Talking party wines on Food In Focus on FM 89.7 with Natascha Moy this Saturday!

This Saturday (10 November, 2012), at 4:00 pm – 5:30 pm, I will be joining Natascha Moy and two other guests on her very successful gourmet food and wine show Food in Focus on FM 89.7.  This show has been running successfully for four and a half years with a star’s line-up of great chefs, restaurant and specialty food owners, wine makers, winery owners and others who are passionate about good food and wine.

I am privileged that Natascha has asked me to join her party this weekend and excited to participate.  Without giving too much away, I will be talking about Party Wines and bringing along three good bottles which are excellent examples of what good party wine is all about.  This is live radio so it will be exciting to find out what Natascha is going to ask me and the other guests.  I just hope that I can contribute and continue to help her grow her following.  My only goal is to help you be able ‘to impress’ the next time you bring a bottle of wine to a party or other function.

I met Natascha through social media as we share a common interest around good food and wine.  We started following each other on Twitter, became friends and started to communicate and share ideas on Facebook, and now will finally have the opportunity to meet and share some good wine and good ideas and discussion together.  I love witnessing (and even better, be part of!) examples where social media really works!

Natascha is a real ‘pro’ in the radio and journalism game as evidenced by her long-running success with Food in Focus.  She has a background in magazine journalism with a Bachelor of Journalism degree and has participated in traditional and online media for years.  She has published her own food newspaper and now continues to share her insights through her radio talk show Food in Focus on FM 89.7.

Natascha and I also share a passion around gender diversity.  This year, she founded a networking movement called Girl Power which has been founded on the principle that women in business have brilliant brains but deserve something more. She runs bi-monthly networking events attended by approximately 60 women talking about everything from sales to sex, and fashion to nutrition.

Once the show is completed, I will write a blog to summarize what we discussed on Party Wines to share with you, but if you can join Natascha, me and her two other guests for Food in Focus this Saturday at 4 pm, we would welcome it.  Hope you are there with us!

Pinterest for sharing the wine lifestyle

I have slowly been adapting to social media over the years, probably at a slower rate than I should have.  It started with LinkedIn and then Facebook some four or five years ago.  Then about six months ago, I started blogging and using Twitter.  And now I use Pinterest.

Pinterest is a ‘pin board’ or scrap book where you pin pictures into various albums.  My bride loves to pin great looking guys (even though I have not been able to find my picture there yet!), her cooking recipes and other things.  I have created two wine boards, one for ‘Wine Labels’ and the other for ‘Wine Humor.’  As I find new wine labels and humorous posts on wine, I save and then pin them in Pinterest.  (I also have a few other non-wine boards.)

I like the concept in that I can find a home and quickly add related items if they are a picture of some sort.  I have about 25 Wine Labels and about 40 Wine Humor pins so far and it grows every week.  And it is possible if you have a picture in a blog post or an article that you can actually pin the blog post by attaching it to the picture you are pinning.  Therefore, it can be used as another channel to introduce people to your blogging.  Each board and each picture can also be captioned.

Feel free to follow me on Pinterest if you like.  Or just check in every now and then to have a wine laugh or see what new labels I have added.  Many of the labels are of wines I have recently drank or have drunk previously and want to remember.  I also plan on starting a board on ‘Wine Decanters’ and ‘Other Wine Paraphernalia’ very soon, maybe as soon as this weekend.

I am less interested in building a following for Pinterest than I am for other aspects of social media I use, but it is fun and and an easy way to share new dimensions of the wine lifestyle.