Blind Tasting Group - Long Beach / Signal Hill @ Delius Restaurant

Hi,

We’ve had such a good group of people gathering in Long Beach every so often that we are going to try making it a weekly gathering.

Location: Delius Restaurant, 2951 Cherry Ave Signal Hill, CA 90755
When : Monday’s @ 7:00 PM

Each participant would bring a bottle of the the evening’s theme (TBA) which we’d brown-bag and taste blind. Each person would contribute $5 to cover a “corkage” fee, which would cover glassware usage. Food would be ordered and paid for individually. If the group starts out small, they can handle us in the normal dining room. For larger groups, I will need to let them know the Friday before, so that they can put on extra staff to take care of us in the Prix Fixe room.

If you’re interested, please send me an email to webb dot albert @ gmail dot com. if you have suggested themes, we’d like to hear them. Otherwise, I’ll be working with the other founders of the tasting to come up with some that we like.

Hoping to do our first tasting on Monday March 11, or 18th.

Cheers!

Bert

Have you thought about a theme yet Bert for the first event?

Lisa and I are in!

Hi!

This sounds fun. Mondays and Fridays are my absolute worst nights, but I should be able to make some of these I cannot make the 11th but I can make the 18th Hope to see you soon!

18th would be better for us.

I’d love to be a part of this, at least from time to time… Heck, that place is very close for me.

Mondays are tough though. I wouldn’t be able to participate until maybe March 25th

Hi Chris! Glad you’ll make it on the 18th. We’re going to shoot for once or twice per month to start depending on interest. With Joel, we’ve got 13 interested so far. The best days for Delius are Mon/Tues because we can use the prix fixe room. We scheduled Mondays to start because some folks already have a weekly Tues group meeting in Venice and we don’t want to be poachers.

We’re thinking of doing a test run for anyone interested on the 11th, but are definitely confirming the first ‘official’ meeting for Monday, Mar. 18th. Since our group had done Pinot the last couple of times at L’Opera, I’m going to suggest we put off revisiting Pinot for at least a few tastings.

I’m thinking 3 possible themes might be:

Pre-2005 Cabernet
Rhone varietals - Southern Rhone vs. California
Really GOOD Merlot

Thinking the min. price should be about $30 if that works for everyone.

I’m putting together an email list in addition to WB so if you’d like to send me your email, I’ll add you to the distribution list.

Marla and I would love to participate. Mondays may be tough sometimes. But it would give us a chance to use our metro lane thingy on the 110. If you have room, we are in.

Any of the themes can work.

Is there GOOD Merlot?

…and the first official theme is?

Finally got my internet back on so here’s an update. We’re good to go on Monday, March 18, at 7PM. The restaurant has a good happy hour menu that ends at 7, so if the group would like to start earlier, 6:30PM, have a few sidebars and order food and start the blind at 7PM, we could do that too.

The theme will be 2005 or earlier Cabernet - Any appellation. Feel free to bring blends that are predominantly cab.

Delius has a fairly large parking lot, but if it fills up, there’s parking on the street behind the lot it should not be a problem.

If you haven’t already done so, please send an email to me at webb.albert @ gmail.com. I’m going to send out an email to everyone so that they’ll have my cell phone. That way people can text me to reconfirm the head count by Friday late.

Thanks again for your interest everyone.

Cheers!

Bert

PS. You’ll have to come to the Merlot tasting, Arnie to find out!

Lisa and I will be there.

I might have a Good Merlot laying around…

Update:

The first meeting is on. If you’re not yet on the list and want to be, please send me an email at webb.albert @ gmail.com. I will be contacting the restaurant on Friday to give them a semi-final headcount.

Place: Location: Delius Restaurant, 2951 Cherry Ave Signal Hill, CA 90755
Time: Monday, March 18 Arrive 6:15 or later
Theme: Cabernet or predominantly-cab blends, 2005 or earlier, any appellation.
Cost: $5 per person corkage, plus your individual food bill

Bring one bottle per person of the theme, a brown paper bag, and any sidebars you feel like sharing. The restaurant has glassware, but they are pinot-shaped so bring your favorite glasses if you’d like

Come as early as 6:15 for the happy hour menu and to break the ice over a few sidebars. We’ll start the tasting after everyone arrives at 7PM.

Again, I’ll be sending an email to everyone so that they’ll have my cell phone. Text me by Friday, or later if your plans change.

Let’s have some fun and see if this will work for everyone longer term.

Cheers!

Bert

Just sent out an email blast. Please check junk-mail if you didn’t receive it.

Attendee list update:

Arnie and Lisa
Rob
Chris
Marla and David
Julie
Bert and Erin
Colin
Jan and Steve
Catherine

So far we have 13 confirmed with 1-3 possibles.

Consider me “confirmed”

Here’s the final list for tonight!

Attendee list update: 14 total

Arnie and Lisa
Rob
Chris
Marla and David
Julie
Bert and Erin
Colin
Jan and Steve
Catherine
Shari

See you all tonight!

GREAT night. Food was spectacular. Wines humbling at times, ROCKIN other times. Loved the blind approach…many interesting reveals. A fun group of folks.

Thanks for making this happen…Rhone here we come!

Super fun night! Loved the food, the company, and the wines. Win, win, win! Can’t wait for the next one, thank you so much!!!

Thanks everyone for coming! Despite the rocky start over the kitchen issue it worked out very well for a first attempt. What a great group of people! I’ll be posting a list of the wines tasted with the results and may need a little help with some missing vineyard designations.

The group agreed to start with meeting once a month on the 3rd Monday of each month which would make the next meeting:

Date: Monday, April 15 at 6:30PM
Theme: Rhone varietals, France vs. California

For anyone else interested, please PM or email me your contact info for the email distribution list as well.