As a wine educator hosting tastings, I often get asked  “what got you into wine?”

I realized I hadn’t shared this story of my AH HA wine and lightbulb moment with my listeners yet and I thought whether a first time listener or loyal Sip Fan (I see you!), that you’d like to know what brought your gal, Nikki, to wine Country, which eventually led to this very podcast becoming a reality

So this week I’m Sharing:

• My first intro into wine… at Pleasure Island???
• The wine that shut me up (Literally)
• Why I got banned from ordering the wine on the Disney Cruise
• My first impression when visiting the Napa Valley
• A tip for you if you have a passion bubbling under the surface 

Splurge on this weeks Sip Spotlights available on my partner website:

The Ah-Ha wine:

Antinori Tignanello

Another super rare WOW wine for me:

Montes Purple Angel 

Other Resources and Ways to stay connected:

• If you'd like to Support the Podcast, I’ll give you a shout out!
• Check out Nikki's boutique wine brand Sollevato!
• Please consider Rating, Reviewing and Following Us on Apple Podcasts! Click Here, scroll to the bottom, tap to rate with Stars and select "write a review" and let us know what you loved most about this episode! And If you haven't already, Be Sure to Follow  the podcast!
• Looking to better at understanding wine? Download my Free Wine Tips Cheat Sheet here
• Follow Nikki on Instagram
• Questions, suggestions and guest requests? nikki@sipwithnikki.com

We get to the end of the meal and of course the tinello was the

first time that I had spent over a hundred dollars on a bottle of wine.

That was a big deal.

My co worker and I split it and we all had a good laugh like, oh, Nicky's

not allowed to order the wine anymore.

But we all agreed it was amazing and I just, I couldn't stop thinking about it.

Not that long ago, I was traveling the world in my corporate sales job when

I discovered a love of fantastic food, beautiful wine, and the people and

the places that bring them to life.

So after a huge life change and moved to wine country California, I've

been studying wine, teaching others about it, and finally making my own.

I started the sip with Nikki podcast to create a virtual space for us to

connect and hang out to try exciting wines together and to make the art of

food pairing and wine pairing, well, less intimidating and more awesome.

So if you're a wine nerd like me, or just someone who loves to enjoy some

of the finer things in life, but It doesn't take it all too seriously.

You are in the right place, my friend.

Sip with me each week as I share tips, recommendations, recipes, and

stories, along with my special guests who will drop some of their knowledge,

humor, and wisdom as we sip together.

Here we go.

Welcome to this week's episode.

I'm so happy that you're here.

If you've been enjoying our previous 30 something episodes and loving, learning

more about wine, making sense of wine, I want to make sure that you have received

my downloadable wine cheat sheet.

Just visit my website, sipwithnicki.

com forward slash resource, and I will email it for free right to your inbox.

It's just a single sheeter, and it's got some concepts that I've pulled

out of my head, and thanks to the magic of Canva, put on paper for you.

And I just think it helps to give some visual guidance to some of the

concepts that I've been breaking down.

So very often when I am working as a wine educator and hosting guests

for wine tasting, they often ask me how I wound up in wine country.

sassy response where I'll say, well, how did you wind up in wine country?

I really do share with people what it was that led me to make a total

life change 12 years ago and, and move here from the East coast.

So as we are learning about wine together, and you've been following my

travels, I thought I might take a minute.

Cause I haven't really shared the depth of the story as to how did I get

into wine and why is this important?

passion so darn loud and strong.

So I'm very excited to share with you just a little glimpse into my past and what led

me to be here as your virtual wine coach, wine educator, super extraordinaire.

So here we go with how did I get into wine?

Contrary to what a lot of people might think, I did not

grow up with wine on the table.

Even though my dad and his side of the family are Italian,

it just wasn't our thing.

We were big food family and gather around the table kind of family,

but I don't ever remember like wine always being on the table.

We did not start drinking wine as kids.

So I think.

Where I really got the bug was in my early 20s.

I was working at Walt Disney World in Orlando and I had this goal

and desire to be a bartender.

That was just always, that was something that seemed very exciting to me.

I remember as a kid, my aunt and uncle had a very cool finished basement in Brooklyn

with a really cool bar and my sisters and I would always pretend to play bartender.

So, I don't know.

It just It always seemed cool to me.

So I took some bartender training in my early 20s at Disney and part of that

was just, I believe it was a single day.

like wine appreciation slash wine tasting class.

And I can, I can picture it.

