2010 marked the 10th anniversary of Toast of the Town, Wine Enthusiast’s traveling consumer tasting series. Perennial favorites with wine and food lovers, the events, held this year in New York, San Francisco, Atlanta, Chicago and Washington D.C., featured over 500 wines and spirits from around the world and signature dishes—offered up in tasting portions— from acclaimed local restaurants. Notable wineries pouring this year included Casa Lapostolle, Louis Latour, Cloudy Bay, Rubicon, Yalumba, Domaine Drouhin, Biondi Santi, Clos de Tart and PerryMoore.
The series kicked off on April 8 in Atlanta, where Southern food and wine fans gathered in the Georgia Aquarium’s Oceans Ballroom, whose dramatic lighting, undulating ceilings (designed to simulate the movement of the ocean) and floor-to-ceiling glass fish tanks provided a stunning backdrop for the event.
Moving west, San Francisco’s TOTT (April 22) took place, for the fourth consecutive year, inside the elegant War Memorial Opera House. Wineries, many a mere hour from their home base in Napa and/or Sonoma, joined celebrated Northern California restaurants including the girl & the fig, holding court over five floors. The striking Field Museum of Natural History once again hosted the Chicago TOTT on May 6. As per tradition, Sue, the world’s largest and most complete Tyrannosaurus Rex fossil, kept an eye over the proceedings.
New York City’s TOTT unfolded with its usual mixture of glamour and revelry on May 24 inside Lincoln Center’s David H. Koch Theater. With the weather holding up, many of the stylish attendees chose to conclude the night on the second floor’s scenic balcony overlooking the center’s main plaza.
The series ended on a high note on June 11 with the inaugural D.C. event inside the grandiose National Building Museum. District restaurants catered to a sophisticated and international crowd and by evening’s end, lively jazz music from the David Bach Quartet prompted spontaneous dancing—an exuberant finale to a successful Toast of the Town season.