Alumni in CAliforniA

SPRING 2012 VOLUME 24

M a G a z I N E

Wine Country

Yasko Cadby ’86 of Opus OneCeleste Carducci ’77 Offers the

Perfect Blend for Napa Visitors

Chaplin School Positions Itself as Food and Beverage Science Epicenter

Winemaker Jeff Cohn ’84 EarnsHigh Marks For His Big Personality Wines

The Eco-Friendly Philosophyof Honig Vineyard & Winery

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II | SPRING 2012

SPRING 2012 VOLUME 24

M a G a z I N E

Press Play

You’ll see this icon throughout the magazine, directing you to videos we’ve created with the stories. With this issue you can learn about winemaking from Jeff Cohn, take a tour of Celeste Carducci’s Napa B &B, hear from successful software entrepreneur Doug Gallagher and much more.

You can also scan this code with your smart phone to find all the videos on our Worlds Ahead website.

GO.FIU.EDU/WINESTORIES

SPRING 2012 | 1

26 On The Cover: a Singular Pursuit of Excellence Yasko Cadby ’86 is the Japan and South

Korea export manager for Opus One, the prestigious Napa Valley winery created by two icons of the wine industry: Baron Philippe de Rothschild and Robert Mondavi. Photo by Eric Risberg.

10 Going, Going…strong as director of auctions and acquisitions

for WineGavel, Gence alton ’02 has an appreciation for both the taste and the history of wine.

18 Play On & Drink Up Lisa Mattson ’97 found her dream job at

Jordan Vineyard and Winery.

20 The adventures of Fahmie & Faulk Michael Fahmie ’02 and Michael Faulk ’05

add to the charm of Bodega, a picturesque town along California’s Pacific coast.

24 a Chat with Doug Gallagher The software businessman turned winery owner talks wine, politics and business.

28 How to B the Best Duffy Keys ’75 puts a modern twist on

French traditional winemaking at B Cellars.

40 The Connoisseur Chaplin School of Hospitality and Tourism

Management Professor Patrick “Chip” Cassidy ’75 is a legend in and out of the classroom.

42 The Perfect Pairing azul Sommelier Cynthia Betancourt ’06 shares her favorite food and wine

combinations.

Eduardo Merille ’97, MBA ’00 captured this sunset image of B Cellars on the evening that owner Duffy Keys hosted an FIU Alumni Association soiree at the Calistoga winery.

I’m delighted to present this special issue of

FIU Magazine. We conceived a wine country

theme around last year’s inaugural Alumni

Association Wine Country Weekend. We

discovered there are graduates of FIU’s Chaplin

School of Hospitality and Tourism Management

in high-profile positions throughout California’s

wine country. Among them: winery owners,

a winemaker, the owner of an historic Napa

B&B and a rare wines auctioneer. We have

business and journalism graduates working in

the wine industry as well. Some of our alumni in

California were already friends, but many were

unaware of the fellow Panthers right down the road. Stop in and say hello to

them on your next visit to California’s wine region.

I traveled with FIU Marketing and New

Media Director Eduardo Merille ’97,

MBA ’00 to Napa and Sonoma counties

to interview, photograph and video

these graduates. It was a real treat

to spend time with each of them and

learn about the hard work and vision

that has gone into their success.

You’ll find their stories throughout the

issue, along with links to their videos.

We’ve included stories on the School

of Hospitality and a few guides for

experienced and new wine lovers. I

hope you will enjoy this issue as much

as we enjoyed putting it together.

Finally, some good news: FIU Magazine has won its first writing award. Our

Fall 2011 cover story, “Bragging Rights & Basic Truths,” captured a Feature

Story/General News Award of Excellence from the Council for Advancement

and Support of Education. Congratulations to the entire magazine team!

Cheers!

Deborah O’Neil MA ’09

from the editor

FIU Magazine editorial advisory Board

Lourdes Balepogi ’00 President of Chispa marketing

fred Blevens honors College fellow and Professor School of Journalism and mass Communication

Gisela Casines Associate dean College of Arts and Sciences

Carol damian Professor of Art history director and Chief Curator frost Art museum

Paul dodson Assistant Athletic director for media relations

Stephen fain Professor emeritus College of education

Susan Jay director of development College of engineering and Computing

Nicole Kaufman mS ’06 director of Corporate & foundation relations division of University Advancement

Larry Lunsford Associate Vice President for Student Affairs University ombudsman

maureen Pelham director of Clinical trials division of research

rafael Paz, esq. Associate General Counsel

heather radi-Bermudez ’06 marketing Coordinator School of Journalism and mass Communication

mary Sudasassi director of Public relations College of Nursing and health Sciences

duane Wiles interim executive director fiU Alumni Association

FIU MaGaZINe Division of external relations

Sandra B. Gonzalez-Levy Senior Vice President External Relations

terry Witherell Vice President External Relations

Karen Cochrane Director News and Communications

deborah o’Neil mA ’09 Editor, FIU Magazine

martin haro ’05 associate Editor

Aileen Solá-trautmann art Director

mariel de moya Designer

WritersSissi aguila ’99, Ma ’08Dianne Fernandez ’94Bryan GilmerMichelle LockeJean Paul Renaud MBa ’11

PhotographersDoug Garland ’10Doug HungerfordSamuel LewisEduardo Merille ’97, MBa ’00Gloria O’ConnellIvan Santiago ’00Eric RisbergJosh Ritchieangel Valentin

FIU Board of TrusteesMichael M. adlerSukrit agrawalCesar L. alvarezJose J. armasJorge L. arrizurietaRobert T. Barlick Jr.Thomas a. BreslinMarcelo ClaureGerald C. Grant Jr. ’78, MBa ’89Mayi de la Vega ’81albert Maury ’96, ’02Patrick O’KeefeClaudia Puig

Copyright 2012, Florida International University. FIU Magazine is published by the Florida International University Division of External Relations and distributed free of charge to alumni, faculty and friends of the university. Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission is prohibited. To reach us call 305-348-7235. Alumni Office: Write to Office of Alumni Relations at MMC MaRC 510, Miami, FL 33199 or call 305-348-3334 or toll free at 800-FIU-ALUM. Visit fiualumni.com. Change of address: Please send updated address information to FIU Office of Alumni Relations, MARC 510, Miami, FL, 33199 or by email to alumni@fiu.edu.Letters to the Editor: FIU Magazine welcomes letters to the editor regarding magazine content. Send your letters via e-mail to alumni@fiu.edu, by fax to 305-348-3247 or mail to FIU Magazine, Division of External Relations, MMC PC 515, Miami, FL, 33199. Letters may be edited for length and clarity. all letters should include the writer’s full name and daytime phone number. alumni, please include your degree and year of graduation.11971_11/11

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fiU magazine is printed on 30% PCW recycled paper that is certified by the forest Stewardship Council

2 | SPRING 2012

By Juan Gomez ’99 Master Sommelier, The Breakers Palm Beach

LILA Photo, Courtesy of The Breakers

A single glass of wine offers something more beyond complexity and

taste. Every sip transports you to different wine regions of the world and their

languages, cultures, politics, religion, food, people and much, much more.

I first began learning about wine when I was a student at FIU. I was born

in a small coastal town in the south of Mexico, where we drank tequila and

beer. I moved to the United States to learn English and ended up pursuing my

hospitality management degree at FIU, one of the best programs in the nation.

My first wine class at FIU left an impression, but at that time, I was unaware of

the impact it would eventually have on my life’s passion and pursuit.

During my senior year, I joined the legendary Breakers in Palm Beach, a

AAA, 5-diamond luxury hotel, as a food and beverage intern. I started out by

working in all the restaurants; I wanted to experience what each one of them

had to offer. It became apparent that working in The Breakers’ 5-diamond

L’Escalier was perfect for me. Working in a fine dining establishment presents

the kind of challenge that I crave, one that requires the ability to be extremely

knowledgeable about food, wine, beverage and service. I knew I was in the

perfect place, but also that I would be starting at an entry level as a server.

To assist me for the position, I took the mandatory 16-week wine class The

Breakers offers and it was then that everything began falling into place.

The wine class was so fascinating! Being educated as a sommelier, the

world of wine exposed me to travel and interactions with people in unique

professions related to food and wine. Along my journey, I have made many

new friends and discussed fascinating topics such as new wine laws, food,

world economies, the arts and other subjects inspired by my passion for wine.

The greatest part of this learning experience has been relating my adventures

to guests with every bottle I recommend.

I was thrilled to be hired as a sommelier so that I could put my theory

into practice. The career path I have chosen is more than just chance; it has

become the driving force to share what I love and savor about life with others.

I’ve had the opportunity of a lifetime working in one of the best resorts in

the world for Virginia Philip, a master sommelier and my mentor. With her

support, The Breakers’ solid wine program and Grand Award-winning wine list,

and my own passion, I decided the timing was perfect to pursue my master

sommelier diploma in 2002.

That journey was as exciting and inspirational as when I first entered the

profession. With every wine that I tasted, every book that I read, every wine

region that I visited and every bit of advice that I received from experts in the

field, I was captivated by the world of wine.

The 2007 vintage brought my dream of becoming a master sommelier to

a reality. The years I spent living and breathing the culture of wine took time,

but like a wine of great age, these experiences have matured my knowledge

and developed my skills as a sommelier. Persevere toward your passion with

attention and appreciation as it takes time to excel and enjoy your craft. My

best advice to achieve your great vintage cuvée: Be consistent and above all

live your passion.

SPRING 2012 | 3

We are proud to salute FIU Panthers point guard Jerica Coley, who has made headlines as one of the nation’s

elite scorers this season. In February, she was named the 2012 Sun Belt Conference Women’s Basketball Player

of the Year. Just as exciting as the sophomore’s performance on the court is her performance in the classroom.

Coley has a 3.35 GPA as a dietetics and nutrition major and hopes one day to be a university professor.

Congratulations to this outstanding FIU Panther!

Florida International University and Partners in Education

Snapshots in Excellence

One of the most important responsibilities that I have as president is to represent our good institution in our community. A key

part of this representation is to tell the story - what we are doing, how we are working to improve community well-being and solve

community issues and how beneficial this can be for our partners.

So it has been a real thrill to participate in the growing relationship between our School of Tourism and Hospitality Management

and Southern Wine & Spirits Company, led by Harvey and Wayne Chaplin. The Chaplins are a visionary father-son duo who now

honor us with their family name on the school.

Both as provost and now president of FIU, I have made countless trips to their North Miami headquarters over the last decade

to chat, to share hopes and dreams and to figure out mutual challenges and opportunities. Having had the privilege of working

directly with my dad (and mentor) back in the day (in our much smaller family business), I often imagine myself in Wayne’s shoes,

as he and his wise father move through their daily business and family routines. So at a personal level, just being with the Chaplins

at their polished round conference table has allowed me to relive – albeit vicariously – moments with my father that can never

otherwise return.

Their significant commitments to our School of Hospitality and Tourism Management have made a difference for a generation

of our hospitality graduates. Thanks to them and many on their staff, we have one of the nation’s top hospitality and tourism

management programs. With their support, the Southern Wine & Spirits Beverage Management Center has been at the forefront of

beverage tasting and analysis technology. It has served as an important resource for students, faculty, industry professionals and our

community. Soon, our university and the South Florida community also will benefit from our new state-of-the art teaching restaurant,

which is a reality thanks to the Chaplin family. Without their continuing support and thoughtfulness, the Food Network South Beach

Wine & Food Festival would not have come into existence. This annual mega-event offers unparalleled opportunities for our students

to work shoulder-to-shoulder with some of the world’s great culinary and wine specialists.

We also have been proud to establish the Harvey R. Chaplin Eminent Scholar Chair, the first and only funded chair dedicated to

beverage management. This once again helps us to stay at the leading edge of hospitality management research and education.

Harvey and Wayne stand as exemplars of the power of partnership and win-win relationships. We look forward to working with

them and their excellent staffs to build an even stronger hospitality and tourism management program with deeper local, national and

international impact! We are proud to welcome formally the Chaplins to our FIU family!

P.S. I invite you to watch a video about our students’ participation in this year’s Food Network South Beach Wine

& Food Festival

PreSideNt’S CorNermArK B. roSeNBerG

Be WorldsAheadSPRING 2012 | 5

Snapshots in Excellence

2012 Food Network South Beach Wine and Food Festival: President Rosenberg is joined at the Q by festival organizer Lee Schrager, Southern Wine & Spirits’ Wayne Chaplin and Chaplin School of Hospitality Dean Mike Hampton. At the Tribute Dinner, Southern Wine and Spirits’ Harvey Chaplin was on hand to honor celebrity chef Charlie Trotter (right). Photos by Ivan Santiago ’00 and Seth Browarnik/World Red Eye Productions

GO.FIU.EDU/SOBE2012

6 | SPRING 2012

Napa Living

BY SISSI AGUILA ’99, MA ’08

PHOTOS BY EDUARDO MERILLE ’97 MBA ’00

UNCORKED

Nearly 4.5 million people visit Napa

Valley each year. It’s a bucket list

experience: Wine tours. Gourmet food.

Picturesque rolling hills. Pampering.

For Celeste Carducci ’77, the dream is

being able to offer her guests a blend

of everything she loves.

GO.FIU.EDU/cARDUccI

SPRING 2012 | 7

Carducci owns the historic McClelland-

Priest Bed & Breakfast Inn in Napa’s

historic Abajo-Fuller Park District. Her guests

are treated to the full Napa Valley experience

– one the FIU alumna has perfected, much

like the fine wines for which the region is

known. Her luxury B&B combines more than

30 years in the hospitality business and a

unique talent set.

Carducci started out in the industry

working for her mother at the Seaway Hotel

in upstate New York. Her mom was one of

the first female hotel managers in the area,

and by her side, Carducci learned it all:

housekeeping, lifeguarding, night auditing

and front desk management.

After completing a summer hotel program

at Cornell University, Carducci was officially

in love with the hospitality industry. She

attended FIU’s Chaplin School of Hospitality

and Tourism Management after hearing

from industry managers that the school was

among the best for job placement and hands-

on experience.

Right out of college, she was hired by the

Marriott Corporation and then went on to work

for a wine distributor in Washington, D.C. for

several years. In her spare time, Carducci

taught health and fitness classes in Virginia.

Shortly after, she took a management position

with Nieman Sporting Clubs of America.

Carducci’s ultimate goal was to meld her

talents and expertise in the hospitality

industry. Moving to Napa and opening a B&B

was the first step. “I finally began pursuing

my dream of blending the careers that I so

much enjoyed when I moved to California,”

she says.

In 1988, Carducci bought the grand 1879

Second Empire Italianate mansion from

Dr. Ethel Priest. The house was the former

residence of Joseph McClelland, the owner

of Napa’s general store. She lived in the

home while renovating. The McClelland-

Priest Bed & Breakfast Inn opened with two

rooms in 1991.

The house offers a glimpse into Napa’s past.

“What I have done is bring the house back

to its former splendor, making every effort to

preserve its historic integrity,” says Carducci

of the 5,800 square-foot home listed in the

National Register of Historic Places. The

chandelier, marble fireplace and wallpaper are

original to the house.

The now six-room B&B features large

suites with fireplaces, Jacuzzi tubs and

private baths. Each room is named in honor

of a famed composer, writer or artist. The

former library, now the Carducci suite, is

named in honor of Celeste’s grandfather,

Giosuè Carducci, who won the Nobel Prize

in literature.

The historic landmark, which feels like a

family home with family photos throughout,

plays host to weddings, private receptions

and tourists from around the world

throughout the year.

Carducci says more and more tourists are

taking advantage of B&Bs. Large vacation

search engines like Expedia have begun

featuring them. And even in a struggling

economy, Carducci’s bookings ran over

8 | SPRING 2012

Celeste Carducci and Bruce Ahnfeld serve Ahnfeld & Carducci wines

at their Napa wine tasting room, Uncorked.

Continued

9

industry average last year.

Hospitality and face time with innkeepers

are a few of the reasons B&Bs are becoming

more popular. Unlike big hotel chains,

Carducci adds, “we’re all unique.”

At McClelland-Priest, health is paramount.

Every morning, Carducci, who teaches

nutrition at Napa Valley College, prepares

a two-course, gourmet breakfast with her

guests’ health in mind. “I shop daily and try

to buy local whenever possible. California is

great for fresh fruit.”

She also serves as a fitness guide for her

guests. The B&B offers one-hour sessions

that can include yoga, stretching, body

sculpting, running, walking, or spinning. For

those who prefer something less structured,

Carducci recommends walking trails with

breathtaking views.

