Where are SmartsCo blogs?

We're busy SmartyPants, so if you want to find out about great food and wine experiences..we've got out blog here and on the SmartsCo website. You can also find coupons for some of our favorite wineries and other stores on our party tips page, which changes regularly.

If you're interested in reading about our experience as part of the Make Mine a $Million Business program sponsored by OPEN by American Express and Count Me In, visit our CMI blog. Here you'll hear all about our experience being featured in an ad campaign for American Express.
Cheers,
Jen and Julie

My Wine, Your Wine let's all try

Last week we got a gift in the mail -- a selection of 6 different wines from MyWinesDirect. They are a website where you can order wines for yourself or others, and - get this - there's always free shipping. We decided to review their wines and their service the only way we know how - with a bunch of friends and some food.

We had eight friends swing by the office last week, with promises of wine and pizza from North Beach Pizza (maybe not the most elegant, but who doesn't love pizza and wine) and a winetasting party. And they came willingly. Shocking. They were a mixture of wine lovers who shop for wine all the time, and others who enjoy just picking up a bottle now and then. We disguised all six wines with our colorful WineWrappers from WineParty (which was recently featured in the Washington Post and Gayot !). And the tasting and talking began.

Our friends Justin (from BPS who also happens to hook us up with all our local printing needs, and we need a lot) and his wife Aya regularly get a selection of six wines from a local store but Justin said "I never had them all together before" -- this seemed to strike a bunch of people as a fun idea. Instead of holding on to the wines or enjoying them slowly one at a time, invite friends over and make it an event in itself to taste them all at once. And a box like we got from MyWinesDirect, does all the shopping for you, which might be great if you're too busy or just want to be surprised.

We started with a Chateau de la Roche Sauvignon Blanc 2003, from Touraine, this was quite a light wine, almost too light without much of a nose. It got in the 3-5 zone in the rankings (with 1 being great and 5 not great). Next up, we had Hahn Estates Chardonnay 2002 from Monterey CA. This was buttery, smooth, fuller-bodied, with some nuttiness. It generally rated around a 2-3. Neither white was a huge crowd pleaser, but the fun began with the reds.

The group split on their favorites between the 3rd and 4th wines -- a good argument for having a wide variety of wines on your table. The Moorewood Pinot Noir 2001 was a hit with some people (especially Chip and me) -- great with pizza, smooth light with berry flavors, great body, really lovely and woody with some strawberries. Others in the group were big fans of our fourth wine, the Palio Vecchio Merlot 2000. This Napa Valley wine was described as musky, peppery, bittersweet chocolate, earthy, nice tannins. And some people wanted more of that right away.

The final two wines were a Chateau Picoron Bordeaux - Cote de Castillon 2000 and a Vitae Sangiovese 2001 from Puglia, Italy. The Bordeaux got comments like "Yum, great structure, with licorice notes, new wood, barnyardy - in a good way." Though one person described it as having a bigger bark than bite, and too watery. The final wine was almost port-like in its lovely sweetness, but without being syrupy. People were surprised by it and most enjoyed it. Perhaps a good sign of how much people enjoyed trying all these wines is that the 4 reds were polished off by the end of the night.

So, what did our wine lovers think of the idea of giving or getting MyWinesDirect? They loved the free shipping and that each box comes with their tasting notes, as well as note sheets where you can take your own notes. They also really liked the suggestions of what kinds of foods to serve with each wine. The price was also popular - $79.95 for all six wines. The individual wine prices, if you were to buy them through MyWinesDirect, seemed a little expensive and not quite such a deal as the group, but not bad. And the group in general said the imagery used in the marketing worked better for gifts for people with more traditional tastes, who are a little less urban.

Our favorite comment came from Justin -- "It's like speed dating for wines" - now that's the kind of dating I like. Chip said the drawback for him on a service like this is that he really wants to know who he's talking to - like he can at a winery he loves or a local wine store. But for others they liked the wide variety that they never would have picked themselves and MyWinesDirect offers a variety that you can't get when you join one winery. The service seems great if you live in a city that doesn't have great wine stores, than for people who live in a place like SF. It also seems like the quality is good across the board - not every wines was a favorite for everyone, but each person discovered something new they liked and wanted more of. Tune in for our next tasting....

