Obama chose to present him with something he might never have had before, a gift of American wine! Specifically, a wine from the Vermentino grape grown in North Carolina’s Yadkin Valley made by Raffaldini Vineyards.

See the video below where Thomas Salley of Raffaldini explains how State Department officials requested samples of the wine from this Italian American family. And how the wine will be presented in a wooden case using old flooring from the Oval Office. Reduce, reuse, recycle!

Also note the transcript provided by FOX 8 in High Point NC, which hilariously misquotes Salley as saying, “The Vermentino grape is Sardinia variety so it’s native the the island of sardine.”

UPDATE: Whoops, Obama gave the wine to the Italian President, Giorgio Napolitano NOT Prime Minister Berluscsoni. Berlusconi will have to bum a sip from him.

SIPPED: a shot glass of sanity?
Chateau Angelus is the first of the top Bordeaux properties to release their 2008 vintage: 50 euros a bottle, or 40% less than the 2007, which was not a strong vintage in the region. Our previous discussion highlighted how mush pricing is relative and based on perception, rather than actual costs. And Simon Staples is back again, quoted as saying that he wouldn’t even be a buyer of Angelus at 30 euros. [Decanter]

SIPPED: wine in the USA
While worldwide wine consumption fell by one percent, Americans tacked on a 1.8% gain in wine last year, the fifteenth consecutive annual gain according to the new edition of Impact Databank.

SPIT: cakes!
On March 23, we laid out the Layer Cake/Cupcake confusion/silly naming. March 26, Layer Cake’s producer (One True Vine) sues the Cupcake producer (The Wine Group) for trademark infringement claiming the name is “confusingly similar.” [Wines & Vines]

SWIRLED IN CONTEMPLATION: Australia
Australian wine “has moved from being revered to being reviled” with tremendous speed, writes Jancis Robinson at FT.com. She asserts this is largely because of the success of “ubiquitous and vapid” low end wines and the high alcohol wines that receive big scores from the Wine Advocate. Then add a glut followed by a drought and fires, industry consolidation and a global recession and it’s not difficult to see why the sledding has gotten a little rough. I’m quite interested in the story of Australia, particularly the one that is not much exported to the US. That’s why I’ll be joining a group wine writers and sommeliers there in June for the Landmark Australia tasting.

More details to come on the wines, the Quinta de Vargellas, and Adrian’s comments on specialty port.

But what grabbed my attention for immediate posting was the fact that they keep a guest book at the winery at Vargellas where visitors are requested to write a poem. I don’t know if these are impromptu poems or if they are told about this before lunch and then have to produce one after lunch–indeed, some of the poems seemed quite “lunch” influenced.

Most of the poems do not have the author’s name attributed in the brochure, but a few did. In the latest addition to our series “leaders and liters of wine,” consider this poem from a visit (during a war!) by the sitting Defense Secretary of the United States. I’ve redacted his name and his wife’s for your guessing pleasure in the comments.

“From out of the sky they flew into Vargellas,
Richard Cheney, his party and Lynne.
But the hosts in Oporto forgot to tell us
the numbers we had to fit in.
Mais Cabirto called “Gilly,”
the hostess so cool,
as forty turned seventy three.
While the wine-hacks with training stood by at the pool
serving port to all they could see. “

John and Dottie dig up this vignette from the the White House Historical Association: “In 1840, the Whigs presented their candidate, William Henry Harrison, as a simple frontier Indian fighter, living in a log cabin and drinking cider, in sharp contrast to an aristocratic, Champagne-sipping Van Buren.” But then they say they don’t know what Obama will have after the inauguration.