Fitness fanatics are naturally attracted to

McClelland-Priest. On the B&B’s Facebook

page, Monica Parikh wrote, “See you in April

for the HITS Napa Valley Triathlon! It will be

such a pleasure to relax in McClelland-Priest

luxury after I kick ass :).”

In 2007, Carducci started looking for a

new venture to add to the mix. “Napa was

missing a wine bar,” she says. Having spent

years in the wine industry and studied

wine at FIU, in France and in Italy, she was

confident that she and her husband Bruce

Ahnfeldt could pull it off.

They bought and renovated a circa

1900 home in downtown Napa. In 2009,

the pair opened Uncorked at Oxbow, an

untraditional tasting salon where guests

are encouraged to get up and sing or play

the guitar.

The wine bar also serves the couple’s

award-winning Ahnfeldt & Carducci Wines.

“When we first bought the place we would

hold some of the grape harvest to make

wine. Today, we hold all our harvest to

produce our red wine.”

Wine enthusiasts are savoring Uncorked.

In 2011, Carducci submitted 12 Ahnfeldt

and Carducci Wines to the San Francisco

Chronicle Wine Competition, all 12 were

awarded medals. In the 2011 America Fine

Wine Competition, the 2007 Ahnfeldt White

Label 100 percent Cabernet Sauvignon took

home gold and the 2007 Ahnfeldt Merlot

won the organization’s silver award.

On Yelp, a popular website where people

rate bars and restaurants, Carducci’s wine

bar has four-and-a-half stars. Don D. from

Beverly Hills says, “The provocative wines

were supreme. If you like smooth red wine,

this is the place to try. Make sure you buy

your bottles before you leave because you

will not find them anywhere else…trust me

on this one folks.”

Local Sharon C. says, “This is the most

fun tasting room in Napa! Friendly and fun

and nothing pretentious here!” Carducci’s

guests take home the perfect souvenir: the

experience of a lifetime. n

FIU Magazine Editor Deborah O’Neil MA ’09 contributed to this story.

SPRING 2012 | 9

Carducci’s McClelland-Priest

Bed & Breakfast in historic Napa

is listed in the National Register

of Historic Places.

9 9

I meet Gence Alton ’02 at his Napa

Valley warehouse shortly after he’s

uncorked a Barbaresco of distinguished

heritage. The vintage tag has fallen off this

particular bottle of Italian wine, made from

the Nebbiolo grape, so it’s hard to gauge

its exact age. But judging from its color

- a rich caramel - and the

collection it came from, it’s

clearly several decades old.

It’s not your typical mid-

afternoon beverage, but

Gence (ghen-JAY) Alton

doesn’t have a typical

office job. He is director of

auctions and acquisitions for

WineGavel, a San Francisco-

based specialty auction

house that sells rare and

highly prized wines online

and at live auction.

Gray skies are hanging over Napa and,

in the vineyards, harvested vines droop

forlornly in the damp air. But inside the

warehouse there’s a cheerful bustle of

activity as Alton and his colleagues get

wines ready for sale, which includes

sampling the Barbaresco, part of a bigger

lot, since it’s crucial to know whether the

wines have been kept properly.

Alton has been with WineGavel, an

emerging company, for about a year. “It’s

growing. Every day we have both the

dizzying, addictive fun of growth and also

the issues of growth,” he says. Weekly

Internet auctions are the mainstay of the

company, with live auctions being held

about a half-dozen times a year. Alton

jokes that he’s a dealer in “second-hand

wine” – the wine hasn’t been used but

it is pre-owned. But it’s clearly serious

business to him to make sure the wine

has been cellared carefully and to explain

its history, or “provenance,” to the buyer.

Alton, born and raised in Istanbul,

came to wine by way of food. His parents

were leery of him studying hospitality,

which at the time in Turkey wasn’t a

very distinguished field of study, so he

got a degree in international relations

from Bilkent University, a leading Turkish

institution. The natural next step would

have been the Foreign Service, but the

call of a career in food persisted and he

started looking at schools in

the United States, eventually

picking FIU.

In his first week at the

university, he took a wine

class taught by Professor Bill

Hebrank. “It was Wine 101

and he walks into this two-

hour session with about 10

bottles of German riesling.

And throughout those two

hours we taste every one and

he basically is telling these

stories, where they came from, why the

styles are so different. I had no idea

that something like riesling could be so

different. There were so many variations.”

Alton walked out a confirmed wine-

lover with a new passion to pursue. His

studies essentially were completed in

1999, although a series of interruptions

meant he picked up his degree in 2002.

He’s continued his wine education since

10 | SPRING 2012

then, and is a candidate for the prestigious Master of Wine title

after getting his degree in Wine & Spirits from the Wine & Spirit

Education Trust.

Meanwhile, after graduating FIU, he worked as a retail wine

buyer for some years, which was interesting but physically and

psychologically grueling with its requisite thousands of tastings per

year. “We had to kiss a lot of frogs to find the princes out there.”

These days he still tastes plenty of wines, but at a bit more

manageable rate, like the Barbaresco, which was part of a collection

that goes back to the 1930s and has an interesting past. The original

owner was apparently a smuggler, and a man with excellent taste

in wine. He was jailed, his cellar confiscated and sold to a storage

company that consigned the lot for auction.

So much for the back story. How did it taste after all these years?

Good, it turns out. Beautifully aged, the wine was balanced and

elegant and showed a wonderful acidity. Ever the foodie, Alton

pictured it going very well with a truffled risotto.

Of course, a lot of wine sold at auction won’t ever see a glass but

will be resold as an investment, which is something Alton has mixed

feelings about. He likes to see wine treasured as a collectible, but he

likes to see it being consumed the way the producer intended, too.

That’s the magic of wine, he points out.

“When you open a special bottle for a special night and people

are just blown away by it and they really appreciate it – that synergy

that happens when an old bottle of wine brings people together is

unshared by any other product,” he says. “That’s what makes old

and rare wine so fascinating.” n

Michelle Locke is a freelance wine writer in California.

BY MIcHELLE LOckE I PHOTO BY EDUARDO MERILLE ’97, MBA ’00

GO.FIU.EDU/ALTON

SPRING 2012 | 11

Bacchus Smiles

12 | SPRING 2012

When

On a Sunday afternoon at the end

of harvest, JC Cellars owner and

winemaker Jeff Cohn ’84 is talking

about wine. With him, it’s easy to see just

how much wine can express the personality

of its maker.

“With cabernet you have to dress up in a

jacket and tie. With zin and syrah you run

around naked and free,” he says with a grin.

“Syrah, petite syrah, marsanne, grenache are

all very romantic.”

This is no stuffy lecture on the secrets of

the cellar. Cohn sprinkles the conversation

with words like “sexy” and “exciting” to

describe wine. He uses grape-stained

fingers to point out the big fermenting tank

that they call “the hippo.”

It’s not hard to imagine why his mentor and

fellow winemaker Pam Starr jokes that Cohn

is “not allowed in the suit club.” Cohn’s wines

– lively Rhône varietals and opulent zinfandels

that regularly earn 90+ ratings – are bursting

with joie de vivre. Wine Spectator has

named JC Cellars one of the top California

zinfandel producers and given Cohn the title

of Zinfandel Specialist.

“He’s known for his zinfandels and zany left-

field varieties. It’s just appropriate for Jeff,”

Starr says. “He has an enthusiasm and zest

for winemaking that I rarely run across.”

Cohn and his wife Alexandra Cohn MS ’87,

a fellow hospitality graduate, opened

JC Cellars in 2005 as an urban winery

in Oakland, CA. They are successful

entrepreneurs in a highly competitive

industry, combining her business

savvy and his artistic vision with a lot

of hard work. Owning a winery means

wakeup calls before dawn to check on

fermenting grapes, hours on the road

visiting vineyards, business trips around

the country and the risk that comes with

depending on Mother Nature’s generosity.

An accountant with a background in hotel

and winery consulting, Alexandra runs the

business side of JC Cellars. She travels

for the winery, “eating my way across

America,” she jokes, managing business

relationships and public relations. “There

are tons of fabulous people in the wine

industry,” she says. “I’m really proud to say

those people are my friends. You have a

growing, close-knit community.”

The serious work of making a mark in the

wine industry seems to have done little to

diminish Cohn’s irreverence. A few years

ago, the winemaker promised to dye his hair

purple if he received a score of 95 or above

on any JC Cellars wine. He got two, a 95 from

Connoisseurs’ Guide for his Fess Parker 2005

Syrah and a 96 from The Wine Advocate for

the Philary Syrah.

The winemaker made good on his promise,

posting the proof online and noting, “It won’t

wash out. I still have some pink highlights.”

An irresistible callingNeither of the Cohns was born into the wine

world. Pluck and talent got them there.

Although both attended FIU, they met after

graduating during an orientation at the Hyatt

Regency Crystal City in Virginia. Alexandra

was an accounting trainee and Jeff was

the food and beverage cost controller for

the large convention hotel. Alexandra even

remembers the day they met: June 3, 1987.

Their leap into the wine industry didn’t

come for years, although wine seemed to

beckon Cohn everywhere he landed, starting

with FIU.

Cohn took his first wine class at FIU and

remembers tasting two wines in David Greer’s

class that got him excited: a Ridge Fiddletown

Zinfandel and a Châteauneuf-du-Pape. “They

had so many layers and were so complex

because they were blends,” he says. “The

influence I got from that has carried through.”

With help from then-Professor Steve Moll,

now the BBC vice provost, Cohn landed a

job as the food and beverage manager for

Bacchus SmilesAlUMNI COUplE JEFF AND AlExANDrA COhN MAKE WINEs WIth BIG pErsONAlItY At thEIr JC CEllArs WINErY

SPRING 2012 | 13

By DEBoRAH o’NEIL MA ’09 I PHoToS By EDUARDo MERILLE ’97, MBA ’00

When GO.FIU.EDU/cOHN

Continues next page

“Wild n’ Zinful,” the wine that convinced Kent

Rosenblum to hire him at Rosenblum Cellars,

the acclaimed producer of zinfandel.

During his 10 years at Rosenblum, the young

winemaker became a star. Cohn made the first

zinfandel ever to grace Wine Spectator’s Top

10 Wines of the Year – the 2003 Rosenblum

Rockpile Road Vineyard Zinfandel. Cohn’s zin

was the third best wine of 2005, right behind a

Joseph Phelps Insignia and a Châteauneuf-du-

Pape, the wine that had opened his eyes at FIU.

He left Rosenblum in 2006 to dedicate

himself to JC Cellars. Today, his winery

produces 5,000 cases of wine per year with a

staff of five, including the Cohns. Their wines

are sold in 26 states and range in price from

$25 to $85.

The accolades keep rolling in for the winery.

In January 2012, Wine Spectator’s Tim Fish

described JC Cellars recent releases as

“outstanding,” singling out the “big, distinctive

St. Peter’s Church Vineyard bottling, loaded

with flavor and personality.”

The creation of a single bottle of wine takes

far longer and far more effort than many

people realize, Alexandra points out. “People

think the wine industry is such a romantic

industry. It’s a lot of hard work,” she said. “You

have 18 months when you are making product

know that would lead to more phone calls

and visits. He’s just not going to take no for an

answer.”

Cohn remembers how Starr made him taste

grapes off the vine, week after week. He

learned from her one of the most important

lessons of winemaking: Don’t rely on numbers

to make your wine. “If it’s not ripe, you need

to wait, even if the numbers say otherwise,”

Cohn wrote in his newsletter. “I live by this

every year, even when I see rain clouds on the

horizon (more gray hairs).”

Starr says Cohn hasn’t changed much since

she first met him 20 years ago. He still asks

her questions that are “sideways enough to

make you think, ‘Why is this person asking

that? Some of his questions have led me to

say, ‘Well, why don’t I do this?’”

“He has become a really great winemaker,”

she says. “He has a very good reputation with

growers and that’s an excellent reputation to

have – your ability to be true and honest.”

Science and artWhile he was studying enology at Fresno

State, Cohn had the chance to pick a

quarter ton of fruit from Robert Biale’s Aldo’s

Vineyard in Napa Valley, famous for its old

vine zinfandel. With those grapes he made

Windjammer Barefoot Cruises. He spent two

or three weeks a month cruising and in his

downtime, he hung out in his friend’s wine

shop in Martinique.

Later, he took a job at Sutton Place Gourmet

in Washington, D.C., where the wine buyer

began teaching him about wine. He took

advantage of his employee discount to taste

and learn more.

He worked one harvest season at Boordy

Vineyards in Maryland, doing everything from

picking grapes to cleaning barrels.

And finally, after years of working in various

hospitality jobs, Cohn told Alexandra: “I think

I want to go back to school and become a

winemaker. I think I can do it.”

Cohn enrolled at California State University,

Fresno to earn a master’s degree in

agricultural chemistry with an emphasis on

enology. Early on, he met Starr, then the

winemaker at Spottswoode in Napa Valley.

Cohn’s earnest desire to learn made an

impression on her that still lingers.

“I remember being grilled by a very

enthusiastic student of enology, asking

questions like, ‘Why isn’t my wine going

through malolactic fermentation?’ It was so

pure and honest,” Starr says. “I told him to

go back and work on it some more. I didn’t

14 | SPRING 2012

Continued

before you have anything to sell the first vintage out.”

Here’s how it happens: It takes one year to grow the grapes, and

hopefully the weather cooperates, giving the vineyards just the right sun

and rain, at the right times. The winemaker decides when to pick the fruit.

There’s no formula for knowing when the moment is right. Cohn relies

more on his senses than the myriad measurement tools available to the

winemaker. By the end, the winemaker is praying day by day that the

weather will hold out.

After the grapes are harvested, it takes three weeks to ferment them, a

process that involves more important choices for the winemaker. Which

yeast to use, whether to do whole cluster fermentation, the temperature

of the fermentation, how many times to punch it down, when to press.

These decisions are part science, part artistry and all affect the quality

of the wine.

“I try not to let the chemistry rule what I do,” says Cohn. “A lot of people

who make wine say it has to be this pH and that acidity. I don’t follow

those rules. My friends will say, ‘Didn’t you look at the sugar? And I say, ‘I

don’t know anything about that.’ I go by what I think is best for the wine. I

go off the wall.”

Go for itCohn relishes the pressure and exhilaration of harvest season. “It’s

what makes me go. This is my most favorite time of the year. This is

when I get to create my vision.”

He makes his blends with a 60-milliliter syringe during marathon tasting

sessions in his Oakland lab. “To really get the feel for what the blend is

about, you can’t spit,” he said. “By the time I’m done, I’m done.”

He always tests his blends twice, coming back the next day to recreate

the wine and see if he likes it as much the second time. “Ninety-five

percent of the time, I nail it. If they come out the way they should, I go

for it.”

He remembers his 2005 wine, The Impostor, a zinfandel blend. The fruit

wasn’t what he’d hoped. It just wasn’t coming together. He kept working

at it in the lab, ultimately coming up with a blend that was 72 percent

zinfandel with syrah, petite syrah, mourvedre and viognier.

He wondered if anyone would understand this big, exotic blend. He

had taken zinfandel to a new level, making a wine that was bold and

balanced. Someone did.

The Impostor was selected as No. 52 on Wine Spectator’s Top 100

Wines of 2007.

When a wine comes together perfectly, it’s hard to pinpoint exactly

why. The outstanding vintage of 2005 left Cohn pondering the wonder of

it all in his newsletter. Maybe it was the amount of rainfall. Maybe it was

when the showers occurred. Or it could have been how the sun shined

at a particular time.

“Or it could have been that every so often Bacchus smiles down on all

of us and provides winemakers a chance to just make great wines.” n

22 QueStiOnS fOr the WinemAkerFirst wine ever made?

JC: elderberry wine from a kit.

If you had to choose another region to craft wines in what

would it be?

JC: Martinique

Favorite color?

JC: Purple

Choose another winemaker to form a winemaking

partnership with.

JC: Isabel Ferrando of Domaine st.-Préfert, laurence Feraud of

Domaine du Pegau or Julien Barrot of Domaine la Barroche

Cork or screwcaps?

JC: Cork

Favorite food/dish?

anything chocolate. anything pizza related. snickers bars and

cassoulet.

Favorite grape variety to play around with?

JC: Mourvèdre and semillon

Activity/Hobby/Pastime other than winemaking?

JC: My kids, exercise and eating.

How many countries have you traveled to?

JC: 22 different stamps in the passport!

What is your favorite beer?

JC: sierra Nevada

Peanut Butter or Nutella?

JC: Can’t we all get along together, forever?!

What is the most reoccurring dream or nightmare you have

during harvest?