The classroom was above one of the clubs at what was called Pleasure

Island at the time at Disney.

So it was like the, the nightclub area.

Those were when the light bulbs started going off was in this wine tasting

class, just like learning how to smell wine and taste wine and describe wines.

And while I never went on to actually become a bartender, At

Disney, I went in another direction.

Everything happens for a reason.

So I think then I started just trying different wines

when I would go to the store.

You know, in Florida, you could buy wine in the grocery store.

And I remember just kind of getting into it at that time.

And then one really pivotal moment was in my early 30s, so about a decade later,

I was working for the Disney Vacation Club in sales, and I got to sail on the

Disney cruise line pretty much monthly.

At the start of every, like, week long cruise there would be a handful of

us that were the team that were going to be working together for the week.

So we would have a team building dinner on the first night of the cruise,

and it was in the high end adult only restaurant called Palo, which all of the

Disney ships have, and even current day Disney new ships have Palo restaurant.

And I remember this one time I was with the four of my other co workers and we

were getting to know each other and game planning for our, you know, sales strategy

for the week over this beautiful meal.

And there were some other wine drinkers at the table and we had ordered

a very nice, um, but relatively inexpensive bottle of Pinot Noir.

And this restaurant was known for its filet, which they would serve

with a gorgonzola and red wine sauce.

Again, still on the menu today.

If you've dined at Palo, you know exactly what I'm talking about.

So it was a big splurge, and I think all five of us at

the table had ordered filets.

So right when the entrees were about to come out, we had finished that.

bottle of Pinot Noir.

So we needed more wine to go with our beautiful filets that were coming.

So our server, Sylvester from India, I remember him saying, Oh, can I suggest

this beautiful, super Tuscan wine?

It would be great with your filet.

And I was like, super Tuscan.

I'd never heard that term before.

And he explained that it was a blend of Italian grapes like Sangiovese and

then Bordeaux grapes like Cabernet.

And I was like, That sounds great.

I'll have a glass.

And he said, Oh, well, it doesn't come by the glass.

And so I looked to my left and to my right, my team members.

You want to do another glass with your filet?

You want to do another glass?

Yes.

So we ordered the bottle and filets dropped in front of us and This

beautiful super Tuscan called Tignanello was poured into our glasses.

And I will never forget tasting that wine for the first time.

Because it was the first time that I had experienced a wine that was

changing in the glass with every sip.

And so I say the last sip was different than the first sip, and every sip was

sort of taking me on a journey, and I just had never experienced that before.

Even when you have a nice bottle of wine, if you're at a table and you're

eating and you're talking with people, you might like really taste the wine

and focus on it on that first taste.

But then you're just kind of talking and picking up your glass in between bites.

And sometimes I think it just gets lost.

And I remember, as wonderful as the company, the conversation, and

the food were, every time I picked up that glass, it stopped me.

in my tracks.

It stopped me in my conversation.

And after I took a sip, it was just like, wow, it's totally different

than it was four minutes ago.

And that was the first time again that I had experienced that.

We get to the end of the meal and Sylvester drops the check, and

of course the Tinanello was the first time that I had spent over a

hundred dollars on a bottle of wine.

That was a big deal for me then, and my co worker and I split it, and we

all had a good laugh, like, Nicky's not allowed to order the wine anymore.

But we all agreed it was amazing and I just, I couldn't stop thinking about it.

So about a month later, I'm out and working on the cruise again.

First night of the cruise, Palo restaurant.

One of my coworkers, Tony, who had been there for that Tina Nello introduction,

he was with me again on the cruise, but the rest of the team was different.

So we're telling them the story of what happened a month ago when Nikki

quote, accidentally ordered this.

You know, 120 bottle of wine, ha ha ha.

And it was the beginning of the meal and we were deciding

what we were going to order.

And I stepped away from the table to go wash my hands.

And when I came back to the table, the bottle of tea Nanello was on the table.

Thank you to my friend, Tony.

So he, he just went for it and ordered it.

And we got to share it with three new people who had never experienced

it while telling them this story.

And.

It became a thing.

It became a tradition.

And one of the things that I really enjoyed was not just obviously tasting it

for myself and experiencing the complexity and the evolution in the glass, but it

was sharing it with my coworkers, some of which were barely wine drinkers and were

like, Oh, yeah, you know, I'll try it.

And that it.

Became really one of the highlights of that team dinner for me was

introducing my coworkers to beautiful wines, my treat, and I loved it.

I loved seeing them experience something new.