Cue Elin McCoy. She’s got the intel on this one. And it ain’t all pretty. To the tape: “Fortunately for Barack Obama, the first wines he’ll sip as president include some pretty nice California bottlings, though one of them poses a foreign-relations test. At the inaugural congressional lunch at the Capitol, right after the swearing-in ceremony, the wines will include 2007 Duckhorn Vineyards sauvignon blanc ($30; find this wine) and 2005 Goldeneye pinot noir ($55; find this wine). Two hundred dignitaries will toast the new President with 15 magnums of Korbel Natural sparkling wine ($15; don’t find this wine). It’s labeled “California Champagne,” so better not show it to the French.” Korbel? Puh-lease. And how did Duckhorn hit a double (they also make Goldeneye; see the inaugural lunch menu at their site)?

Mike Steinberger pops off a piece on Slate bristling with his usual brio. He has his own version of financial stimulus and suggests expanding the paltry White House wine cellar, introducing mature wines as opposed to current releases, and flattering foreign dignitaries by re-introducing wines from their own lands (presumably as an aperitif). I’ll raise a Montelena to that.

What will you pop next Tuesday? UPDATE: Or, if you were in charge of the inauguration lunch, what would you pour for the 200 honored guests?

Related: “The Sorry History of Wine in the White House,” p. 54, A Year of Wine
“Leaders and Liters of wine“

SPIT: too little
An eagle eyed publicist at Kendall-Jackson spotted a mention of their Chardonnay in an interview the Obamas did with People magazine. The maker of this supermarket staple then sent “a few congratulatory cases of the brand” to the Obamas, care of the Democratic National Committee. Celebrate a historic victory such as his with a $12 chardonnay? But what did Shafer send them?

SPIT: Sauvignon blanc
NYT restaurant critic Frank Bruni goes public about his dislike of Sauvignon Blanc as he tasted one from California, “he offered a grimace and a cry of anguish.” And what did his colleagues do to him after that. Why, laugh at him. Get the full story and their wine picks for turkey day in Eric Asimov’s column.

SPIT: 2008 Hospice de Beaune
The climate, both meteorological and economic, put a damper on the annual charity auction for barrels of red Burgundy. [Reuters]

SPIT: celebrity wine
Michael Vick’s 22 dogs will appear on a new wine line called “Vicktory Dogs.” A portion of the proceeds benefit the shelter in Utah where the dogs now reside. [ESPN]

Last week we heard about the Palin syrah and because it’s organically grown in Chile, we knew it was the perfect wine for the veep wannabe, Sarah Paleen (as they say in Alaska, methinks). Check out reader Nate’s tasting note.

In anticipation of this Thursday’s debate (when we will need mucho vino), put your country first and decide which wine is best suited to each of the three other candidates! I already had my say during the primaries, so now it is your turn.

To sweeten the pot, I will be giving a away a signed copy of my book, Wine Politics: How Governments, Environmentalists, Mobsters, and Critics Influence the Wines We Drink, a book in which none of these four candidates is mentioned!

Post your pairings for the non-Alaskan candidates here in the comments. Friday after 3PM Eastern, check back to see the winner, selected at random. Everyone, to your snow machines!

SPIT: Adolescent binge drinking!
France will debut it’s first ever anti binge drinking campaign on Friday. According to Decanter, it will run on TV, radio and in in movie theaters and “feature adolescents enjoying a ‘paradise-like universe’, which turns into a nightmare after they drink too much.” Whoa! Send in a clip if you see it.

SIPPED and SPIT: The St. Emilion classification!
Sweeping victory from the jaws of defeat (or, more likely, the other way around), the classification of St. Emilion producers that updates every ten years was thrown out by a judge last week–only to be reinstated on a temporary basis for three years by another authority later in the week. [Decanter]

SIPPED: summer all year!
Rosé surpasses white wine as the most popular in France. [Times.co.uk]

We know international summits are tough. They’ve been known to make a teetotaler go weak in the neck as recently as, oh, last year.

Now we have this photographic intel that the Teetotaler-in-Chief raised a glass with President Yushchenko in Kiev last week! The Dr. Vino cam only has this one angle, but it looks distinctly like the fruits of the vine that he his holding in the glass behind his goobery hand. My guess is that it beats fermented yak milk!