WineClub & WineParty

So I unveiled WineParty, our new winetasting kit to my wine club (SFWC) last week. Our little club of about a dozen great friends have been getting together about once a month to learn more about wine for over seven years. While our unwritten -- but frequently mentioned -- rule is "you don't talk about wine club", I have to give them a bit of a shout out as these friends have been my inspiration for my half many SmartsCo product ideas and concepts.

To me, WineParty is basically SFWC in a box. We've tried out kits in the past that didn't really work as there usually weren't enough blinding sheets (we typically blind 8 to 12 bottles, and WineParty has 24 WineWrappers), didn't have good note pads, and they certainly weren't stylish. I also found it difficult to pour a bottle of wine with a bag wrapped around it - our WineWrappers adhere to the bottle and there are four really festive designs (okay I'm biased).

Our Review of Italian Barberas

Eight members attended the last meeting that featured Italian Barberas. Everyone got one of our WinePassport: Italy as their handout for the evening on arrival with a glass of our starter wine, the new Bootleg Italian Sauvignon Blanc . Our hostess, Tracy, put out some great cheese, dips, and Italian sandwiches and we were set for a great evening. We sipped on one of as we waited for everyone to arrive. Then we jumped into the tasting itself. With our tastings, everyone starts with about 1 to 2 ounce pour of each of the wines, so we can quickly (and soberly) make an assessment of the wine. Once our favorites have been determined, we typically finish off the rest of the wine, typically getting a bit loopy (let's just say in the past, some of our tastings have turned into slumber parties).

This time everyone was behaved and they took great notes on the Tasting Notes provided in WineParty which I summarized below - mactualacutal quotes, but a bit of paraphrasing (as you can tell, some people take better notes than others).

#1 - 2003 Agostino Pavia Barbera d'Asti "Bricco Blina" - $10.99 at K&L (a great wine shop in SF)
GROUP SUMMARY: A clear loser from the get go. However, we had a great selection from which to choose, so on it's own, it would be enjoyable at this price point.
Color / Aroma

• hearty and earthy, "like dirt after a fresh rain"
• cloudy, lots of alcohol on the nose
• bright ruby color
• brownside of red
• smooth balanced smell

Taste

• Tangy and acidic, with subtle tannins
• Orange, acid
• A little harsh, nice nose, metallic, oak
• Hot tangie, slight jam, not too smooth, steel / "like biting metal when getting fillings"
• High acid, raspberry young, subtle jam
• Light, raspberry, tart, earthy, fresh rain, mud, musky

Overall opinion

• good for a pre-dinner wine
• "unique"
• Not super fond of (after breathing, mellowed out a lot though)
• Excellent aperitif, needs fat such as salami / cheese, pizza
• "Sort of like licking a 9-volt battery"(NOTE: Several club members were familiar with this taste from childhood. I'm surprised they made it to adulthood.)

#2 - 2003 Cascina Val del Prete Barbera d' Alba "Serra de Gatti"- $15.99 at K&L
GROUP SUMMARY: A close 2nd to wine #4 (the Ruggeri), and a nice bargain. Same winery as #3, and while the less expensive option, this beat #3 hands down.
Color / Aroma

• dirty, plumy, fresh black fruit
• Clear, deep ruby color
• Acidic fruit
• Cranberry red

Taste

• soft, balanced tannins, with good acidic finish
• Woody, plum, soil
• Tangy, soft with high acid
• Bright, concentrated black jammy fruit, nice acid finish, odd vannillan character, well balanced
• Plum, ML
• Plum, smoother than slight spicy. Weacidicanced with slight acitic end

Overall opinion

• good with pork in a cherry reduction or other fruit
• Smooth and nice
• Smoothest overall

#3 - 2003 Cascina Val del Prete Barbera d'Alba "Carolina"- $33.99 at K&L
GROUP SUMMARY: 3rd favorite - most people guessed this was the most expensive as the jammy, rich wines, tend to be pricier. While favoritethe 8 SFWC members favorited this one above all, most of our group prefer more lively wines and clearly found wine #2 (from the same winery) & #4 more enjoyable.
Color / Aroma:

• rich, cocoa butter and honey aromas with evident wood
• Dark odor, nice nose
• Honeysuckle
• Roasted red pepper, musty

Taste:

