Swirl, sniff, taste, swish, spit, repeat. Four … hundred … times. While it may seem a bit overwhelming, I can think of far worse things to be doing over a long weekend in San Francisco.

It all started when Anthony Dias Blue — Andy to his friends — invited me to fly out to California to participate as a judge in the 30th annual San Francisco International Wine Competition. Winemakers from around the globe — 28 states and 27 countries — submitted 3,900 wines from 1,290 wineries to be judged in several different categories, including best white wine, best red wine, best sparkling wine and best dessert wine.

Recommended Stories

Infiltrating the Left: Going undercover and attending radical, left-wing ‘ICE Out’ trainings

USS Spruance breaks record for longest deployed destroyer since WWII

Mills strategist calls for Fishback to leave politics over false claims about investigations