Why is a set of wines arranged in a particular order for tasting purposes referred to as a flight? Even the venerable Oxford English Dictionary doesn’t seem to know – its … <span class="entry-title-primary">Flights of Fancy</span> <span class="entry-subtitle">Getting your wines in a row</span>Read more

“Try this one weird trick” those trashy online ads plead — promising to help you lose that belly fat, regrow a bumper crop of lustrous hair, outwit the market, or jump … <span class="entry-title-primary">One Weird Trick</span> <span class="entry-subtitle">The Value of a Slosh</span>Read more

Fashion is as fashion does. We crave the new, eschew what was. ’Twas ever so, and wine, you know, is not exempt from fashion’s flow. In Pharoah’s court, they have advised … <span class="entry-title-primary">All the Rage</span> <span class="entry-subtitle">Wine moves on, friend</span>Read more

  When I became a wine enthusiast, the standards for fine wine were set in just three places: Bordeaux, Burgundy, and Champagne. In Boston, little Italian wine — or even French … <span class="entry-title-primary">Meet the Refusniks</span> <span class="entry-subtitle">What happens when imitation trumps progress</span>Read more

Today, most wine education takes the form of a guided tour of what we might call the Appellation Trail. Since appellations constitute the fundamental categories nation states use to organize and … <span class="entry-title-primary">On the Appellation Trail</span> <span class="entry-subtitle">It's a consensus style, not quality, that matters most</span>Read more

The dinner party differs from the cocktail party in one very important respect. Hemmed in as you are by a place setting, it’s generally not possible to seek new company if … Don’t Just Chat Up Your WineRead more

In Georgian England, three-bottle men were so-called because of the prodigious quantities of Port they consumed daily. It’s easy to see how, under these circumstances, dinner parties could (and frequently did) … <span class="entry-title-primary">Two Always Better Than One</span> <span class="entry-subtitle">Wine education favors the multi-bottle personality</span>Read more

IS A RED WINE so deeply-hued you can’t see beyond its surface inherently of better quality than one you can peer right into . . . or even through? Wine marketers are … Of Wine Transparent and OpaqueRead more

EMILE ZOLA’S 1873 novel Le ventre de Paris (‘The Belly of Paris’) opens with a pre-dawn parade of horse-drawn carts laden with produce making their way to Les Halles, the city’s great public … The Origins of ConnoisseurshipRead more

Years ago I interviewed the doyenne of Americans involved in the Burgundy wine trade, the knowledgeable and colorful Becky Wasserman, for a story in the Boston Globe. We rendezvoused at the … Eat your fruits and vegetables … Don’t Drink ThemRead more

What are the origins of sweet wines?  Evolutionary biologists tell us that our distant hominin ancestors came down from the trees already addicted to the sweet taste of ripe fruit. Grapes, … <span class="entry-title-primary">On the origins of sweet wines</span> <span class="entry-subtitle">Having our fructose and alcohol, too</span>Read more

I find myself spending a lot of time in the wine corner at Formaggio Kitchen correcting misconceptions about wine —or perhaps I should say out-of-date-conceptions —meaning things that may have once … <span class="entry-title-primary">The Drying of German Wine</span> <span class="entry-subtitle">Milk Street Kitchen Radio</span>Read more