Grape of the Day

I've seen lots of impressive wine lists in my time. It seems as if proprietors or beverage directors get a buy on some high-end, well-known red wines and they fill up their lists with those wines. This is not to demean those wines, but the finest of the big, bold, tannic reds simply do not go with light and highly spiced, capsacin-filled foods. It's a waste of a great wine and perhaps a waste of great food. The other night, we went to The Consulate in Atlanta. https://www.theconsulateatlanta.com/ If you live in the Atlanta area and like creative cuisine, this is a must-go. It's not a pre-set, prix fixe menu like most other top-end restaurants these days, and honestly, it's not priced like one either.  Let me explain the concept. Once per quarter, a guest spins the globe. And, whatever country the highlight lands on, that is the menu for the 3-month period beginning roughly one month later. In their 10 years, The Consulate has presented original menus from 38 regions (al...

 He said it. He really did. While Abe Lincoln's most famous speech of November 1863 was delivered on the 19th day of that month, his Gettysburg Address simply did not measure up in clairvoyance to his speech delivered just the day before where he warned his listeners that in the 21st Century, they should not believe everything they read on the internet. In particular, and relevant to us, he told the crowd that more than 150 years later, the internet would be littered with a strange hybrid of humans known as influencers and that one of the areas on which they claimed expertise would be the pricing on restaurant wine lists. Why do I write about this today? Why not? Well the real reason is that yesterday evening, an instagram reel by an influencer was shared with me that purported to tell you what to stay away from on wine lists. Madame Influencer made her case. And she supported her case with ... her case. For those who need to know, she said that frequenters of restaurants should st...

It's sad. There are some very good foods and food ingredients that have a way of killing the wines we serve with them. Does that mean we should stop eating those foods or that we should stop drinking wine with them? It turns out the answer is neither. We just need to be more careful about how we are pairing them. Fair warning before you read further that this might get a little bit or a lot geeky. Then again, I might change my mind and it might not be geeky at all. We shall see as my flying fingers tap dance on my keyboard. Let's start with an easy one, relatively speaking: chocolate. Now, as chocolate afficionados of which I am not one know, there are all different varieties of chocolate: sweet, semi-sweet, bitter, mik, different percentages, and more. They all have different characteristics, but they also all have a commonality. They are all ultimately a byproduct of the cocoa beans that come from the cacao tree. Probably the biggest challenge in chocolate is the pyrocyanidi...

Just a couple of weeks ago, I wrote about the mystique of blends, particularly red blends. But why do winemakers blend varieties of grapes into a single wine? Is it just commercial or is there science to it? And if there is science, is there also art? I think the answer to all of those questions is yes. For some, it's simply trial and error, and frankly, there is nothing wrong with trial and error, but I suspect that the finest wines blend grapes using a splash of science combined with a dollop of art. But escaping from the finest wines to just some pleasing ones, the commercial side often takes center stage. What's really going on? Let's start by considering perhaps the best known blend, the red Bordeaux. Frequent readers here, moderately knowledgeable wine drinkers and people who have searched for it probably know that there are five red Bordeaux grapes -- alphabetically, Cabernet France, Cabernet Sauvignon, Malbec, Merlot, and Petit Verdot. How exactly did they come to b...

When I "announced' that I was going to restart this blog on a semi-regular basis, I also solicited topics. After all, one of the biggest reasons I stopped doing this blog for quite a while was that it is really difficult to come up with fresh ideas that I know enough about to write off the top of my head. One of the first requests that I got was to explain why there is so much difference in taste profile from one Barolo to another. For starters, I don't know when the difference becomes so much. Is so much a lot, a little, or somewhere in between? I suppose that's in the eye of the beholder. Before we get into the actual topic here, let's get to Barolo. If you're coming with me, we're going to fly from Atlanta to Milan (Milano if you prefer) and try to sidestep the Winter Olympic traffic. It's cool, but not frigid today and the "nuclear snow" as the ski mountaneering expert described it yesterday has stopped. The drive from Milan to Barolo is n...

