Jun 29, 2006
I wish W.R. Tish would write more. First, his wine experience is deep. For a decade he was the managing editor at Wine Enthusiast Magazine. Second, he’s got a probing mind that combines with a great sense of humor. However, there is very little humor, but lots of probing, in his most recent article for Wines & Vines Magazine that takes a fairly close look at the wine Buying Guides of three major American wine magazines. Let’s get to the…
Jun 29, 2006
I got my invitation in the mail today for August’s Family Winemakers of California Tasting. Based on the preliminary list of wineries that have committed to pouring at the event, it appears there will be upwards of 400 California wineries at Fort Mason in San Francisco on August 20 and 21. Most of them will be relatively small wineries too. The question for anyone going to this event is how to attack it. After all, we are talking about a…
Jun 23, 2006
The word on the street is that while the 2005 Bordeaux vintage is quite good, the pricing of the top wines is, well, quite ridiculous. Decanter has the story. But consider this: First tranche pricing of only a portion of Chateau Lafite’s 2005 bottling was announced at $375 per bottle for negociants. The negociants are selling a bottle of the wine to merchants for around $465. And we aren’t even at the marked up price for you….the consumer.If you are…
Jun 21, 2006
Just something to consider…. I was talking with a journalist in Colorado today who receives a lot of wine shipments to his home…every day. He disclosed to me that in a very consistent way wines delivered by UPS are about 15 degrees warmer than wines delivered by FED EX. How does he know this? He measures the temperatures of the outside of the boxes when they arrive at his home with a laser temperature guage. He says the difference in…
Jun 21, 2006
While California wines dominate cosumption of domestic wines, other states across the country have seen their wine industries reallly take off. A combination of high quality bottlings and the attraction of a local wine country seem to have spurred this "other state" explosion in wine production. The question is, how to get more people to try wines from "Other States". I like what Ohio did recently. They recently staged the Ohio Wine Challenge. Taking a page out of Robert Mondavi’s…