Last-Minute Opportunity for Wine Knowledge at the BCAE!

A few weeks ago we told you about learning wine the strategic way at the Boston Center for Adult Education.

The appeal of this approach to wine -- structured yet fun, takes you from Point A to Point B with lots of sipping in between -- is so great that the "wine the strategic way" class is now over-subscribed. They've had to offer a second session and now they need to fill it up.

That's where your opportunity comes in: a second chance to sign up for a very popular course.

The catch is that you've got to decide by Monday, and the sessions start on Wednesday.

Yep, that's this Monday and this Wednesday.

Not a lot of time. So here's what you need to know:

The class -- offered via a universally-respected organization called Wine and Spirits Education Trust (WSET) -- has no prerequisites.

It's designed for people with a limited understanding of wine. (Which means stupid questions are welcome.)

The instructor tells you exactly where to start. (How to taste wine, how to read labels, how to select wine, and which grapes and regions to definitely know.)

And it's broken down into two-hour sessions, from 6 to 8 p.m. on Wednesday evenings from March 3 through June 23.

All in all you'll taste more than 90 wines. Nine-ty.

The class fits quite nicely into that after-work slot.

And it ends just in time for you to go and show off your newly-acquired knowledge at your favorite neighborhood place, or even to the folks who normally sit around your kitchen table.

Which makes it not such a bad way to spend two hours on Wednesday evenings.

Go on and sign up. It's wine knowledge. Available now.

WHAT: WSET Advanced Certificate Course

WHERE: Boston Center for Adult Education, 122 Arlington Street, Boston

WHEN: Wednesday nights from 6 to 8 p.m. beginning March 3

MORE INFO AND RSVP: Click here

DAILY TIDBIT:

Check out the 3-minute wine school organized by WSET, or Wine and Spirits Education Trust (the folks who sponsor the tasting course described in this email). You'll find 12 short films on different wines styles and regions. For free. Think of it like a pre-tasting for the course!

When Art Meets the Palate: Painting and Food from Spain at the MFA

Painting, Pablo Picasso said, is just another way of keeping a diary.

If that's true, then the diary of Spanish painter Luis Melendez was chock full of hams, olives, grapes, vinegars, tomatoes, garlic, cheeses, and who-knows-what in various jugs and jars.

All of those items were the subjects of his still-life paintings which, along with Melendez' 18th-century contemporaries, are currently on display at the Museum of Fine Arts.

The MFA's curator of paintings is offering special sessions to the public to explore the subject of feasting at the Spanish table.

And then, appetites whetted, we eat.

Or at least we watch a culinary demonstration directly inspired by the paintings and their gastronomic pleasures.

Both sessions -- the talk and the cooking demonstrations -- are offered in March in two separate sequences.

Both are bound to entice.

Both may just inspire you to start painting your own diary, of food or wine or or or...

Looks like that Picasso guy was onto something.


WHAT: Feasting at the Spanish Table
WHERE: Museum of Fine Arts, 465 Huntington Avenue, Boston
WHEN: Tuesday, March 2 and 9 or Thursday, March 4 and 11 from 10:30 a.m. to noon
COST: $53 for both sessions (for members, students and seniors), $60 general admission
RSVP: Call 617.369.3306

DAILY TIDBIT:

David Arvid is one of the today's most successful painters of the wine experience and the pleasures of consumption. Find him online here.

Wine + Music + Coffee at The Java Room

Quick!

What do these three things have in common?

Wine
Music
Coffee

Hmmm....

They're all social activities and are usually best enjoyed with friends?

Absolutely.

But how about this: They are each a specialty at The Java Room in Chelmsford.

Take the coffee. "Black as hell, strong as death, and sweet as love." (Their words, not ours.)

And the near-daily music, such as:

Friday, February 26: Alex Cole (saxophone) - Gretchen Stone (piano) Duo
Saturday, February 27: Trude Witham Group
Sunday, February 28: Sunday Jazz Brunch with Michael P. Chasse and Friends

Pick up a glass or two from their wine bar, settle back, and you are officially done for the evening.

WHAT: Wine, Coffee and Music
WHERE: The Java Room, Ginger Ale Plaza, 14 Littleton Road, Chelmsford
WHEN: Most nights. Click here for complete music schedule.
MORE INFO: Call 978.256.0001


DAILY TIDBIT:

For more on the association of wine with coffee, consider this: wet-processed coffees are roughly akin to white wines that have been fermented without the grape skins, while dry-processed coffees are like red wines, fermented in the coffee cherry with the skin intact. (Source: Tom Owen of Sweet Maria's Coffee)

Restaurant Wine at the Retail Price, The Blue Room

The dictionary says that to be "in cahoots" means "to conspire together."

