While Sally Hemings, the half-sister of Thomas Jefferson’s wife, Martha, is perhaps the best known of the women associated with the third president, there were others, and they were all related.

Three generations of men in Jefferson’s family had relations with Hemings women. Talk about complicated. And this extended family lived at Monticello, some masters, some slaves.

In The Women Jefferson Loved, history professor Virginia Scharff looks at these relationships that Jefferson tried to keep out of the public eye and how they influenced his views on slavery and politics.

She’ll be discussing the book at Monticello November 30.

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Come taste a variety of apples you won’t find anywhere else.
PHOTO FROM VINTAGE VIRGINIA  APPLES WEBSITE

Vintage Virginia Apples and the CoveGarden Ruritan Club are hosting the 10th Annual Apple Festival at the Albemarle CiderWorks on Rural Ridge Farm in North Garden on Saturday, November 6 from 10am to 5pm.

It’s going to be a real fall affair for the whole family, with hay rides, fresh cider, apple butter making and Brunswick stew by the Ruritans. There will also be a bunch of artisanal food and craft vendors, and an apple pie contest sponsored by In The Kitchen. Music? They got that too. Faster Than Walking, Jim Waive, and Applejack Jam will be jamming.

And adults can sneak away to the tasting room for some hard cider.

And you could learn something. Workshops on heirloom apple tastings, pairing artisanal cheeses and apples, growing a winter salad garden, planting your own trees and more will be offered throughout the day.

For more information go to vintagevirginiaapples.com or call 434-297-2326.

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On Sunday, October 24, 2010, Keswick Vineyards will host the first annual

The first annual Words & Wine event, a fundraiser for WriterHouse, will be held 0n Sunday, October 24 at Keswick Vineyards from 1pm to 4pm. Wine tasting, complimentary wine glass, light hors d’oeuvres, and one raffle ticket. Ten percent of all event-related wine and merchandise sales go to WriterHouse. Buy yout tickets online, mail a check to WriterHouse, PO Box 222, Charlottesville, VA 22902, or stop by the house.

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The Kluge Estate Farm Shop will be launching its Thursday evening Wine Down event this coming Thursday, July 15 from 6-9pm. According to the Farm Shop’s Kristen Moses, the weekly event is a chance to network, taste some good wine, perhaps some new vintages, and linger around the courtyard bar and listen to music or sample the tasty menu in the Farm Shop.

The Kluge Estate Farm Shop has also extended its hours. New hours are Monday through Saturday 11am-8pm and 11am-6pm on Sunday.

“Due to heavy end of day traffic and requests to linger after hours, we want to accommodate our customers as they sip,” says Moses.

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The Virginia Arts of the Book Center will host a book launch of After Love, an illustrated poetry collection by Ryan Fox and Jeff Pike, on Thursday, July 1 at 6:30pm at its location in the Ix Complex in Charlottesville (977 Second Street SE). After Love was conceived and manufactured in Charlottesville by the poet and artist with the help of the University of Virginia Art Department and book artisans at the Virginia Arts of the Book Center.

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Elizabeth Wiegand will present selections from her new cookbook The New Blue Ridge Cookbook Authentic Recipes from North Carolina’s Mountains to the Virginia Highlands at the New Dominion Bookshop on Saturday, June 26 at 11:00am.

America’s legendary Blue Ridge Mountain region is known for its rich history and culture and, not least, its traditional cuisine. But much of what’s cooking there is new: From the southern edge of North Carolina up to central Virginia, the Farm to Table movement is thriving, and so—once again—are small farms and artisanal food providers. Caring about where food comes from, how it is grown, and how it is prepared, they have transformed the culinary scene for newcomers and old-timers alike.

The New Blue Ridge Cookbook takes a fresh look at local, seasonal foods and honors efforts of sustainability, as well as the area’s rich culinary history. It presents new approaches by chefs, farmers, and others in the know. Recipes include: Blackberry Cobbler, Sweet Potato Pancakes, Smoked Mushrooms with Creamy Polenta, Watermelon Salad with Sage Flat Bread, Mozzarella & Almonds, Heirloom Tomato and Zucchini Tart,Venison Tenderloin with Elderberry Sauce, Lavender Apple Galette,Buckwheat Pound Cake

About the Author:
Elizabeth Wiegand is the author of The Outer Banks Cookbook. Her articles on food, travel, and design have appeared in the Washington Post, Southern Living, and Our State: North Carolina. A member of the Southern Foodways Alliance, she maintains a blog at carolinafoodie.blogspot.com. She lives in Raleigh, North Carolina.

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Cheap drinks? Eats? A.J.Maher’s got the scoop at cvilledrinkspecial.com
PHOTO COURTESY A.J. MAHER

Dish recently stumbled on a local website called cvilledrinkspecials.com, which lists the various drink and some food specials at over 30 restaurants around town. It’s quite an undertaking, considering that ABC laws don’t allow restaurant to advertise such specials. But according to the site’s creator, UVA grad A.J. Maher, it feeds a need (or quenches a thirst).

“Last winter. my friends and I decided it was a pain in the a** to call bars all the time to figure out what the specials are,” says Maher. “ Since the ABC won’t let them advertise happy hours and specials, we saw a need for a one-stop resource.”

Indeed, in addition to some fabulous drink specials on the list, there are some great food deals as well. At the Biltmore, salads, sandwiches, and burgers are $5 on Wednesdays, and over at St. Maarten’s, you can get a pork BBQ sandwich with fries for $4.99. On Mondays at Wild Wing Café there are $1 kid’s meals, and over at Bel Rio they have $5 entrees along with some great wine and beer specials.

It also sounds like Maher wouldn’t mind some help, maybe some folks sending him some email or tweets about the latest deals ([email protected]), as updating the site is time consuming and not terribly lucrative.

“It’s only made me $14 in the four months of its existence, from Google ads, and I can’t sell ads to the bars.”

Still, he sounds an enthusiastic note about why he created it, “Surely other financially-struggling students and penny-wise locals were looking for food and drinks on the cheap too.”

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