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Last summer I wrote about going to the Society of Wine Educators Conference and getting my wine geek on. This year the conference was in Monterey, which is a part of California wine country that I had not yet visited yet, so I was looking forward to this trip for... Read More

American craft brewers may boast about their innovative ways: bourbon barrel-aged beers, wild ingredients, beers that tip the ABV scale well north of 15%. Belgian brewers have been doing wild stuff for years. Not that “wild” is always the same as “good”, just as has been shown with the American... Read More

Harpoon’s head brewer, Al Marzi, had a session recently. “I was just over in England for a wedding and had some great cask ales. My wife was drinking a 3.8% bitter, I had a 4.5% ale, and they tasted great. That’s session. If you’re going to sit down in a... Read More

While domestic gin sales remain mostly flat to sinking, many consumers and savvy bartenders appear to be rediscovering the imported premium gin segment. The annual growth rate in sales of all imported gins reached two to three percent in 2OO6 (some estimate even four percent), a rate that has remained... Read More

The life-span extending effects of red wine’s resveratrol are being followed up the evolutionary scale by David A. Sinclair’s research group, which now reports positive results in a mammal, the mouse (published in nature November 2OO6). Recall* that prolongation of life had been demonstrated previously in resveratrol-treated yeast, roundworm, fruitfly,... Read More

Buying wine in the United States used to be a big deal, something almost ceremonial and definitely out of the ordinary. One of the major reasons that consumption’s reached a new height of popularity in the past decade is that we’ve finally overcome the idea of wine as a “special... Read More

Sideways, that infamous movie, did wonders for Southern California wine country and most notably, Pinot Noir. As a Sommelier I was trying for years to get some clients to try this wondrous grape, with some success. Then this movie comes out and top of the line drinkers of California Cabernet... Read More

New Zealand has it backwards (or is it upside down?), and I’m glad. Grapes are harvested six months early there, in the New Zealand fall, our spring, enabling us to already sample some of the superb 2OO6 vintage. We were recently favored by a visit from the two principals of... Read More