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"Tastings"
I don’t even want to count the number of wines I tasted this week. Five tastings in three days is a bit much. But stacking grapes as disparate as zinfandel, pinot noir, and garnacha against each other on consecutive days allowed an unexpected common denominator to leap forth: Vine age matters.
People often ask “How [...]
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I’m a neophyte in Greek wine. Like most baby-boomers, my education started and ended with Retsina. A rustic tavern wine, Retsina is to Greek wine what straw-flask Chianti is to Italian wine: the plonk we drank before we knew any better—and before Greek and Italian winemakers stepped up their game.
Named [...]
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One of the hottest tickets at Sundance 2011 wasn’t a film. Rather, it was the launch party for the Napa Valley Film Festival, which debuts this November 9–13. Sixteen Napa wineries came to Park City to pour the good stuff—90+ point, limited-production wines from Carneros to Calistoga—while celebrity chef Continue Reading →
Water is for fish! That’s what my Italian husband likes to proclaim at the dinner table. But truly, water is a wonder drug. Without it—lots of it—I couldn’t survive my profession. That, and the inelegant art of spitting.
So, armed with my nifty green Nalgene water bottle, I faced down a [...]
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Remember Mateus? Back in the 1980s, quality table wines from Portugal were rare as hens teeth. Today, that hen has a full Cheshire-cat grin.
With 200 indigenous, tongue-twisting grape varieties, Portugal has lots to offer adventurous tasters. Not only are there unfamiliar grapes to explore, like peachy Alvarinho; light-bodied, raspberry-redolent Castelão; and [...]
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