and we get to talk to the people it goes to. In fact, Pim has already been in contact with some of the families that will get our aid money. She sent them some disposable cameras and asked them to take pictures of their lives. The results are quite extraordinary, both for their immediacy, but also some of the images are quite beautiful in their own right.

So we’re feeding some very needy farmers in Lesotho. And how are we doing it? By holding a big-ass charity raffle, with prizes donated from bloggers all around the world.

Here at Vinography, we’re hosting all the prizes donated by wine bloggers, plus some very special prizes donated by folks who look kindly on this effort. Before I tell you about the prizes on offer, however, you should know that winning a prize is as easy as making a $10 donation to our cause. Every ten bucks you donate gets you another “ticket” for the raffle. You designate which prize you want your “ticket” to go for, and then a computer program gives you that many chances to win. Donate $5000 and you’ve got 500 changes to win one, or many prizes.

So there you have it.  Cima Collina’s auction item this year is prize code WB14:  Cima Collina Precious Pinot Three bottles of rare, estate Pinot Noir. This prize will come in a 3-bottle wood box gift pack with our special labels made from real silver and palladium. Prize includes the cost of shipping. This small, rare bottling of Pinot Noir is from our estate vineyard 700 feet above sea level and 14 miles from the ocean in lower Carmel Valley. This is a dark crimson Pinot Noir with blueberry, sassafras, smoky flavors and aromas. It was aged 11 months in French oak, 40% new, and is unfined and unfiltered, and 169 cases of this wine was bottled, and only 300 of these 3-bottle wood box gift packs are available. This wine can be shipped to the following states only: California, Oregon, Washington, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Texas, Florida, Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois, Georgia, Virginia, New Hampshire, Washington DC. Valued at $200.

Click here for other great wine auction items and here for items from food bloggers around the world.

Here’s a photo of James working with barrels on our new Oxoline racking system. We are excited about using this system as all of the barrels stay in place for filling, washing, etc. The “old” system mostly used here in the states is to place the barrels on forkliftable pallets that stack directly on top of the barrels below. There are a lot of safety issues (earthquake and employee) working with these racks, not to mention all the time the forklift driver (me) spends moving them around. This system saves time, space and effort.

We are fine-tuning the acid levels in the wines right now and getting them ready for what I call their winter hibernation — making sure the bungs are clean, barrels are topped up, leaks are taken care of, etc. It is beginning to get cold in the cellar. The floor particularly is cold, so sometimes it is hard to warm up completely even if one is active. Ah, the romance of wine (hee hee).

On the sales front, I hear that our (relatively new) Northern California distributor, McNeil Wines , is working hard on getting Cima Collina placed throughout Northern California…….more to come.

Dog News: My dog, Tanner, seems to have almost fully recovered from his grape-induced kidney failure. Now, I just need to find him a job to pay back all those vet expenses……anyone have a job for a very cute little Jack Russell??