• leathery (pigskin), oaky, tannic, wild fennel and cooked green pepper
• Structured tannins, carmeley, well balanced
• Good acidic, light & thin
• Burnt-sugar, fennel, cherry
• Vegetal, pinewood, melon

Overall opinion

• would be good with osso bucco, pork with leeks or braised fennel, stewed lamb, duck with cherries
• "okay, but not very inspired:
• Smooth after about 10 minutes, pretty biting at first - eat with putenesca
• least favorite - appetizers only

#4 - 2003 Ruggeri Corsini Barbera d'Alba "Armujan" - $17.99 at K&L
GROUP SUMMARY: this was the overall winner, with most everyone putting it as their first or second favorite.
Color / Aroma:

• soft nose, leather, fresh stewed artichoke
• lovely nose
• deep ruby color
• very nice cherry smell
• vanilla nose

Taste

• soft wine, with good acids and a nice long finish
• A little hot, spicy, tannins, burnt sugar
• Pineapple, leather, cherry
• Dark berry, smooth
• Balanced, fruit and well structured tannins
• Very fruit forward, more tannic / pucker at end
• Fresh goat cheese, dry tannins

Overall opinion

• would be good with lonzo (cured pork loin), salami or anything salty
• Some tannins, good finish
• Floral finish, bright acid
• Good with salty food, fat, porcinis
• very nice
  
  

Something Fishy's Going On

My friend Eric went on a fishing trip in Cabo a couple weekends ago and brought back some yummy fish for a fish party that I helped out with. This year, instead of the Sea of Cortes the fishermen set their sights on the Pacific side of the Penninsula in hopes to catch some marlin, with little success (given the fact that marlin isn't so yummy to eat, it seems to me a better idea to stick in the bay where you're sure to catch lots of tuna and dorado, but I'm not a fisherman). But he was intent on bringing back fish for the party and chartered another boat and brought back some great tuna and dorado.

Saturday consisted of an early trip to the SF's Ferry Plaza farmer's market where we could pick up all the goodies to prepare a fab meal. Then we stopped off at Trader Joe's for the few items not available at the farmer market and and then we spent all afternoon cooking. We tried to keep a pseudo Mexican theme and had the salsa music when we served our friends with a great meal:

First Course
Chips with Tomatillo salsa and homemake guacamole (mashed avacado, diced garlic, jalapeno, onion, lime juice)
Seared Tuna encrusted in sesame seeds with a soy-based sauce with ginger, green onions, and garlic, and jalapeno
Dorado Ceviche - (Did you know that Dorado is the same thing as Mahi Mahi? I didn't). Got the perfect ceviche recipe from my friend James at Destino Restaurant, who knows all about making great cevice. James tells me you can make ceviche from any fish and there are 5 elements to ceviche and you can adorn is as fits your personal preference.
- fish (any kind you want, really, just be sure it's super fresh and cut up in small pieces)
- lime juice (the key is that you really don't want to marinate the fish for long - 5 minutes for light fish, 15 - 20 minutes for steakier fish, such as swordfish. A saw a recipe that says to marinate for 3 hours which I suppose you would do if you're not working with really fresh fish, but with the good stuff, James says a few minutes is perfecto!)
- heat (japapeno or other hot pepper, garlic)
- diced veggies (red onion, tomoato, avacado, etc.)
- herbs (typically cilantro, but others could work too)

Main Course
Sauteed dorado - just fish in some butter
Tuna belly baked with onions, lemon in tin foil
Caesar salad - key is to cover each piece of lettuce in olive oil that's been infused with garlic overnight. Then you'll boil one egg (or 2 depending on the size of the salad) for 1 minute and break it and mix it in with the lettuce; and then add chopped up anchovies (fresh ones are much preferable to canned) and lots of parmesian cheese and croutons (use some old french or sour dough bread fried in olive oil and diced garlic). Mmmmmm.
Baked eggplant and tomato with a vinagrette, parmasian cheese and bread crumbs. This was a bit of a complicated dish we got from the Alice Water's Chez Panisse Cookbook, but well worth the time and effort. My only change would be to reduce the amount of bread crumbs as the eggplant and tomatoes were so tasty on their own

Dessert
Creme Brulee - I actually had never made it before. It's basically egg yolks and heavy cream infused with vanilla bean. The key is to only cook half the cream with the vanilla bean and then cool it down with the 2nd half of the cream before you mix in the egg yolks and pour it in the ramakins. One of many techniques I got from my favorite cookbook The New Best Recipe Cookbook from America's Test Kitchen. It's quite weighty, but they clearly have done the research on how to perfect any recipe.