UPDATE: thanks to a comment from reader Mark, please feel free to “CAPTION THIS PHOTO!”

SIPPED and SPIT: NYC wine bars
Closing tonight is Divine Wine Bar East. Zagat reports they have having the Mother of All Happy Hours tonight to liquidate (ha) the inventory. Opening: Bowery Wine Company and the new wine lounge at Le Cirque. See the action on the NYC wine bar map!

SIPPED: The audacity of nope
French President Sarkozy, a self-proclaimed teetotaler (although see here and here for evidence to the contrary), has the nerve to ask to see the wine list at Windsor Palace before a state dinner. [Times of India]

SIPPED: resveratrol
“Researchers at the University of Rochester have shown for the first time that resveratrol, a natural antioxidant found in grape skins and red wine, helps to destroy cancerous pancreatic cells by crippling the diseased cells’ mitochondria, the minute organelles found in the majority of living cells which provide them with energy.” [FT.com]

Image: fair-use is made of a reduced size crop of an image that appeared in the NYT attributed to Lisa Adams.

Hugh, 42, told me that in 1972, his dad, Jack, got word from the Nixon White House that they would need 13 cases of Schramsberg 1969 blanc de blanc. And those cases had to be delivered to Travis Air Force Base. Hugh said that it was all a bit mysterious but his dad loaded up the cases into his jeep, drove them over to the Base where he got paid and left the wine.

Then three weeks later, images of Nixon’s historic trip to China were broadcast back to the US. And there was good old Nixon raising a glass of Schramsberg with Premier Zhou En Lai in a “toast to peace.” Hugh said that Barbara Walters reported from Tiananmen Square that Nixon and Zhou had just toasted with the Schramsberg “blank de blank.” Thirteen cases must have kept the whole delegation happy!

In what would be a bookend to state dinners and Schramsberg during Hugh’s mom’s lifetime, the Schramsberg brut rose 2004 was served at the state dinner with Queen Elizabeth II in Washington last year. The Teetoaler-in-Chief did not call and there was no drop-off at an AFB. Instead, the head usher just ordered it through the local distributor and Hugh didn’t even know it was being served.

Image credit, click through for more photos from the historic trip including this one, no doubt after the 13 cases of Schramsberg.

…the urbane Thomas Jefferson, who occupied the residence from 1801 through 1809. Jefferson moved swiftly to grace the President’s House with all the trappings of the leader of a great new country, including stocking it with fine wines from around the world. Jefferson’s Williamsburg education and worldly ways imbued him with a predisposition for the pleasures of the palate, and his extensive travels throughout France and Italy in the 1780s made him a student of wine.

When he ascended to the presidency, Jefferson had wine vaults constructed below the east colonnade to house his sizable collection. (The area is no longer used for that purpose.) He is said to have spent more than $11,000 on wine during his two terms as president, a sum that in today’s economy would equal roughly $175,000.

Jefferson was a gracious host, regularly dipping into his private collection to entertain foreign dignitaries, as well as his colleagues and opponents, in high style. In Jefferson’s day, presidents didn’t have expense accounts, but rather were expected to run the household from their own salary. Indeed, it is said that Jefferson was generous to a fault, entertaining so lavishly that financial problems would follow him to his grave. [Wine News]

Wow, what a gent. And what an exemplary, overstretched American consumer! Good thing home equity loans hadn’t been invented or he might have set off his own mortgage crisis at Monticello.

Mitt Romney: According to the NYT, he is so “vigilant about nutrition” (read: boring!) that he eats the same meals every day. Anathema to the wine lover! Added bonus: teetotaler. No love from wine geeks.

Mike Huckabee: He’s reputedly a charmer, plays guitar, knows (or knew) how to eat, and jogs every morning. But he’s also a southern Baptist minister, so he doesn’t dance and is a teetotaler. So close, yet so far. Wine pick: “Fre,” a de-alcoholized wine.

