Paul Greggut is a longtime, experienced wine writer from Seattle. His wine column appears in the Seattle Times. Paul has come up with an interesting list of wine trends for 2005 I find two of his predictions very interesting and I hope he’s right about them: -A trend change toward lower percentages of alcohol in dry table wines. -Renewed consumer interest in un-oaked, food-friendly white wines. There is an interesting question connected with this issue. Who drives trends in the…

Over at the Santa Cruz sentinel writer Nancy Redwine (is that really her name?) speculates on what’s in and out for food in 2005. I like these kinds of lists. They make think and I get to measure my own opinions against another’s. But in her list what’s in and out with regard to food there is a huge omission: They appear to her to be neither IN nor OUT. Yet clearly FoodBlogs are IN. Some the best, most original…

Let me say up front that I believe the Wine Spectator Magazine is extraordinarily lucky to have Jim Laube at the head of their tasting panel for California wines. Say what you will about preference, big wines, the 100 point scale or the influence of the magazine. The fact is, Jim Laube has one of the best palates in America. My guess is he could make far more money simply acting as a consultant and selling his palate to those…

New Years Eve is going to cut into the’ pocket book more than usual this year…that is if you insist on toasting with Champagne rather than domestic sparkling wine. It’s about the historically low value of the dollar versus the Euro. The dollar has declined more than 20% this year and hit historic lows. That means Champagne is going to be more expensive than usual. How much? These are prices from K&L Wines in San Francisco: 1996 Dom Perignon: $100…

It appears the stars are aligning for the market in high end California wines to soar. Though it is unlikely this surge will equal the staggeringly ridiculous run up in prices for California wines seen between 1998 and 2000, it appears that the economic ground has been laid to see the sales and prices of high end luxury wines increase. Consider the macroeconomic factors at play. Home values as well as the stock market have continued to rise throughout 2004,…