Veggie burgers – impossible food-wine pairing?!?
Okay, we just did an “impossible” challenge but it reeked of pipi and April foolery. So here’s something more useful: five veggie burger recipes via the Times, where the article was as high as number two on the most emailed article list over the weekend. Seeing it on the way to the Trade Joe’s, we...
‘Virgin boy eggs’ from China: impossible food-wine pairing?
Ah, spring is in the air. And people around the world are thinking about eggs. Here, we have bunnies who lay colored and chocolate eggs. In China, it turns out, the springtime air in Dongyang fills with the smell of hot urine and the gastronome’s mind in that city then turns to…eggs. Let’s hear the...
Domaine de Ferrand, La Ferrande, 2009
To poll at 90 percent is unheard of in a democracy. So it’s a good thing this wine isn’t running for office since all but three out of 30 or so in my NYU class liked it when I poured it this week. We had a quick tour de France I was looking for an...
Millennial foodies, check. But no love for the millennial wine geeks?
“When Did Young People Start Spending 25% of Their Paychecks on Pickled Lamb’s Tongues?” Such is the headline of a New York magazine article about young foodies. Or, rather, one young foodie, the 27-year-old Dine Chang. While the story tried to make larger points about the millennial generation’s love of food, casting the story in...
Wine circa 1933, LOLz, Cheval Blanc ’47, lite beer — sipped & spit
SIPPED: circa 1933 Fortune.com republished a lengthy archive article from 1934 over the weekend. There’s lots to savor: the author suggests American wine can handily undercut French wine on price, urges an Eastward expansion of vineyards in the US, and notes that Champagne wasn’t considered wine by government policy. SIPPED: LOLz “Jay McInerney writes for...
The experts strike back?
There’s something of a cottage industry that has emerged in trashing the reputation of wine experts. Richard Quandt of Princeton wrote an hilarious essay entitled “On Wine Bullshit.” Bob Hodgson had his two devastating papers about wine competitions. The Wine Trials books suggest high-volume, low-priced wines are all that you’ll ever need. The WSJ got...
Moncuit, Roagna, Cascina della Rose, Arnot-Roberts – Polaner highlights
It’s the time of year when distributors and/or importers have annual (or semi-annual) portfolio tastings. These are opportunities for breadth, not depth, as hundreds of current release wines (and occasionally some older ones) are put out on tables, often with the winemaker pouring. Yesterday was the Polaner Selections tasting and I dropped by for a...
Wholesalers beat a retreat on CARE act
After appearing in two sessions of congress, a legislative proposal that would have threatened the legal, direct shipment of wine is dead according to Shanken News Daily. They cite Tom Cole, president of Republic National Distributing Co., who says “The CARE Act is officially off the table.” Wine lovers can breathe a sigh of relief....
The etiquette of pouring a counterfeit wine
Friend of the blog, Mike Steinberger, started a series of posts on his blog wherein he plays Wine Ethicist, answering (or posing) questions on etiquette in the wine world. Since Mike has fallen off the face of the internet (actually, I think he’s traveling) and has let his blog idle this week, we’re happy to...
Deep throat reveals Cameron state dinner wines
Even though the White House is no longer printing the names of the wines on the menu nor releasing them after the fact, it turns out that we had our own “deep throat” at the event: none other than the wine person of the last decade, founder of Cellertracker, Eric Levine. Sure enough, Eric posted...
Steampunk wine opener, man’s cave, stars, wine bars – sipped & spit
SPIT: Metrokane’s The Rabbit Install a machine such as in the above video and you will really one-up your neighbors in the corkscrew department. SIPPED: reading What? That LA Times is dropping stars for restaurant reviews? I’m 99+ points on that. [LAT] NO LONGER SIPPING: wine bars Lou on Vine, the LA wine bar and...
Cork and dagger: Should wines served in the White House be disclosed?
Remember the state dinner when the White House served green curry shrimp with a 15.6% alcohol grenache for the Indian premier? (and the typos!) Or a “Carlos Santana” brut sparkling wine with dessert for the Mexican president? Oh how we howled at those selections wondering if the White House wine steward was trying to derail...
