Picnic Vino

A no-nonsense approach to summer wine.

POSTED // Jun 24,2009 - Having recently read good advice from another wine geek in this column about picnic and barbecue wines, I thought I'd contribute my 2 cents' worth to the topic of summer sipping ...

The Chard Facts

How to avoid bad Chardonnay

POSTED // Jun 17,2009 - I love Chardonnay. There, I said it. It's out in the open. Chardonnay gets a bad rap from novice and expert alike. There are more styles and expressions of it than GlaxoSmithKline has pills...

Inside Baseball

Getting the scoop on how to read your local wine store

POSTED // May 27,2009 - Wine consumers are suckers. As a wine broker, some of the things I do are deliberately aimed at your weaknesses...

Party Time

Tips on conducting an in-home wine tasting and curbing inflated egos.

POSTED // May 13,2009 - Wine-Know-It-Alls are curious creatures, designed to bring down every convivial moment at the pull of a cork...

Springtime Sipping

Light Plus Lower Alcohol = Refreshment

POSTED // Apr 15,2009 - I’d spent the evening sipping white Burgundy from a paper cup, patting a horse on the nose and watching the sky slowly turn blue, bluer, bluer still, into night and then stars ...

Que Syrah?

A primer on Syrah, Petite Syrah and Shiraz.

POSTED // Apr 1,2009 - It’s a wine business insider’s joke: “What’s the difference between gonorrhea and Syrah?” Answer: “You can get rid of gonorrhea.” Ba-dum-bum!

A-Lists

Great wine lists aren’t about size; sometimes haiku matters.

POSTED // Mar 25,2009 - Size doesn't matter. Not with wine lists. All a great wine list need do is rouse my curiosity and encourage my thirst. But, just as with Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart, who couldn't define what constituted obscenity...

Value for the Soul

Rules wine imbibers live by.

POSTED // Mar 4,2009 - The cure for a fearful populace is generosity—with ourselves and with others—and, I say, let it begin with our palates.

Bitter Sweet

POSTED // Feb 13,2009 - I am a wine-mad Lear wandering on the heath, spitting my rage and disdain at the insistent Valentine theme of chocolateand-wine pairings that beats me about the face and neck, as it always does this time of year. I Google wine and chocolate and 43,600,000 results pop up in 0.