Which sounds just a little bit shady, except when the conspirators share the benefits, and the benefits involve red, white, and sparkling.

It's The Blue Room and central bottle who are in cahoots these days. One's the award-winning Mediterranean-influenced restaurant in Kendall Square, the other's the recently-opened, small-producer-focused wine shop near Central Square.

The benefit of their being in cahoots?

Increased buying power.

How they're passing that benefit along to you?

Starting this weekend they're instituting Retail Sundays.

That means that, when you're having dinner at The Blue Room and you order a bottle of wine, you'll pay the price you'd pay as if you bought it at central bottle.

That means no exponential mark-up.

That means no corkage fee.

That means one price, whether it's at the restaurant or the shop.

That means -- and this is the best part -- that you're in cahoots too.


WHAT: Retail Sundays, starting February 28
WHERE: The Blue Room, One Kendall Square, Cambridge
WHEN: Starting Sunday, February 28 from 5:30 to 9:30 p.m.
RSVP: Call 617.494.9034


DAILY TIDBIT:

Generally, retail is 1.5 times higher than wholesale. That means a $10 bottle of wine would sell for $15 in a store. However, this is the "suggested retail" and many retailers mark it up less. In a restaurant, a markup on that $10 bottle of wholesale wine would be $25 for 2.5 times, or $30 for 3 times. (Source: Restaurant reviewer Michael Bauer of the San Francisco Chronicle in an article published January 8, 2010)

Design Your Own Tasting of Old World Malbecs, RWB Ticket Discount

A few weeks ago we asked you, our readers, to design our next wine tasting.

Think about it a minute, we said.

We wanted you to taste the wines (Old World Malbecs from Cahors, France).

We wanted you to hear from the winery owner (Philippe Lejeune of Chateau Chambert).

We wanted you to go home with a better handle on Malbecs than you did when you arrived.

That's where we started. And that's where we'll end. What happens in between, was for you to tell us.

And so you did.

Quite the opinionated lot you are.

Conduct a blind (blindfold-optional!) tasting of Malbecs versus other wines, you said. Multiple winners allowed. (Naturally, we said.)

Give me a recipe so I could use Malbec in my kitchen, you said.

Tell me how the owner of the winery prefers to drink his wine, you said.

Make it fun, practical and personal, you said. And invite a starving artist musician to play.

All good, good, and good. (Especially for the contest winner, who submitted the best entry and won two free tickets to the tasting.)

We are already doing our best to use as many of your suggestions as possible, beginning with the time frame (you preferred earlier in the evening), the venue (central Boston location), the reasonable price (RWB readers get a special discount), and the post-tasting dinner (at Sel de la Terre in the Back Bay).

What's left is for you to grab your tickets, show up, and see your ideas in action.

Oh, and taste some killer Malbecs -- the original version -- while you're at it.


WHAT: Tasting of Old World Malbecs with Philippe Lejeune of Chateau Chambert
WHERE: Bulthaup Designer Showroom, 200 Boylston Street, Boston
WHEN: Saturday, March 6 from 5 to 7 p.m.
COST: Normally $25. $20 for Red White Boston readers with the Discount Code RWBCAHORS.

ALSO: Post-Tasting Dinner with Philippe Lejeune
WHERE: Sel de la Terre Back Bay, 774 Boylston Street, Boston
RSVP: Just let us know.


DAILY TIDBIT:

Old World Malbec is a little bit like the Marlboro Man, but without the nicotine. It's rugged. Long-lasting. Original. It does its own thing, current tastes be damned. "Current tastes," if you're a Malbec drinker, likely means the Argentinian iteration of the grape. Old World Malbec wines from Cahors, France, however, have been known since the thirteenth century as "the wine of popes, kinds, and czars."

Wine Week-End Wine. White and Red All Over.

What really is a Super Tuscan?

What really changes when a wine shop comes under new management?

How much better, really, is a wine shop at wine-food pairings just because it's an extension of the gourmet deli next door?

And what does it mean, after all, to be "Boston's most innovative wine shop"?

Pick one -- or all -- of these riddles to answer. Then follow them up at their sources, below, tomorrow afternoon.

The best part, other than (obviously) knowing the solution?

None of them will cost you a dime.