JC: Who has time to sleep, let alone dream?

Do you have a name for your press?

JC: No name for the press.

Favorite vintage from your winery?

JC: 2003 and 2005

What snack gets you through the day?

JC: Diet Dr. Pepper, roasted almonds, snickers and popcorn.

When you take a vacation, where do you go?

JC: Cabo, baby!

What is that one bottle in your cellar that you are most

looking forward to drinking one day?

JC: a 1990 Henri Bonneau Cuvee speciale.

What do you never leave your house without?

JC: My keys and my cell phone.

What was your favorite subject in school?

JC: Physics and lunch.

If you couldn’t make wine anymore, what would you do?

JC: Be a stay-at-home dad and let my wife work at a CPa firm.

What is the one thing you wish someone would have told

you before you entered the wine industry?

JC: That being on the road selling wines was stressful.

Name and breed of your favorite dog?

JC: I had an airdale when I was a kid but now have a

Welsh Terrier.

This Q&A was prepared by Hospice du Rhone, the world’s largest

celebration of the 22 Rhône variety wines, and originally appeared

online at hospicedurhone.org.

SPRING 2012 | 15

Wine GrapesIt all starts on the vine, where wine grapes produce the sugar that yeast will turn to alcohol. These grapes are different than the green and red table grapes at the supermarket, chosen for their unique flavor elements. All grape juice is clear; red wine’s color comes from soaking with red grape skins. You can get white wine from red grapes or soak a little and make the wine pink.

Wine 101Does the Glass matter?Yeah, a little. A tall champagne stem shows off the bubble trails. And the bulb of a stemmed wine glass gathers aromas, so pour one only half full. But glassmakers offer a ridiculous number of shapes. You don’t really need a different glass for cabernet and zinfandel – you’ll enjoy yummy wine in a juice glass with a rooster on the side..

oak barrelsWhen winemakers stored their stuff in oak barrels centuries ago, they noticed it added a vanilla flavor. Today, a winemaker influences the flavor of wine by deciding whether to use barrels made from European or American trees, determining how much the inside of the barrel is charred and how long to age the wine in the barrel.

FinD a Wine You’ll love:A wine made from and named after just one wine grape variety is known as a varietal wine, which is common in the United States, Australia and Germany. These are the most common California varietals:

reds:Merlot: Old-school French Bordeaux grape with mellow plum/cranberry flavors. Good with food or alone.

Cabernet sauvignon: Merlot’s Bordeaux brother tastes like berry jam and smells of pipe tobacco when it’s right, but it’s very tannic and full-bodied and may be too harsh without some age in the bottle or without the fat of a juicy steak alongside.

Pinot noir: Liquid velvet/lavender/raspberry elegance in a glass. Try one from Carneros in California or Oregon’s Willamette Valley.

Zinfandel: The grandpa grape of the California wine scene grows in century-old vineyards. A basket of yummy berries with a hint of spice.

Whites:Chardonnay: Tropical fruit flavors from the grapes blend with a buttery taste from special fermentation and vanilla and toast from the oak barrels.

sauvignon blanc: Refreshing, clean white wine with thinner body and subtler mineral and herb flavors.

Blends:Many winemakers love to blend wine grapes to produce complex and interesting wines, often using some lesser known varietals like petit syrah, cabernet franc or semillon. In California, some blends are labeled “Meritage,” signifying that they are made in the Bordeaux style of France. The best way to get to know blends is to try some.

rosé: The most common U.S. pink wine is white zinfandel, made from the same grape as red zinfandel. It’s sweet and lower in alcohol because fermentation leaves behind some sugar. Some wine buffs look down on white zin, but it’s the first wine many ever enjoy. Around the world, you’ll find dry (not sweet) pink wines that are as serious as they come.

16 | SPRING 2012

aGinG WineFirst, make sure it’ll get better - like cabernet - or even keep without spoiling. Drink most whites and some reds, like Beaujolais Nouveau, soon after buying.

Storing wineDark, cool and consistent (55°F to air conditioned room temperature) are the rules. Racking bottles on their sides keeps the cork wet and stops air from getting in to hurt the wine. If you don’t finish your bottle of wine, FIU wine expert Chip Cassidy recommends gassing it up. Pick up a canister of Argon Gas at a wine shop and inject it into the wine bottle. The gas displaces the oxygen that spoils the wine. Both red and white wines can be stored in the refrigerator for three to five days, as the cold temperature will slow down the oxidation. Take your red wine out of the fridge an hour or two before drinking.

hoW to Drink WinePour, swirl and check out that body and nose. “Body” is a wine’s thickness and intensity of flavor. Swirl a wine in your glass and notice how much sticks to the sides. Use your nose to enjoy the wine’s “nose” or unique fragrances – more than half the experience. A musty, stale, papery smell means the wine is “corked,” or spoiled, by a compound from its cork stopper – if so, send it back.

Sip, slurp and taste. As you sip, slurp air through the wine to release its flavors. Swirl the wine in your mouth and swallow. Look for:

• Tannin: Mouth-drying, slightly bitter property like unsweetened tea.

• Dryness: Whether the wine has any sweetness. Even if perfectly dry, the wine should still taste of ….

• Fruit: California wineries are known for huge, intense fruit flavors, while many European wines, such as those from France, feature more subtle fruit.

• Acid: The sharpness or tartness of a wine. Good wines balance their acid with their fruit (and/or tannins) to create a pleasing balance of flavors.

• Complexity: Is there a circus in your mouth, or just one clown banging a cymbal?

• Terroir: Any wine may also show “terroir,” or unique flavors imparted by the particular combination of soil, sunlight, wind, rain and other conditions where it was grown.

Name of the winery

Vineyard where the grapes were grown

The vintage, the year the grapes were harvested

Location of theVineyard

Wine grape variety used

What's on the label?

SPRING 2012 | 17

As a teenager, you worked at the mcdonald’s drive-through in

Pittsburg, Kan. What wine would pair ideally with mcdonald’s

famous french fries?

Got to be Champagne.

oh, wow. i would’ve gone red with that.

No, salty foods are perfect for the acidity and the bubbles in

Champagne or sparkling wine. I just bought three cases of sparkling

wine last week. I think drinking Champagne is something that people

should not reserve for special occasions. On a Monday night with

broccoli and grilled pork, open a bottle of Champagne. It always

makes you feel good, popping a cork and listening to the bubbles.

i notice you said you bought cases of wine. i thought a big perk of

the wine biz was lots of free wine.

Well, it depends on what job you have and how much access you

have to different wines.

i guess you don’t get a free $52 bottle of Jordan cabernet as often

as a winery would give away a $9 or $10 or $12 bottle, huh.

Right. But I have friends at different wineries, and all of us get an

employee rate for our companies’ wines, so I’m able to keep the

cellar going a little bit.

You started college at Kansas State. how’d you end up

transferring to fiU?

I had a bad winter. Every now and then people from small towns

get it and say, “Oh, I don’t have to be here anymore. I’m an adult

now, and I can go wherever I want.” I was dating a guy at K State

who wanted to be a dive instructor and he said, “Why don’t we

move to Florida?” So I did.

And you majored in communications with a concentration in

hospitality management. Sounds like perfect preparation for your

current job.

I love the wine business, and I credit that to the School of

Hospitality at FIU and to Chip Cassidy’s wine class. It got me

excited about wine. And so I’ve made a career in something I

always wanted to do – communications – in an industry that’s

fascinating. Over the years, there have been so many times when

I’ve paused and thought, “I can’t believe I get paid to do this.”

i think you have my dream job. Can you explain how i failed to

choose a career in the wine industry?

That’s easy: Because you didn’t go to FIU.

oh. tell us about your gig at Jordan.

18 | SPRING 2012

originally from Gerard, Kan., Lisa mattson ’97 studied communications and hospitality management

at fiU. She lives in California’s Sonoma wine country and works as communications director for Jordan

Vineyard and Winery, a producer of high-end cabernet sauvignon and chardonnay. She’s also the

author of an irreverent memoir on the dating career that led her to her husband and soul mate, damon

mattson. North Carolina-based author and wine lover Bryan Gilmer had some questions for her.

Miami leads alumna to wine, social media and a memoir PLAY ON & DRINK UP

SPRING 2012 | 19

Since we’re a family winery, it’s pretty

all encompassing – everything from the

marketing and messaging for the brand to

public relations and digital media strategy and

execution. I do a weekly video blog. I write all

the copy for our direct-to-consumer newsletter

and sales rep presentations.

how do you use social media?

We never directly try to sell on social

media. Our idea is that if you take care of

your customers, your customers will take

care of you. We ask ourselves, what do we

have to share where we could be a helpful

resource for our followers? We did a piece on

how to make French macaroons with our chef

in the kitchen. How to prune an olive tree.

Stuff like that.

right now, i’m enjoying a glass of the ’97

Volpaia Chianti Classico riserva, and i know

you used to represent the importer of that

wine. What’s in your glass?

Um, right now Gatorade, because it’s 7 in

the morning here, and I just got back from

running 4 miles at the gym. Last night it was

Gloria Ferrer Sonoma Brut, a sparkling wine,

and yesterday at work I had our Jordan 2002

cabernet, an incredible wine. We did a vertical

tasting (several consecutive vintages) up

through our 2008 cab. It’s amazing to see how

those wines age. Hmm...isn’t it only 10 in the

morning on the East Coast where you are?

So it is. i, ah, wrote that question last night.

Next topic: At wine tastings, it’s customary

to swish and spit to avoid unseemly

drunkenness. explain how to do this

gracefully and without staining your blouse.

I think at everybody’s first tasting, you

don’t follow the spit rule and you get burned.

At a winery, especially in Europe, it’s easy,

because you can just spit on the floor.

When you’re in a hotel banquet room,

professionals bring their own plastic

Dixie cup. You put the cup almost to

your lip and spit into it. That’s the sign

of a true professional: a wine glass in

one hand and a Dixie cup in the other.

Also, watch out for a full dump bucket

because there’s the possibility of

something splashing up on you.

You’re looking to publish your memoir,

The Exes in My iPod, in which you use a

13-song playlist as a window into your

previous relationships – as your book’s

pitch notes, “a string of exes that could

fill a National football League roster,

53 men.” one song on the playlist is

“Brass monkey” by the Beastie Boys.

tell me about thAt guy.

Oh, God. I met that guy at FIU. In my

media law and ethics class. He was

the carefree slacker type, and I was the

girl who wanted to sit in the front row

and fill up two binders with notes. We

dated for almost two years. I would be

trying to study, and he’d come over with

a six-pack of Heineken and take out

whatever CD was in my stereo and put in

the Beastie Boys – because that was the

only one I had that he liked. He taught

me to relax and have fun. n

Get in touch with Lisa Mattson ’97 at facebook.com/exesinmyipod or @lisamattsonwine on Twitter.

PLAY ON & DRINK UP

Photo by Damon Mattson

20 | SPRING 2012

By DEBoRAH o’NEIL MA ’09 I PHOTOS BY EDUARDO MERILLE ’97, MBA ’00

Nestled along the northern reaches of California’s Pacific Coast highway is the hamlet of Bodega, a curious mix of rural charm, American pop culture and majestic coastline.

Ansel Adams came here in 1953 to photograph the iconic St. teresa de Avila church that still sits in the center of town. Alfred hitchcock filmed The Birds with tippi hedren in the early ’60s here as well. the 140-year-old Potter School featured in the movie stands just behind the church.

it is here that miami natives and college friends michael fahmie ’02 and michael faulk ’05 landed after college and decided to start a business.

GO.FIU.EDU/FAHMIE

A reAl couNtry storeA trained chef, Fahmie bought the historic

Bodega Country Store in the center of town

and, with help from Faulk, began restoring it

as a proper country store – a place where you

can buy home-cooked food, local produce

and Patty’s homemade goat cheese, batteries

and matches, California wine and books by

local authors. His website sums it up: “A nice

store in a small town.”

“I have a real working country store,”

Fahmie said. “People find it to be a bit of a

novelty these days. Bodega Country Store

represents a sort of lost Americana. I’m really

proud of what we have done here.”

Fahmie has kept intact the store’s original

kitchen, situated right next to the checkout

counter. He and his staff prepare food

throughout the day – fresh-baked cinnamon

rolls, chicken salad, crab macaroni and

cheese – using a Burton induction burner and

two small convection ovens, a microwave

and four tabletop warmers. Fahmie, who

worked at the Mandarin Oriental and as a

private chef to, among others, FIU President

Emeritus Modesto A. Maidique, has no desire

to modernize his historic kitchen.

“You embrace what you have. That’s

what I have learned as someone who came

from a place where you can get what

you want, when you want it,”

he said. “As a chef in Texas,

I flew in caviar from Russia and

salmon from Alaska. But the sign of a

really good chef is taking something

ordinary and making it extraordinary. I

make crab macaroni and cheese, and

I can’t keep it on the shelves.”

Visitors to Bodega Country Store

are greeted with a life-sized Hitchcock

outside and inside, Fahmie may

well have one of the world’s largest

collections of Hitchcock memorabilia.

A couple of times a year, Tippi Hedren

drops by the store to sign autographs.

You can, of course, pick up a copy of The

Birds. You can also say hello to Zeka, the

store’s real bird. Zeka, by the way, was Zek

until “he” laid an egg.

Fahmie caters to two crowds. The locals

are pretty well birded out and just want

supplies and good food. Tourists, on the other

hand, come from all over the world to visit the

sites Hitchcock made famous and to recreate

Ansel Adams’ black and white steeple image.

They too want good food and supplies, but

they also want to chat with someone who

knows the town’s history, and they get a warm

welcome at the Bodega Country Store

. ‘Proof thAt God loves us’Fahmie and Faulk met while they were

culinary arts students at Johnson & Wales.

After graduating, both went to FIU. Says

Fahmie, “I had a lot of industry experience,

but I wasn’t getting promoted because I didn’t

have a bachelor’s degree.” They worked

alongside FIU chef instructor Michael Moran

’86, MS ’03 at the Food Network South Beach

Wine & Food Festival for two years. Both were

mentored by FIU hospitality instructor and

wine expert Chip Cassidy ’75.

“I started taking the hospitality program so I

could be more well rounded,” said Faulk, who

also has worked as a chef and now manages

restaurants. “Chip was a major influence on

me wanting to learn about wine.”

While in college, the two did internships

as chefs at Doe Bay Resort on Orcas Island

in Washington. The beauty of the west coast

awed them. “I just wanted to be in wine

country in the Pacific Northwest,” Faulk said.

Fahmie spent the next decade working as

a private chef before deciding to “step back

Continues next page

Michael Fahmie may well have one of the world’s largest collections of Alfred

hitchcock memorabilia in his store.Michael Faulk named his wine for his Cuban grandmother, Engracia.

Zeka, the real bird, lives at Bodega Country store.

SPRING 2012 | 21

22 | SPRING 2012

and take a breath.” He took a year-and-a-half

off to travel and author Eat. Drink. Be Merry:

Vagabonding in the Americas,” a photo book

of his journey.

There are photos of pine forests and rocky

beaches, tomatoes and wine grapes, and

Fahmie canoeing and camping. Alongside

pictures of vineyards in California, Fahmie

wrote, “Wine is constant proof that God loves

us and wants us to be happy.”

A sweet GiGFahmie has family in Sonoma County, so

he had been visiting the area for years. He

had stopped at the Bodega Country Store

several times and recognized its potential.

One of Bodega’s pioneering families, the

McCaughey brothers, built the store in 1856.

But it was run down and operated as a cheap

convenience store.

“It was such a historic building in a historic

place and you come out to the coast and all

you could get was a beer and maybe a frozen

burrito,” Fahmie said.

In 2008, a business broker mentioned to

Fahmie an old country store on the coast

that was for sale. Fahmie knew exactly where

it was. He decided he would be the one to

bring back the Bodega Country Store. “I

decided to do it my way,” he says.

He wanted the store to claim its role as

the center of town life, the spot where every

passerby and local stops for food, information

and conversation. His culinary skills would

be central – he saw an opportunity to create

a menu of gourmet grab-and-go items for

visitors headed to the breathtaking coastline

just a few miles away. He also wanted to have

fun with the village’s storied past.

He called on his longtime friend Faulk to

help him out. Faulk had already settled in

California, running restaurants around Napa

and Sonoma, meeting winemakers and

winery owners throughout the region. He

also began experimenting with winemaking

at home as a hobby.

Faulk left LaSalette, a fine Portuguese

restaurant in downtown Sonoma, to help

Fahmie get the Bodega business off the

ground. The historic building had been

neglected and needed some TLC. In the

beginning as they worked on the building,

the two catered weddings and held oyster

barbecues on the weekends in the center of

Bodega. “It was a sweet gig,” Faulk says.

