Scenes from Charlotte Wine & Food Weekend 2019

Charlotte Wine and Food weekend recently wrapped in Charlotte. It’s one of my favorite weekends of the year! All of the weekend’s proceeds go to children’s charities, so if you needed an excuse to have wine, this is it!

I attended two events this year. The first was a dinner at Corkbuzz ft. Special Guest Fred Dame, Master Sommelier, from DAOU Vineyards & Winery. If you are a fan of the Somm movies then you’ll remember Fred Dame. (The first Somm is still my favorite!) In 1987, Dame brought the master sommelier program to the United States and helped establish the American chapter of the Court of Master Sommeliers.

I also always enjoy Laura Maniec, Master Sommelier and Proprietor, Corkbuzz Restaurant & Wine Bar. The picture below is of Fred and Laura with my friend Lauren, the Exec. Director of Charlotte Wine and Food Weekend, along with two of their other colleagues.

We drank DAOU wines paired with several courses. DAOU makes The Pessemist red blend, which I have written about many times as one of my “everyday” favorites. Their Reserve Chardonnay and their Reserve Cabernet were my favorites of the evening.

Executive Chef Anthony Salvato did a great job with ALL the food. I didn’t get a lot of great pictures because I was, well, drinking too much wine. But the smores tarts were to die for!

The following night I went to the Grand Tasting, which is CWFW’s largest tasting experience. There was a selection of over 100 carefully curated wines from around the globe and yummy bites from Charlotte’s culinary scene – Bulla Gastrobar, Corkbuzz, Fin & Fino, Hawkers, Mimosa Grill, ROOTS Café, Stoke, Sweet Lew’s BBQ, Swirl, Upstream, WP Kitchen + Bar, and Zinicola.

Some of my girlfriends and I went together and had such a fun time! Several of us are going to Portland together soon and we had fun trying the Wilamette Valley wines!