Definitely fun was had by all. The early Sunday morning flight to DC for the WineParty launch came way too soon (fortunately we turned the clocks back so I got an extra hour sleep).

Definitely Count Me In (maybe you too?)

Regular readers of this blog know SmartsCo received a Make Mine a $Million award from Count Me In, OPEN by American Express and the Women's Leadership Exchange in August. Since then, it's been a whirlwind of activity which has been pretty exciting. Thus far, we've benefited from increased financing opportunities, marketing exposure, and business coaching -- all things that are helping our business grow - details on that below, but first:

If you're a woman-owned business you can win, too - How to Apply
We're thrilled that we have this opportunity and know there will be lots of amazing things going on over the next few months that will help get us to the $Million mark (and well beyond). What's even better is this opportunity is still available to other women-owned businesses. I highly encourage East Coast women-owned businesses to apply for this great award by November 18th - winners will be announced in NY on December 2nd, and Jen and I will be there to cheer other applicants on. It's a very easy application (and the folks at Count Me In will help you if you need it) and well worth your time. If you know of any woman-owned business looking for more tools and resources to help them grow, do tell them about it.

Here's how we've benefited from winning the Make Mine a $Million award..Yippee!

1. New Financing Opportunities
As soon as we won the award, the folks at OPEN by American Express and Count Me In helped open financial opportunities for us through new loans and lines of credit. We've always been big users of our OPEN card when we're in a cash crunch as it has low rates and doesn't have penalties for using the 'checks' they send you. Now we have a line of credit from OPEN which will also come in handy when the bank account gets a bit low (doesn't every small business go through that from time to time?).

These new financial opportunities have already played a key role in helping us increase our growth rate as it afforded us the ability to bring on new people to our team to help us sell and market our exciting products Moreover, now that we know we have access to capital and lines of credit, we're able to expand our product development plan for next year so we can create lots more ways to learn about life's greatest pleasures th(hint: think Paris, French wine and bubbly for the near future and lots more fun stuff later in the year).

2. Increased Marketing Exposure
The folks at OPEN have also been really great at generating publicity for us such as featuring Jen on a panel moderated by OPEN's president at the New York Times Small Business Summit last month. This was a great panel, and we were able to connect with other cool businesses such as ZipCar, a very cool urban car share company that we are collaboring with on fun marketing programs.

3. Coaching
Last, but certainly not least, this award comes with excellent business coaching, which is proving very valuable and inspirational to us. We've also been getting great advice from TV producer and entrepreneur Nely Galan, of "The Swan" and other shows and from Dresdene Flynn-White of Action International. It's great to have successful and intelligent women provide us with ideas, opportunities and help us think strategically about continuing to help SmartsCo grow.

Pretty exciting stuff for sure. So if you're a woman-owned business, be sure to apply. If you're just looking to learn more about life's greatest pleasures, get excited for lots more more great new products to come out of SmartsCo.

Wine Party On

So we hosted our first official WineParty sipping on great Pinots and Sparklers at J Vineyards & Winery this weekend. It was a blast. About 50 super fun and friendly folks joined us for a tasting filled with all sorts of fun and games on a gorgeous afternoon in Sonoma. When they arrived, everyone received a copy of our new WinePassport: California and then we quizzed them with questions from WineSmarts and then had them guess about the wines they were tasting which we blinded with the WineWrappers from WineParty.

This type of event was exactly what we designed WineParty for, and I think everyone learned something about what they were tasting because they had to take a step back and think about it. It was great to have our "official" launch at J as we've been fans of J for years. I think their bubbly is my all-time favorite, and it's always such a nice place to visit - friendly staff, nice patrons, delicious food (check out their recipes), and awesome stylish merchandise (and I'm not just talking about our stuff).

We had 3 stations set up outside of J's gorgeous tasting room and our guests tasted two wines at each station.