It took a couple of months to get the store

ready for opening. Faulk eventually returned to

the restaurant industry and is now the general

manager of Wildfox, about 40 minutes north

of San Francisco. And Fahmie now offers FIU

students the opportunity to intern at Bodega

Country Store and learn about California’s

wine country.

eAt. driNk. Be Merry.For the last five years, Faulk has been

making small-batch wine at home. He calls it

Engracia, named for his Cuban grandmother,

Engracia Perez Hernandez, who fled Cuba in

1960. The label is designed with the island of

Cuba. Dominos designate the vintage.

He works with California growers to get his

grapes and makes a merlot, pinot noir and a

chardonnay. Fittingly, the making of Engracia

is a social event and Faulk’s friends help him

out. Every year, he has a bottling party and

hosts private tastings at his house.

Faulk also welcomes FIU alumni and

students to join them. Anyone interested in

helping with harvest, bottling or just in tasting

some wine is welcome to contact him. He can

be reached through engraciawines.com.

“We have a great time throughout harvest

season,” Faulk said. “I get a group of my

friends to help me pick the grapes, then we

crush and press. When it’s ready to bottle I

call on my group of friends and we bottle and

label. We eat good food, drink great wine,

get our hands dirty and have fun doing it. It’s

basically a party, but we work first, then party.

You get this great sense of accomplishment

and it is indescribable.”

Where the winemaking will go, Faulk

isn’t sure but he’s developed a philosophy

for Engracia.

“A person does not make wine, rather

they simply guide it along during the natural

process in order to ensure that the finished

product is one of great quality,” he said.

“I prefer the term ‘Wine Father’ or ‘Wine

Mother’ or perhaps ‘Wine Parent’ rather than

‘Wine Maker.’ ”

The two friends still hold their summer

oyster barbecue across the street from the

store. And they will be happy to tell you all

about Bodega’s quirky history over a bottle

or two of Engracia. n

Continued

SPRING 2012 | 23

By Martin Haro ’05

Dr. Sergio González-Arias is living his

dreams – and toasting every milestone with a

glass of his own wine from Soñador Cellars.

When the Cuban-born, New York-raised

physician first decided he wanted to become

a neurosurgeon in the 1970s, he headed

to Europe to pursue doctoral and medical

degrees at the Universidad de Zaragoza.

When he saw a need for a multidisciplinary

department of neurosciences at Miami’s

Baptist Hospital, he helped develop it,

bringing together doctors from different

departments including neurology,

neurosurgery and neuroradiolgy. He is now

medical director of the Baptist Hospital

Neuroscience Center.

And when the doctor was invited to

join the faculty of FIU’s Herbert Wertheim

College of Medicine as chair of the

Department of Neurosurgery, he accepted

the job, enthusiastic about not only lending

an expert hand in the school’s early years

but offering students the best neurosurgical

training. González-Arias was already part

of the FIU family – his daughter Veronica

graduated from the College of Business

Administration in 1995 and his son-in-law,

Raul Maristany, received his degree in public

administration in 1997.

That go-get-it attitude was the key

ingredient González-Arias needed when

he realized in 2001 that partnering with

longtime friend and FIU alumnus Doug

Gallagher MS ’77 on Soñador was an idea

full of potential.

“My wife Maria and I were at a wine

tasting one afternoon and we just looked at

each other like, ‘Why don’t we do this?’”

That, in a nutshell, is how the doctor

got into the wine business. To be clear, this

isn’t a hobby. FIU Magazine asked the FIU

professor a few questions about medicine

and winemaking.

How does a Miami doctor get into the

California wine business?

Wine is one many interests. When I was

in Spain studying, one of my memories is of

sitting for a meal at the pensión and sharing

red wine with the people there. And my

wife Maria and I enjoy a nice glass and the

process of making wine. We started collecting

wine a long time ago, in the mid-’80s.

living on the east Coast, seeing

patients at Baptist and teaching at FIU,

how involved are you with operations

at soñador?

Winemaking is an episodic event with

a few critical moments like the harvest,

creating the blend, bottling…. We have our

consultant on site in Napa who oversees

everything for us, but we head west and

we’re there for those weeks where quality

control is essential.

Where do you stand on the debate about

a glass of red a day helping to keep the

doctor away?

There’s a lot of literature about this out

there, but I don’t think that a glass of wine

every day, for someone who is healthy and

has no liver problems, can hurt. Wine is part

of the Mediterranean diet, which is opposite

ours in every way. It’s also a social thing,

too. Maria and I have met so many different

people at tastings over the years – people

who wouldn’t otherwise come together if not

for wine. Going back to the health question, I

think our younger generation is approaching

wine better, with more balance.

speaking of balance, you run a department

at a major hospital and you teach at a

university. How do you unwind after a long

day at work?

My favorite way to unwind after a 12-hour

day at the hospital and teaching at FIU, which

I also enjoy tremendously, is to spoil my two

grandsons and let them do everything their

parents don’t let them do. The boys are 10

and 7 years old and are building a “man cave”

in one of our rooms. And every once in a while

my wife and I will take a bottle from the cellar

and have it with dinner.

you mentioned you’ve been collecting wine

for a long time. How big is the González-

arias collection?

We have about 5,000-6,000 bottles from

all the major wine-producing regions of

the world.

I imagine you’re fonder of reds.

I enjoy whites as well. At a slightly warmer

temperature than most people like it.

What’s the prescription for the best way to

keep such an impressive collection?

I keep all the wines at 52 degrees. n

When Dr. Sergio González-Arias is not seeing patients or teaching at FIU, he’s tending to his Napa winery, Soñador

The DOcTOR behIND The DReAm

24 | SPRING 2012

A sunset stroll in Doug Gallagher’s Napa

olive grove calls for a Montelena

sauvignon blanc.

For a philosophical discourse on what

makes a great entrepreneur, the founder

of a global software company pours a

2005 special cuvée cabernet from his

winery, Soñador.

Turn to talk of politics and this one-time

U.S. Senate candidate brings out the wine he

served at his son’s wedding, a 2007 Domaine

Serene pinot noir.

When you love wine as Doug Gallagher MS ’77

does, pairing it with food is just the beginning.

Wine can be the perfect accompaniment

to any event or it can be the event

itself, as it was this fall when Gallagher

welcomed me and FIU Marketing

Director Eduardo Merille ’97, MBA ’00

into his St. Helena home for an evening

of fine wine and conversation.

“Wine is a passion of mine,” said Gallagher, who earned

a master’s degree in FIU’s College of

Business Administration. “It’s part of my life and I want to share it with others.”

I wasn’t sure we’d be able to

connect with Gallagher during his

harvest season hiatus in Napa. It was his

last weekend in California before heading

home to South Miami, and he was busy

packing. Earlier in the day, he’d hosted

students from the Culinary Institute of

America for a wine tasting.

However, when we arrived, he’d set out

manchego, brie and swiss with Rustic Bakery

cheddar sticks and whole grain flatbread.

A buffet table was spread with all variety

of stemware. Gallagher greeted us warmly,

poured the Montelena and invited us to his

back porch where the October sun was

setting over cascading terraces of tomatoes,

pomegranates and olive trees in his garden.

Now retired, Gallagher spends four months

each year in Napa Valley so he can be involved

with the harvest for his wine. He lives the

Napa lifestyle when he’s there, making meals

from the day’s produce and dining at Napa’s

famously fabulous restaurants where he has

gotten to know the local chefs.

He clearly delights in treating his guests to

Napa’s bounty. Later that evening, he served

us red and gold heirloom tomatoes from his

garden with basil and aged balsamic from the

farmer’s market. He encouraged us to taste

them with the Soñador cabernet, which earned

90 points from Wine Spectator.

Wow. “So that’s what a tomato tastes

like!” Merille joked.

About 10 years ago, Gallagher and FIU

Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine

Professor Sergio González-Arias (see profile

page 23) decided to start a boutique winery in

Napa. They called it “Soñador,” the dreamer.

They began by buying grapes from Jan

Krupp at Stagecoach Vineyards and then

hired Bruce Devlin as their winemaker, which

gave them access to more vineyards. Today,

Soñador produces 300 cases of one cabernet

per year sold for $50-$60 a bottle in California,

Nevada, New York, Washington, D.C., North

Carolina and Florida. Each year, they donate a

dozen or so cases of Soñador wine to various

charities for auctions.

“What’s been most interesting about

being involved in the winemaking process

is being able to understand everything from

viticulture in the vineyard to what happens

in the fermenting process,” Gallagher said.

“There’s a lot of chemistry to winemaking and there is also

a lot of risk management involved in winemaking.”

Risk management is a subject

Gallagher knows plenty about. In 1985,

he quit an executive vice president’s

job when the company owner laid out

new compensation terms that were

unacceptable to Gallagher.

Some might call it crazy to walk

away from a job – any job – when

you’re a 35-year-old married father

of four boys. But Gallagher had a

different idea. This time around, he

decided he would work for himself.

In 1985, he founded Gallagher

Financial Systems, a company that made

software for mortgage lending institutions.

His company streamlined burdensome

mortgage lending paperwork into an

electronic process that eliminated 80

percent or more of the pre-printed forms

and provided laser printed replacement

documents. His clients included JPMorgan

Chase, Citibank and Wells Fargo. At its peak

in 2005, Gallagher Financial employed 175.

In 2007, Gallagher saw the subprime

mortgage lending crisis unfolding and decided

to sell the company he’d built from the

TALKING wINe, poLITIcs & BUsINess wITh

By DEBoRAH o’NEIL MA ’09 I PHoToS By EDUARDo MERILLE ’97, MBA ‘00

Doug Gallagher and FIU Magazine Editor Deborah O’Neil enjoy a Montelena sauvignon blanc.

DoUG GALLAGher GO.FIU.EDU/GALLAGHER

SPRING 2012 | 25

ground up. Gallagher Financial Systems was

purchased in 2008 by Wipro, a global IT giant

and Fortune 50 company. The software and

technology solutions he pioneered are now

Wipro Gallagher Solutions, used by 25 leading

banks around the U.S. and Australia.

These days, he is writing a book about

his 23 years as an entrepreneur. He’s even

come up with a catchy title for the book:

Anomalytics.

“What it takes to be a successful

entrepreneur is somewhat counter

intuitive,” he said. “Most think that the reason someone forms a company is to make money. That’s not the case. I would refute anyone who would say Steve Jobs did what he did for money. It’s about having a passion for an idea.”

Gallagher did some unconventional things

as a CEO. To make sure everyone was

focused on the client and encouraged to

innovate, his executives didn’t have titles.

Gallagher fostered a workplace culture that

was supportive of his employees’ family time.

For every year of service, his employees

received an extra paid vacation day to be

used around the holidays.

“The idea was to provide each staff

member with an incentive to be with their

family,” he said. “I’m a believer that if people

are given the ability to manage their own time,

the results in productivity will far exceed what

you expect to get from the normal process of

close supervision and management.”

Born and raised in Delaware, Gallagher

comes from a family with a strong

commitment to public service. His father was

mayor of Wilmington, Del. His older brother,

Tom Gallagher, a three-time gubernatorial

candidate, has held three Florida Cabinet

offices: insurance commissioner, education

commissioner and chief financial officer.

A lifelong Republican with a thoughtful

approach to fiscal conservatism, Gallagher

has twice run for public office and lost,

most recently the 2004 U.S. Senate race.

He campaigned as a family man and

businessman who could introduce fresh

ideas to politics.

“Our family has a culture of believing

service is a worthwhile endeavor,” he said. “I

believe it’s important for people to be involved

in the political process.”

Right about then – somewhere after the

pinot noir and a debate on the electability of

GOP candidates – Gallagher brought to the

table dark chocolate covered wine grapes.

With those jewels before us, any difference

of opinion about the upcoming presidential

election melted away. Gallagher sure knows

how to win over hearts and minds.

Over the years, Gallagher’s wine

collection has grown from a few hundred to

a 10,000-bottle cellar. He jokes that he has

enough wine to throw a party every night for

the rest of his life without running out. “My

friends always tell me they never have a bad

bottle of wine with me.”

The gracious host had one last surprise

before we left, a Spanish sherry neither

Merille nor I had ever tried. It was a 1972

Don PX, a thick and sweet, molasses and

caramel wine that we will long remember, not

merely for the wine’s astonishing decadence

but for the occasion.

As Gallagher served us, he mused aloud,

“You always wonder with wine, do you save the best for last or bring it out first?” n

DoUG GALLAGher

By Michelle Locke

Sitting in the plushly decorated formal

salon of Opus One, Yasko Cadby ’86 is the

picture of tranquil elegance as she talks

about the shaky start to her new job as Japan

export manager for the prestigious Napa

Valley winery.

She was apartment hunting in Tokyo on

March 11, 2011, when the devastating Tohoku

earthquake struck. “I was on the 21st floor

and the earthquake hit and it was, ‘Do I want

to come here?’” she recalls.

The answer was “Yes,” and Cadby took on

her new duties overseeing markets in Japan

and South Korea in June – fortunately with

few tremors of the business variety.

Cadby doesn’t really have to sell the

wine. Opus One, the brand founded in 1979

by California wine pioneer Robert Mondavi

and Baron Philippe de Rothschild of France,

is wildly popular both in the United States

and Asia. (Constellation Brands, Inc.,

purchased Robert Mondavi Corp., assuming

50 percent ownership of Opus One in 2005.)

It’s not unusual for the winery to get a call

from someone trying to put in an order for

10,000 cases, a flattering but impossible

request since it’s about half the winery’s

annual production.

Her job is to make sure people

understand the product. “At the restaurant

we just don’t want people to say, ‘Oh, we

want Opus One,’” she says. “We want them

to say, ‘Oh, I like the 2005 Opus One as

opposed to 2007 because ’05 is a little bit

more of a reserved style.’ That’s the level of

communication we want and to do that we

need to educate sommeliers.”

On a sunny day in the Napa Valley, the

Opus One winery is a symphony of good

impressions, from the sweep of green

vineyards leading up to the winery to the mix

of soothing – but not soporific – music playing

over outdoor speakers. That last item is no

accident. As coordinator of guest relations

here, Cadby pulled out her own CDs to help

liven up the music selection.

Paying attention to detail is a key part of

the Opus One experience, says Cadby.

“Even when I come here now, I feel the

sense of urgency,” she says. “Your back

A SinGulAr PurSuiTof EXCEllEnCE

Opus One export manager Yasko Cadby ’86 keeps an eye on the big picture and the little details

26 | SPRING 2012

needs to be straight.”

The winery, which makes only Bordeaux

blends, primarily cabernet sauvignon, is

famous for its distinctive architecture, in

particular a rotunda set low to the ground

and surrounded by a grassy berm, part of

a conscious effort to create something that

complements rather than contrasts with

its environs.

The slender and soft-spoken Cadby

is one of the few U.S. winery

representatives in Asia. She’s also a

woman executive in a climate that

isn’t as male-dominated as it used

to be, but can still be conservative.

But it doesn’t take more than few

minutes of conversation to see

the expertise and enthusiasm that

drive her– and a delightful sense

of humor, too. Should she need to

be assertive in a negotiation she

occasionally brings out her secret

weapon: Saying “No” politely but

firmly in English. “They understand,”

she says with a smile.

Cadby, who was born and raised

in Japan, didn’t start out expecting

to be managing the finer points of

high-end wine, or any wine for that

matter. After getting a business

degree from Sophia University in

Tokyo she wasn’t quite sure what

she wanted to do, but she knew

she was interested in the airline

travel industry. She looked at a few

schools but finally settled on FIU

because it was one of the few at the time

offering a hospitality management program

– with the added bonus of being in a warm

weather climate.

Her interest in wine came via a class

in wine education led by Professor Chip

Cassidy, well-known as a mentor to many in

the wine world.

“What I learned from him was his passion

for wine,” she says. “The wine’s not just to

drink. Wine has a lot of history and you’ve

got to also understand its agriculture, its

chemistry, its biology, all these things. I was

so fascinated by this.”

Cassidy is “very good at pulling

everybody’s ability and making them grow

into the next step,” says Cadby. Even today,

when she’s feeling tired or at a loss, she’ll call

Cassidy for help and “just talking to him, my

energy level goes up.”

Another avenue into the world of wine

came through her job as a Japanese-English

translator for Florida Power & Light Co. She

often went along to local restaurants to

translate for visiting executives from Japan,

which naturally segued into helping them

decipher the wine list once they discovered

her expertise.

