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GLADDENING the HEART

The notion that a dram or two is good for the heart is far from new; it can be traced back to biblical times. The accretion of scientific evidence to support the notion in little more than the last quarter century should be convincing. We continue to see the playing...
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ENDANGERED COCKTAIL of the MONTH

GIN Could there be a more appropriate cocktail to sip at the dawn of summer than the Daisy a cool and refreshing drink named for a hardy, innocent flower? Two versions of this drink were in wide circulation by the time Prohibition rolled around in 1919.  The early version appears...
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CRAFT NAVIGATES NEW WATERS

Despite long-standing concerns with the economy the domestic beer segment overall, and the craft beer set in particular, continues to perform well for retailers and distributors. Nudging up one half percent, the beer industry fought against strong and troubling economic trends, especially in the second half of 2OO8. Craft brewers...
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GIN is IN

Visit a bar and listen closely – above the din of USUAL  conversation and RHYTHMIC rattle of ice in its shakers – you can hear it loud and clear: Gin is in. The spirit that served as one of the core foundations upon which cocktail history is built the spirit...
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Silent Selloff: Ninety Plus Cellars

WINE MARKETING IN PINCH TIME SILENT SELLOFFS Latitude Beverage Company has scored nicely with Ku Dé Ta.Now Kevin Mehra is quietly talking up Ninety Plus Cellars. First the plains then the moat now Kevin Mehra is ready to scale the walls of the wine castle. Sipping Starbucks on the Needham...
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Wyndham Estate’s Shiraz

Syrah or shiraz as it’s called in Australia and some elsewheres, is bursting its erstwhile boundaries, and emerging all over the world’s wine scene. It remains, however, a dominant grape only in southern France and in Australia. Since I’ll be focusing on Australia today in response to a visit from...
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Sauvignon Blanc

. . . the point is that the Marlborough style . . . now appearsto set the standard by which the market measures virtuallyall Sauvignon Blanc.  Sauvignon Blanc’s reversal of fortune from shunned outcast to darling of the American dinner table owes everything to a style that emerged full blown...
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Smoked Beer

. . . smoked beers are more than likely,every bit as old as smoky whiskey, and were once much more widespread. The first time I had Victory Brewing’s St. Victorious doublebock, I noticed a difference from other doublebocks I’d had. It had an extra dimension to it, a richness that...
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Endangered Cocktails

Last month we discussed vodka a spirit overlooked in the states until the 1950s, when it took the nation by storm.  Tequila suffered a similar fate – didn’t gain notoriety here until the “Great Experiment”, when any liquor was good liquor.  Surely you’ve tried a Tequila Sunrise or a Margarita,...
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