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Thu, Mar

Zuri Wine Tasting & Tours makes a complicated beverage simple

Tuanni Price gives a wine tutorial at a luncheon. Photo by Jason Lewis

Food

“Wine is a really beautiful beverage.  There is a lot of artwork that goes into making it.” -Tuanni Price, owner of Zuri Wine Tasting & Tours

By Tracey Edwards

Wine is a sophisticated beverage for a mature drinker, which separates it from other forms of alcohol.

“Wine is a catalyst for conversation,” said Tuanni Price, owner of Zuri Wine Tasting & Tours.  “If you go out with your friends, and you’re drinking vodka, or hard liquor, the conversation can very quickly can go into a different tone.  That’s the effect that hard liquor has on most people.   But if you go out with your friends, and you’re all drinking wine, it’s like a much more intellectual conversation.  It’s much more open minded.”

For many people wine can be complicated, as there are so many different types and flavors.  Zuri Wine Tasting & Tours makes it simple by educating people people through tasting events and by taking trips to Santa Barbara, Napa, and Sonoma County, where many wine vineyards are.    

It can be a daunting task to select the proper wine to match certain foods, or to find one that fits a person’s palate.  Zuri Wine Tasting & Tours solves that issue for many people.

“A lot of times people don’t drink wine because they feel intimidated by it,” Price said.  “They don’t know where to start; they don’t know what they should drink; they don’t know how they should drink it.  We teach people how to select wine in grocery stores and at restaurants.  We want them to be more confident when ordering wine.”

Because wine can be complicated, having a deeper understanding of it can be helpful.

“I say that tasting wine is like dating a man,” Price said.  “You have to approach it with an open mind and be a little cautious.”

Zuri hosts their own wine-tasting events, and they also provide their services at social events.  They can entertain groups as small as 15 people in private in-home tastings.  

“When you come to our wine tasting, people will taste wines that they cannot find in a grocery store, and they are educated about the tasting process,” Price said.

Zuri hosts wine tours to Santa Barbara monthly.  People are driven by chartered bus for a 10-hour tour, and they visit tasting rooms where they can meet the owners of the various wineries.  Twice a year there are trips to Napa and Sonoma County.  Packages include airline tickets, ground transportation, lodging, and wine tours.  

In February, Zuri Wine Tasting & Tours will host Wine Over L.A., which will be a weekend filled event.  On Friday the 17th, “Pizza, Wine, and Chatter” will kick off the weekend.  On Saturday there will be a wine tour to Malibu.  And on Sunday there will be the 5th Annual Winter Wine Festival, which is a boutique wine event held on a yacht in Marina Del Rey.  

To book Zuri Wine Tasting & Tours, or to attend one of their events, visit www.zuriwine.com, or find them on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram