I received an email today from a new friend asking whether or not I thought he should purchase a wine fridge. My emphatic response was YES!
Wine storage is an issue that does not always come up when discussing wine but it probably should. Mistakes from storing wine upright to keeping it in the kitchen or some other hot place (I did that once – and learned a lesson) can really damage that expensive bottle you have been saving for a special occasion. Read the rest of this entry »
What is better, an old wine or a young wine?
The truth is, there is no RIGHT answer to this question. For starters, some wines are made to be aged (some French Bordeaux) while others are meant to be drunk young (fresh, crisp whites such as a New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc). Furthermore, even red wines that CAN be aged, don’t necessarily HAVE to be. Some people prefer a young wine, while others may prefer an aged wine. Read the rest of this entry »
I was recently made aware of an interesting article about hangovers in the New Yorker. Needless to say I do not condone drinking in excess, but every once in a while it happens – and leads to the inevitable hangover. Yes I have learned a lot about my own tolerance and I respect alcohol (and wine in particular) enough to ENJOY it and not ABUSE it. BUT, that same love of wine has made saying “no thank you” very challenging when someone offers another glass of the good stuff – leading to the unfortunate “one too many” (or as the case may be and article is called “A few too many”).
A friend from college is running for city council here in NYC. He has a fund raiser tonight and he was able to get a well regarded published cookbook author to demonstrate/prepare several gourmet courses for the guests at tonight’s event.
When he and I first spoke about the event I thought how fabulous it would be for me to pair each of the courses with a wine. He loved the idea, but sadly, in the end the logistics made doing this too complicated. The response to this fund raiser was so overwhelming that the guests will be seated but will not have table space. They will be holding their plates on their laps and we ultimately decided that managing the food while also trying to hold onto a glass of wine would prove to be problematic. So we came up with what I believe was the next best option – sparkling wine. Nice and refreshing on a warm summer day, and said to be “food neutral” the Yarden 2000 Blanc du blanc would be served as the guests arrive.
Although I’m confident that we came up with the best alternative to each course being paired with a wine, and I am really looking forward to this event, I still want to sneak in some wine (I won’t). The more I come to learn & appreciate wine, the more I treasure a well paired wine with good food. The best meal in the world without any wine is simply void of what I believe to be a critical element in culinary appreciation. While I fully understand the complication inherent for today’s event, I believe that any food related event MUST have wine to compliment the food/meal.
On a completely UNrelated note, I just finished reading another very nice article written by a wine writer whose pieces I’ve really come to like. I have linked & mentioned pieces by Laurie Daniel before, and here she talks about New Zealand Pinot Noir. Pinot is a HOT varietal (still) and one that I tend to either love or…well, not hate, but if I don’t really like it I generally don’t care for it at all. Daniel discusses the huge increase in Pinot planting and production in recent years and discusses several specific New Zealand Pinots (all rather expensive with the cheapest being $21). A nice quick & simply read with some good suggestions for the Pinot lover. Enjoy!
Happy Wine & Food pairing!
WTG
I attended an Israeli wine tasting at a local cultural center earlier this week. The instructor spoke both about the Israeli wine industry as well as basic wine appreciation. Among the instructor’s opening statements was a proclamation that the Israeli wine industry took a major step forward with the introduction of the Golan Heights Winery 15 years ago (it was more like 25 years ago). Shortly thereafter we tried the first wine, a sauvignon blanc. He began by pointing out that it is not straw in color, as a straw color indicates a flaw (not true). Upon tasting the wine he pointed out that this wine was NOT oaky like some other whites since Sauvignon Blanc generally only spends 6 months in barrel (when in reality this Sauv Blanc was made in stainless steel tanks and saw no oak – hence the non-oakiness). Finally he alleviated the concerns of an attendee regarding sulfites in wine informing the class that white wines, although written on the label “contains sulfites”, don’t really contain sulfites. I raised my hand and announced that i thought all wines contained sulfites, even organic wines (albeit in smaller quantities). He emphatically responded that I was wrong, reds contain sulfites but whites do not.
Speaking of his angry response, in a crowded room with over 50 people drinking (not spitting) wine, he consistently “sshhh-ed” the crowd. I can appreciate the challenges of speaking before a loud audience but while drinking wine in a crowded room did he really expect the audience to remain perfectly silent??
A real quick weekend post. I have written plenty about the health benefits of wine and my affinity to Israel has also been well documented on this site. So when I stumbled on the following post I knew I had to re-post it here for all of you. Enjoy the article, “Researchers Develop White Wine With Health Benefits Similar To Red”.
Happy healthy WHITE wine tasting!
WTG
What a difference a little marketing & the word FREE can do.
I attended the Murcia region of Spain’s wine education event at Astor Center 2 days ago, followed by an intimate lunch at 81, a restaurant on 81st St in Manhattan yesterday. The events were set up by the same gentleman who set up the tasting I attended for Rioja wines (also at the Astor Center) about a month ago. The Murcia event, like the Rioja event, was free of charge, but the Murcia event seemed to have been advertised to the general public as opposed to the Rioja event which was more of an industry only event. Well, the marketing & cost (FREE) led this event to be PACKED full of…well, lets say packed full of people who like free wine!
Cheers to red wine & a longer life!!!
The NY Times had a few wine related articles today. The first, discussed a topic that has been written about frequently here, that of “resveratrol” – the wonder-drug contained in red wine. Previous reports had indicated that the amount of resveratrol in wine were nowhere near enough to be effective from simple wine consumption. But one of the sources in todays article notes “a mere four, five-ounce glasses of wine “starts getting close” to the amount of resveratrol they found effective”, as opposed to previous studies that determined that “to gain (sufficient) dosages people would have to drink more than 100 bottles of red wine a day”. An interesting read that can be found here.
The other article titled “What’s the Peppery Note in Those Shirazes?”, talked about Australian (where Shiraz originated) researchers who sought to find out why there are peppery notes in Australian Shiraz. Read the rest of this entry »
I have recently written about wine service in restaurants. While it is a bit of a hot topic right now (depending on who you ask) I want to take the conversation in a slightly different direction; “by the glass service”.
To bring this all together, my issue with wine service in restaurants had to do with how servers were pouring wine, or more specifically, high much they were pouring in the glass. Frankly I felt that almost EVERY TIME I allowed a server at a wine bar to pour, they would invariably pour to a level that did not allow me to swirl the wine – thereby detracting from my full appreciation of said wine.
Today I bring up by the glass service as this is something offered at my restaurants and wine bars for those who want to try a wine, but may not be prepared to buy a full bottle. It is especially helpful if two (or more) diners want different wines. Read the rest of this entry »
I’m revisiting this topic having previously discussed it in an April post given a recent spat of articles.
The first is written by Christopher Hitchens in Slate who takes issue with waiters pouring wine from a bottle he ordered for reasons he states in his piece (interrupting a story, pouring so that customers will feel obligated to order another bottle, etc.). And more recently, Calgary sommelier Aaron Plamondon, who refutes Hitchens piece and “defends the service industry”. Read the rest of this entry »
