The Keynote speaker is often the reason why an event draws participants. The European Wine Blogger’s Conference is different. The mere fact that we are the first group of bloggers to simply get together and talk about wine blogging, well, that seems to be enough to draw people in and of itself. So far, the response has been better than expected and we’re sure that any future events will be much larger in scale. That said, we don’t have any Keynote Speakers, but we do have some great wines.

Wine is our common thread, and we’re all a bit geeky when it comes to this fermented treat. Hence, we thought, “Hey, rather narrow ourselves solely to the topic of blogging, let’s taste some wines together”. On Friday night, August 29th, we are asking all of the participants to share their wines with us including great discoveries from their region or wines they made themselves. But the next night will be a bit different. Our Keynote Tasting on Saturday will take place in a quaint and traditional restaurant where we will eat some amazing food and taste some wines that we think deserve to be highlighted. Some are quite pricey, and a few are down right cheap! We’ll have red, white, rose, and a few “stickies”, along with an opportunity to mill about and enjoy one another’s company.

Now, so that we are all clear, the list below is only partially done, and there are a few surprises that just might find their way in; but we thought it would be good to give a sample of the wines for you to see. We also want to emphasize that this will not be a stodgy, straight laced tasting with us lecturing about the wines. No, this will be a tasting where we take and ask you to tell us what you think. Heck, we all write about wine don’t we?!

Information will be made available on each wine and some of the wines will even have their creators present, so you can ask them directly. As for Catavino, well, we picked these wines for a variety of reasons, and we’ll share some of the stories with you, while at the sametime being available to field questions.

I know I’m looking forward to it, and I hope you are too!

Cheers,

Ryan Opaz

• Taylor Fladgate - Quinta de Vargellas 2005
• Bentomiz Ariyanas - Naturalmente Dulce
• Cortes de Cima - Reserva 2005 2004
• Herdade do Esporao - Private Selection Red 2004
• Dominio de Tares - Cepas Viejas 2005
• Niepoort - Batuta 2005
• Casa de la Ermita -  Petit Verdot
• Abadia Retuerta - Valdebellon 2005
• Marques de Griñon - Syrah
• Lopez de Heredia - Tondonia Red 1999
• Roda - Roda I Reserva 2004
• Dinastia Vivanco - Coleccion Vivanco 4 Varietales 2005
• Muga - Torre Muga 2005
• Malhadinha - Malhadinha 2006
• Casa Vides - Rosae Rose 2007
• Massana i Noya - d’Avi Ton 2007
• A. Pazos de Lusco -  Lusco
• Lopez de Heredia - Tondonia White 1989
• Rafael Palacios - Louro do Bolo Godello 2006
• Bodegas Hispanos y Suizas - Sauvignon Blanc 2007