wine

  1. Because wine is, after all, my love language

    Because wine is, after all, my love language

    Dear love, I wanted to let you know how much you mean to me, and how there aren’t enough words to express this. But I am a flawed human. I may not always be on time with the flowers, helping out with the chores, keeping places tidy and neat, or quick to understand what you need most when you’re busy. 

     

    Despite all that, there is one thing I am good at: picking out the wine for our evening. 

    Because wine is, after all, my love language.

  2. Dry January is (finally) over, would you like a glass of non-alcoholic wine?

    Dry January is (finally) over, would you like a glass of non-alcoholic wine?

    Another year, and another month of Dry January in the books. For those that haven’t caught on yet, myself included, non-alcoholic wine has picked up a lot of attention and momentum during January. So naturally, we wanted to ask the question: what is a non-alcoholic wine? 

  3. Book Review: Italian Wine Unplugged 2.0 Offers a Deep Dive Into Italian Wine

    Book Review: Italian Wine Unplugged 2.0 Offers a Deep Dive Into Italian Wine

    As wine lives, breathes, and evolves, so must wine study books change over time. The best reference books about wine reflect this natural evolution with updated editions that add to an original wealth of material. 

    Italian Wine Unplugged 2.0 is a second-edition book that builds upon the success of Italian Wine Unplugged Grape by Grape, a study guide for students and lovers of Italian wine that debuted in 2017. Compiled by a team of wine experts and educators, the first edition quickly became a benchmark and has been used as the core textbook for the Vinitaly International Academy (VIA), a leader in Italian wine education. 

    As its subtitle, Grape by Grape, suggests, the first edition focuses on Italian grapes, specifically 430+ indigenous varieties. Within its pages, you will find all the well-known varieties like Sangiovese and Nebbiolo as well as the obscure, hard-to-pronounce grapes such as Susumaniello...

  4. Bruna Flaibani on Biodynamics and why Friuli is Kissed by Luck

    Bruna Flaibani on Biodynamics and why Friuli is Kissed by Luck

    The Flaibani estate is located in Cividale del Friuli in the Colli Orientali del Friuli area very close to the Slovenian border. The Flaibanis have three hectares of planted vineyards, all terraced and with steep slopes, that resemble a garden surrounded by six hectares of woods. They are working with vines over 100 years old with their youngest vines over 20 years. They produce less than 10,000 bottles of six different types of wine from Schioppettino, Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Friulano, and Refosco dal Peduncolo Rosso. Their wines have a vibrancy, energy and quality that validate all the passion and hard work behind them.

  5. Pierre and Antonin Making Natural Wine in the Languedoc

    Pierre and Antonin Making Natural Wine in the Languedoc

    Pierre Caizergues started making wines in Montreal d’Aude west of Carcassonne in southwestern France in 2015. He was joined by his friend, winemaker Antonin Bonnet, full time in 2020. The two friends specialize in low intervention wines (low or no added sulfites), with varietals like Carignan, and some resistant varietals such as Cabernet Cortis and Souvignier Gris. They also separately make a Mourvèdre in the village of Saint Jean de Fos in the Larzac region of France. Larzac is a bit further east in the Hérault region while all the other wines they make are made in Aude near the estate in Montreal d’Aude / Hameau de Stricou.

     

  6. Roberto Di Meo of Di Meo Winery on the Historical Wines of Campania, Pompeii and Mount Vesuvius

    Roberto Di Meo of Di Meo Winery on the Historical Wines of Campania, Pompeii and Mount Vesuvius

    Campania offers some of Italy's great sensory experiences from the beaches of the Amalfi Coast, the ruins of Pompeii, to the food and energy of Naples. It also is home to four of Italy's great wine grapes Aglianico, Fiano di Avellino, Falanghina and Greco di Tufo. 

    The Di Meo winery, located in the province of Avellino, is one of the most celebrated Campania estates focusing squarely on native varietals. In the early '80s, three siblings Erminia, Generoso and Roberto Di Meo acquired the historical estate from their parents, which includes 25 hectares and an 18th century farmhouse that was once a hunting lodge of the Caracciolo Prince....

  7. An Indian couple painted in the Mughal style sitting on a patterned cloth with birds in their hands.

    How studying Sanskrit love poetry can answer the question: Why wine?

    Do you ever think, “why wine?”

    There are many people who don’t, but since you’re on the website of a wine magazine, you might have given the question some consideration.

