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At the end of the day isn't the question really one of economics?
No such thing as wild yeast fermentation?
I might be a decent journalist, but I am a very good cynic. That's why when I read the Wine Buisiness Monthly piece entitled Study Indicates Commercial Yeast Strains Take Over Fermentation, and then Tom Wark's , Wild Yeast Fermentation:There's No Such Thing, the reportage and interpretation ...
Well, it's not always easy to be politically astute and morally correct in our consumerism. I wish there was an easier way to discern a company's politics. Take the company Curves for example. Apparently the people that own this are extreme right-wingers and donate largely to those causes. So whenever I know women who talk about going there, I inform them.
And it's rampant. Take Unilever and their Dove campaign for "real beauty". Well that'd be super and all if they weren't the same people making Axe products and doing a 180 where men and women are both treated reprehensibly.
I guess my point is it's hard enough knowing what the major corporations are doing, and who they donate to, so picking out a few winemakers out of the 10's of 1000's out there around the globe is the proverbial needle in the haystack.
And then there's being too politically correct as it were. Sometimes you just have to call a spade a spade. And if people are going to flip out over it then the problem is with them being over sensitive. Much like your cheese analogy.
And as always, George Carlin said it best....
George Carlin on "soft language"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h67k9eEw9AY
The wine world's own Paula Deen
Jonathan Nossiter was the first to alert me to a rant by winemaker Fulvio Bressan on Facebook on Italian integration minister Cécile Kyenge — Italy’s first African-Italian minister. She has been a target since taking office. In trying to offer Bressan an excuse I can only come up with insanity...
God love ya, Alice. Because I so hate you. Because I'm so jealous of your life. You're a helluva gal.
When hanging in Signagi
If you come to Georgia for wine, sooner or later you’ll find yourself in the sweet little town of Signagi. Or at least, if you're smart you will. It's about 1.5 hours southeast from Tbilisi towards the Caucasus. It's a picture perfect, hilltop touristic town, complete with an image ruini...
This is why I've always referred to them as 'minimalist' wines, rather than natural. The latter opens up too many needless arguments over semantics, whereas the former conveys more of an attitude and desire without being bogged down with the semantical minutiae.
Natural wine, belief and desire
All right. It has to happen. So let it flow. When I read Lettie Teague's lead in the WSJ, it was obvious where she was going. WILLIAM JAMES was not only a famous philosopher but a source of some pretty memorable quotes. One of his better-known observations, "Belief creates the actual fact," c...
As someone in the hopitality biz a very long time I too never understand this attitude. People get religious about how local and organic their food is but think nothing of the wine, or dismiss 'natural' wines as hippy bullshit. The cognitive disconnect simply boggles the mind.
The challenge for Georgian wine
Back at the beginning of all of this, a friend took me to his friend's cooking school late night gathering. It was past midnight and they were a cocktail swilling smart set. I tried whatever was going around in the martini glass but it was too sweet--strange for a country were sweet is a rare ev...
Sadly, as a Canadian (eh), it's nigh on impossible to get most of these wines as we're condemned to drink the overpriced plonk as dictated by Big Brother in the province of Ontario. I suppose the alternatives are perhaps getting some of the wine clubs into offering a better selection of biodynamic and organic wines.
I'm curious though as to how hard it is finding most of these in the US - NY state in particular. Seeing as we're in Toronto, we pop down to Premier Wine and Spirits across the border with some regularity so perhaps that would be more viable? And what's the cost you're looking at on a lot of these vintages? I'd presume that for many of us, money is in fact very much an object.
I read an article recently with Hugh Johnson lamenting how so many good wines that were fairly priced even 20 or 30 years ago are now unobtainable by most except maybe once in a blue moon for a very special occasion. And while I can understand that with limited supply - as everyone wants a nice Bordeaux - but I always find that at odds with the big picture that says more wine is being produced than ever before without signs of it slowing down. So which and where do we find these affordable gems for the working stiffs. Dropping $250 on a 95 Emidio Pepe would be nice but something I can ill afford with anything even approaching regularity.