WHAT: Tasting of Super Tuscans
WHERE: Berman's Wine and Spirits, 55 Massachusetts Avenue, Lexington
WHEN: Saturday, February 20 from 3 to 6 p.m.
COST: $0

WHAT: Wine Tasting (of southern Italian wines) to Celebrate the Grand Reopening
WHERE: OurGlass Wine Co., 124A Broadway, Route 1 North, Saugus
WHEN: Saturday, February 20 from 1 to 5 p.m.
COST: $0

WHAT: Wine Tasting + Hors d'Oeuvres from Henry's Foods of Beverly
WHERE: Henry's Wine Cellar, 588 Cabot Street, Beverly
WHEN: Saturday, February 20 from 2 to 5 p.m.
COST: $0

WHAT: Complimentary Wine Tasting
WHERE: Vinodivino, 899 Walnut Street, Newton
WHEN: Saturday, February 20 from 1 to 5 p.m.

COST: $0


DAILY TIDBIT:

Compared to the year before, the sale of domestic wine increased 4.6% while imported wine declined 1% in the 52 weeks ending January 9, 2010. (Source: The Nielsen Company, as reported on WineBusiness.com)

Prix Fixe Menu (at Sportello) + Live Music (at the ICA) = Night Out

Dinner and a movie?

Nah.

Dinner and a live music performance?

Hmmm...

How about dinner (when it's prix-fixe at Sportello) and a live music performance (when the music is at the Institute of Contemporary Art from unconventional pianist Christopher O'Riley showcasing songs by R.E.M., Nirvana, the Cocteau Twins and more)?

Now that's much, much more like it.

Call it a night out on Boston's waterfront.

We call it art.

Of the edible and the performance varieties.


WHAT: Prix Fixe Pre-Theater Menu (exclusive to ICA performances)
WHERE: Sportello, 348 Congress Street, Boston
WHEN: Performances from now through May, beginning February 27 with Christopher O'Riley
COST: $35 (excluding beverage, tax, gratuity)


DAILY TIDBIT:

Wine blogger Tom Wark offers 50 suggestions for maintaining Facebook fan pages for wine businesses. They include:

4. Pictures of visitors to your winery that you recently met or hosted

10. Comments on what your business says about our economy

16. Recommendations on other wineries to visit and why

28. Public announcements when you've discovered a Fan did something great!

29. Link to a recipe you think would work with one of your wines

30. Expose Fans to your favorite charities

45. Tell Fans about a great "other person's wine" you tasted

50. Occasionally explain why you love making wine.

Wine Everywhere, Just Because It's Wednesday

Not sure if you've noticed, but Wednesdays have become the wine lover's highlight of the week.

Here, hypothetically, could be your itinerary on any given Wednesday, should you wish to pursue the pleasures of wine from one part of town to another.

All that's required: good friends, an open heart, and enough fare for the T ride home.


Start at 5 p.m. at Federal Wine & Spirits on State Street. The place is cavernous, the steps downstairs to the tasting are treacherous, and the wines they pour are always (always) worth the effort.

Between 5:30 and 7:30 p.m., make your way to Rialto in Cambridge. Wine Director Brad Nugent will hand you two tastings, one white and one red, gratis. (This week he's pouring a 2007 Furmint from Austria and a 2007 Cabernet Franc from the Loire.)

Hungry yet? Head back over to the Bristol Lounge at the Four Seasons and pull up a chair for their Burgers & Burgundy offering. Anytime between 5 and 10:30 p.m., order their super-special Bristol burger (with truffle fries, housemade pickles and Vermont cheddar cheese) with two half-glasses of Burgundy, all for $30.

Or try the three-courses-for-$18 Pasta Tour at Tavolo in Dorchester. They spotlight a different part of Italy each week -- this time around it's Roma -- and as for what to drink, just put your trust in the folks at the bar.

Then, for a light finish to the evening, try Sel de la Terre's Long Wharf location for oysters shucked fresh at $1 each from 10 p.m. to 12:30 a.m. Round those out with a crisp sparkling wine or a clean Sauvignon Blanc, and you've got yourself quite a nightcap.


DAILY TIDBIT:

The TImes of London reported yesterday that French viticulturalists are trying to generate new profits from the by-products of wine production that used to be discarded. Producers are developing medicines and supplements based on leftover materials such as grape seed extracts. One such product from the Loire is called Dionysox, a drink made from skins and other grape residue that is the non-alcoholic equivalent of two glasses of wine.