After getting her degree in hospitality

management, Cadby started graduate studies

but left that for full-time work, and ultimately,

a move to the burgeoning California wine

scene. She got married, had two daughters,

both now in college, took a little bit of a break

in her career and then began taking wine

classes and working as a freelance writer and

translator. Interestingly, she learned wine first

in English and had to turn around and re-learn

the terminology in Japanese.

Her job at Opus One started casually

as an on-call employee. But by 2007 she

was working full-time as guest relations

coordinator. In 2011, she took on the export

manager job, although she still visits the

U.S. frequently.

This harvest, she spent a week

in the United States that included

getting up at 3 a.m. to experience

night harvesting, which is something

wineries do to keep grapes cooler and

fresher. It made for some long days,

but it’s all part of the task of learning

how to communicate the whole story

behind Opus One wine. “The goal is

when people talk about Opus One it’s

because of the quality of the wine, not

because of the brand name,” she says.

Showing visitors around the familiar

rooms, Cadby stops at some of her

favorite places, like the salon, with

its mix of 18th-century Italian opera

chairs and contemporary seating, and

the tasting room, bathed in a soft light

at day’s end. The cellar is another

treasured spot with its rows of pristine

barrels all meticulously painted with

red wine around the middle – no untidy

splashes of red wine here.

In the end, it’s the details, and the

passion for getting them right, that

count, she says.

“So many things need to be clicking in your

head. You have to have a passion otherwise

it will be a pain. You have to work weekends.

You have to work nights. You have to get up

early. You have a lot of ‘you have tos.’ If you

have that passion, you want to do it and that

passion makes everything easy.” n

Michelle Locke is a freelance wine writer in California.

SPRING 2012 | 27

By DEBoRAH o’NEIL MA ’09 PHoToS By EDUARDo MERILLE ’97, MBA ’00

28 | SPRING 2012

GO.FIU.EDU/kEYS

dUffY KeYS ’75 BLeNdS

trAditioN, ArtiStiC

iNterPretAtioN ANd

the fiNeSt iNGredieNtS

At hiS B CeLLArS WiNerY

SPRING 2012 | 29

For years, Duffy Keys ’75 kept a home in California’s wine

country while he traveled the world as a senior executive at

The Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts. Already a fine dining

connoisseur, Keys began thinking about wine as the natural

next chapter of his career.

Keys was at a Fourth of July barbecue in 2003 extolling what his

own winery might look like when he met Jim Borsack, the co-owner

and senior vice president of El Portal, a global chain of designer

leather stores. Also a food and wine lover, Borsack had just planted 20

acres of cabernet on his Temecula property.

By the end of 2003, the two became business partners combining

their business, food and wine expertise to launch B Cellars. Their

winery in upper Napa Valley’s historic Calistoga sits on 22 acres, eight

of which are planted with cabernet, cab franc and merlot.

“I spent 30 years eating and drinking in all parts of the world,

working for the finest luxury hotel company in the world, The

Four Seasons,” said Keys, a graduate of FIU’s Chaplin School of

Hospitality and Tourism Management. “What I learned there can

be translated to wine – it’s about ingredients and processes and

excellence. It is doing the very simplest things exceptionally well

every day.”

B Cellars wines are modeled on the French blending tradition, with

a contemporary approach. The winery procures grapes from Napa

Valley’s most coveted vineyards including To Kalon, Dr. Crane, Caldwell,

Williamson Ranch, Juliana, Maldonado, Star, Stagecoach and Lewelling

for their four proprietary blends and small-batch single varietals.

“You have to figure out how you are going to differentiate yourself,”

Keys said. “One of the things that sets B Cellars apart is that all of

Napa Valley is our terroir.”

Today, B Cellars wines can be found in the best restaurants and wine

shops in 19 states. Their distributor in a half-dozen states is American

Wines, the fine wine division of Southern Wine and Spirits, owned by

the Chaplin family, namesake of the FIU Chaplin School of Hospitality

and Tourism Management. B Cellars wines range in price from $55 for

their blends to $145 for their limited releases.

Robert Parker, the world’s most famous wine critic, highlighted

B Cellars wines in his Best of Northern California 2007, 2006, 2005

review: “Jim Borsack and Duffy Keys have hired Kirk Venge as their

consulting winemaker, and the wines are clearly made in a fruit-

forward style that should satisfy consumers and restaurants looking for

immediate drinkability.”

“Our objective is to be in the top five or six steak houses, Italian

restaurants and fish houses that are the stalwart in every community,”

Keys said. “We want to be in the top three or four country clubs and

wine shops in a community. If we do that, the rest becomes almost

viral. It takes care of itself.”

FIU Magazine spent an afternoon with Duffy Keys at B Cellars,

touring the vineyard and winery. Keys explained their approach to

winemaking and how the lessons he learned at The Four Seasons have

shaped the success of B Cellars.

30 | SPRING 2012

IN THE BEGINNINGKeys and Borsack shared a vision for their wines, but to bring it to life, they

needed a winemaker and they needed fruit. They set their sights on the best of

both, but breaking into California’s close-knit winemaking world was not easy.

“When we first got started we had a guy out of the luggage business and

one from the hotel business,” Keys said. “We told them we were taking enology

and viticulture classes at UC Davis. They were not impressed. The growers were

saying to us, ‘I have a reputation. If I am going to sell you this fruit, who is going

to make your wine?’ Meanwhile, the winemakers wanted to know where we were

going to get our fruit.”

Well connected after more than 20 years in the luxury hotel industry, Keys, with

some help from Borsack, leveraged their professional relationships to open doors

in the Valley. Through legendary winemaker Nils Venge they were able to make a

connection with Nils’ son Kirk Venge to become B Cellars’ master winemaker. Nils

was the first American winemaker to earn a perfect 100 score from Robert Parker.

Kirk was named one of the Top 20 New Winemakers in the World in 2005 by Food

& Wine magazine.

Keys muses, “The adage, ‘The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree,’ is evident in

the production of every vintage of B Cellars since inception.”

With Venge as the B Cellars winemaker, the renowned Beckstoffer Vineyards

signed on as well.

“The Wall Street Journal recently called Andy Beckstoffer the most powerful

person in Napa,” Keys said. “The point they were making was what goes on in the

vineyard is really the driving force behind what’s in the bottle. Between Nils and

Kirk Venge and having access to three of Beckstoffer’s champion vineyards, the

rest was a lot easier.”

One school of winemaking is single vineyard

varietal. In that model, a winery owns a vineyard of,

say, cabernet. Every year, they bottle the cabernet that

comes off their estate. B Cellars signature wines are

blends, but they also produce single vineyard wines

from Beckstoffer’s pedigreed Dr. Crane, To Kalon and

George III vineyards.

“There aren’t many producers who get access to

these vineyards,” Keys said. “It’s a way for us also to

dimensionalize ourselves to show people that while our

blended wines speak for themselves, we also can make

a single vineyard varietal wine and hit it out of the park.”

The French, on the other hand, have been blending

wines for centuries. Keys and Borsack were drawn to

the French style of winemaking but found it limiting.

“They blend Bordeaux with Bordeaux, Rhône with

Rhône, Burgundy with Burgundy. That’s their Old World

tradition,” Keys said. “We said, ‘We can do anything we

want.’ What happens if you paired a Rhône varietal with

Bordeaux? A Bordeaux with a Burgundy?”

They began experimenting with finished wines from

great winemakers – great producers of syrah, cabernet

sauvignon, sangiovese, chardonnay, viogniers.

“What we learned from that process is we can capture

layers of flavors in a bottle that is impossible to get in

the approach of a single vineyard varietal,” Keys said.

WHAT IF...?

SPRING 2012 | 31 Continues next page

32 | SPRING 2012

The spirit of B Cellars wines – rooted in tradition

but not bound by it – encourages innovation in the

winemaking process.

Keys was in Italy working on a hotel and winery

project a few years ago when he was introduced

to a winemaking process called the Ripasso

method. Sangiovese was pressed off the skins

and the grape skins were kept in the cellar. Once

the sangiovese was fully fermented, it was poured

over the grape skins. The resulting sangiovese had

a deeper color and soft mouth feel.

Back in California, after the first vintage where

they replicated this process on sangiovese; Keys,

Venge and Borsack started to consider the next

year’s vintage. Why not try the Ripasso method,

with a B Cellars twist?

“Because we aren’t bound by any method,

we said, ‘What if we use the Ripasso method

on the sangiovese, but take it a step further and

introduce the skins of the petite sirah into the

mix?’” Venge said. “The petite sirah skin is very

thick, very sturdy. It also delivers this rich ruby

purple color while adding structure and more

subtle tannins. So, we incorporated this approach

into the second vintage production of our Blend

24 and the result was AMAZING.”

Between the traditional Ripasso method for the

sangiovese and the inclusion of petite sirah skins

into the sangiovese fermentation process, the

Blend 24 transitioned into what they refer to as a

“Napa Valley inspired” Super Tuscan – unique to B

Cellars. The wine has a distinct flavor profile with

rich tannins, bright acidity and velvety mouth feel.

They have used it for Blend 24 every year

thereafter. Robert Parker gave the 2007 and

2008 vintages ratings of 90 and 91 points. He

described the B Cellars 2006 sangiovese as “one

of the finest wines I have tasted from this varietal.

It comes across as a distinctly Rhône-like red,

displaying black fruit, earth, strawberry, red cherry,

new saddle leather and olive characteristics in its

spicy personality.”

CREATIVE INTERPRETATION

Guests enjoy the gardens surrounding the B Cellars tasting room. Jim Borsack, co-founder of B Cellars

SPRING 2012 | 33

The Four Seasons operates five-star hotels

around the world where every detail of the

customer experience is executed to the

highest standards. Keys has brought the same

approach to his wine business.

“Our view is in order to make the very best

you can’t cut corners,” he said. “French

oak barrels cost $1,200, so a lot of wineries

choose a less costly approach. They cost

less, but the flavor delivery is noticeably

different. All of our oak barrels are from

France, except for our barrels for sangiovese

that come from Hungary.”

They developed the B Cellars branding system

around the idea of ingredients. They were the

first to put the wine’s components on the front,

instead of the back of the bottle. For instance,

a customer who buys the 2007 Blend 24 will

easily see that it is made up of 40 percent

cabernet sauvignon, 30 percent sangiovese and

30 percent petite sirah.

The B in B Cellars represents brix, a

measurement of a grape’s sugar at harvest.

So, B Cellars wines are named sequentially

(Blend 23, Blend 24, Blend 25 and Blend 26)

signifying that the grapes were harvested at the

sweet spot of optimal ripeness for their style

of wines. As Mercedes and BMW have already

demonstrated, the numbered brand system

appeals to customers.

Says Keys: “It goes to one of our other points

of view about wine: It’s not all the mystery that’s

important. It’s what you like that counts."” n

ONLY THE BEST

34 | SPRING 2012

the keyingredient

FIU honors Chaplin family with naming of the School of Hospitality and Tourism Management

By Martin Haro ’05 I Photo by Ivan Santiago ’00 and Gloria O’connell

Father and son Harvey and Wayne Chaplin

In 1996, FIU’s resident wine expert Chip

Cassidy ’75 approached Miami-based

Southern Wine & Spirits of America with

an idea.

Let’s build a beverage management center

at the School of Hospitality and Tourism

Management, he proposed. There, FIU

could train the next generation of hospitality

specialists on the science of analyzing, testing

and experiencing the finest wines, spirits,

beers and other beverages in the world. The

Chaplin family, owners of Southern Wine, saw

promise and gave the project their support.

“It was an intriguing idea because there

really wasn’t a program like it anywhere that

incorporated wine and spirits

education into the mix,” said

Wayne E. Chaplin, Southern

Wine’s president and chief

operating officer. “We believed it

was a great move for us, for FIU

and for the community.”

The initial gift by the Chaplin

family has grown into a public-

private success story that has put the

university’s program at the forefront of

hospitality education worldwide. Earlier this

year, FIU honored the partnership when it

announced that the Biscayne Bay Campus

(BBC) program would now be known as the

Chaplin School of Hospitality and Tourism

Management. The naming of the school

in honor of the Chaplins is a result of the

continued support they have offered FIU for

the past 16 years. A nationally recognized

wine and spirits distributor with 12,000

employees, Southern Wine operates in 35

states and has corporate headquarters

in Miami.

“Southern Wine & Spirits and the Chaplins

are passionate supporters of FIU and the

superior hospitality management education

we offer students from all over the world,”

said FIU President Mark B. Rosenberg.

“This naming recognizes that commitment

and augurs an even stronger partnership

going forward.”

“This is a beautiful honor,” said Harvey

Chaplin, the company’s chairman and CEO,

who is the recipient of an honorary doctoral

degree from FIU. “We definitely appreciate it.”

In addition to the Southern Wine & Spirits

Beverage Management Center, the Chaplins

supported the establishment of the Harvey R.

Chaplin Eminent Scholar Chair in beverage

management and the creation of an FIU wine

and food festival.

Today, Professor Barry Gump still holds

the Eminent Chair’s position, the only one

in the country; the school’s facilities at

BBC are undergoing a $7 million upgrade;

and, under the leadership of Lee Schrager,

the Food Network South Beach Wine &

Food Festival has grown into one of the

biggest events of its kind in the country.

In fact, many of the improvements to the

classrooms and labs at the school are being

paid for with proceeds from the annual

event. The festival has returned more

than $16 million to the Chaplin School of

Hospitality and Tourism Management, much

of it for student scholarships.

The Chaplins, Dean Mike Hampton

acknowledges, have been incredibly generous

to FIU and to the school. Their contributions

have helped attract high-profile industry

talent, such as Michelle Bernstein, Robert

Irvine and chef Allen Susser ’78, to speak to

FIU students. They also have made in-kind

donations to the school’s programs and given

of their time.

The South Beach Wine & Food Festival has

benefitted the school in other ways as well.

This year, more than 1,100 FIU students

were involved in the preparation, staging and

execution of the event. They did everything

from securing city permits and building sets to

preparing food alongside celebrity chefs and

serving the thousands who flock to the four-

day bacchanalia.

“The Chaplins designated us as the co-

host direct beneficiary of the festival,”

Hampton said. “We couldn’t have asked for

a better partnership opportunity and learning

environment for our students.”

As Harvey Chaplin remembers it, aligning

Southern Wine’s efforts with FIU’s was a

daring corporate move.

“I don’t think an alcoholic beverage company

had supported a Florida university before, and

none of us ever dreamed that we would end

up where we have,” he said. “It really has

been a wonderful ride.”

Wayne Chaplin echoes his father’s

satisfaction with the relationship, calling it

a truly incredible public-private success.

“The way we have been able to support

FIU and help build the hospitality

school into something that is not only a

community gem but an entity that has

had and continues to have an impact on our

industry,” he said, “we’re proud of that.”

In 2010-’11, the Chaplin School of Hospitality

and Tourism Management conferred 625

bachelor’s and master’s degrees, nearly

double the number of degrees students

earned in 2002-’03. For the Chaplins, the

school’s work is a priority. Wayne Chaplin

says supporting FIU helps create a pool of

talent that’s well educated in every aspect of

the industry.

“Obviously, because of who we are, we

want candidates to be knowledgeable

about the beverage industry and for FIU

to be recognized in that area, too,” he

said. “FIU graduates go into the workforce

understanding the beverage game better than

a lot of their peers.”

It is due in part to the vote of confidence

the Chaplins gave FIU and its School of

Hospitality and Tourism Management that

the program is one of the country’s most well

regarded. Wayne Chaplin is confident one day

soon FIU will become the gold standard. n

“We believed it was a great move for us, for FIU and for

the community.”

SPRING 2012 | 35

36 | SPRING 2012

SPRING 2012 | 37

the ChAPLiN SChooL of hoSPitALitY ANd toUriSm mANAGemeNt iS PoSitioNiNG itSeLf AS A LeAder iN food ANd SCieNCe reSeArCh

For more than a year since Mike Hampton became the dean

of the Chaplin School of Hospitality Management, he has

been examining a critical question: How can the school

build on its widely acknowledged excellence to distinguish

itself in this highly competitive field? The university’s research

mission is helping to shape the answer.

Hampton, who came to FIU in 2011 with more than 20 years of

experience in the industry, recently shared his vision for the school.

describe the future of the Chaplin School of hospitality

and tourism management.

Conceptually, the school is positioned to become a food and

beverage science epicenter that would house a data repository

and clearinghouse for food, wine, beer and spirits information and

research. It would be replete with customized scientific laboratories,

sensory evaluation rooms, production and processing facilities, a

biological conservatory and greenhouses.

So research will become central to the school’s mission?