 You saw the title and you were hoping, weren't you? Admit it. You thought I was going to report on a new discovery that drinking copious amounts of wine around the clock every day was going to improve your memory. I'm not. I've been working on this experiment for a while now and drinking wine has not improved my memory. Perhaps it has occasionally distorted my memory, but it hasn't improved it ... at least not yet. For me, however, the good news is that memory is still pretty darn good, so I'm here to report that wine seems to have not diminished my memory. So why I am I writing this? I want you to use your memory in order to enjoy your wine more. It works for me and it can work for you. And, contrary to popular belief, if you do use your memory whether or not you choose to combine it with one of those wine apps that I disdain, you'll get more pleasure out of wine. What do I mean?  I want you to remember what wines you liked and why. Not just that it was a Merl...

 Welcome back!! As those of you who were regular or semi-regular readers know, I went about a year and a half writing original content off the top of my head. I ran out of steam. I ran out of ideas. Now I'm back, but not every day. Yesterday, I paid a visit to one of my seemingly favorite homes away from home -- the Delta Sky Club. For those who have never been in one, it's an airport lounge frequented for the most part by people who fly an awful lot on Delta as well as some who simply have the right credit cards or who spend more money on it than it is worth. In any event, almost all of the Sky Clubs have a bar with selections of complimentary alcoholic beverages as well as "premium" ones that you can pay for with dollars or with Sky Miles. Yesterday, being done with client interaction for the day and knowing I was not getting behind the wheel again for the day, I ventured to the Sky Club bar as did a seemingly professional woman probably about 40 years old. She orde...

I know; you drink beer on Super Bowl Sunday. But maybe you're not really a beer drinker. Perhaps you like wine better. But it's so hard to figure out what to drink with your Super Bowl food. Why is that? There is so much variety. If you're eating at the Super Bowl the way lots of other gluttonous Americans who plan to take Monday off from work do, you've got a huge variety of foods at your disposal. Let's go through them and see some of the problems: Chips and salsa -- salty and acidic Chips and veggie dip -- salty and green Barbecue of one type or another -- salty, a little spicy or a lot spicy, and likely somewhat fatty Wings -- spicy or lemony or garlicky or fried and maybe with blue or some combination Veggie platter -- somewhat bland, but the dips will change that Charcuterie platter -- fatty, sometimes spicy meats and cheeses that do or do not go with the meats All kinds of sandwiches usually with meats that fit into some of the catgories above Pizza More frie...

Let's get to the controversy first. This is not a debate about long-term shifts in climate on earth and what is or is not causing them. If that is the debate that you do want, there are plenty of places online that you can do that. Frankly, as someone who doesn't study climate science, my thoughts on the matter should no more influence yours than should any other random person's. Here is a fact. The last 10 years or so have been warmer across essentially our entire planet than they have been over any other 10 year period since people started using thermometers and recording temperatures for posterity. Roughly 50 years ago back in the 1970s, we had a multi-year period during which temperatures were much colder than norms over the same periods of manually or electronically recorded temperatures. Each has an effect on wine. Let's consider what this does to wine and to some extent why. And, before you think I've misled you, this is not about wine that might have been ma...

 I took 3 years off from this blog. Why? I write off the top of my head and the top of my head just wasn't coming up with new ideas. So, I stopped for quite a while and focused on some other things.  What, you ask? Work, life, family, volunteering, debate reviews. One of those has somewhat fallen off the radar, so the top of my head had an idea. Suppose you were a person just getting into wine or even if you've been drinking it for a while had never really explored. What might I tell you to do? Do not drink Chardonnay or Cabernet Sauvignon for a year.  That's right. I'm telling you to stay away from two of the most popular grapes in the world. Why would I do that? Well, among white wines, Chardonnay is about as full-bodied as it gets (yes, I could name some obscure grapes that might dispel that, but that's not the point) and among red wines, Cabernet is about as full-bodied as it gets. So, when people start their wine adventures with those fuller-bodied wines, they ...