The second place wine that became a special treat on the cruise then was

Purple Angel, which is from Chile.

It's the Carmenera grape, which is super rare.

And again, that was a suggestion of one of the servers, or it may have

been the sommelier on the Disney ship.

And that became one in the rotation.

It was always a little bit less expensive, still a splurge, but really unique.

And I just was so excited to share this wine with my team members.

So I think.

That was the culmination and that's where the love of wine and seeing

how it could elevate a meal and how it could almost dominate or stop a

conversation was a really big piece of it.

That was, uh, probably around the year 2006 and then In 2009, my mom and I

took our first trip to Napa Valley just as wine lovers and wine drinkers.

And there were moments during that trip going to wineries and seeing the

lifestyle of, oh my gosh, these people, they own a winery and they live here

and they grow these grapes and they make the wine here and they host the parties.

It's the tastings at the picnic tables in their backyard.

And until you travel to a wine region, I think we forget that wine is farming and

it's agriculture because the end product, the bottle of wine, is so sexy, right?

We forget.

just all of the grit and the farming and everything that goes into it.

And I was just enamored with that concept during my first trip to Napa Valley.

So then I started coming once a year and then twice a year,

and then I moved out here.

in 2012 and landed at Pride Mountain Vineyards, where I have been a wine

educator for the last 12 years.

And I've had the privilege of hosting guests and teaching them

about wine and kind of the same thing that I was doing at the dinner

table at Palo, but now it's my job.

And part of what also led me to move to wine country, California, was not just

to live in the wine country and Be a wine educator, teach about wine, but I also,

like many people, was really intrigued with the idea of making my own wine.

Because I knew how much joy a beautiful glass of wine or a bottle

of wine was bringing me and those around me and the joy of making wine.

Much like why I love to cook and sort of create something from nothing

and then watch people enjoy it, I really loved the idea of being

able to hold a bottle of wine in my hands and, and say, I made this.

So right away when I moved here, I learned that it's very common to make at home wine

and to creatively find grapes, whether it's leftover grapes from a vineyard where

you might work or neighbors who grow them in their backyard and don't use them.

And um, it's pretty easy to have a rustic setup and make wine at home

in, in buckets and glass carboys.

And that's how I started just practicing.

My first wine was a Rosé of Grenache.

By the way, if you missed the episode on Rosé All Day, go back to that.

We'll talk about the beauty of Rosé there.

But I started by making five gallons of wine at a time just to go through

the process and learn the ins and outs.

And that really grew the love of and grew the desire to do it for real and

do it on a little bit of a bigger scale.

So fast forward to meeting Michael, enjoying wine together and making

more home wine together and then in 2019 is when we were able to Purchase

a half a ton of grapes and make our wine properly at a winery called A

Custom Crush, and grow it from there.

So as I'm recording this, it is the middle of August, and we are just a couple weeks

out from Harvest getting started here.

And it's always this mixture of a little bit of anxiety of the unknown

and just, you know, It's just, you know, it's a lot of work, but also

excitement of what's about to happen and what are we about to create.

That is how I got into wine and now I pretty much enjoy wine more days than not.

We really get a lot of joy and pleasure from the taste of wine.

Not just drinking to drink, but we're really fascinated with travel and how that

goes hand in hand with wine as you've.

Heard in some of my recent episodes and our travels to Italy and Mallorca when

you go somewhere new you want to taste the wine of that place that the people

from that place made with their own hands.

It's been an exciting journey and we're ready to go for Harvest 2024,

which will be our sixth harvest for our Solovato Sangiovese wine brand.

And I'll put the link in the show notes there.

I'll also link to my partner.

website, wine.

com.

If you would like to splurge and try Ting and Yellow and Purple Angel, if

you have a special occasion coming up and you just really want to

experience two super unique, super special and rare wines, you can grab

them from the link in the show notes.

So now you know more about what led me here and how I got here.

Soup with Nikki came to be, and if you have something that's pulling you in

a weird direction, something that's bubbled up and on your heart or in your

brain, I encourage you to explore it.

See, it might be worth a life change to find something that brings

you joy, satisfaction, challenge, and excitement, and can also, in

return, bring that joy to others.

So as always, if you're enjoying our podcast, please leave us a rating,

leave us a review, and please feel free to send me an email, nikki.

sipwithnikki.

com.

Dot com.

Again, nikki@sipwithnikki.com and let me know what you think

and what you'd like to hear next.

Until next time, sip well.

And I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be a writer.

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