Mohegan Sun Winefest 2012

Whew, what an awesome whirlwind of a weekend I had at the Mohegan Sun Winefest with friends Theodora, Ashley, and Tina!

As I mentioned in my last post, we were invited as “media guests” to the event this weekend — a big thank you to Mohegan Sun for the awesome opportunity.

We headed to the wine fest around noon after our run and breakfast — and look who the first person we saw was upon entry! Why, it’s Bobby Flay!

We didn’t wait in line to say hello but seeing him was cool. :) We had wine to drink!

The grand tasting was held in a huge convention room in Mohegan Sun; there were over 1,000 wine (and beer!) brands available for tasting. Wow!

We got right down to business.

I loved this Valley of the Moon brand from California — not only were the labels cool (and creepy), but their Syrah was outstanding.

Other brands I was excited to see there but didn’t get a photo of:

• Chateau Ste Michelle
• Coppola Estate Wines (LOVE their wine)
• Kendall Jackson Winery

And many more whose names I simply forgot to write down because I was too busy tasting them. :)

The girls and I obviously had an awesome time wandering around and tasting wine. I mean, who wouldn’t? Our photos quickly changed from professional:

To silly:

:) Don’t worry, we also filled our wine glasses with water frequently!

There were also some food vendors around — both snack type samples as well as lunch food (for purchase). I had some unpictured chicken tacos for lunch, and a major tasting highlight was this amazing Black Bean Sweet Potato Dip pictured below from Wicked Natural. I was REALLY tempted to buy a jar but I didn’t want to check my bag to fly home — perhaps I’ll pick some up online? It was THAT good. And ya’ll know how I feel about black beans and sweet potatoes together. :)

After the wine tasting, we took a breather for some coffee and chair massages (randomly free and awesome), and then headed back for more. But this time, we headed for the beer!

Tina also bought us some tickets to the gun show. ;)

I’m not usually a huge beer person but I really liked a lot of the ones I tasted, including some old favorites like Magic Hat #9. I hadn’t had that in way too long!

This was apparently the weekend of the photo bomb. These dudes in the photo below got us bad. Ha!

The girls and I had big plans to go out to dinner at Bobby Flay’s Bar Americain inside the hotel following our day of tasting on Staurday, but we weren’t able to get a reservation until 10 p.m. By the time the winefest ended at 5 we were starving, so we ended up just going back to our hotel room, ordering pizza, and having a silly girls night in. It was a blast. :)

I’m on the flight home to Raleigh right now (yay for in-flight wi-fi!) — I can’t believe how quickly this weekend went by! I’ll share the rest of our weekend adventures tomorrow.

Have a great night, friends!