You sit down at a table at a restaurant and persuse the menu and the wine list. After a few minutes, you choose your food for the evening and a bottle of wine to share that goes with the food. Upon ordering the bottle, you can see that look in your server's eyes. She wonders what I have just asked for and how it is that she is going to get it served. You see, it's the first time any of her guests have ever ordered a bottle of wine. And, she doesn't know what to do. And, then to make matters worse, there is a chance she is reading this. But, then again, that's not all bad because some stories end better than others. In this particular case, she took one of the alternatives available to her. She approached a manager or beverage manager, I'm not sure which, for help. This manager came to the table and showed our hero how to open and serve the wine. Well, sort of. This manager says she is going to hold training for the staff so that they can all see the right way to do ...

I'll be one to say it and I'll say it here. I really do not like having to look at a restaurant menu or worse yet, a restaurant wine list on my phone. The whole craze of using QR (quick response in case you weren't sure) codes to get to a menu or a drink or wine list is a craze that makes me crazy. I'm not as facile as most of the people half my age and my eyes just don't like looking at the list either in a microscopic size or pinching it so that it's bigger, but then having to scroll all over the place to see what I really want to see. Imagine a 5-page wine list or a 10-page list or a 200-page list on your phone. Maybe you can, but for me, it is a nightmare that just won't quit. But, for restaurants, there are hueg advantages. If wines are kept online so that diners and drinkers can see the list on their phones, then restaurants can easily track inventory. They can also track the likes and dislikes of frequent guests. They can see how people are choosing t...

As a broad classification, the most expensive wines in the world are Burgundies. Primarily red, but a few whites as well. Are they worth it? It depends who you ask, but don't ask me as I will never know.  There is a website that every year compiles a list of the 10 most expensive labels on average and shows that average retail price. And, it is not split by vintage, so the most prized vintages are ever more expensive. In 2021, 9 of the top 10 are Burgundies (the other one being a TBA Riesling) and 8 of the top 10 cost more than $10,000 per 750 ml bottle, on average. Compare to 2019, when only 5 exceeded $10,000. In just 2 years, the price to make this esteemed list has gone up by more than 50%. That is inflation. The number one wine on the list is the Domaine Leroy Musigny Grand Cru weighing in at an average of $32,857 per 750 ml bottle. On the 2020 list, the same wine was not #1, but it was only about $17,000 per bottle. What happened there? Who drinks this stuff? Presumably, it...

What makes you like a wine better than another wine? I don't know. It could be that it tastes like a Hawaiian pizza, that's it's overly oaky, or that it's so tannic that you're still puckered up from last night's glass. While I've exaggerated a bit, I have heard descriptions that approached each of those from various people describing wines they love. On the other hand, if you are reading a description of wine from people who are experts in the field or at least purport to be, you'll likely see descriptors a bit different from those. What are their keys and if you understood them, would they make a difference to you? It might be easier to start with what they are not. I've never heard a real wine geek describe what they really like in a wine with a particularly simple description. And, if you read a review of a great wine, it might go on and on ... and on. It's that last "and on" after the ellipsis that should be telltale. Experienced w...

Perhaps it's the alcohol. Maybe it's that you are just doing something fun. Could it be that only nice people drink wine? No, I know it's not that as I've had the other experience as well. But, by and large, when out tasting wine whether at a winery, a wine bar or restaurant, or just wherever it's an option, nice people seem to abound.  Consider yesterday. We chose to take our relatively new puppy (she's 4 1/2 months old now) out to do some wine tasting. We chose two wineries, one of which we had been to previously and the other which we had heard good things about, that claimed to be dog friendly. And, both were. Arriving at the first one, poor little Lola was amazed at everything around her -- the sights, the sounds, the smells, all the people, and even a few other dogs. While I went to get us wine, Lisa found a "sofa" on one side of an outdoor table. A couple less than half our ages was on the other side. I don't expect we have much in common wi...

