Dr Vino's wine blog

I made it! A plane, a train and an automobile managed to bring me to Bordeaux for the big wine trade show, Vinexpo.

I’ve already found my way to the press area with the wifi so we’re up and running! Stay tuned for live reporting from the show now through Thursday. Next up: St. Emilion Grand Cru (or, fka Grand Cru Classé) 2006 tasting.

It’s big. The main exhibition hall is one kilometer long and 100 meters wide. There are 2,400 exhibitors and about 10,000 visitors expected each day.

I chatted with Ed Lauber, the New York-based importer who has attended every Vinexpo for the past twenty-something years–including the pre-air conditioning era.

He said he keeps coming back since “this is a people business” and he enjoys networking, at lunch and around the show.

Wine. People. That sounds about right.

House of Mondavi’s crumbling foundation
“But by early 2004, Robert Mondavi Corp.’s reputation for high-quality wines had eroded, and the House of Mondavi was rent by conflict. His hand-picked successor, son Michael, had been removed as chairman, and the Mondavi family was on the brink of losing control of the company. Indeed, behind Michael’s ouster was a closely guarded secret: Robert faced a personal financial crisis that threatened to embarrass him and destroy his legacy.” [WSJ, with video!]

Are wine ratings pointless?
“A wine gets rated one time — a nanosecond in its life cycle,” says Sebastiani winemaker Mark Lyon. “From then on, its fate is determined. Aren’t wines always evolving? Shouldn’t they be rated every year?” From a story by W. Blake Gray in today’s SF Chron

Slow drinkers
“Boxed wine really does keep for six weeks, but would we keep one in our refrigerator for that long? There are so many interesting, affordable wines on the shelves that we’d rather taste several wines than one in a big box.” – John Brecher and Dorothy Gaiter. But what about the low low price per glass if you can find a good one?!? [WSJ]

Do futures have no future?
“Wouldn’t it be nice if we didn’t have to play this game? I hope 2006 will not be a success. I hope it will really show the Bordelais the shortcomings of the system.” –Jancis Robinson in a podcast on Bordeaux futures, aka “en primeur”

Some might think Jim Hutchinson and Jeremy Parzen wacky: they are importing lambrusco after all. If you remember lambrusco, it might be from the cloying Riunite whose marketing department declared “on ice…so nice.” (As recently posted in a comment, with video!) Ack.

So why lambrusco? Because it’s actually great stuff, fast on its way to becoming my Wine Of The Summer 2007. That’s right, purple fizzy stuff.

It’s great on a deck, with food, especially mortadella, a specialty also from the Emilia-Romagna region. And at 11 percent alcohol, it’s light and refreshing. One writer I was talking with about lambrusco said it’s kind of like the old Schaefer beer whose slogan was “the beer to have when you’re having more than one.”

Jim, Jeremy & Co (formally known as Domenico Valentino Selections) are importing lambruschi–or lambrewski if you prefer–from one producer, Lini. They are available at the wine shop Vino, I Trulli restaurant and the hipster wine bar and stealth restaurant Centovini in Manhattan. These boutique wines bear no resemblance to the mass-marketed lambruscos.

The white is fun. The dry red has great red fruit, vigorous bubbles, and some serious tannin–it is more fun. But the real winner in my view was the dry rose. It has a beautiful delicate notes of cherry and strawberry and good acidity.

So chill, pop, nosh, and enjoy the new wave of lambrusco. And like a beer, there’s no corkscrew needed!

Related:
New York wine shops, a map
New York wine bars, a map

Have you ever thought about having a wine from your birth year? Oddly, I never had until site reader Michael in Toronto asked me. Thanks, Michael!

That sent me on a quest to find a wine from my birth year. I wrote up the experience for the July issue of Food & Wine magazine.

In case the story piqued your interest in finding a wine for your birth year, check out the fabulous infographic that is the Robert Parker vintage chart. It only goes back to 1970 though so for older vintages, you might consider checking out Michael Broadbent’s Vintage Wine.

And if you’re stopping by the blog for the first time because of the story, then consider subscribing to the site’s feed or monthly email updates on the right. And feel free to poke around and see some wine picks or explore any of the categories on the first sidebar!

If you haven’t seen the story in print (p. 156), or you’re curious to see which wine I drank and how much it cost, check out the magazine, which is hitting bookstores and mailboxes now. Or I suppose you could cheap out and see it online.

“Finding Wine of a Certain Age,” Food & Wine

One week from today, Gotham (Penguin) will release House of Mondavi: The Rise and Fall of an American Wine Dynasty by Julia Flynn Siler.

