Happy Valentine’s Day, everyone!

Above, from right: Slow Wine Oregon senior editor Michael Alberty with Annedria and Andrew Beckham of the Beckham Estate Vineyard in the Chehalem Mountains of Oregon wine country. The Beckham winery, producer of some of the most compelling wines I’ve tasted from the Pacific northwest, appears in the debut edition of the Slow Wine Guide to the Wines of California and Oregon.

On Monday, March 4 and Tuesday, March 5, I’ll be joining Slow Wine editor-in-chief Giancarlo Gariglio as we present the second edition of Slow Wine California and the inaugural edition of Slow Wine Oregon in San Francisco and Portland.

I won’t be following the entire tour but tastings will also be held that week in Denver, New York, and Boston.

Click here for tour information.

Please come out and taste with me and my fellow editors! There will be plenty of amazing American wines to taste not to mention the Italian and Slovenian estates that will joining the tour as well (click the link above for info on the wineries that will be pouring at each event).

A true labor amoris, the Slow Wine experience has been a real eye-opener for me: I realize now how wrong I have been in the past about California viticulture (really wrong) and I also now have a richer sense of Oregon’s greatness.

Back at the home office in Bra (Piedmont), Italy, my colleagues are in the process of publishing the entire U.S. guide online on the Slow Wine blog (click here to view, no paywall). And you’ll also find posts there on our field editors.

Before I head off to the west coast, I’ll also be presenting some really great tastings here in Houston, including “How to Pair Texas BBQ with Italian Wine,” at the Taste of Italy food and wine trade fair and festival on Monday, February 25. Now in its fifth year, it’s an event that I help to produce together with the Italy-America Chamber of Commerce Texas (one of my most beloved clients, rated the number one chamber in NAFTA, no joke!).

The seminars, which will also feature Master Sommelier June Rodil and top American wine writer Bruce Schoenfeld, are nearly all full. If you haven’t already signed up, please shoot me a PM and I’ll see what I can do to get you in.

We are also looking for volunteers in exchange for a comped spot at the BBQ tasting and seminar.

Hit me up, people! I hope to get to taste with soon and I’ll also be at the upcoming Gambero Rosso tastings in Chicago and New York if you happen to be around.

Sorry for the too-much-info post and thanks for the support! I hope to get to taste with you this month and next! That’s Oregon editor and wine writer extraordinaire Michael Alberty below, left, and Slow Wine editor-in-chief and super taster Giancarlo Gariglio tasting with me in Oregon in late spring of last year.