WineFest 2007

This past Thursday was the March of Dimes WineFest 2007 and Union Station here in Kansas City. The basic set-up is local restaurants set up booths and offer samples of food while the local wine distributors bring a handful of wines each. The end result is over twenty restaurants and close to one hundred different wines that people are free to try throughout the evening. I was the wine chair for this year’s event, which meant I was responsible for soliciting the wine distributors and organizing their portion of the event, and I also helped Restaurant Chair Jimmy Frantze with a few small parts of the restaurant organization.

Now that all is said and done, I’m quite happy with the way things went. There could have been a few more people there, but I feel that way about pretty much every charity event. Overall we had a nice setup, a good ground, solid support from the food and beverage community, and I think people enjoyed themselves quite a bit.

I’m the first person to offer caution at these events, warning attendees that they should go with the intent of supporting charity—not the goal of getting to try all kinds of amazing and expensive wines. Having said that, I was very impressed with the quality of wines across the board. Everyone that attended had a solid range of wines and I didn’t see (or try) anything that disappointed me. On the main floor were wines from Trimbach, Rosenblum, Willamette Valley Vineyards, Yalumba, and plenty of other wineries. One of the guys slipped a bottle of Ojai in and had that off to the side to pour for people who appeared seriously interested in wine, and one of the restaurants even brought along a bottle of Vieux Telegraphe Chateauneuf-du-Pape Blanc.

For the hundred or so people back in the Premier Wine Room (i.e. the really expensive tickets and sponsorship packages) there was a deluge of great wine. Italian wines were present pretty much across the board, with Brunellos and Barolos popping up on a couple of tables along with some Super Tuscans. Beringer Private Reserve Cab, Cosentino’s “The Poet” and Belle Glos Pinot Noir were also floating around, as well as some stuff from Nickel and Nickel. For those of you that haven’t discovered the high-end Spanish wines yet there was a selection from Val Llach (pronounced “V-EYE ack”) that shows how much further your money can go in Spain than in France, but with all due respect I think the Orenellaia that was open was the top dog of the evening.

All that is well and good, but what really impressed me was the quality of the food. Normally at these events there are at least one or two restaurants that don’t really put 100% effort into the whole deal, but that was not the case here. Seared scallops from The American Restaurant, wonderful salmon on homemade potato chips from J.J.’s, a great penne pasta and pork shank from Frondizi’s, tiramisu from Il Truolo, cold potato soup with steak tartar from 1924 Main, homemade jambalaya from The Mango Room, traditional broiled lamb chops from Capital Grille and spicy seared lamb chops from The Phillips Chophouse, an outstanding Kobe beef served over noodles in hot beef broth from bluestem (they actually prefer the “B” lower-case), and many others. As grateful as I am to all the restaurants for stepping up the way they did I know it is really just a reflection of the respect they all have for Jimmy Frantze and what he has done for the KC restaurant community.

I do in wish I could offer more details on the wines I tasted, but the reality is I spent most of the night running and never really had the chance to taste many of the wines at all. Sort of the way things work when you’re “in charge.” But no complaints, and I did win an item at the silent auction: a bottle of 2002 Quilceda Creek Merlot. Whenever I get around to opening that I’ll make sure to write up a detailed review.