Sans Soucy Blackberry Sangria

If you read my post about Clarksville's Wine Fest then you know how much I loved Sans Soucy Vineyard's Blackberry Sangria. They took the recipe  off their website but were nice enough to email it to me:

Blackberry Ginger Sangria

• 2 bottles of Sans Soucy Blackberry wine
• 1 cup of finely chopped fresh ginger
• 1/2 cup of sugar
• 2 cups of frozen berry fruit mix
• 1/2 of pineapple tidbits 
• 1 can of frozen orange juice concentrate
• 1/2 liter of 7-up or other lemon soda

One to two days before, combine all ingredients except soda. Keep refrigerated. One hour before, add soda, mix well, serve very chilled. Makes approx 1 gallon. Optiona: add a tablespoon of berry fruit to individual glasses for garnish.

Trust me, you should try this recipe. Obviously, any blackberry wine will do but Sans Soucy's is especially awesome!

Sans Soucy Blackberry Sangria

10 years ago today

Exactly ten years ago today, I was recently moved in to my high-rise apartment in downtown Pittsburgh! This was my view. Pretty cool, eh? A great place to live for a hockey stalker like me. Of course, they have a new arena now but if you could turn just a little left in this picture, you'd could see where the new one was going to be built. Pittsburgh is a gorgeous city!

10 years ago today

No oysters until further notice.

That's the sign that was posted on the wall of an area seafood restaurant on Friday. You'd think this far north, we wouldn't be impacted very much by the BP oil leak. Maybe if you don't like seafood. I joked with the owner that maybe he could make a claim with BP, since I heard at least two other customers say they came just for the fried oysters. I didn't really think he'd qualify, since their buffet has lots of other foods on it. But he did tell me that his seafood distributor, who bought over $1 million worth of oysters from the Gulf last year, did not qualify for a claim because his business is not technically located on the gulf. That's the trickle down effect right there. Way more people have been affected than just those on the gulf. And that's by the leak itself. I won't even go into the politics of how many people are affected by the inane moratorium on gulf oil drilling. So as much as we love our fried oysters, that's a way smaller price to pay than those people in the gulf who are more directly affected. It's even way less than the trickle-down people who probably won't qualify for claims.

But hey, since when does Vice President Biden live close enough to the Gulf to qualify for a claim? After all, he billed a recent Gulf visit to BP. $75,000. That could have helped out a lot of struggling Gulf families.

No oysters until further notice.

Sisterly pride

 

My sister is the coolest and I have to share this awesome story about her. It started with sorrow when of her co-workers experienced a tragedy. Her co-worker"s schizophrenic son stabbed her other son in the head. One son is dead and the other is in jail. The funeral home said they could not even start on the funeral until my sister's co-worker gave them $5000. Of course, she didn't have that kind of money. No one does these days. My sister certainly doesn't, but she wanted to help. So my sister went and asked her boss if she could sell back some of her vacation days to the company. Her boss said yes. When her boss mentioned it to other co-workers, they all began selling back their vacation days until the company had the full $5000 to pay for the funeral.

People tell you to practice random acts of kindness every day, but few rarely do it. My sister does. And she won't toot her own horn, so I'm tooting it for her.

Love you, sis!

Sisterly pride

THIS is why I love hockey...

Read this essay and you'll love it too! There's Something About Hockey.

THIS is why I love hockey...

Ditto

Ditto

I hate today

Today is the day I hate the most. June 6th. It's been 6 years since my Dad died, although it seems, literally, like yesterday. Love you & miss you, Daddy!

I hate today

New hottie

 

Yep! I saw "Prince of Persia." I'd read some pretty bad reviews of it but I was pleasantly surprised. I thought it was pretty good. Granted, it's got lots of bits of other movies in it, but most do these days. There's quite a bit of "The Mummy" in it, including Gemma Aterton kinda looking like Rachel Weiss. Lots of sand, too. And desert guardians. There's obviously some "Lord of the Rings" there. Instead of a ring, it's a dagger, and there's that whole Aragorn-thing Jake Gyllenhaal has going on, which is always a good thing. As well as the Nazgul. It even has bits of "Hidalgo" in it, thanks to some grand escapes across desert village rooftops. And not to be outdone, quite a few tidbits from Indiana Jones movies. It also pays homage to time travel movies. There were some new things, too, tho.