But if you are jonesing for a preview, you can check out Friday’s Wall Street Journal, which will run an excerpt. Maybe it will be the excellent prologue. Whatever section they run, I’m sure it will spark interest in the book. Unlike the new Diana book by Tina Brown that is excerpted in Vanity Fair this month, a broad audience is not likely to be overly familiar with the Mondavi family. The NYT today discusses whether such excerpts help books but I’d say that in this case it is a resounding yes. Hit the comments with your views.

From the advance copy floating around the Dr. Vino World Headquarters, I’d say that if you are interested in American wine, Napa Valley, business history, intergenerational family dramas, the (Italian) immigrant experience, and hubris, then this is one you want to pre-order. More later.

With Father’s Day closing in this Sunday, inquiring minds might want to know: what do wine geek dads want as gifts? I polled three wine bloggers who are celebrating their first Father’s Day.

The Brooklynguy: “I would love to taste Krug NV.” This Champagne is a about $125 (find this wine)

Josh of Pinotblogger: “One thing I’d like to receive for father’s day would be a couple more Riedel wine glasses. I break far more than my fair share. :)” [Hmm, maybe Josh should try the impact resistant glasses? -Dr. V]

Lenn of Lenndevours: “My dream present would be: Sherwood House Vineyards a 36-acre vineyard in Mattituck. Cost: a cool $4.1 million. The realistic one: An afternoon in wine country with my wife and son…along with a lunch from Village Cheese Shop and local wines.”

Ah, sounds nice especially since I’ll be in Bordeaux this Sunday away from Mrs. Vino and our son. But if they still wanted to get me some wine related paraphernalia…I’d love a corkscrew that the TSA wouldn’t take away from me when I forget it in my carry-on. But in the event that is not available, I’d settle for the Chateau Laguiole with a handle of red stamina wood (about $129). But I wouldn’t want to sacrifice THAT one to the TSA!

Imagine my surprise the other evening when that I thought that through the rosé blur I saw a naked woman on the label. Was this one of those subliminal messaging ads? No. There she was, in silhouette on the label of Domaine Bernard Baudry Chinon rose 2006, and about nine months pregnant. And she was tossing back some wine. And that had a big line through it.

Would this wine make you infertile? Oh no. The penny dropped. This was some illustrated warning against drinking wine while pregnant!

Funny that it was a wine from France of all places, not the America, the land of the free and the Surgeon General.

And to top off the odd juxtaposition, I was chatting with a pregnant woman the other day in New York who had just had a prolonged amniocentesis. She said that the doctor had told her to go home and have a glass of wine to relax. And no, she wasn’t Rachel Weisz.

Wow, American doctors recommending wine. French wine makers posting warnings. Talk about changing attitudes to wine!

Yes! I made it 30 days with no (er, little) bottled water! And I’m not even living in a yurt, making clothing from alpacas that I’m raising, and eating exclusively local root vegetables.

Thirty days with no bottled water may not seem like a lot. And, quite frankly, it’s not. I didn’t bring Aquafina to their knees. And I did cause myself a lot of inconvenience.

For those of you who just tuned in, the logic behind my self-imposed ban on bottled water (and soda) is a form of my own carbon offset. Yes, it would have been a lot easier to pay $15 to buy some credits. But I wanted to take matters into my own hands and go bottle-for-bottle offsetting the carbon of my wine consumption. My logic was that the wine I enjoy is unique while the bottled water I can buy at every corner shop is easily substitutable with tap water and a little planning.

So what I’ve learned:

* Try not to blast the air conditioning with the windows open (actually I jest–the AC was coincidentally–and annoyingly!–broken during the entire period).
* NYC tap water really does taste like chlorine. And it is best served cold, VERY cold.
* Refilling the same Poland Spring bottle for a few weeks straight isn’t the best idea.

So am I going to keep up the ban forever? No. But I’m going to reduce the amount of bottled water, especially non-sparkling, that I buy. In fact, British consumers were urged last week to substitute French wine for New Zealand wine in the name of finding a wine that had fewer “food miles” under its belt.

This is nonsense. British wine consumers should instead celebrate the diversity of distinctive wines from around the globe and instead perform their own offsets and drink tap water. Or something else less fun. Just don’t give up the diversity of wine!

So what am I going to drink to celebrate? You might think a big glass of Pellegrino. But actually, since I included all club soda and tonic water, I have been thinking about a Tom Collins (gin, lemon juice, simple syrup, and club soda) ever since I read Eric Felten’s WSJ article ten days ago. So tonight I’ll be mixing up a cocktail before dinner. And maybe I’ll just have a glass of tap water to go with my wine at dinner.