Menu for Hope: Give of Yourself This Season
Thursday, December 18, 2008 at 12:13PM 
"What you've hidden is lost. What you've given away is all yours." -Shota Rustavelli.
I know. I know. All of you dear readers were planning to buy me cases and cases of wine for Christmas. But, I have a better use of your holiday funds this season. Every year, food and wine bloggers join together to raise funds for Menu for Hope, which supports the UN Food Programme and specifically, school lunch programs in Lesotho, Africa.
How does it work? Well, over the last few weeks food and wine folk across the nation generously donated culinary-themed prizes to what Alder Yarrow over at Vinography.com calls a "big-ass charity raffle." And now you get to view the list of prizes on Chez Pim's and Vinography's sites and buy raffle tickets for the items you see and love (click here to see just the wine prizes). Each ticket runs $10. So, donate say $100 or $500 or $5,000 and just imagine all the delicious goodies you could bring home. And the number of children you'll feed with your gift.
In an attempt to serve someone other than myself this holiday season, I sought the help of some incredibly generous local vintners and put together this phenomenal NoCal Wine and Food package:
Flavors of Napa and Sonoma
Take home this package of single vineyard wines from Belle Glos, Signorello Vineyards, and Rossi-Wallace along with a six-year vertical of Page Wine Cellars' Proprietary Red and see for yourself if California has any real terroir.
Prize winners will receive a case of Signorello Vineyards' 2005 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon and three Magnums of Belle Glos’ 2007 Pinot Noirs, one from each Single Vineyard Designate the Sonoma Wine Label offers (Los Alturas, Clark and Telephone and Taylor Lane Vineyards).
The prize also includes a half case (four chardonnay and two pinot noir) of wines from Rossi-Wallace Vineyards. This is a new venture from legendary Napa Valley winemaker Ric Forman and his wife, Cheryl Emmolo. 2007 is the inaugural vintage and neither the chardonnay, which comes from Rutherford’s esteemed Star Vineyard, nor the pinot noir, from Antinori Vineyard on Atlas Peak, have been released to the public. Yet.
And, while he doesn't make "single vineyard" wines, Bryan Page does make singular blends. When he offered a six-year vertical of his Page Proprietary Red, I got so thirsty that - for just a moment - I forgot to add his prize to the package. That's right. Six wines. Six vintages, starting at 1999 and running until 2004.
In addition, the prose from world-renowned wine and food professionals Thomas Keller and Karen MacNeil will help you figure out what to pair with your fabulous new wines. This prize also includes an autographed copy of Thomas Keller’s The French Laundry Cookbook, an autographed copy of Karen MacNeil’s Wine, Food & Friends and MacNeil’s 2009 Wine Lovers’ Page-A-Day calendar.
Value: The wines alone are worth almost $2,000.
I cannot thank Ray Signorello, Bryan Page, and Joseph Wagner enough for their help, or Karen MacNeil and Thomas Keller enough for their autographs. Ric Forman and Cheryl Emmolo have become dear friends, and I hope you enjoy their wines (they're the last in my collection and I'm really going to miss them). And I cannot give enough thanks for all of you who donate to this wonderful cause.
If you haven't bought a dozen raffle tickets for the Menu for Hope auction, please check out the prizes listed on Pim and Alder's sites and make a donation now! Here's how:
1. Choose a prize or prizes of your choice from our Menu for Hope at http://chezpim.com
2. Go to the donation site at http://www.firstgiving.com/menuforhope5 and make a donation.
3. Each $10 you donate will give you one raffle ticket toward a prize of your choice. Please specify which prize you'd like in the 'Personal Message' section in the donation form when confirming your donation. You must write-in how many tickets per prize, and please use the prize code.
For example, a donation of $50 can be 2 tickets for EU01 and 3 tickets for EU02. Please write 2xEU01, 3xEU02
4. If your company matches your charity donation, please check the box and fill in the information so we could claim the corporate match.
5. Please allow us to see your email address so that we could contact you in case you win. Your email address will not be shared with anyone.
Reader Comments (3)
Nice one Brooke. You have outdone yourself :-)
I won! I won! Wheeee!
It's great that people are able to get the home loans and that opens up completely new possibilities.