Stuck in Lodi Again

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Actually I've never been stuck in Lodi, in fact I don't remember having been there before but last week I had the opportunity to get to know it a little while working on the EGVM program there. One of the high points were the excellent Grape Festival with clever displays of mosaics made of beans, seeds, and lots of grapes depicting scenes of California, all created by local children, really good music, and in general a nice old-fashioned county fair atmosphere, which is hard to find in fairs these days. It was also fun to have a hidden tasting of wines, two each of red and white,and to try to guess the varietals. I'm ashamed to say that with of all my wine imbibing I got a perfect score: perfectly zero. It's not easy to confuse a Chardonnay with a Chenin Blanc but I managed to do it.
Another fun venue was their farmer's market on Thursday night. It's a big one with lots of local produce, the usual overpricing but what would you expect at a farmer's market anyway.
The work was interesting, inspecting grapes for the pest. The grapes were for winemaking, and they grow about a dozen varieties, to sample a loose berry in the variety being looked at made me aware that they taste different from each other but all were good.

Now I'm back in Fresno; I have been here before but it is always a pleasure to eat the cold plate special at George's Shishkebab Restaurant in the downtown area- a very fine restaurant and everything, including the lamb and the moussaka is great.

A couple of weeks ago I went to see the mechanically harvested wine grapes go to Gallo for crush. Three gondolas with six tons of grapes each going into a trough with giant augers- what a sight.

Well farewell friends.

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