This piece is part of our Colatoday Q+A series. Do you know someone we should interview? Nominate them here.
Sisters, co-founders + co-hosts of Wines to Find podcast, Michelle Lester and Sandy Dawkins, are no strangers to interviews, so they sat down with us to talk about the Soda City and where to, in fact, find wine.
We asked Sandy + Michelle a few questions about their Wines to Find podcast. Keep reading to find wine resources around Columbia, where to develop your taste for wine, and the future of wine in SC.
(Read time: 6 minutes.)
1. Describe your perfect day in Columbia in a few sentences.
Michelle: Going to Soda City Market and attending some kind of Carolina sporting event.
Sandy: I like walking and enjoying the riverwalk. My daughter is super into art, so we would go to the Columbia Museum of Art and probably get brunch at some point.
2. Is wine and brunch a good pairing?
Sparkling is probably best or a lighter red. Sparkling wines go really well with fatty, salty things. Order something with a little bit of sweetness and don’t go overly dry.
3. What is your favorite local wine + where can we find it?
Wonderment Wines by Stephanie Cook. We talked to her in episode 40. She lives in Charleston, but is from Leesville and still has a farmhouse there. She travels back-and-forth from here, SC, to Sonoma to make her wine, about every other week. Her wine has won a lot of accolades too. It is very good!
If you like wine, there is something for you. NC, SC, VA, and GA are growing in wine tourism and we did a podcast episode on southeast regions that have festivals and such.
We would also recommend certain vendors around town, but know you can go to a store and ask someone what they recommend, but what they like may not be what you like. Wine always comes down to personal taste.
People or places they recommend around Columbia:
- Bryan at The Gourmet shop — We really like what he recommends and he’s someone to either ask questions to or tell you more about specific wines.
- Doug at Vino Garage — Vino Garage has great prices and we like the selection Doug puts together.
- Morganelli’s Party Store off of Forest Drive.
Some of our favorite restaurants with nice wines:
Restaurants that sometimes host wine dinners
- Ruth’s Chris Steak House
- Halls Chophouse just started doing some
- Gervais and Vine
4. What were the last 3 things y’all did locally?
- Just for fun:
Sandy:
- Attended the Carolina Cup
- Went to the Cola food and wine festival
- Went to the Art Crawl in Cottontown
- Podcast-wise
Michelle:
- We just had a bucket list interview on our latest episode.
- Attended the book talk + food and wine pairing at Femme x. We had the author on the podcast.
- We have an upcoming interview at HALL Wines.
5. Why the podcast format? Tell us how and why y’all started talking about wine on a podcast.
Michelle: I kept a wine journal and it went back like 25+ years. But when you get older, you are interested in your kids’ hobbies, but as your kids get older, you have more time for your hobbies again.
We went to France together in May 2019 and decided to start the podcast in Jan. 2020. Our first episode tells our origin wine stories and what has kept us coming back to wine.
6. I listened to your Wonderful World of Wine Radio Show with Kim episode where you talked about wine tasting intimidation due to lack of knowledge of “good wine.” Where is somewhere you would send locals who don’t know a lot about wine (or who have wine tasting intimidation) to taste test.
We came out with a couple of episodes where we really focus on this topic. Kim is a great teacher. There’s a common thought that wine is unapproachable and we talk about it in our 100th episode. Wine is subjective, so no matter what anyone says, if you don’t like it, you don’t like it. We’re just wine enthusiasts.
A few of the places we would recommend to do wine tastings are:
- Vino Garage with Doug
- The Gourmet Shop (they have many French focused wines)
- Rocky the wine guy with Palmetto Wine Sellers off of Devine Street does educational classes where he’ll give you information as he guides you through a tasting. He’ll ask questions like, “why do you not like this wine?” to help you find what you like.
A few tips when getting started:
- Taste something you like and think, “where else does this grow?” or “what other wines taste like this?”
- Find resources like our podcast + people like Doug that you trust and understand wine.
- To expand your palate, find a region or grape you like then try different kinds of wine made from that grape or in that region each week to expand your palate in different areas or soils. But still make sure it’s focused on what you like.
Sometimes there is an acquired taste to some things like wine, but as you taste more you can identify “what” it is you don’t like. And you have a comparative basis.
7. What’s one thing you want Soda Citizens to know about you, your podcast, or anything else you have going on?
Just that the more you taste, the more you know and wine really is very subjective. Don’t be intimidated and if you like pink, sweet wine then you should order it.
Also, wine is made in the vineyard, not in a winery. There are some vintage wines that can be harder to find, but just because it’s an old wine, doesn’t mean it’s good. [Sandy added laughing] That’s a whole other discussion.
8. What do you think Columbia will be known for in 10 years?
Sandy: The riverfronts in the area in general will be upcoming.
Michelle: The food and wine scene will be growing. Gallo — a large family-owned wine distributor — is moving a lot of its operations from CA to SC and bottling it here. Learn more about what this means for SC in episode 78.
After our interview, Doug from Vino Garage came over and walked us through a taste testing of this 2010 red wine. We learned about the coloring, how to smell for certain notes, and had a discussion about the notes we all tasted. Both city editors went into the interview not big red wine fans, but agreeably enjoyed this one. Just goes to show, maybe we just hadn’t had the write one until then. And thus, our infant wine palates were expanded just an inch more.
What other wine resources do you know about in Soda City? We’re talking restaurants, people, hidden gems… etc. We’d love to hear them.