Drinks with Sticks, Food Too, at Casablanca

So maybe it's a gimmick, this drinks-with-sticks thing.

But it's a fun one, and if there was a restaurant to pull it off, it's Casablanca.

That's because both the drinks and the food at Casablanca are particularly skewer-worthy.

They call it the Skewer Menu.

We call it budget-friendly, as in $5 for three skewers and two sauces, and $8 for cocktails.

And limited-offer, as in dinner only on Mondays and Tuesdays.

As for the food, think kebabs: lamb, veggie, shrimp, beef, chicken.

As for the drinks, think candied lime (on a skewer, naturally) accompanying the Dark and Stormy. Cherries with the Manhattan. Antipasti with the Martini.

Puts a whole new twist on the swizzle stick, doesn't it?


DAILY TIDBIT:

In 1933 an engineer named Jay Sindler was looking for a way to get the olive out of his Martini without using his fingers. He invented the swizzle stick -- with a spear-point on one end -- and was awarded a patent for it in 1935.

Wine + Cheese : Fire + Glass, Diablo Glass School

Not at all sure what it is about the folks over at the Diablo Glass School in Roxbury.

But they have been bih-zee.

As in, signing on master glass cutter Mosehn Kazemi.

As in, providing studio space to students from MassArt and BU etc etc etc.

As in, giving local teenagers a place to go -- for vacation week, the summer, and all other times too -- and teaching things like flameworking, glassblowing, and casting.

And then there is the wine.

Once a month Diablo hosts a wine tasting and live glass blowing demonstration.

At the same time.

Here's what happens.

They pour you a glass. And it will not be some cheap wine either. It will be carefully chosen by an importer who specializes in small-producer French and Italian wines.

Then they begin the demonstration, from bowl to stem to base.

You are mesmerized. It's got to do with all that fire and all that heat emanating from the furnaces, plus the choreography of the process, plus oh yes the wine.

A few hours later you will leave, warm on the outside and on the inside too.

WHAT: Wine and Cheese Tasting + Glass Blowing Demonstration
WHERE: Diablo Glass School, 123 Terrace Street, Boston
WHEN: Monthly. Next event is February 27 from 6:30 to 9:30 p.m.
COST: $35


DAILY TIDBIT:

Less than 12% of the US population drinks more than 90% of the wine consumed in this country. (In other words, not everyone loves wine but those of us who do, really really do!)

For the Love of Wine

"Where there is no wine there is no love."
--- Euripedes

"Never bring up your better bottles if you are entertaining a man who cannot talk. Keep your treasures for a night when those few who are nearest to your heart can gather round your table, free from care, with latchkeys in their pocket and no last train to catch."
--- Maurice Healy, Claret

May our love be like good wine, grow stronger as it grows older.
--- Old English toast

"Let your boat of life be light, packed with only what you need. A homely home and simple pleasures, one or two friends worth the name, someone to love and someone to love you, a cat, a dog, and a pipe or two, enough to eat and enough to wear, and a little more than enough to drink. For thirst is a dangerous thing."
--- Jerome K. Jerome

Wine gives us liberty, love takes it away.
Wine makes us princes, love makes us beggars.
--- Wycherly

And we meet, with champagne and a chicken, at last.
--- Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

I get no kick from champagne.
Mere alcohol doesn't thrill me at all.
So tell me why should it be true,
That I get a kick out of you.
--- Cole Porter

In water one sees one's own face. But in wine, one beholds the heart of another.
--- Old French proverb


DAILY TIDBIT:
Excerpts from Gayot's Top Ten Wines for Valentine's Day:

1. Champagne Jean Milan
Why: "Faintly sweet, feminine yet full-bodied."

2. Chateau Haut Marbuzet
Why: "The palate is voluptuous with an underlying note that's masculine, feral and sexy."

3. Deviation Dessert Wine from Quady Winery
Why: "Made with orange Muscat infused with damlana, a Latin American aphrodisiac herb."

4. Tandem Chardonnay
Why: "It has an almost salty quality that just makes the mouth water for more."

5. Taylor Fladgate 30-Year Old Tawny Port
Why: "It balances sweet with tongue-teasing freshness... Its finish is long and seductive, with toffee, chocolate, and roasted nuts."

Taste Organic Wines Saturday at Busa Wine & Spirits, Lexington

Imagine this...

Northern California landscape of vineyards, redwoods, sheep ranches, and apple orchards.

Vines planted at 1000 feet above sea level.

Picture-perfect tasting room.

Organic since 1986.

Now -- or actually on Saturday afternoon -- taste the wines that come from a place like that.

That place is Yorkville Cellars of Mendocino County. Their wines will be poured and sampled at Busa's in Lexington from 4 to 7 p.m.

Will you be able to taste the landscape and the sea and the chemical-free vineyards?

No promises.

But, with a story that evocative, imaginations tend to run free.

Good thing your wallet won't.

Tasting is free. And the wine is just $14.99 per bottle to take home.

Go on. Breathe easier.


WHAT: Tasting of Organic Wines from Yorkville Cellars
WHERE: Busa Wine & Spirits, 131 Massachusetts Avenue, Lexington
WHEN: Saturday, February 13 from 4 to 7 p.m.
COST: $0

DAILY TIDBIT:

Check out Busa's online Winter Wine Guide, which is like a very user-friendly Who's Who of the shop's inventory. You'll find the nitty gritty data (winery, varietal, region, drink years), plus food pairing suggestions for each wine, plus a few a-human-wrote-this sentences on what makes each wine unique.

When the Best Drink Is Not Wine: Two Nights of Spirits at Franklin Southie

Time for full disclosure.

Sometimes -- sometimes -- we actually think that wine is not the best drink option.

(Shocking. We know. But hear us out.)

Sometimes the best drink depends on the time of day, like espresso at 4 p.m. or kombucha tea at 7 in the morning.

Sometimes it depends on the occasion, like the launch of a new line of rum or the neighbor kid's summertime lemonade stand.

And sometimes the best drink depends on who's pouring, like the folks behind the bar at Franklin Southie especially when they're matched up with the folks behind DrinkBoston.com.

On two nights this month and next month, they'll be making your non-wine drink very well worth drinking.

Tomorrow night, for starters, they're toasting Rio's Carnivale festival by pouring Leblon Cachaça -- with $5 caipirinha shots, $6 mixed drinks, $5 bar snacks after 9 p.m., and free giveaways starting at 8 p.m.

Take your pick. Then settle in for one very satisfying wine-free night.


WHAT: Leblon Cachaça Carnivale Night
WHERE: Franklin Southie, 152 Dorchester Avenue, Boston
WHEN: Thursday, February 11 from 8 p.m. to 2 a.m.
MORE INFO: Call 617.269.1003


DAILY TIDBIT:

Caipirinha, Brazil's national cocktail, is made with sugar, limes, and cachaça. Cachaça is a distilled alcoholic beverage made from fermented sugarcane, with an alcohol content somewhere between 38% and 80% by volume.

Wine + Chocolate Events for You-Know-What Day

Blame it on the phenylethylamine.

That's the chemical that our brain produces when we're falling in love. (Or so we're told.)

Phenylethylamine is also a chemical found in chocolate, which helps make both things -- love and chocolate, that is -- so addictive.

Sweets for your sweet, and all that.

Phenylethylamine is in wine too, but it lacks the flush of chemical-induced affection. The best that researchers can come up with is to blame wine's phenylethylamine for the migraine-ish headaches some people experience the day after.

Alas.

The wine-chocolate-love menage-a-trois, nonetheless, is alive and well. See the examples below for just the start of such events going on around town this week, a few as soon as tomorrow evening.

Because it's never too soon to get some nice phenylethylamines into your system.


WHAT: Dessert & Dessert Wine Pairings with Sweet Solutions and Pastry Chef Judy Mattera
WHERE: Gordon's Fine Wine & Culinary Center, 894 Main Street, Waltham
WHEN: Wednesday, February 10 from 7:30 to 9 p.m.
COST: $45

WHAT: Couples Cooking: Be My Valentine
WHERE: Eurostoves, The Culinary Centre, 45 Enon Street, Commodore Plaza, Beverly
WHEN: Thursday, February 11 from 6:30 to 9:30 p.m.
COST: $150

WHAT: Wine and Chocolate
WHERE: The Wine List, 655 Iyanough Road, Hyannis
WHEN: Friday, February 12 at 5:30 p.m.
COST: $30

WHAT: Wine and Chocolate Class and Dinner
WHERE: The Boston Wine School, 1354 Commonwealth Avenue, Allston
WHEN: Friday, February 12 from 6:30 to 9:30 p.m.
COST: $100

Food Film Love Sex, Tonight in Cambridge

No one knows where these people come from.

But every once in a while a group of them will spring up, dandelion style, with an idea so odd and yet so fully realized that you wonder why it took them and only them to make it happen.