Restaurants and banquet halls love large gatherings. They often have open bars and to go with the open bars, their charges for alcoholic beverages are often quite exorbitant. And, frankly, they like nothing better than the wine drinkers. More so than with other alcoholic beverages, they are able to move their bad wines at good wine prices. Really? How does that happen? There are a few brands that you can see over and over at functions like this. Typically, they have something in common with a more famous brand. But, these are the mass-produced wines from out of the way vineyards that a restaurant or banquet hall can put out there as the same thing as the top tier wine whose name it sounds like.  But, and there is a big but there, they don't resemble each other. They're not produced from grapes from the same vineyards, perhaps not even the same regions. They're not produced using the same exacting techniques. And, they don't taste anything remotely like the wine they are...

Some restaurants have what they call a Reserve List. This might be wines that are higher-priced, special wines, wines that they store or handle differently, wines that are poured in bigger or better glasses, or simply better wines. Some people always order off the Reserve List; others never do. I tend to look to the Reserve List in special situations: when it's "Half Off Night," when there is a steal on there, or on special occasions. Not all wines on the Reserve List are created (or priced) equally, however. There are some that everybody recognizes, some that a smaller group recognizes and some that only a few will recognize. Let's consider each of them. Unless the restaurant is featuring a particular wine, you tend to get your worst pricing on the wines that everybody knows although that is not always the case. While I rarely call out names, I am going to illustrate with a few. Where I live, there are two Cabernets that seem to be on every restaurant's Reserve L...

We're back in Italy today or more specifically in Campania. It's a scenic region known for the seashore of Naples, Mount Vesuvius, the ancient ruins, and the Amalfi Coast. It also produces some pretty good wine, most of it red. While it is far and away the most famous, Vesuvius is not the only volcano in Campania. In fact, geologists have found 24 of them in the region although most remain bubbling underwater some in the many lakes of the region. What this does from a wine standpoint, of course, is to provide the local grape growers with a rich, quite minerally soil in which to grow those grapes. The natural acidity that the soil imparts to the grapes makes for wonderful pairings with the often tomato-based dishes that the Neapolitans are known for. If there is one part of Campania that is more volcanic than any other, it is undoubtedly Campi Flegrei or the Phelgraean Fields. Slightly more than 10 miles nearly due west of Naples where Campania meets the Gulf of Napoli, the soil...

What is a grape tell? You can't look it up on the internet, at least I don't think you can. Why not? I just made it up. Where did it come from? Have you ever played poker or some other game where you wager based on the cards you hold or something similar? Great players approach every hand the same way. Lesser players have "tells." They might scratch their head when they have a great hand or lean to their side when they are bluffing. They might take a deep breath when they are pretty sure they are making a bad decision. Many grapes have tells as well. No, they don't scratch their heads. That might be a bit challenging for them, but in grapes, they are flavor tells. You pick up a glass of white wine. You swirl it and smell it to get the aroma. You taste it. The one thing you can't get out of your mind is lychee. You can smell it, but even more so, you can taste it. The grape is Gewurtzraminer. Your large glass is filled with red wine. It's you detect a hint ...

We all know you can't make wine from local grapes on the island of Bali. It's part of Indonesia; it's hot and humid, and it's on the equator. That's three strikes and you're out. Well, let's go to Bali to see if they can prove us wrong. It's another tough trip from the US to this island paradise. Our first leg takes us to Seoul, South Korea, technically Incheon just out of town. It's a long flight, but in the world of vicarious travel, time stands still. Our layover is scheduled for 18 hours, but magically we are cutting it to 18 minutes. We're leaving South Korea to go to Indonesia and flying into Jakarta, the capital, and by some measures, the most populous city in the world with the metropolitan area having more than 33 million residents. Another 15 hour layover gets transformed by the magic of the grapeoftheday and 15 minutes later, we head on the much shorter, roughly 2 hour, flight to Bali.  Bali has an interesting shape to it. It looks a b...