Every retail wine shop worth its salt ought to be part clinic, a place where problems can be addressed and resolved. In the wine corner at Formaggio Kitchen in Cambridge where I work, for example, we spend time showing folks how to use a waiter’s corkscrew to open a bottle of wine safely (and with a…
I’ll clink to that:
On the uses of the toast
THE LAST TIME I SAW Italian actress Virna Lisi she was having a wonderful time vamping it up as a reptilian Queen Catherine de Medici in the 1994 film adaptation of the Alexandre Dumas potboiler La Reine Margot. The photo at left I take to be from her 1965 Hollywood film, How to Murder Your Wife. Together the smile,…
When troubles come America's Test Kitchen Radio
Often the variation that occurs in the same wine from one vintage to another is minor and limited to interesting variations on a theme. A cool spring…a drier than normal summer…a little too much rain in September…each can leave their imprint on a wine. But what happens when conditions are seriously bad? You might think…
Waiter, There’s a rock
(herb, green bean) in my wine! America's Test Kitchen Radio
It’s not easy to translate sensation into words, but sommeliers, retailers, and even winemakers are under constant pressure to do it. Much of the rhetoric that ensues is fanciful and frankly useless, but a handful of terms now seem to have entered what might be called wine’s universal, if unofficial, lexicon—a set of terms most…
Up with Champagne,
down with flutes! America's Test Kitchen Radio
It was the Widow Clicquot (Veuve Clicquot) who around the turn of the 19th century developed several now-standard techniques for making Champagne both reliably sparkling and profitable when produced on a mass scale. And it’s really from this time forward that the heavy-duty marketing of Champagne as an indispensable accompaniment to the good life gets…
In search of the source of originality in wine
We long ago settled the question of whether cigarettes are bad for you and whether seat belts save lives. While nothing seems more obvious now, it wasn’t always the case. When I was growing up in what is now settled science on these topics was still up in the air. Where it would come down no…
Wines that play by their own rules America's Test Kitchen Radio
Chris and I have spoken on air several occasions here about appellation wine—the most prestigious category of wine, wine made according to the rules you might say. On a recent segment we chatted about wine that flaunts the rules. You could call it outlaw wine if you wanted to be dramatic, but perhaps we’d be…
Where English is spoken but only Georgian is drunk Cozy spot in Tbilisi Old Town sources natural wines from peasant vintners
TBILISI, REPUBLIC OF GEORGIA. If the steeply winding, cobble-stoned climb from Tibilisi’s old town up Metekhi Rise leaves you with any breath at all, be prepared for the view from its heights to take it away. Before you a broad swath of this wildly romantic city unrolls like an exotic carpet– from the gracefully curving…
What’s the difference between expensive and inexpensive wine? America's Test Kitchen Radio
We’ve devoted several radio spots to the question of how wine is priced and whether it’s always possible for even experts to accurately guess a wine’s price by taste alone. Recently Chris and I discussed a similar question, one that I know troubles many wine consumers: What factors contribute to making one wine more expensive…
When we drank it in Tuscany . . . Imagination is wine's secret sauce
I drew this cartoon a few years ago after a conversation with my wife about just how much the where and the when of wine affects our experience of it. It’s especially common, we decided, with people who have just returned from vacation with a bottle or two in their suitcases. It seemed almost supernaturally…
Water into wine America's Test Kitchen Radio
One of the more remarkable things about wine is the reverence that people seem to have for it. And I don’t just mean among geeks; you see this in people with no special relationship to wine. Even among novice wine drinkers, there is the idea that there is something rather special about this ancient and…
Do older vines make better wine? America's Test Kitchen Radio
The kinds of things a wine producer can say on a label are pretty strictly regulated. First there are the national authorities in each country who are responsible for upholding the rules associated with marketing appellation wine. Then there are rules imposed by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms for wine sold in the U.S.…