Folks, good thing you checked in! We’re having a giveaway! This week and next, we’re offering sets of tickets to an Appellation St. Helena tasting at Flora Springs Winery & Vineyards. Details:

WIN: two tickets
VENUE: Flora Springs Winery & Vineyards, 1978 West Zinfandel Lane, St. Helena
TIME & DATE: 2 to 5 p.m., Saturday, May 10
DRAWING ENDS: May 7

Taste more than 90 wines from the wineries of Appellation St. Helena and enjoy scrumptious food prepared by the one and only Dean & DeLuca. Soak in the ambiance of the beautiful Flora Springs Winery, a 19th-century stone structure featuring fabulous views of the Napa Valley. Stroll in the vineyards, explore the caves, or simply relax as you enjoy the elegant wines of Appellation St. Helena. The two tickets are valued at $150.

You must be 21 to enter this drawing. This week, for two tickets, here is the trivia question: How many bubbles are in a bottle of champagne? How about in a flute? Deadline to email me your answer at jyadegaran@bayareanewsgroup.com is Friday, May 2 at noon. Do not post your answer here.

Our second giveaway! We’re offering five sets of tickets to an Appellation St. Helena tasting at Flora Springs Winery & Vineyards on May 10. It’s a gorgeous property and so are the wines. Read below for more information and drawing details.

WIN: two tickets
VENUE: Flora Springs Winery & Vineyards, 1978 West Zinfandel Lane, St. Helena
TIME & DATE: 2 to 5 p.m., Saturday, May 10
DRAWING ENDS: May 7

Taste more than 90 wines from the wineries of Appellation St. Helena and enjoy scrumptious food prepared by the one and only Dean & DeLuca. Soak in the ambiance of the beautiful Flora Springs Winery, a 19th-century stone structure featuring fabulous views of the Napa Valley. Stroll in the vineyards, explore the caves, or simply relax as you enjoy the elegant wines of Appellation St. Helena.

Join the fun of the blind tasting and be included in the drawing for your own wine cellar. The “instant cellar” is actually three cases of assorted St. Helena wines valued at more than $1,500. Hello! You don’t have to be a wine pro to enter the tasting. Good guesses are perfectly acceptable. And to help you out, many of the unidentified wines will be poured at the regular tasting tables so you can do a little detective work in advance. Each pair of tickets is worth $150.

You must be 21 to enter this drawing. I have five sets of two tickets to give away. I will give away one pair this week, one pair the next, and three pairs the week of May 5. Read the wine trivia question below and email the answer to me at jyadegaran@bayareanewsgroup.com. Do NOT post the answer here. The winners each week will be selected at random.

This week, for two tickets, here is the trivia question: How many bubbles are in a bottle of champagne? How about in a flute? Deadline to email me is Friday, May 2 at noon. Good luck!

Such a scene at Wine 2.0 last night. In a good way. The annual convergence of the wine and tech worlds happened this year at Crushpad’s new urban winery in the Dogpatch hood of Potrero Hill. I’d say there were about 500 people there, from winemakers and marketers to bloggers (word!) and venture capitalists.

Think about it. Wine is exploding. Yes, even at a time when Wine.com got itself a swanky brick and mortar (4th Street on Berkeley, if you haven’t checked it out yet). Moving right along, you can buy, sell, flip and write about wine online; you can market it; you can track your cellar and share it with friends; and make new ones of those too, while you’re at it.

Not familiar with Wine 2.0? Check out and join their Facebook page. The group, cofounded in 2006 by Jeff Playter and Cornelius Geary (formerly of Diageo), is a wine industry and consumer trade show. In other words, massive networking both online and off and tasting of many very cool boutique wines. It is 11,000 registrants strong, with 1,500 of those in the Bay Area.

The wine of the night for me was left-handed and charming The Boxer Shiraz from Molly Dooker. It’s $20 and has violet and cassis aromas that lead to blackberry and licorice flavors. Very rich yet balanced. I loved this wine.

