Last year at the festival they offered an Advanced Wine Tasting Course with Michael Jordan. The class took place over three different days, Tues, Wed, and Thurs afternoons from 2-4 PM. Each day we covered a different wine region, starting in Italy, going through France and ending up in Germany. The amount of knowledge that he gave us was amazing. We were provided with notepads, and I took diligent notes. I had not taken notes since Ive was in college, and by the last day my hand was sore! He gave us much of the information on the wine regions and designations that one would have to memorize for their Sommeliers exam.
When we entered the room there were places set up, each with four or five glasses of wine and a bottle of water. These were the glasses that we were to taste/drink throughout the class that day.
This image shows the wines (glasses some finished, sorry!) from our first day in Italy, the empty one contained Magicale. This is such a tasty wine! It is actually a sparkling wine from Brachetto, called Brachetto dAcqui. Michael Jordan has it bottled under the name Magicale for all the Disney resorts, and the brand name Magicale is exclusive to Disney. The white wine is a Soave, the remaining reds are a Tommy Lasorda Chianti and a Negro Amaro, Verve from Solento.
The next day we went to France. The wines in this picture from left to right are White Burgundy, La Fite Bordeaux, Chateau Neuf de Pape Grenache and a Chateau St. Marten, Coteaux du Languedoc. (Sorry if my spelling is off.)
The final day I didnt get a picture because I was almost late for the class. We used some DVC points that we needed to burn through to stay at the Hotel. I was checking in and getting the tour of the Concierge level, but had to cut it short in order to make the class, so I forgot to take pictures of the wines that day. They were all German wines, mostly Reislings which were all of a different age. Michael Jordan wanted to point out to us the different flavors of these wines as they aged.
We tasted a Pfeffingen, Dry Riesling from Pfalz, a Graff Reisling, a Spatlese, then from Wolf a Wachenheimer Belz Reisling also a Spatlese. Then from Wirsching a Slivaner Auslese, and lastly a Kammerberger Spatlese Burgundian QMP.
All the wines we drank we just wonderful, and it was such an informative class, the amount of knowledge this man has in his head is incredible. Im sorry that he is not running any wine classes this year. At the end of the class we were all presented with a certificate of our participation.
As I mentioned earlier, we used up some DVC points to stay overnight (it was the day before DPs birthday) and since it was a Thursday we had enough points to stay on the Concierge level, so here are a few shots from the Concierge Lounge afternoon service. In the morning, they had Continental Breakfast, from 11 to 4 they served snacks, chocolate covered strawberries, cookies, finger sandwiches, cheddar goldfish, uncrustables. From 5-7 they served veggies & dip, a few hot items and beer and wine. In the evening they served cookies and other desserts, and some cordials.
That evening we dined at Napa Rose Restaurant at the Chefs Counter. We ordered the Vintners Menu and split it between the two of us, but we added an extra cup of the signature mushroom cappuccino (soup) to our order. I dont have pictures of all the courses we ate, but here are a few
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No idea what this was except that it was some sort of fish served over beans and a tasty sauce. I can say that because everything I have eaten at this restaurant has always been GREAT! They split everything for us in the kitchen at no additional charge.
The next course was soups, since we ordered two they didnt split them and we just switched halfway through. One is the signature Mushroom Cappuccino and the other is a Tomato Soup
We had the strawberry duck, and one of the accoutrements was sweetbreads, which we never would have eaten had we known what it was. However, we found out that something we thought wed never eat was actually good! The split portion here was just perfect so that we could eat dessert later.
So I thought that I didnt have pictures of all the courses, but I was wrong, I just didnt get a very good picture of the dessert. Since it was DPs birthday and mine was the week before, I think we let that slip sometime during dinner, so they brought us both birthday desserts! Perhaps I had enough wine that I wasnt thinking when I took these dessert pics!