Rudy Giuliani: Rudy used to like Long Island merlot but 9/11 changed everything. Now he’ll drink whatever is local, as long as it is American.

John McCain: He used to be more of a loose cannon eight years ago. Now, the fire in the belly appears as mere embers. His wine is a 10 year old Turley Zinfandel, fiery in it’s youth, now sadly without vigor.

Barack Obama: This man has got style. Heck, one commentator even said he was the “wine track” candidate some time back. So he’s our man for the White House. He’s also quite a blend himself, born in Hawaii to a mother from Kansas and a father from Kenya and lived early on in Indonesia. This eloquent American blend could be none other than one of the finest wines in America, with structure and spice: Ridge Monte Bello.

Hillary Rodham Clinton: We know Hillary hearts New York but is she cold as ice? Wine pick: Standing Stone, Vidal, ice wine 2005, Finger Lakes.

John Edwards: he’s made it far on his “two Americas” theme. We know what that means–beer America and wine America. We’ll split the difference and put him down for a Franzia box wine.

The wild cards

Ron Paul: this guy may be crazy–he wants to eliminate the IRS, the Federal Reserve and a host of government departments and restore the gold standard–but if he is, then he is rich and crazy thanks to his $19 million in fund raising last quarter. Wine pick: Armand de Birgnac, Ace of Spades, “gold bottle,” non-vintage Champagne $300.

Fred Thompson: This Tennessean seems like a natural fit for Bourbon. No love from wine geeks.

Dennis Kucinich: Given his hhhhot young wife (born 1977), he clearly likes youthful reds. We’ll put him down for a California Pinot, most recent vintage available.

Christopher Dodd: His move to Iowa in a desperate attempt to score fourth place makes him seem pandering. And nothing tries harder to be a crowd-pleaser yet fails to inspire more than Merlot.

Bill Richardson: He’s big and he claims to have the most foreign policy experience. Wine pick: the brawny 2004 Numanthia from Spain.

Related: “Bush-Kerry 2004: an election guide for wine lovers“

This just in from the Pyonyang bureau: Kim Jong-Il says cheers with wine!

The despotic ruler of North Korea was known for his lavish lifestyle. However, UN sanctions, enacted last year, aimed right at his silky soft underbelly banning trade in crystal, silk scarves, designer fountain pens, furs, leather luggage, jet skis, and Harley-Davidsons.

Now the Financial Times reports that the Dear Leader “has given up cognac so that his liver can last a few more years.” And with a $1 million a year budget for ‘yak, that is quite a lot of Louis XIII not consumed.

Given Kim’s apparent deteriorating health, would he and President Roh Moo-hyun raises glasses of wine to toast the summit? As the picture picture above shows, he’s still enjoying red wine in big glasses!

And just in case you were wondering what to pair with blueberry wine, here’s a quick take on the summit menu:

The South Korean delegation was served with a variety of North Korean food specialties, including boiled beef, stewed ribs, carp stew and trout soup.

Pyongyang’s famous blueberry wine and Ryongsung beer was served during the dinner, and watermelon and roasted chestnuts were saved for dessert.

Mark has a once-a-month sort of blog. Since it’s nearly impossible to find, I’ll post a link here to a recent rant about Sarkozy and a brief overview of the likes and dislikes of other French pols, past and present. My favorite vignette: the last of the hard core Socialist prime minsters, Pierre Mauroy, polished off the official PM’s cellar within a week back in 1981.

We know that President Nicolas Sarkozy doesn’t drink alcohol because he said he is “too busy” (even if we caught him having a glass of Sancerre on the campaign trail). Even Reuters has a story lamenting the fact.

So what are we to make of this video then of a press conference immediately after Sarkozy had a meeting with President Vladimir Putin, also a teetotaler? As the newsreader mentions in his lead, “apparently they only drank water together.”