But I obviously have a "thing" for this type of dude, as seen by other faves of mine:

 

So if you look like these guys, drop me a line!! Hahaha! Yeah, right. Won't hold my breath on that one!

New hottie

Hottie of the Month

Been awhile since I had one. Re-watched "The Hitcher" last week. This cutie is in it. I don't know why I'm hung up on grungy 22-year olds lately. This is Zach Knighton. He cleaned up for a doctor role in "Flash Forward." Now I wish I'd kept watching that show. Oh well...

Hottie of the Month

License to drink

Or something like that. At least it's a license to walk the streets of Clarksville a bit tipsy once a year. This was the 4th annual Lake Country Wine Festival but the first time I'd attended. And it was totally and completely awesome. I don't know, maybe it was all the tipsy-friendly people, all the great wine, people pouring you glass after glass, or maybe it was that the weather was awesome!

I found plenty of wines I liked but I only bought 4:

Chili Dawg, Peaks of Otter Winery, Bedford - this wine tastes like hot pepper jelly and they served it with a bit of Easy Cheese, just like you would do salt with a shot of tequila! Great for around the fire pit! And the 2 hippies they had selling and serving the stuff? I hope they get a raise! They were so cool! This booth had tons of people around it ALL DAY! 

Blueberry, Coltsfoot Winery, Abingdon - a sweet, smooth blueberry wine! And the folks at the booth were SO nice! In fact, all their wines were excellent, but I liked the blueberry (their sweetest) the best. They had a cranberry wine that would be perfect to serve with Thanksgiving dinner.

Late Harvest, First Colony Winery, Charlottesville - honeysuckle, roses and apricot. Tastes SO sweet. This is technically a dessert wine and it beat out Tomohawk's honey wine in taste for me, so I went back to buy a bottle.

Blackberry, Sans Soucy Vineyard, Brookneal - Most of the 15 wineries had their own special Sangria recipes on hand. I thought the best Sangria of the day belonged to Sans Soucy Vineyards, made with their blackberry wine! I went back for 2 glasses, and then bought the wine so I could make it at home! And the folks there? Super nice! And considered local.

There were many other wineries that had really good wines. I would have bought more but didn't think it prudent, being unemployed and all. Mattaponi Winery had an excellent strawberry wine, probably the best of the whole event. Peaks of Otter had a mango that was great, a peach that was super and good blueberry, blackberry and strawberry wines too. Tomohawk Mill had a great honey wine! Fincastle had a rose sangria that was a huge hit with the crowd. It was good, but I still liked Sans Soucy's blackberry sangria better! And of course, Chateau Morrisette had all their great wines out! They have a brand new blackberry wine that was awesome! The only reason I didn't buy any of their wine is because my two favorites of theirs (Red Mountain Laurel and Sweet Mountain Laurel) are sold in our local grocery stores!

The only downside to the day was involving some of the above-mentioned Sangria, which everyone was more than happy to give out samples of, just like their wine. Except for Hickory Hill Vineyards from Smith Mountain Lake. When me and my friend went up and asked to taste the Sangria, he told us only one sample per group. Huh? When every other winery is pouring sample after sample? At first we thought he was joking, but then he poured my friend a sample, but not me. Well, I'm not buying anything I haven't tasted myself, so I just walked off and tore up the brochure I had picked up. I won't buy their wine with that attitude. And why doesn't it surprise me coming from people at Smith Mountain Lake? I've always found people from up there a tad snotty. You have to understand I live in the only lakeside town in Virginia, next to the largest lake in Virginia, and yet Smith Mountain Lake thinks it's a super special place to be. More like, it's super crowded. You want to have nice, quiet, lakeside living, you come to Buggs Island Lake. You want to hear jet skis and power boats all day, you go try to afford something at Smith Mountain Lake.

Okay, forget my rant about lakes in Virginia, I still think that was a shitty attitude to have at a wine festival! The whole point is to show off your wine and let people taste it so they buy it. Won't be buying anything from Hickory Hill and I'll tell others not to, also.

But with that one minor exception, the day was awesome, the band rocked (ain't nothing wrong with good Bon Jovi covers at a wine festival) and the people were friendly! Thanks to Melinda, Linda, Mary, Charlie and all those other hard workers who make cool stuff like this possible in little 'ole Clarksville.

License to drink