Exactly. Food and beverage science research will serve as a

platform for interdisciplinary cooperation in chemistry, biology,

geology, meteorology, nutrition, health sciences and in medicine. It

is likely that our research would be eligible for significant funding

from external and federal sources.

Give us an example of the kinds of questions food and

beverage scientists study.

I’ll give you an example that was featured in Time Magazine

recently about ongoing research into food preservation, which is a

critical issue for disaster relief and humanitarian efforts related to

famine. Following massive natural disasters, crops are destroyed,

stores are gone and transportation routes are limited. So how do

we feed people who are affected by disasters or by famine? They

can distribute “Meals Ready to Eat,” the dehydrated MREs that U.S.

soldiers eat out in the field. But those are pretty awful, so there’s a

By Deborah o’Neil MA ’09 I Photo by Doug Garland ’10

Continues next page

desire to improve the quality of the food.

Food scientists are looking at new ways to

preserve food so that the essence of the

food remains intact with optimum nutrition.

At the same time, that food has to be

packaged so that it can be transported in

crisis zones and easily distributed to feed

hungry people.

This is one example of the kinds of

important issues we can address with

scholarly research in food sciences.

Another example in beverage sciences

would be research on yeast and

fermentation optimization for beer and

wine. We can also do research on new

wine, beer and spirits products and how to

make them palatable to new and emerging

markets around the world

how does the new teaching

restaurant fit in?

It will play a very important role in the

growth of the school. The restaurant

is an educational environment that is

unparalleled. It is a teaching laboratory

that will enable new research and learning

opportunities on such things as service

techniques or new product testing. For

instance, our students could test market

a new beverage product during one of our

open luncheons. Our students will learn

how to better manage restaurants, better

interface with customers and achieve

greater efficiencies. The new facility also will

have a state-of-the-art beverage science

laboratory where faculty and students

will be able to do research on product

innovation and product design.

Why did you decide to go in

this direction?

We did an assessment of growth

opportunities and found that there is

significant demand for education and

research in the field of beverage science.

That is especially true in the immediate

service market for FIU. Major food and

beverage companies, like Diageo, Brown

Forman, Quirch, Burger King, Goya and

several key coffee roasters have regional

and headquarters offices in Miami; and

while their operations and marketing

efforts are coordinated in South Florida,

their research and development activities

are maintained or drawn from elsewhere,

often for lack of local resources.

An important consideration was being

able to utilize and capitalize on the

school’s existing core competencies and

strengths, such as infrastructure, faculty,

staff and facilities. For example, we have

an extensive array of food production

laboratories and demonstration kitchens

that have excellent capacity for increased

utilization. We’ve assembled an impressive

collection of faculty with expertise in food

production, wine, beer and spirits.

What we see is that the school can

contribute to academia and to industry

through scientific study that builds upon

the well-founded framework and facilities

already in place.

What about students who are really

seeking qualifications so they can break

into the hospitality industry?

We’ve always provided outstanding

industry education and job placement for

our students and that will not change. All

of the major hospitality corporations in

the world like Marriott, Hyatt and Carnival

recruit our students because they are so

well prepared for the careers.

What we are going to do is give students

even more opportunities. For instance, we

38 | SPRING 2012

Continued

are exploring partnerships with universities

in Italy and Argentina that have viticulture

programs. So all of our students, as well as

those studying beverage science, would be

able to study abroad in the key wine regions of

the world. They will understand the beverage

industry from the perspective of a global

marketplace.

We will offer a certificate in culinary arts

and, of course, accept students from other

culinary arts programs like Johnson & Wales

and Le Cordon Bleu. What we can offer

those students is the opportunity to learn

management in our bachelor’s program.

While they are here, they might get interested

in molecular gastronomy by studying with

one of our food science researchers. Our

graduate programs will give them the skills

to pursue advanced positions in food and

beverage product analysis, design, innovation,

development and production.

how will plans for the school’s growth

distinguish fiU from other programs?

We are often compared to other hospitality

schools like Cornell. However, we are not

trying to be like Cornell, an excellent program

that is different than ours. The FIU model of

hospitality education will be in niche areas

where we already have a strong foundation.

We will become recognized as a worldwide

leader in food and beverage science and

management.

how will your vision take shape in the

coming years?

It is already taking shape with the

construction of the new teaching restaurant

and with some strategic faculty hiring in food

sciences. We will work with our partners like

Southern Wine & Spirits and Diageo to develop

research programs that advance the industry

and provide our students with unique learning

opportunities. We are shifting completely in a

new direction. It’s going to create a dynamic

program that nothing else comes close to. n

PrePPING THe FUTUreA new teaching restaurant in the Chaplin School of Hospitality

and Tourism Management will strengthen the school’s growing

research in food, beer and spirits and sharpen its focus on building

management skills.

The 8,000-square-foot restaurant will feature an intelligent

2,500-square-foot kitchen that will allow those in the kitchen to see

what’s happening in the dining room. The high-tech kitchen is designed

to help students look strategically at how restaurants operate so they

can learn high-level management skills.

The kitchen also will have a new 650-square-foot brewing science lab.

Professor Barry Gump has run the school’s brewing science program

for the past five years, basically out of a small room converted into a

lab. He says this physical expansion will usher in not only an expansion

of the program, but also more research and greener practices as well.

“I’m thrilled to pieces about it,” he said.

The restaurant’s 4,200-square-foot dining room will feature a glass-

enclosed 260-square-foot, two-story wine tower with cellaring for some

1,500 bottles. The tower can host VIP dinners for 12, and will bridge the

center and the rest of the teaching areas. At the other end of the room

will be a full working bar.

The $5 million upgrade is being paid for with money raised during the

first decade of the Food Network South Beach Wine & Food Festival.

“We will have a state-of-the-art teaching restaurant and brewing

science lab,” said Dean Mike Hampton. “No one in our region is doing

food research or wine, beer, spirits research. We’re in Miami, and we will

have all the tools we will need to become the hub in the southeast for

this type of education and research.”

SPRING 2012 | 39

40 | SPRING 2012

Patrick “Chip” Cassidy ’75 was

barely out of high school when

he first tasted one of the world’s

venerable wines, a 1959 Château Lafite

Rothschild. Even then, the young man

who grew up to become one of the

country’s beloved wine experts – and do

business with the Baron Eric

de Rothschild – knew it

was exceptional.

It was New Year’s Eve

1967, and the Long

Island teen was about

to ship off to Vietnam.

He attended a party

at the home of his

friend Richie Prisco,

whose father was an

orthopedic surgeon

with an impressive wine

cellar. Cassidy spotted

the Lafite and told his

friend, “That’s one of

the world’s greatest

wines.” To their surprise,

Prisco’s dad let them

open the bottle.

Cassidy remembers the Lafite

knocked his socks off. That

tasting was the beginning

of a lifetime of teaching,

savoring and sharing wine as

a merchant with Crown Wine & Spirits and

faculty member in the Chaplin School of

Hospitality and Tourism Management. Until

recently, Cassidy was the wine director for

Crown with a list of devoted customers

including Julio Iglesias, Matt Dillon and

Hunter Reno.

Today, he’s celebrated in wine circles

not merely for his expertise, but also for

the joy he brings to teaching students

and customers about wine. Twenty

years ago, Miami Herald wine critic Fred

Tasker dubbed him, “the universally

acknowledged wine guru of South Florida,

the nation’s third biggest wine market after

California and New York.”

Wall Street Journal wine writers Dorothy

J. Gaiter and John Brecher named him in

2000 “a model of a great wine merchant.”

Their description of Cassidy the merchant

could just as easily be Cassidy the

professor.

“Chip is very knowledgeable about

wine, but that’s not what makes him

special,” they wrote. “What always drew

us to Chip was in his flat-out enthusiasm

for the subject.”

The Wall Street Journal made note of

his refreshingly unpretentious way with

wine: “I don’t think he ever said anything

to us like, ‘You’ll enjoy the bramble-like

bouquet of this wine.’ Instead he says

By DEBoRAH o’NEIL MA ‘09 I PHoTo By ANGEL VALENTíN

40 | SPRING 2012

GO.FIU.EDU/cHIP

SPRING 2012 | 41

things like, ‘This wine will blow your

head off!’ ”

Napa Valley rare and fine wine expert

Gence Alton ’02, one of Cassidy’s former

students, says, “He has the humility that

only genuine lovers of wine are capable of

acquiring in this realm. He is as down-to-

earth as wine itself gets, a trait that a lot of

people in the business tend to lack.”

Anybody can learn to appreciate wine,

says Cassidy. He quotes the renowned

wine expert Alexis Lichine: “When it comes

to wine, I tell people to throw

away the vintage charts and

invest in a corkscrew. The

best way to learn about wine

is the drinking.”

“You just have to practice,”

Cassidy said. “Your parents

never taught you about your

palate, did they? That’s what

I do. I get people really thinking about

themselves. I get them in a frame of mind

so they really want to learn this, achieve

this. I put them on the path.”

Cassidy has led FIU’s wine program

at the Chaplin School of Hospitality

and Tourism Management since 1984.

His wine courses provide a broad

understanding of wine as a cultural

institution and business, set in the context

of world history. He also teaches them

how to drink wine – smelling, swirling and

spitting a variety of wines in every class.

Cassidy’s former students work in some

of the world’s top wineries, restaurants,

distributors, hotels and resorts. The scores

of students he has mentored credit him

with teaching them to appreciate wine and

opening doors for their careers.

“I had no idea what I wanted to do

with my life when I started at FIU,” said

Stephanie Honig ’97, who went to work

for Clicquot, Inc. after graduating from

the School of Hospitality. “I took Chip’s

wine class and I was really fascinated

by wine and by him. Chip became my

mentor. He had me sitting in meetings with

distributors. He had me tasting wine all the

time. I realized I really wanted to get into

the wine business.”

Long after they graduate, Cassidy‘s

former students still call on him for advice.

“Not only did Chip mentor me through

my FIU years, but he was also there for

me after graduation and beyond,” says

Alton. “He remains the wind beneath my

wings. I am proud to be a ‘Chipster’ as

his lifelong protégés in this small business

affectionately call him.”

Just as Cassidy has served his students,

he has helped the university’s hospitality

program grow and mature into one of

the best in the country. In 1997, Cassidy

worked with Southern Wine & Spirits

of America to launch an FIU food and

wine festival. That event is now the

internationally renowned Food Network

South Beach Wine & Food Festival,

attracting more than 50,000 visitors every

February and raising millions for FIU. The

university awarded Cassidy the 2006

Excellence in Service Award, citing the

festival in his lengthy record of service.

He travels the world tasting 5,000

wines per year and judging top wine

competitions. Among his many accolades:

The 2000 European Wine Council’s

Ambassador’s Award and Market Watch

Retailer of the Year.

Cassidy’s connections in the wine world

are far and wide, from winemakers to

wine writers and wine sellers. In talking

about French wine during class last fall,

he regaled students with stories of his

encounters with France’s most famous

wine families. Later in his life, Baron

Philippe de Rothschild did business from

his bed in the Château

Mouton Rothschild in

Bordeaux. So Cassidy

visited with the baron in

his private quarters.

“No matter what room

you went into in his house,

there was a pad and a

dozen sharp pencils.”

Cassidy said. “He said if he had an idea

he always wanted to write it down and he

didn’t want to have to look for paper. He

was unbelievable.”

He also has spent time with Baron Eric

de Rothschild, maker of Château Lafite,

the wine that first made him think, “If I

want to drink wines like this, I have to get

into the wine business.”

Years after that first Lafite, he and Eric

de Rothschild shared a 1937 Château

d’Yquem together, one of the greatest

vintages of the legendary wine known

as “liquid gold.” A photo of Cassidy,

Rothschild and the late Jay Weiss of

Southern Wine hangs in Cassidy’s office.

“I tell my students, ‘I can’t say I ever

made a lot of money, but boy I’ve

had the greatest life you could ever

imagine,’” Cassidy said. “Wine is a great,

great business.” n

The scores of students he has mentored credit him with teaching

them to appreciate wine and opening doors for their career.

At 32, FIU alumna Cynthia Betancourt ’06

is preparing to become the country’s first

Hispanic woman to earn the prestigious

title of master sommelier from the Court of

Masters. When it comes to wine experts,

there is no finer vintage than that. After all,

there are only 186 people in the entire world

with this distinction. Only 17 of them happen

to be women. To be counted among them is

a dream Betancourt began cultivating while

studying at FIU.

It was here she found herself engrossed by

introductory wine courses. The trained chef

would soon trade in her apron for a decanter.

Since then, she was named Best Young

Sommelier in a recent competition sponsored

by Les Chaînes des Rôtisseurs, the world’s

oldest international gastronomic society,

and has worked at some of South Florida’s

premiere restaurants. In 2007, she was named

wine director of Azul at the Mandarin Oriental

on Brickell Key where, until recently, she

oversaw a collection of 500 bottles. She has

traveled the world honing a delicate palate that

can discern the subtlest of distinctions.

A certified advanced sommelier, soon she’ll

start studying four hours a day, every day for

her three-part master sommelier test. It’ll take

two years for her to be completely ready to

tackle the blind wine tastings and rigorous

theoretical exam about droughts, production

lines and seasons across the globe’s wine

producing regions. All of it, while doting on her

1-year-old son.

FIU staff writer Dianne Fernandez ’94

sat down with Betancourt at Azul’s terrace

overlooking Biscayne Bay to talk wine and

food pairings while sampling one of the

restaurant’s exquisite dishes.

DF: It’s your job to know what is the

perfect wine for every meal. What’s your

favorite pairing of all time?

CB: I love riesling. My favorite pairing is riesling

with Peruvian food. Tiraditos, ceviche – it’s

heaven. That was my first request when I gave

birth. I had my son and decided to wait until

I could really enjoy it. Four weeks later, my

husband and I came to the Mandarin to eat. I

savored that half glass of wine and every bite. I

especially love S. A. Prüm riesling.

DF: Fine wine isn’t just for fine dining

anymore. What can you serve up on

pizza night?

CB: Refreshing reds: barbera, dolcetto. Pizza

and primitivo is also a great pairing. The right

wine can go with just about anything.

DF: I love that! In that spirit, let’s go

ethnic. I come from a big Cuban family.

What wine would you pair with arroz

con pollo?

CB: I would probably do an oak-aged

sauvignon blanc. Illumination by

Quintessa, specifically.

By Dianne Fernandez ’94

THE

42 | SPRING 2012

Photo by Josh Ritchie

DF: You chose Azul’s smoked octopus and babaganoush for our pairing. What wines are we sampling?CB: It’s my favorite dish. To start, Gewurztraminer by Navarro. It really accentuates the spices, but it is low in alcohol. It won’t make the dish spicier. You don’t want to cover up the chef’s subtleties.DF: How important is that?CB: As a sommelier, we should approach the pairing of wine keeping in mind both the palette of the guest and the effort of the chef in creating the dish. Next with our pairing is Montenisa. It is a rosé sparkling wine. Very high in acidity. Very refreshing. It’s the opposite of the Gewurztraminer. What I’m doing with this rosé is cleaning your palate, reviving it. These are the two options the sommeliers usually use to pair. DF: Both are amazing. Which is your favorite?CB: Oh gosh, it’s like choosing your favorite

son. If I was having it for dinner, I would go with Gewurztraminer. If I was having octopus as an appetizer, then I’d go with the Montenisa.DF: What’s another cool pairing? CB: Burgers and Carmenere from Casa Lapostolle. It’s really good. Get blue cheese, sautéed onions and add bacon. Delicious!DF: What’s the best wine out there for, let’s say, less than 15 bucks?CB: Crios de Susana Balbo Torrontes. It’s a great white wine. She also makes wonderful reds at very affordable prices.DF: What is your favorite part of being a sommelier?CB: Being part of the dining experience, being able to accentuate what the chef is doing. You really get to know people too. Once customers come by a few times, you get to know their likes and dislikes. They really open up to the sommelier.DF: What do you attribute that to?

CB: Your being approachable and humble. You can’t impose on people what they should enjoy – a guest is going to have what they want. My approach is to be of an inviting nature. Rather than correcting, enlightening.DF: As a sommelier, how often have you introduced someone to a wine they cherished?CB: Five to 10 times a week. DF: Are you surprised FIU has cultivated the careers of several winemakers and winery owners as well as sommeliers of your stature?CB: I think FIU has one of the best hospitality programs in the country. The reason why I enjoyed going there is because it’s not just theoretical, a lot of the teachers have real working knowledge. They know people in the industry. It was great networking. Last year, I had two interns from FIU. One of them was my assistant sommelier. FIU cultivates that talent. n

SPRING 2012 | 43

Photo by Josh Ritchie

Cynthia Betancourt, left, shares wine and food pairing ideas with FIU writer Dianne Fernandez.

