The Taos Winter Wine Festival has arrived!
This annual four-day weekend of events features the culinary artistry of our local chefs and restaurants paired with the best wines available.
Bringing over 30 wineries to Taos to partner with 24 of the town’s best restaurants, this four-day extravaganza of snow, food and wine, featuring the Grand and Reserve Tastings, chef’s luncheons, wine seminars and wine dinners, is not to be missed!
The weekend culminates with the Grand Tasting at the Taos Valley Ski Resort where restaurants and wineries serve samples of their best food and wine.
Whether you’re in Taos Ski Valley, exploring the Mountain or hanging out in town, wine tasting is a great way to spend a cold winter afternoon in Taos.
Tomorrow and Friday, The Cellar gets into the spirit of the Winter Wine Festival with very special tastings both afternoons.
If you’ve been to The Cellar’s fabulous tasting events, you know you’re in for a treat, but if you happen to be in town and you’ve not experienced a wine tasting, and don’t plan on attending any of the major events this weekend, this is the perfect opportunity to dip your toes into the proverbial water.
Here are a few tips so you don’t feel too much like a fish out of water, as you make the rounds of the tables at The Cellar.
Don’t wear fragrance. Seems obvious, but scents can ruin the tasting experience for everyone within nose-shot.
Drop pre-conceived preferences and notions. Maybe you’ve never tasted a sparkling wine you’ve liked, but go ahead and try what is being offered, you might be pleasantly surprised.
Some people imagine that they do not like sweet wines at all, but after sipping a ‘dryish’ dessert wine, it turns out to be their favorite of the wines poured!
Be open-minded, ask questions and be sure to savor every last sip. If you feel overwhelmed by the assortment of wines offered, it is perfectly alright to sniff, sip and spit (into the receptacle offered.) You do not have to swallow every sip you take to enjoy the flavor and body of the wines.
That said, considering the wines featured at these two tastings, you probably will! If you’d like to order some of these great wines to come to your front door then you may want to take a look at the options from this denver wine delivery service to see if your favorites are available.
“These are the best of the best!” Martha Aguilar told me when we talked about these events.
“It’s a very busy week and the distributors and wine makers are on incredibly tight schedules, so we narrowed our tastings down to showcase the very best wines possible.”
The Cellar’s own wine expert, Charles Baston agreed.
“These are going to be very tasty offerings,” he told me yesterday when I stopped in to talk about the tastings, “Kermit Lynch will be here as well as Shiverick Imports (featured at the Lambert’s wine dinner), and Robert Sinskey,who also happens to be a great raconteur.”
I’ve included the full schedule of the individual tastings happening at The Cellar, below.
Thursday, January 31st
2:30pm-4:30pm -> Kermit Lynch
3:30pm-4:30pm -> Raventos i Blanc
4:30pm-5:30pm -> Wine Bridge Imports
Friday, February 1st
2:00pm-3:00pm, -> Frontier Wine Imports
3:00pm-4:00pm -> Stoller Family Estate
4:00pm-5:00pm -> Shiverick Imports
5:00pm-6:00pm -> Robert Sinskey
As always, the wines featured will be discounted for purchase.
For more about these tastings at The Cellar and everything they offer, please visit their site linked below.
For more information about the Taos Winter Wine Festival, please visit their site as well.
All images Stock Files, except bottom photo thanks to The Cellar