Station One was manned by our friend Stefani, the creative genius behind J's merchandising program and a super fun gal to boot, who poured their Chardonnay and Viognier. While I'm typically an ABC girl ("Anything But Chardonnay") I really enjoy J's version of it as rather than an oaky and buttery style, it made in a nice and crisp, almost in a Burgundian style. The Viognier, which is currently one of my favorite whites these days, on the other hand had just enough oak to mellow out some of the citrus characteristics of the varietal.

I covered Station Two which featured two Pinot Noirs: 1998 Nicole's Vineyard and their 2003 Russian River. I had a blast getting our guests to identify which was which. At first they were stumped, but after I explained that with age, the flavors in a wine are going to blend together and it will become smoother and mellower, almost everyone got it (and they went home really understanding how age impacts a wine). I really would love to do a tasting with the same wine from various years and see how well people do. (The first photo is me manning my station with some yummy Crimini mushrooms on creamy polenta).

Finally, Jen poured a yummy Zinfandel and of all things a Pinotage at Station Three. The only Pinotages I've ever had have been cheap ones from South Africa, and I found them to be thin yet jammy and they didn't really impress. But J (which, by the way, is one of just three wineries that make the stuff in California and I believe there are only 15 acres of it under vine in the state) has done something really nice with it. In fact, it was so yummy that I was duped and mistook it for the Zin - Oops. Oh well, I've never claimed to be a wine expert, just passionate about it and love to continue my education too. (Second photo is Jen pouring wine for some of our guests).

BTW - Jen and I would love to hear about your wine tastings and fun themes or comparisons you're doing so we can provide suggestions on PartyCentral of our website. If you have some good stories, please send them our way

Wedding Non-Crasher - Part II

So the last of my 5 weddings this summer took place last weekend, and to be honest I'm a bit sad. Not that my social schedule isn't packed with SmartsCo parties across the country this fall, but I do see what the "Wedding Crasher" characters were onto (not that I'm bringing home strange guys from each of these - I just like the dancing).

This last one was for my dear friends Tracy and Carl and it was georgeous. I was particularly honored to be able to play the flute in this one (I don't get too many opportunities to perform anymore other than the occasional wedding - and I much prefer the flute to being a bridesmaid). I think the best part of the whole weekend for me was the arts and craft projects which I helped out on. I just love weddings where friends and family chip in and create beautiful things.

Tracy and Carl's moms made yummy cookies that were family favorites and we boxed them up, and tied cute ribbons around them. Next up was tying bows on the programs which was a 3-step project: folding the programs, punching the holes, and then tying. As a former process consultant myself and Carl being a product manager, we both were quite interested in streamlining the process so there were no bottlenecks. I think we did a pretty good job reconfiguring the assembly line when certain people got behind.

The highlight of the wedding weekend for me began the next morning at 6 am when we got up and drove up to our friends McNultys house in Sonoma County to pick roses. They have about 1000 absolutely gorgeous rose bushes and were kind enough to donate roses to the wedding. I learned a lot about roses that day. The rose pictured here is called "Perfect Moment" - how fitting! According to Terry McN. "It is one of our favorite roses. However, it is not at all
fragrant. What it lacks in fragrance, it makes up for in its spectacular color scheme."

So here's what I learned on my rose pruning expidition, thanks to Terry's great lessons.

1) You should always cut a stem so that your cut is about 1/4" above an outward-facing leaflet
2) when you prune, from the base of each rose you select for cutting, count down at least 5 leaflets until you locate an outward-facing leaflet. Then cut just above that leaflet.
3) some bushes are more prickly than others (boy can it be painful if you aren’t careful).

Storing
1) You should immediately put them in a clean pot filled with TEPID water. NOT warm, as warm water tends to blow the blossoms too quickly. And NOT cold water, as cold water will cause the cut ends to seal themselves, and then they die too early.
2) you should remove the bottom leaves, but keep the thorns on

Cool stuff.

Types
There certainly seem to be a heck of a lot of roses out there: different species, different colors, different varietals. It’s actually pretty fascinating, and beautiful I think they create a new rose for every first lady as I saw a lot of names of former president’s wives. (My favorite rose was believe it or not – the Nancy Reagan. Not sure what to think about that one.)

Hmm – maybe one day I’ll leave the City, get a house of my own and grow roses. Could be fun.