  8. Lauverjat Menetou-Salon: A Family Battles Historic Forces; ‘We No Longer Have Seasons’

    Lauverjat Menetou-Salon: A Family Battles Historic Forces; ‘We No Longer Have Seasons’

    We were at a small wine shop, looking for a nice end-of-summer white. We spotted the bottle at the same time and both said, “Awwww.” It was Menetou-Salon, a Sauvignon Blanc from the Loire Valley of France, which we don’t see that often. When we do, we think of Windows on the World in New York’s World Trade Center, where we first tasted it decades before terrorists brought down the twin towers on Sept. 11, 2001, killing almost 3,000 people. We recalled that first bottle when we had another Menetou-Salon at a French restaurant in St. Maarten during a cruise in 2006 and toasted our dear wine-loving friend Cathy, who we lost in that devastating attack 21 years ago. 

    ...

  9. Mario Paoluzi of I Custodi: Rediscovering Mount Etna's Traditions

    Mario Paoluzi of I Custodi: Rediscovering Mount Etna's Traditions

    Mario Paoluzi is the owner of I Custodi, an artisanal winery located on the northern slope of Mt. Etna in Sicily. I Custodi refers to themselves as the "keepers" or the "guardians" of Mt. Etna's vineyards. Their mission is to preserve the land and traditions of the region as well as to respect the people.

    Paoluzi teamed up with well-known and highly regarded oenologist Salvo Foti to produce wines from Etna's indigenous grapes using traditional methods dating back centuries. The winery is part of a very important association of Sicilian growers and producers called "I Vigneri," which dates back 500 years but has more recently been revived by Foti as a way to pass on the skills and techniques of grape growing and winemaking from older generations. As a result, previously abandoned vineyards have been revived and there has been a renewed interest in the wines of Etna. 


    Christopher Barnes: Mario, tell us a little bit about how you got into the wine business.

    Mario Paoluzi: It was 2007. I was already here in Sicily, in Catania since 2001, since I moved here from Rome for a family business reason. And I had the chance to meet with Salvo Foti, who was following at the time a project called Il Cantante that...

  10. Indigené Cellars: It’s All About Giving Back – and Amphoras

    Indigené Cellars: It’s All About Giving Back – and Amphoras

    We were at a large tasting hosted by the Association of African American Vintners in Oakland a few months ago when John sampled a Grenache Blanc, a variety we generally consider more solid than exciting. This was an exception. It had a combination of generous fruit, tropical life and an earthy roundness that made it complex and delicious. When John said all of this, the man who poured it smiled and said: “That’s good to hear because otherwise I wasted a whole lot of money on terra cotta pots.”

    John rushed to get Dottie to taste the wine. Then we vowed we’d find out more about this man and his wine.

    The man is Raymond Smith, owner of Indigené Cellars, with a winery in Carmel Valley and a tasting room in Paso Robles. It turns out he has a story quite unlike any other we’ve heard over the years, featuring bottling lines, the value of mentors and even a soul food supper club for at-risk youth in San Francisco.

    And many amphoras.

    Amphoras are ancient, but also a little bit of a trend in local winemaking. Famed Napa Valley winery Dalla Valle Vineyards has used some since 2018. In a recent press release, winemaker Maya Dalla Valle said the use of amphora “adds to the complexity of the wine without introducing higher quantities of new oak to overpower the fruit and nuances it contains.”

    Smith, who is 59, studied journalism in college, but he found a job at a large winery in Paso Robles. “I learned all about bottling and barrel work, like the mid-part of winemaking,” he told us when we called.

    A few years later, someone contacted him about helping to start a mobile bottling operation. “So we got this business up and running,” Smith said. “These guys were the money part and I was the sweat equity part, the guy who had the knowhow. It changed my perspective of winemaking from learning from one guy to learning from 400 guys because I was traveling all over California and meeting new people and learning about new ways of blending wines, new ways of making wines.”

    As a result, Smith speaks with intimacy about multiple regions of California in a way we’ve rarely heard.

    In a short time, Smith bought the bottling business. That’s when his education really took off. He told us he always had mentors, winemakers who were eager to discuss everything with him. Many had one thing in common: “I always for some reason was hooked up with some crusty old Italian guy. I always met Italian varietal makers for some reason and kind of stayed close to them and these were guys who I had a deep relationship with.”

    We think his secret was that he listened. As he put it: “I had no problem ever saying I didn’t know and once I did that they had information for me every time I showed up.”

    ...

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