Hippocrates used red wine to disinfect

wounds. The Romans would add small

amounts to their water supply to ensure

purity. And in William Shakespeare’s

Hamlet, Cornelius toasts to his nephew’s

“better health” – even if the wine did turn

out to be poisoned.

Even before microbes could be magnified

or arteries could be mended, people turned

to wine, not only to soothe, but also to heal.

But it wasn’t until much ado was made over

the French, their eating habits and their

lifespan that modern science started taking

wine as seriously as, well, everyone else.

The “French Paradox,” as it’s been dubbed,

ponders the question: How can a people

who invented such delicacies as quiche,

foie gras and éclairs have such relatively low

cases of heart disease and cholesterol?

The answer, many put forth, was in the wine.

“The research is concrete that drinking

wine in moderation provides your body with

significant heart health benefit,” said FIU

alumna and nutritionist Janet Brill MS ’93, the

author of Prevent a Second Heart Attack.

“I recommend to everyone that can drink

safely to drink one glass a day.”

Brill, who dedicates an entire chapter of

her book to the benefits of red wine, notes

that someone who drinks in moderation

decreases their chance of a heart attack by

50 percent. Even someone who discovers

wine later in life can reap the benefits –

provided it’s done in moderation.

Specifically, red wine benefits the

heart in three major ways.

First, Brill said research has found that

the ingredients found in red grapes, most

notably resveratrol, boost the production of

high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol

– the good kind of cholesterol that helps

remove the plaque that builds around the

artery wall. Heart attacks happen when that

plaque bursts or builds to a point that clogs

the artery and prevents blood flow.

Second, those same elements in grapes

not only raise HDL cholesterol, but also

make the particles bigger.

“You want big, fat fluffy versions of HDL,”

Brill said. “That’s a beautiful thing when it

comes to preventing heart disease.”

Finally, red wine increases antioxidant

levels, which fight the very creation of

plaque. And to top it off, Brill said, the

ethanol found in wine – and in all alcoholic

beverages – seems to increase the potency

of those antioxidants already found in

grapes (and any other red fruit).

“At the base level, everything looks great

for wine,” said sommelier and wine educator

Aaron Berdofe.

Berdofe reminds us that the research is

fairly new and many times, “we just want

justification for drinking wine.” Moderation is

key. That means two 8-ounce glasses a day

for men and one for women.

And

it may

not be just

the wine alone

that causes the French

to live longer and healthier lives, despite their

cuisine. Literally, Berdofe said, it may be their

joie de vivre.

“For the French, it may also include being

active, eating right and having a strong

social community,” he said.

Tania Rivera, an assistant professor of

nutrition and dietetics at FIU, agrees that

there is still much to learn about wine’s

role in keeping the heart healthy. She

emphasizes that alcohol is not part of a

healthy diet.

“Although it doesn’t hurt to have a glass a

day, I wouldn’t recommend to someone who

doesn’t drink to start the habit just to keep

the heart healthy,” she said.

So, which would be the heart healthiest

wines? Pinot Noir, says Brill. Grapes grown

for this red wine usually come from cold

and wet environments so that the healthiest

parts of the fruit are kept at their freshest.

Other dark, rich reds like cabernet and petite

syrah also top the list for health benefits. n

For a healthy heart

consider a red

By Jean-Paul Renaud MPA ’11

44 | SPRING 2012

WE rECommEndFrom reds to whites to bubbles, FIU graduates who live and love wine share

their favorite drinks of choice with FIU Magazine.

SPRING 2012 | 45

STEPhanIE honIg

Billecart-Salmon Champagne Rosé, France ($86)

Robert Weil Riesling Kabinett,

Germany ($33)

Joh Jos Prum Riesling, Auslese, Germany ($50)

Dr. Konstantin Frank Gewürztraminer, Finger Lakes,

New York ($17)

Bründlmayer, Grüner Veltliner, Austria ($25)

Patz & Hall Pinot Noir, Hyde Vineyard,

California ($65)

Alión Ribera del Duero, Spain ($50)

Oremus Late Harvest Tokaji ($56)

La Spinetta Moscato d’Asti ($20)

Domaine William Fèvre Fourchaume, Chablis,

France ($35)

DoUg gallaghEr

Penfolds Grange, Australia ($300)

Rockford Basket Press Shiraz, Barossa Valley,

Australia ($80)

Torbeck, Barossa Valley, Australia ($60)

Ornellaia Tenutea Dell’ Ornellaia, Italy ($160)

Soñador Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley ($50)

Araujo Eisele Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon,

Napa Valley ($150-$200)

Hourglass Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley ($150)

Château Lafite Rothschild Pauillac, France ($1,000)

Château Margaux Premier Grand Cru Classe,

France ($1,000)

Château Cheval Blanc St. Emilion Grand Cru,

France ($750)

ChIP CaSSIDyBorsao Garnacha, Spain ($8)

Rodney Strong pinot noir, Russian River Valley,

CA ($14)Châteauneuf-du-Pape Grenache, France ($40)

Bernkasteler Doctor Riesling, Germany ($50)

Billecart-Salmon Champagne, France ($50)

Allegrini Pallazzo della Torre, Italy ($23)

Castelo Banfi Brunello di Montalcino, Italy ($70)

Bruno Giacosa Barolo, Italy ($100+)

Monte Antico Sangiovese, Italy ($10)

Montevetrine Sangiovese ($30)

gEnCE alTon3 To Try Before You Die:

Domaine Comte de Vogüé, Musigny Vieilles Vignes,

France ($300-$6,000)

Jean-François Coche-Dury, Corton Charlemagne,

France ($1,000-$3,000)

Robert Weil, Kiedrich Gräfenberg Trockenbeerenauslese

Riesling, Germany ($200-$600 per half bottle)

3 To Drink Once a Week:

Zind-Humbrecht Pinot Gris Rangen de Thann Clos

Saint Urbain, France ($30-$600 per half bottle)

R. López de Heredia Viña Bosconia Gran Reserva,

Spain ($30-$1,300)

Domaine Claude Dugat Gevrey-Chambertin,

France ($50-$400)

3 For the Curious to Try:

Josko Gravner, Breg Anfora, Italy ($60-$120)

Henri Bonneau, Châteauneuf-du-Pape Réserve des

Célestins, France ($200-$1,000)

Sine Qua non, The 17th nail In My Cranium,

California ($850)

lISa MaTTSon after a long day at work, always go for the bubbly. Best values include Gloria Ferrer blanc de noirs (about $14),

schramsberg mirabelle brut rosé (about $20) or louis bouillot Cremant de bourgogne rosé (about $14).

For writing, try something bright and focused like a French Sancerre. Try Château de sancerre or pascal Jolivet (about

$16).For everyday drinking, something simple and elegant, with low alcohol and nice acidity, so it pairs well with dinner – and

won’t get you tipsy off a glass or two. Dry rosés are great food wines, such as Château d’aqueria tavel from France’s

rhone or beckmen Grenache rosé (both about $18). you can never go wrong with Jordan Cabernet sauvignon for red

(about $40).

after breaking up with a boyfriend, Champagne is necessary. go for the well-deserved splurge – the real stuff, only made

in the Champagne region of France. Try louis roederer brut premier (about $50), or laurent-perrier brut rose (about

$60). When on a budget, I personally find it very hard to find a great wine from California for under $15, especially red

wines. you’ll usually have to go with whites, such as hanna sauvignon blanc and Gloria Ferrer sparkling wines. Gainey

vineyard merlot ($17) from Santa Barbara is one of the best-value reds in California. Up in oregon, there is ponzi pinot

Gris, (about $15). Portugal and greece offer some easy-drinking, quality whites and reds for about $10. the stump Jump

from australia is also a great value red for about $13.

GrApe

Dawn approaches slowly on the Napa Valley floor. When the sun finally brushes across the top of the Vaca Mountains, the Honig wine estate begins to glow with all of the promise and spectacle that nature has to offer. Solar panels project an iridescent rainbow of butterflies and bees. A red winged hawk

watches over the grape vines, soaring over the golden-green cascade that stretches into the horizon. This is what FIU alumna Stephanie Honig ’97 sees from her back patio. So sublime is the

view that the Honig family hired California artist Tom Hennessey to create an illustration of it for their sauvignon blanc label. The label was all the buzz when it debuted and brought renewed acclaim for their wine.

By DEBoRAH o’NEIL MA ’09 I PHoToS By EDUARDo MERILLE ’97 MBA ’00

46 | SPRING 2012

expectAtiOnSGO.FIU.EDU/HONIG

SPRING 2012 | 47

“It turns out the wine inside the bottle is

as refreshing as the label,” wrote California

wine blogger Peg Melnik. “It has aromas

and flavors of grapefruit, pear, melon and

spice. The wine has a round texture and

vibrant acidity. A great package inside

and out.”

Honig lives on the estate with her husband,

Michael, who brought new life to the family

winery when he took it over in 1984. Their

three children Sophia, 4, Lola, 3, and

Sebastian, 1, are growing

up nibbling on sauvignon

blanc grapes.

Raised in Argentina, Honig

discovered her love of wine

in college when she took a

class and did an internship

with Chip Cassidy in the

School of Hospitality and

Tourism Management.

“Chip became my

mentor,” she said. “He had

me sitting in meetings with

distributors. He had me

tasting wine all the time. I

realized I really wanted to

get into the wine business.”

After graduating, Honig

went to work in sales for Clicquot Inc.

in New York and for Rudd Winery of

Napa Valley. In 2004, she completed an

Advanced Certificate and Diploma with

the Wine and Spirit Educational Trust. She

later started making wine in Argentina and

imported her own wine brand. She now

handles public relations and develops

international and national markets for

Honig Vineyard and Winery.

“If it had not been for wine classes at

FIU and my FIU professors who got me

educated and excited about wine, I wouldn’t

have taken this path,” Honig says. “There

is a lot about wine that I love. It’s a very

dynamic business, wine is a fun product,

and you are selling something that makes

people happy.”

At 60,000 cases annually, Honig is a

medium-sized winery that makes two wines,

a cabernet sauvignon and a sauvignon

blanc. At $40 for the red and $17 for the

white, both are praised as exceptional

values. Honig wine is sold in 19 countries

and featured in hundreds of restaurants

around the country.

The little creatures that inhabit the Honig

vineyard bring more than rural charm. They

are part of the Honig family’s approach to

winemaking. Their 70 acres of cabernet

sauvignon and sauvignon blanc grapes are

grown according to California’s new code of

sustainability standards.

In 2010, Honig was one of 17 wineries to

participate in a pilot project for the state’s

new sustainability certification. They have

maintained the certifications since then,

even publishing their “Green Report Card”

online. They were rated “excellent” in almost

every category from minimizing water use to

their comprehensive employee benefits.

Instead of spraying chemicals, the winery

uses owl boxes, which provide a habitat

for owls that control rodents. They’ve also

created a natural habitat for blue birds, bats

and bees.

Five wind machines protect crops during

the winter by mixing the air and raising the

temperature by a few degrees to prevent

freeze. This is a more eco-friendly approach

than pumping water to protect against frost.

The Honig wine bottle is 15 percent lighter

than standard wine bottles. Less glass

means less energy used in its production

and less fuel needed

to ship. The winery

also saves on fuel by

coordinating its pickup

and delivery schedule

so that delivery trucks

always leave with a full

load of bottled wine. Plus,

the tractors in its vineyard

use biodiesel fuel.

In 2006, the Honigs

installed 829 solar

panels at a cost of $1

million. The panels power

the winery and their

private home, saving

them $42,000 a year

in electrical bills and

preventing the emission of more than 7.5

million pounds of carbon dioxide.

The family focuses the long-term viability

of the soil, the vineyards and their business.

Honig says, “We are stewards of the

land and it is our responsibility to take

care of it and pass it on to our children in

excellent condition. Better soil and better

grapes also make better wine. If you buy

a nice heirloom tomato and you buy a

commercially grown tomato and make

sauce out of each, clearly you’re going to

have better sauce with the heirloom tomato.

It’s the same with grapes and wine. A

beautiful vineyard is a healthy vineyard that

produces great wine.” n

48 | SPRING 2012

Stephanie Honig and her son Sebastian Honig Sauvignon Blanc

I’ve had the privilege of serving as

president of the FIU Alumni Association for

the last two years. As we look forward to

welcoming a new president for the Alumni

Association in May 2012, I’d like to take time

to reflect and offer my gratitude. It has been

an exciting time for FIU and especially the

Alumni Association.

The programs of the Alumni Association

have continued to grow alongside our

university’s growth. We have hosted the

largest, most successful Torch Awards in

our history and moved the annual event to

the chic JW Marriott Marquis downtown.

We reinvigorated the Panther Pit Alumni

Association Tailgates at the football games

in time for the 2010 season. Since then, we

have hosted some historic pre-game tailgates that have brought thousands of people

back to campus. The Alumni Association also won a new grant to hire the university’s first

career services specialist dedicated to serving our graduates. Last year, we traveled to

China and established a new chapter in Beijing, bringing more than 200 China graduates

together for the inaugural chapter event.

I am particularly proud that the Alumni Association has also become increasingly

involved with supporting our students. This year, half of the proceeds of the Torch

Awards are being dedicated to the First Generation Scholarship Fund. The annual fishing

tournament provides thousands more in additional scholarships to FIU students.

On a personal level, my time as president has given me the opportunity to connect with

many alumni, give back to my university and participate in community projects. I have

enjoyed this the most – being able to tell the FIU story to alumni and members of our

community. I will continue to do so long after my presidency ends.

I have also learned a great deal as president. Representing the Alumni Association on

the Foundation Board of Directors has allowed me the opportunity to gain experience

in fundraising and planning for campaigns. I believe that FIU’s aggressive fundraising

campaign can be achieved when alumni in the city become engaged. As a graduate and

Panther, I look forward to continuing to serve the university’s campaign.

All of the accomplishments of the Alumni Association resulted from the hard work

of many, especially my fellow Alumni Association board members and staff. FIU is

lucky to have dedicated and talented individuals who put in long hours to ensure

its success. I owe a debt of gratitude to everyone who has worked with me during

the past two years. A special thanks goes out to my friends in Alumni Relations,

Advancement and External Relations.

Moving forward, I will continue to give back to my alma mater in any way I can. I am

excited for the future of our university. Go Panthers!

Jack González ’97

from the ALUmNi ASSoCiAtioN PreSideNt

SPRING 2012 | 49

FIU 2011-’12 alumni association Board

executive Committee

Joaquín “Jack” F. González ’97

President

Gonzalo acevedo ’91, MBa ’10

Vice President

ariana Fajardo, esq. ’93

secretary

sharon Fine ’99, Ms ’11

Treasurer

Gabriel albelo ’93

Parliamentarian

ralph rosado ’96, Ma ’03

Governmental relations Officer

José M. Pérez de Corcho ’93

Past President

Officers

Gus alfonso ’02, Ms ’08

Chi ali ’00

stewart l. appelrouth MBa ’80

ricardo C. Cabrera ’94

lilian T. Chiu ’00

elizabeth Cross ’89

Isabel C. Díaz, esq. ’01

Cynthia J. Dienstag, esq. ’83

Marlon Font ’04

anastasia Garcia ’89

Jorge F. Hernández ’95

Michael a. Hernández ’04, MPa ’11

eduardo Hondal ’88, Ms ’00

samuel C. Jackson MPa ’90

Jaime N. Machado ’01, MBa ’10

Michael P. Maher ’97

ana l. Martínez, CPa Macc. ’92

Franklin Gentle McCune ’05, Ms ’08

Michael r. Méndez ’03, Ma ’10

alberto Padrón ’98, MBa ’09

Frank Javier Peña ’99

enrique Piñeiro ’03

alicia M. robles de la lama, esq. ’98

a. Celina saucedo ’99, MPa ’11

50 | SPRING 2012

the fiU Panthers went to their second bowl game in two years – and brought a few thousand friends along for the ride to St. Petersburg, fla., where the Beef ‘o’ Brady’s Bowl was held at tropicana field. “this was our largest away game tailgate to date, with more than 1,000 people in attendance,” said duane Wiles, interim executive director of fiU Alumni relations.A contingent of more than 600 Panthers boarded buses at mmC and hundreds more drove up with friends so they could

witness the matchup against marshall University. fiU lost to marshall 20-10, but fans had a great time at the bowl game festivities, including the Panther Pit tailgate with food, music, games, prizes and performances by the fiU marching Band. Spotted in the crowed were the four horsemen, michael maher ’97, frank Peña ’99, Alberto Padron ’98, mBA ’09 and eddie hondal ’88 mS ’00 – as well as a famous Panther, danny Pino ’96, the star of Law & order: Special Victims Unit.

photos by samuel lewis

psychology senior patricia Martinez gives a shout-out to wide receiver t.Y. hilton during what was #4’s final game as a panther.