Happy Friday, everyone. Thanks for all your submissions for the Ultimate Blind Date tasting at Flora Springs Winery. It was great fun reading through your answers. I printed out the correct ones and then pulled the winner’s name out of bowl that I sometimes use as a decanter.

The question, once again, was: Besides drinking, wine is used as a cleanser. What is it good for cleaning, and why?

Here’s the answer: According to Dr. Mark Daeschel in the Journal of Food Science, wine is a great cleaner of kitchen counters and silverware, as well as of fruit and vegetables. Its acidity and alcohol are effective at combating E. Coli and staphylococcus. The journal went on to say that someday, a wine-based cleaner could be a natural alternative to bleach.

So, the winner is: Chip Ferguson.

In his answer, Chip went on to give the ‘why.’ He wrote:

The wine acts as a disinfectant and kills salmonella, a common food-borne bacterium, within a few seconds. Wine is a natural antimicrobial and scientists at Oregon State University are developing a new disinfectant containing wine to fight off microbes like bacteria. Dry whites, such as Sauvignon Blanc, work best because they don’t leave a stain or sticky residue.

Well done, Chip! Email me and I’ll hook you up with your tickets. Everyone else, check back Monday for the next trivia question. We’ve got four more pairs to give away!

Here’s a Corkheads first. We’re offering five sets of tickets to an Appellation St. Helena tasting at Flora Springs Winery & Vineyards on May 10. It’s a gorgeous property and so are the wines. Read below for more information and drawing details.

WIN: two tickets
VENUE: Flora Springs Winery & Vineyards, 1978 West Zinfandel Lane, St. Helena
TIME & DATE: 2 to 5 p.m., Saturday, May 10
DRAWING ENDS: May 7

Taste more than 90 wines from the wineries of Appellation St. Helena and enjoy scrumptious food prepared by the one and only Dean & DeLuca. Soak in the ambiance of the beautiful Flora Springs Winery, a 19th-century stone structure featuring fabulous views of the Napa Valley. Stroll in the vineyards, explore the caves, or simply relax as you enjoy the elegant wines of Appellation St. Helena.

Join the fun of the blind tasting and be included in the drawing for your own wine cellar. The “instant cellar” is actually three cases of assorted St. Helena wines valued at more than $1,500. Hello! You don’t have to be a wine pro to enter the tasting. Good guesses are perfectly acceptable. And to help you out, many of the unidentified wines will be poured at the regular tasting tables so you can do a little detective work in advance. Each pair of tickets is worth $150.

You must be 21 to enter this drawing. I have five sets of two tickets to give away. I will give away one pair this week, one pair the next, and three pairs the week of May 5. Read the wine trivia question below and email the answer to me at jyadegaran@bayareanewsgroup.com. Do NOT post the answer here. The winners each week will be selected at random.

This week, for two tickets, here is the trivia question: Besides drinking, wine is used as a cleanser. What is it good for cleaning, and why? Be specific. Deadline to email me is Friday, April 25 at noon. Good luck!

If you’re like me, you’re more than willing to eschew huge, elbow-smashing events like ZAP in favor of events small enough to feature intellectual seminars and an opportunity to meet legends in the wine business, and big enough to enjoy walk-around tastings of cult producers.

Women for WineSense’s Grand Event, which runs May 2 to May 4 at various locations in the Napa Valley, is a prime example of the latter.

I attended last year’s Grand Event in San Francisco and got so much out of it: I took a sensory evaluation seminar with UC Davis legend Ann Noble (to date the best lesson in evaluating wines that I’ve had). I got to meet Margrit Mondavi and hang with Leslie Sbrocco.

It’s this kind of full, satifsying experience you’ll get next month. If you can’t attend all three days, I suggest you attend Saturday’s festivities at the gorgeous Culinary Institute of America in St. Helena. You’ll be able to choose from fascinating seminars, from the effect music has on the palate to the latest in organic winemaking.

