WINE AUCTION & CELEBRATION ADDS NEW EVENTS AND AWARD PRESENTATION TO SCHEDULE OF FESTIVITIES

HILTON HEAD ISLAND, S.C.-Got a taste for Italian? Learn how to whip up a sumptuous three-course dinner worthy of a cucina Italiana from Michael Anthony's Executive Chef Michael Cirafesi. Complementary wine included.

The Cooking Demonstration and Wine Tasting is one of several new events planned for this year's Wine Auction & Celebration running March 23 through April 1. Also on the menu, seminars on New Zealand wines and Pinot Noir.

The epicurean lineup will begin at 11 a.m. March 31 with the cooking demo and wine tasting taking place in Michael Anthony's new demonstration kitchen located above the restaurant in Orleans Plaza.

Participants will watch Cirafesi prepare a marinated seafood salad with fresh orange and fennel, homemade spinach and potato dumplings with wild mushroom sauce and panna cotta with fresh berries, representing three unique regions of Italy.

Renowned wine educator Clint Harris, a recipient of Wine Spectator's Award of Excellence the past four years, will be pouring wine especially selected to go with the appetizer, entrée and dessert.

At 2 p.m. James Vuletic of Providence Winery and Berridge Spencer of Man O'War Winery will conduct a seminar on New Zealand wines at The Westin. The renowned winemakers will explain how climate, soil and other conditions affect the characteristics of wine.

The New Zealand wine seminar will be followed at 3:30 p.m. by a workshop on Pinot Noir. Premier winemakers Brian Loring, owner of Loring Wine Company, and Ryan Zepaltas of Siduri, one of the most highly rated American Pinot Noirs, will discuss how they handcraft one of the world's great wine grapes into distinctive wines.

Tickets are $125 for the Cooking Demonstration, $50 for each of the wine seminars or $200 for all three events.

The Arts Center also will present the inaugural Hess Award, honoring one of Napa Valley's most prestigious wineries, at the Wine Auction & Gala. Named after its first recipient, the award will be presented to Tom Selfridge, president of The Hess Collection Winery, a California vineyard acclaimed for its cabernet sauvignon and one of the most expansive private collections of modern art in North America.