The iconic wine list (natural style)
Who can afford to taste the iconic wines? The 1947 or 1961 Bordeaux for example? The DRCs and the Jayers? They are simply outside of financial reach, unless one has a rich uncle with a wine cellar. I had one of those rich uncles but he was a fool. Uncle Jack's wine cellar was tiney: half-dozen...
And this is why they need to abandon the word natural. The semantical nonsense revolving around this word in this context is the height of absurdity. This is why I always utilize "minimal(ist)" instead. It speaks more to the spirit of the thing than anything technical. It means that while the wine may not be completely "natural" it is at least what the winemaker is striving for. The natural silliness reminds me of that scene from Grosse Point Blank....
Waitress: What do you want in your omelette, sir?
Marty: Nothing in the omelette, nothing at all.
Waitress: Well, that's not technically an omelette.
Marty: Look, I don't want to get into a semantic argument, I just want the protein.
The Spanish battle for natural (with an Italian tangent)
Because of bitchiness between Italian natural wine factions-- ViniVeri and VinNatur-- many unhappy winemakers defected to the corporate side. This meant that they actually crossed the threshold and showed their wines at ViVit. This was the Vin Italy's (the huge Italian trade show's) attempt at ...
How do you feel about the whole ceramic egg thing, Alice?
Animal skins the new qvevri?
In the market, hunting for purple Cherokees I bumped into Kevin Mckenna of LDM (Louis/Dressner/McKenna). We were standing between the cucumbers and the red peppers when in the course of catching up, he told me that Louis-Antoine Luyt of Clos Ouvert had just finished his first fermentation in an...
"without attitude or pissing people off-- a trait worth acquiring"
peaking of anyone in particular, Alice? Hrmm? :)
how to love wine -- a complicated matter
Eric Asimov, The Chief Wine Critic of The New York Times, is one of the most influential wine voices in the United States and he wields that power with grace, humor and gravitas. He has an enviable ability to deliver a message without attitude or pissing people off-- a trait worth acquiring. U...
Alice, I'm always curious to how much you look to try forgotten - or little known - grapes. Much like what Chris Kern is doing in SoCal. Things like Traminette from Ithaca or Negrette, et al. While it's the natural/minimalist wine world is wonderful, what about those gems no one sees much of anymore? Do those things pique your interest as well?
My Newsweek story on unusual wine regions
Morocco to the Moon Aug 20, 2012 --Alice Feiring Years back, when Napa winemaker Michael Mondavi told me that he would love to make wine on the moon, I thought, Michael, you are one crazy dude. Historically, there have been some basic prerequisites for a good wine region: water (yes, the ...
While not quite cider I can never think of cider without thinking of Applejack and the following quote....
"There are few compounds that are more sinful than the applejack of New Jersey. The name has a homely, innocent appearance, but in reality applejack is a particularly powerful and evil spirit. The man who intoxicates himself on bad whisky is sometimes moved to kill his wife and set his house on fire, but the victim of applejack is capable of blowing up a whole town with dynamite and of reciting original poetry to every surviving inhabitant."
– A Wicked Beverage,” New York Times, April 10, 1894
My Newsweek story on hard cider (love the stuff)
Hard Cider, Drink of Presidents, Makes a Comeback Oct 29, 2012 --Alice Feiring Hard cider has tried to stage a comeback so often, it’s practically moldy. Yet finally, after many years of false starts, the drink is showing signs of a true renaissance. According to industry belwether Shanken N...
You have a real knack for turning wonderful phrases, Alice. I can never think of Italian wines - the spoofalated kind at any rate - now without thinking of that wonderfully cheeky phrase of yours in Parkerization - which I now use for all spoof wines - 'molto spufalato'.
Your other phrase from Naked....'a fat and slutty syrah' makes me giggle like a schoolboy whenever I drink syrah now.
You certainly make reading about wine a hell of a lot fun, Alice.
Cheers
Cutter
Bea hookup at The Real Wine Fair
When I saw Sagrantino -maker Filippo Antonelli last month he told me that our friend, Giampiero Bea was in a tempest. It seems as if Davero, (the brand that I helped out with the 2008 Sagrantino) had issued a wine by the name of Rosso Di Bea. As it happens two weeks later I saw Giampiero at The...
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