Take the group called Food at 24fps. (That stands for Food at 24 frames-per-second, which happens to be the standard exposure rate for 35 mm movie cameras).

Their purpose in life is to screen classic and obscure films about food.

They don't charge you anything for admission. (Though they won't turn down a five-spot if you've got one handy as you're walking in the door.)

They will provide "appropriate refreshments" when possible. (We aren't sure what that means, exactly, but we're awful curious to know.)

And their first event is tonight.

Naturally, this being the week before Valentine's Day and all, the subject of the film is sex, food, and maybe (maybe) love. The film is called Tampopo (it means dandelion in Japanese), it was first released in 1985, and you can read more about it here.

It's a cheap date. And a memorable one.

If you're looking for something a little more... unusual this Valentine's Day, this is it.


WHAT: Screening of Tampopo by Food at 24fps
WHERE: Adams Pool Theater in Adams House at Harvard, 29 Bow Street, Cambridge
WHEN: Tonight at 6 p.m.
COST: $0 though contributions are welcome


DAILY TIDBIT:

According to a review of the movie in 1987 in the New York Times, Tampopo's title character is a youngish widow who aspires to make, cook and serve the best noodles in any noodle shop in Tokyo. Her noodles at the beginning of the movie are promising but not great; the male lead, a trucker passer-by, describes them as "sincere" but "lacking in guts." The rest of the movie is a quest through Tokyo for the perfect ramen recipe.

Opening Night of the Bar at Pops, RWB Contest Alert

Here's what's happening:

Wednesday night is the invite-only launch party for the new Bar at Pops. Oversized new bar, view of the Back Bay, extensive cocktail list, all inside Pops Restaurant on Tremont Street.

Here's what we're giving away:

A spot on the exclusive invite list.

Here's what you need to do to win:

Follow us on Facebook.

Scoot over to the Discussion board.

Tell us how you find out about wine events in Boston. On Facebook? Twitter? Emails from restaurants and shops? Which ones? Word of mouth? Etc?

That's it.

Winner will be chosen randomly and will be notified on Monday morning, February 8.

Good luck. And we'll see you at the bar.


DAILY TIDBIT:

Wondering what to do with leftover wine? Pour it, if possible, into an empty and clean half-bottle, so there's less room for oxygen contact. Then put it in the fridge, because cooling slows down the aging process. Wine from opened bottles will last longer this way.

Drinks with Our Friends to the North (Shore)

This one's a shout out to our friends up north.

Up on the North Shore, that is, as in Newburyport, Gloucester, Beverly, Rockport...

Here's a quick run-down of the wine happenings there these days, from a Pinot Noir tasting paired with a book signing of Boston Noir, to live music and a sushi pit.

Notice how many times COST: $0 appears in the list below.

Road trip, anyone?


WHAT: Tasting of Winter Wine & Spirits (plus live music and food)
WHERE: Port Wine and Spirits, 25 Storey Avenue, Newburyport
WHEN: Friday, February 5 from 5 to 8 p.m.
COST: $0

WHAT: Weekly Wine Tastings
WHERE: Henry's Wine Cellar, 588 Cabot Street, Beverly
WHEN: Every Thursday from 4 to 7 p.m. and Every Saturday from 2 to 5 p.m.
COST: $0

WHAT ELSE: Pinot Noir Tasting and Book Signing of Boston Noir
WHERE: Henry's Wine Cellar, 588 Cabot Street, Beverly
WHEN: Thursday, February 11 from 4 to 7 p.m.
COST: $0

WHAT: Weekly Wine Tastings
WHERE: Grand Trunk Old World Market, 53 Pleasant Street, Newburyport
WHEN: Every Friday from 3 to 6 p.m. and Every Saturday from 2 to 6 p.m.
COST: $0

WHAT: Sushi Pit and Live Music (plus craft beers and wine)
WHERE: Latitude 43, 25 Rogers Street, Gloucester
WHEN: Tavern and Restaurant open for lunch and dinner every day
LIVE MUSIC CALENDAR: Click here.

WHAT: Cooking Class and Wine Tasting with Chef Ken Duckworth
WHERE: Duckworth Beach Gourmet, 24 Washington Street, Gloucester
WHEN: February 10 and 11
MORE DETAILS: Click here.


DAILY TIDBIT:

Local bands and craft beers are two major pieces of Cape Ann's entertainment scene. Check out the Cape Ann Brewing Co. (and their Fisherman's Brew) and Dog Bar (for live music most nights of the week), both in Gloucester.