HOME

Babak and his sister Azita Bina-Seibel are equal partners in the restaurants and wines; she is the executive chef for both places. She was actually in the kitchen at Bin 26 when I had lunch that day: a gently autocratic presence with long, straight salt and pepper hair, and a... Read More

Oxygen has always been a blessing and curse as it reacts to the world around it. From way back in grade school science we have been taught that oxygen is the core of the building blocks of life. Animals need it to breathe, fire to burn, without it life as... Read More

In his new book, I’ll Drink to That: Beaujolais and the French Peasant Who Made It the World’s Most Popular Wine, author Rudolph Chelminski charts the rise and fall and inevitable rise again (if he has anything to do with it) of the Beaujolais empire. The French peasant his too-long... Read More

No one ever said growing up was easy to do. Maturity begets responsibility and so follows the necessity of prioritizing efforts, goals, and interests. Be it graduating from school, entering the workforce, raising a family, or running a craft brewery, everyone eventually has to become an adult. At the recent... Read More

Gruetappeared as some kind of anomaly when the silver or gold-labeled bottles first spread along the East Coast in the 199Os. Gruet, priced well below Napa and Sonoma sparklers, soon caught a wave of enthusiasm. Today the winery, owned and run by members of a Champagne family, consistently captures awards... Read More

LOLLY MASON • 51 • Bartender • Meritage at Boston Harbor Hotel • Boston, MA Boston bar icon Lolly Mason is a hardhitting yet deft mixologist. This dynamic, self-taught woman with a deep history in Boston bars, has lots of fans, fine-tuned taste buds; she’s candid, quotable, and both sociologically... Read More

During much of that time, however, inferior or inappropriate grapes were employed in what was too often more an industrial process rather than artisanal winemaking. Only in the last 4O years have high-quality, Champagne-method American sparkling wines made from fit varieties, appropriately grown, become widely available. During much of this... Read More

The Year in ReviewTrends & Projections The mood in the industry, fueled by growing consumer excitement, is upbeat. Having successfully weathered a number of lean years where discretionary spending was down, overall economic confidence weak and unemployment growing, wine has proven its staying power. Put succinctly, a broader array of... Read More