Over a Greystone lunch, you’ll hear from trailblazers in the industry, like Harlan Estate’s vineyard manager Mary Hall. By the end of the day, you will have tasted wines from 30 wineries with women in the roles of vineyard manager, winemaker, or CEO.

The cost for Saturday is $140 ($115 for WWS members). Space is limited so go to WWS Web site to purchase your tickets today.

We’re all quite familiar with the various ways by which to aerate wine. Decanting. Swirling in glass. Swirling in mouth. Aeration is necessary, as you know, to increase a wine’s velocity and decrease its pressure. The decrease in pressure draws in air, allowing a better bouquet, enhanced flavors and a smoother finish.

I usually decant old and new reds.

But lately, I’ve been aerating everything in between because I’ve found a way to make the process less cumbersome. A large, crystal decanter is not your best friend when you’re only having a glass. It’s just not worth washing afterward, even with my long, nifty decanter sponge-cleaner.

The tiny Vinturi Wine Aerator ($40) works on a glass by glass basis. I put it on the table at dinners or when my wine club meets for people to experiment. You simply hold the egg sized contraption over your glass and pour the wine into it. The devise makes an offensive, giggle-inducing sounds, but otherwise, I’m a bit hooked on mine. I wasn’t wild about the price tag, but once you’re accustomed to aerating your wines with it, the process can get a bit addictive.

Would you pay $40 for the Vinturi? What’s your favorite mode of aeration?

Just took Master of Wine Tim Hanni’s free online survey to determine where I place in the world of tasters. I first read about Hanni and his taste bud test in the Chronicle. Hanni believes you owe your wine preferences and your ability to taste based not on how much professional wine tasting training or education you have, but on the number of taste buds on your tongue and your overall reaction to things like coffee, salt and cocktails.

According to Hanni’s test, I’m a hyper sensitive taster or someone who prefers wine with minimal oak, lower alcohol and balance and finesse over power. My favorite wines, according to Hanni’s quiz, are dry roses, Rieslings, Alsatian wines, Chardonnays from France or unoaked versions from the New World, Pinot from anywhere and lower alcohol reds from anywhere.

Pretty spot on, I must say.

What I find misleading or rather inconclusive about this test is that it doesn’t address the notion of palate evolution, or the fact that despite my affinity for Burgundian Pinot Noir, I can still enjoy a Napa Cabernet or even  a Lodi Zinfandel — with the right food and friends.

The site addresses this issue to an extent, saying, at the end of the quiz, that this is only a starting point of wines you may like and is not an accurate example of everything you drink.

According to the Chron article, some experts praise Hanni, calling him a scientific hero for democratizing the wine evaluation process.  Others warn that his technique is not as clear cut as it sounds.

I for one praise Hanni and his methods because, if it accomplishes one thing, I hope it is this: that more people will come to trust their own palates and rely less on the opinions of the world’s two or three mega critics. After all, the survey proves, if we know what we like in coffee or tea, we know what we like in wine. Brilliant. It’s only six questions. Take it and share your results here.

Hey folks, if my column gushing all about Ryan Zepaltas and his gorgeous Sonoma Coast Pinot Noirs wasn’t enough, I implore you here to meet the man and taste his new releases at Pleasant Hill Wine Merchants. Zepaltas is the assistant winemaker at Siduri in Santa Rosa. He’s a Pinot Prince.

He’ll be there this Friday, April 18 from 5 to 8 p.m. Cost is $20 ($10 for wine club members). The shop is located at 2685 Pleasant Hill Road, Suite D, in Pleasant Hill and is fast becoming the county’s spot for hipster tastings and excellent selections of small, artisan producers.

Folks, just spotted a phat coupon on page A7 of today’s Times. Spend $30 or more and get $10 off your purchase. The coupon expires April 16 and is only valid at the new Walnut Creek store at 2220 Oak Grove Road. (Read George Avalos’ Times business story from the end of January announcing the chain’s new-store announcement, or my story last month on BevMo cellarmaster Wilfred Wong.)

Pretty good deal, considering the paper is 50 cents. What are you waiting for? Happy Friday.