FIU president Mark B. rosenberg greets Marcel Navarro ’93, an FIU Board of Directors member, and his wife susana Navarro ’94. Joining them are the couple’s children, Aly, AJ (middle) and Alex.

GO.FIU.EDU/2011BOWL

SPRING 2012 | 51

the FIU Marching Band pumps up the crowd as it makes its way through the panther pit tailgate into tropicana Field.

Duane Wiles, interim executive director of the FIU Alumni Association, pulls double-duty as he greets fellow tailgaters and dotes on his son Julian.

Flag bearer Kevin Cruz, a biology junior, leads the FIU Cheerleaders onto the field.

Criminal justice senior Ceasha Wilson and recent business management grad Jamesha richardson ’12 strike a pose at the panther pit tailgate.

The FIU Alumni Association’s first Wine Country Weekend brought together alumni from around the country for a three-day tour of Napa and Sonoma during harvest season. During the October 2011 trip, travelers visited alumni-owned vineyards and wineries and enjoyed wine lectures by Chaplin School of Hospitality and Tourism Management Professor Chip Cassidy ’75 and California wine expert Clark Smith. They were treated to a reception at Uncorked at Oxbow, a Napa wine tasting salon owned by FIU alumna Celeste Carducci ’77 and a soiree at B Cellars winery, owned by FIU alumnus Duffy Keys ’75. Host hotel for the weekend was the Flamingo Resort & Spa in Santa Rosa, whose marketing is led by FIU alumnus Dan Brown ’77.

FIUWine Country WEEkEnD

52 | SPRING 2012

GO.FIU.EDU/WINEWEEkEND

On any given day at the Flamingo Hotel and Resort, a

Hollywood film crew might arrive for a two-month stay or a

mother might give 48 hours notice for a 100-person quince.

As the director of sales and marketing for the retro-inspired

Santa Rosa hotel, Dan Brown ’77 helps make it all happen.

The Flamingo has been host to many memorable events, from

weddings and reunions to the filming of the movie Bandits

and most recently, filming for the new movie, The Five Year

Engagement. Brown even got to be part of the cast, appearing in

a scene with Jason Segal and Chris Pratt.

“What I like about the hotel business is you are able to meet

people from all over the world,” he said. “You see them enjoying

themselves with family, friends and associates and you get to

be part of that experience. It’s really a joy to provide people a

beautiful setting for that special moment in their lives.”

After graduating from FIU’s Chaplin School of Hospitality

and Tourism Management, Brown was selected for the Hyatt

Management Training program. “I’m forever grateful to FIU

for having the major hotels come down and recruit students,”

Brown said.

He went on to spend five years working for Hyatt in Chicago

and San Francisco and later moved into marketing for resorts like

the Red Mountain Resort and Spa in Utah and Loews Coronado

in San Diego.

When the FIU Alumni Association decided to organize a wine

country weekend travel excursion, Brown was happy to help

with the planning. The Flamingo served as the host hotel for the

harvest season getaway. Brown reconnected with his hospitality

classmate Celeste Carducci and his former professor Rocco

Angelo while meeting other alumni also working in California

wine county.

“This has been great,” Brown said. “We are finding out who is in

our own backyard and making those connections.” n

Photos by Eduardo Merille ’97 MBA ’00

SPRING 2012 | 53

By DEBoRAH o’NEIL MA ’09

GO.FIU.EDU/BROWN

mAKiNG fiU CoNNeCtioNS iN CALiforNiA

54 | SPRING 2012

HIsTOry COMes alIVeeastern mediterranean, 11 nights roundtrip

departing on July 23, 2012 from Rome, Italy, on Celebrity

Equinox

hosted by fiU President mark rosenberg and fiU Senior

Vice President of Advancement and foundation President

howard Lipman

Your senses will come alive with a kaleidoscope of sights,

sounds and tastes on this grand voyage of discovery.

Step back in time as you explore the eternal city of Rome.

Admire Greece and all its ancient glory from the Acropolis

to the breathtaking beauty of the Greek Isles. See history

come alive where continents converge and cultures cross in

Turkey’s spiritual heart – Istanbul. Visit the ruins of Pompeii

and drive the scenic Amalfi Coast high above the glistening

Tyrrhenian. Ports of call include: Santorini, Greece, Istanbul,

Turkey; Kusadasi (Ephesus), Turkey; Athens, Greece;

Mykonos, Greece; Naples/Capri and Rome, Italy.

BreaTHTakING sCeNeryNew Zealand/Australia, 12 nights

departing on march 16, 2013 from Auckland,

New Zealand, on Celebrity Solstice

hosted by Associate Vice President of Advancement

Bill draughon

Your “Down Under” New Zealand and Australia cruise

will overflow with natural and cultural wonders plus unique

wildlife. The grandeur of New Zealand’s countryside and

the stunning World Heritage Fjordland National Park will

enthrall you. Enjoy one of the world’s most popular and

cosmopolitan cities – Sydney, Australia, with its beautiful

harbor and iconic Opera House. Take a helicopter ride

to look for great white sharks off world famous Bondi

Beach and experience one of the seven natural wonders

of the world, the Great Barrier Reef. Ports of call include:

Auckland, Tauranga, Wellington, Christchurch, Dusky,

Doubtful and Milford Sounds, New Zealand, and Melbourne

and Sydney, Australia.

Cruise with Fiu in 2012-2013

MOre PaNTHer GeTaWaysAlumni can explore excitingdestinations around the worldthrough the FIU AlumniAssociation travel program. laND JOUrNeysNormandy & ParisTuscany-CortonaTreasures of East AfricaTreasures of India & Nepal laND & CrUIse JOUrNeyChina & Yangtze River rIVer JOUrNeysRhone RiverWaterways & Canals of Holland & Belgium For information about dates, pricing

and itineraries please contact Bill

Draughon at 305-348-3961 or

Draughon@fiu.edu or visit the FIU

Alumni Association travel page at

fiualumni.com.

The FIU Alumni Association is pleased to announce two spectacular voyages to the Mediterranean and New Zealand/Australia for the 2012-13 travel seasons. You’ll be sailing on Celebrity’s award winning ships – the Equinox and Solstice. FIU President Mark Rosenberg and FIU Foundation President Howard Lipman will be your hosts on our Mediterranean cruise. Bill Draughon, associate vice president of University Advancement, will host the New Zealand/Australia cruise. A donation will be made to the FIU First Generation scholarship fund for every cruised booked through Cruiseland/Cruise Planners.

For more information or to book your cruise, contact FIU alumnus Bob Zweig ’85 at Cruise Planners/Cruiseland – 866-946-2732 or Bob@Cruiseland.com and request the FIU Alumni promotion that features a $200 shipboard credit per stateroom. Space is limited so please reserve your stateroom soon.

SPRING 2012 | 55

CLASS NoteS1970

Frank M. Souto ’74 is president of FMS & Associates, LLC, a company based in Racine, Wis., that consults with credit and collection companies. He also represents the Texas-based business of his designer brother-in-law, Silvio Menéndez, Wild Timber Designs, which manufactures a variety of wood products. An Alumni Association Silver Pride Inductee, Souto works with alumni associations at different universities across the United States to raise additional funds for those associations.

1980 Jesus Romero ’81, MS ’83 was

included in Barron’s magazine’s listing of the top 1,000 financial advisors in America for the first time this year. A Merrill Lynch financial advisor with more than 50 years of experience, Romero specializes in the handling of wealth and liability solutions.

Keren Peters-Atkinson ’88 recently was promoted to chief marketing officer of Madison Commercial Real Estate Services. She previously served as the company’s director of sales and

marketing. In her new position, Peters-Atkinson will direct the traditional and online marketing plans for Madison’s 10 companies and 12 joint ventures, as well as those of related entities nationwide. She also will continue to write the company’s award-winning weekly work/life advice e-newsletter and blog, “Monday Mornings with Madison,” which can be found at mondaymornings.madisoncres.com.

1990José Tomas ’92, MS ’03 was elected to the Board of Directors of the Society for Human Resource Management, the world’s largest HR association. Tomas serves as president of Latin

American and Caribbean operations and global chief human resources officer for the Burger King Corporation.

Gabriel Albelo ’93, president of the Miami-based TransAmerica Training, was honored by Oracle University last fall with a National Special Recognition and Marketing Collaboration Awards for his

and his company’s outstanding track record in selling, supporting or delivering Oracle training. He is a member of the Alumni Association Board of Directors.

Ivan J. Parron ’94, JD ’05, principal partner of the Miami Beach-based entertainment, media and sports law firm Parron Law, was admitted to the New York State Bar. Parron is already admitted to practice law in Florida and Washington, D.C.

Luis Marcelino Gómez ’95, MA ’98, Ph.D. ’01, a senior lecturer at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, published his fourth short-story collection,

Cuando Llegaron los Helechos (When the Ferns Arrived), last November.

Ginelle Santamaria ’99 and Michael Joaquin Alvarez welcomed their first baby, a son named Michael Joaquin Alvarez II, last Oct. 9.

2000

Larry Fleurantin, Esq. ’00, an Honors College graduate and the principal attorney at Larry R. Fleurantin & Associates, published an article titled, “Exhaustion of

Administrative Remedies in Immigration Cases: Finding Jurisdiction to Review Unexhausted Claims the Board of Immigration Appeals Considers Sua Sponte on the Merits.” The article appeared in a 2010-’11 issue of the American Journal of Trial Advocacy.

Maria Arbiol ’03 and Luis Lopez del Castillo ’04 were married last July 9 at Viña Casas del Bosque, a vineyard in Santiago, Chile. The couple first met in FIU in

2002 and currently reside in North Carolina, where she is finishing a degree in educational leadership at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and he works in the Raleigh office of Wasserman Media Group as a Hispanic marketing consultant.

Al Rego MBA ’04 recently was promoted to vice president of Clinical Operations at Miami Children’s Hospital. Rego, who has been with the

hospital for more than two decades, now oversees its pharmacy; clinical laboratory; departments of radiology, dietary and environmental services; and patient and guest relations.

Alumni Association Member

MOre PaNTHer GeTaWaysAlumni can explore excitingdestinations around the worldthrough the FIU AlumniAssociation travel program. laND JOUrNeysNormandy & ParisTuscany-CortonaTreasures of East AfricaTreasures of India & Nepal laND & CrUIse JOUrNeyChina & Yangtze River rIVer JOUrNeysRhone RiverWaterways & Canals of Holland & Belgium For information about dates, pricing

and itineraries please contact Bill

Draughon at 305-348-3961 or

Draughon@fiu.edu or visit the FIU

Alumni Association travel page at

fiualumni.com.

rosanna Fiske Ms ’94 was named one of the 100 most influential Hispanic business executives in HispanicBusiness magazine’s October 2011 issue.

The associate professor in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication and director of the Global Strategic Communications master’s program at FIU was among 30 Hispanic executives selected in the Corporate Influential category. She was chosen for the impact she has had inspiring other Hispanics in their in communications career paths.

“I am honored to have been selected by HispanicBusiness as one of the leading Hispanic business leaders,” she said. “As a Hispanic faculty member in the leading communications program for Hispanic students, it is especially rewarding to be part of such a distinguished group of diverse executives and academics.”

Fiske was the first Hispanic woman president of the Miami chapter of Public Relations Society of America. She has received a number of industry and academic awards, including an FIU Torch Award, the 2010 Public Relations Professional of the Year PRemio Award by the Hispanic Public Relations Association for her many years of service to advance the profession, as well as her community.

At FIU, Fiske has been instrumental in helping shape the school’s Global Strategic Communications program into the largest graduate communications program in Florida. Currently, she also serves as the chair and CEO of the Public Relations Society of America.

56 | SPRING 2012

Give Back.

Connect.

Enjoy.

fiualumni.com/join • 305-FIU-ALUM

Build something larger than yourself. this is what it means to be a member of the fiU Alumni Association.

Lourdes Cristina Cortizo ’07 married Edward Joseph Acevedo at Gesu Catholic Church in Miami last Aug. 20. They reside in Arlington, Va., where Lourdes is a practicing attorney in Washington, D.C.,

and Edward is a professional staff member for the U.S. House Committee on Foreign Affairs under the leadership of U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen ’75, MS ’87.

Norma Watkins ’08, a professor emerita at Miami-Dade College, has written a memoir titled, The Last Resort: Taking the Mississippi Cure. In her book, Watkins tells the story of a childhood at Allison’s Wells, a popular Mississippi spa proper white people run by her aunt, and of a one-woman battle against the hypocrisies of segregated society.

Jenifer Merille ’11 and Eduardo Merille ’97, MBA ’00 had quite the blessed December 2011. On Dec. 12, Jenifer earned her degree in education and crossed the stage nine months pregnant. Eddie, who is FIU’s director of marketing and new media, snapped this picture of her at Commencement with FIU President Mark B. Rosenberg. Less than two weeks later on Dec. 23, baby Melody Blas Merille arrived just in time for Christmas. Melody was welcomed by brother Luke, 4, sister Mila, 2, and by her abuela, fellow FIU alumna Marianela Merille ’75, Ms ’77.

Alumni Association Member

susan (Novoa) Carvajal ’06, Ms ’09 and

George Carvajal ’08 were married on Sept. 23, in a

ceremony that was dressed up in blue and gold.

The bride and groom reached out to FIU President Mark B.

Rosenberg and the FIU Alumni Association to inquire about some FIU

goodies that could help enliven the ceremony, since their wedding’s

colors were navy blue and gold. FIU holds a special place in the

couple’s hearts: the pair met at FIU in 2006 playing intramural soccer

with their respective Greek organizations.

“We bleed Blue and Gold,” Susan said. “We both worked on

campus and we lived in the dorms, so it’s no surprise that the

majority of our love story was written with FIU as its stage.”

To make their special day even more so, FIU sent beads and pompoms

their way, as well as a very special guest: Roary.

SPRING 2012 | 57

Eric Pfeffer ’77

• Founder and President of The Pfeffer Group, LLC• Former Chairman of Wyndham Hotels Worldwide• Lifetime Member, FIU Alumni Association• Bachelor’s in hospitality and tourism management

Q. What are your fondest memories of FIU?a. The relationships I developed with international students from South America, the Middle East, India and Greece come to mind. As it turns out, this understanding of and getting used to multi-cultural mentalities, customs and other idiosyncrasies early on in life gave me a competitive advantage as I climbed the corporate ladder.

Q. How did FIU prepare you for your career?a. I was a veteran of the Israeli Defense Forces and a foreign student, so when I came here I was ready to work. I felt that FIU professors gave me an immediate understanding of the basics of hotel and restaurant business and its marketing, operational and financial aspects. Their advice was very instrumental in my decisions.

Q. What is the best piece of advice you have ever received?a. I was told to work in the industry while I studied it and to keep an open mind. I once faced a crucial decision and I approached Professor Rocco Angelo for advice. During graduation, I was offered a management trainee position at The Plaza in New York and, since I was already a front office manager at the Howard Johnson Golden Glades, I was also offered the assistant manager position of the flagship Howard Johnson in Lake Buena Vista, Fla. Rocco’s advice turned out to be prophecy. He said to me, “Don’t be blinded by the glamour, someone has to be the president of Howard Johnson.” Within 15 years, I was named president of Howard Johnson Hotels. Q. Why is it important to be involved with youralma mater?a. First, keeping in touch with the past, with those who had an impact on your life, is a great foundation for continued success and happiness, regardless of your goals or purpose in life. Second, I always keep in touch with the faculty to stay up to date on the young graduates coming out of school for recruitment purposes or as a source of current information.

Q. What is your proudest accomplishment?a: On the business side, the fact that I was able to succeed in the corporate world, retiring from the highest position at Wyndham Hotels Worldwide (the largest franchiser of hotels in the world), and establishing The Pfeffer Group. The company allowed me to go from being a “corporate animal” to an entrepreneur. When we started, we were doing only consulting and we’ve since ventured into a number of partnerships, including The Pfeffer Group Retail Division, financial investments and a residential real estate private fund. On the personal side, my daughters Jacqueline and Jessica give me a lot of pride and joy.

VIP: Very Important Panther

Photo by Doug Hungerford

58 | SPRING 2012

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