Beaujolais and Burgers: a rare wine post

There's an event next month that I'm not even going to...but I would if I could, so I thought I'd tell you about it. I know I don't post most of the GREAT beer events that go on around here, but...this is a wine event that intrigued me, so I'm passing it on.

Beaujolais and Burgers is on Monday September 17, 6-9, at The Walnut Room. For $15, you get "gourmet burgers" from 500 Degrees (don't know if the truffle-oil fries are included) paired with Georges Dubeouf's Beaujolais by wine author Mark Oldman. There are "party favors" (that's code for schwag) and chances to win prizes.

Beaujolais is easy-drinking wine, something I'm always urged to drink heavily in November...but I always forget. I wanted to try this event, and have some fun, but I'm traveling. If anyone does go...can you drop a note?

"Summer is no time to fuss with the petty details of wine"

One of the best things about Malt Advocate becoming part of M.Shanken Communications is that I got a comped subscription to Wine Spectator. I'm learning a lot about wine, and a lot about magazine design, too.

But one thing I learned pretty quickly was to turn to Matt Kramer's column first, and the latest issue was no disappointment. That quote in the title of this post was the takehome for me, and it applies equally to beer or whiskey. Dude. It's summer, we're out on the deck, it's either the weekend or one's coming. Relax and enjoy. Or as Kramer said, "Even I, a professional wine obsessive, find myself during the warm summer season saying, well, to hell with it..." Yup.

So I present my own version of his points.  

• Rediscover pale ale. Sierra Nevada, or the new ones from Victory or Left Hand. Pale Ale is a drinker, not a thinker, and still great cold. Best of all, at around 5-6%, it's still big-glass beer. Yeah.
• Summer beers have returned. After being off the radar for a few years -- why? I don't really know, maybe brewers catching their breaths -- summer beers are back in a big way. Try that Citra-spiked Narragansett Summer in the big blue can, or the Stoudt's Kolsch, or whatever your local brewpub's got that's light and frisky. 
• Hefeweizen! The summer beer that never, ever goes out of style. Don't want to go to the trouble of washing those big weissbier glasses? You're absolved, my child: go forth and pour hefe into any good beer glass you want. Want/don't want a lemon slice? Do as you please, and don't let anyone tell you different.
• Try something new. There are always beers out there you've never had, whole styles of beer you've never tried -- or liked, and maybe this is the time to give it a shot. Go to a bar, saddle up, and grab a new handle. You're out, you're drinking beer, you're having fun. 
• Relax. This ain't no time to argue. It's time to enjoy. Grill. Chill. Tip a few.

Sound good? Indeed. Just don't remind me of this when something pisses me off in July and I start ranting!

Action on the PLCB blog

I know, I know: I don't have Part II on the PLCB hearings up yet. But I do have several new posts up on the PLCB blog, including this one on Stapletonstein's Monster (or, The Wine Kiosk That Refused To Die!) and this one on how the upcoming PA Supreme Court decision on the incredibly controversial (!!!!) 'beer in supermarkets' issue is really a no-win for beer distributors because of bad strategy. There's also a new poll...that's just slightly tongue-in-cheek.

Think ahead for Mom

I'm not dead...just busy. Being busy is good, it means I'm making money (or doing interesting things), and that means I can keep blogging.

Meantime, a quickie. I just got a press release urging me to remind my readers that Father's Day is coming and that ties suck, so buy Dad a bottle of nice booze.

I say, Mother's Day comes in just two weeks, and doesn't she need a drink too? I know Cathy likes a good peaty Islay whisky, or a brisk New Zealand sauvignon blanc, or (her fave) a case of IPAs. It doesn't have to come from the kids; all you dads out there owe a lot to the mothers of your children. So get to a liquor store and find her something nice. Who knows, she may let you have some too!

Not to forget Wine in grocery stores: Garces Trading Company

Okay, first a confession: I really, really want to go to Jose Garces's new place, Garces Trading Company. The foodstuffs sound delicious, hell, even the coffee sounds good. And that wine, stuff you can't even get anywhere else --

Oh. Wait. That's the problem. Garces Trading Company includes a small area that is technically a Pennsylvania "Wine and Spirits Shoppe," even though it doesn't sell any spirits; so let's just call it what it is: a State Store, staffed by PLCB personnel. So it's not wine being sold by Garces (since that would, of course, be illegal), it's just a store inside his ... grocery store.

Why is this rotten? Well, I laid it all out here about a year ago, but let's run it real briefly: this deal (and it is a deal: the PLCB claims it put out an ad in the paper and Garces answered it) allows Jose Garces to take part of a small part of the state's monopoly on wine sales. Not only can he sell wine inside his store, something no one else in Pennsylvania can do, but the PLCB is also slipping him exclusive wines. In the words of Liquor Control Board wine buyer Cindy Carnieki (quoted on the WHYY site) "These wines are not in restaurants, not in PLCB stores. We're picking very exclusive wines for this. They are seeing wines they've never seen before." And Garces is getting all this...without even having to buy a license. He's a BYOB where you can Buy Your Own Bottle -- your exclusive bottle! -- right inside the restaurant.*

So what. I can hear people saying it: so what?! This is great, we can get wines we can't get anywhere else, hurray, Pennsylvania's not so bad!

How is it fair for Garces and Garces alone to get this deal? If this is the pilot program the PLCB claims it is, how will it be fair unless every restaurant that wants one, from Philly to Erie, gets one, and each one gets 'very exclusive wines' for their own customers' pleasure? Why, it won't be, because that would be impossible. Why not have cognac shops inside cigar shops, or rum selections in Caribbean bodegas?

I said that the PLCB was arrogant in the post linked above. I may be wrong. They're a mad, blood-blinded Cape buffalo, crashing through booze retail in Pennsylvania on a destructive, random path: yes to this beer sale, but not to that one; no wine sales in grocery stores (unless it's by machine), yes to beer sales in grocery stores; exercise monopoly muscle but put on a happy face and spend almost $3 million on a name change and facelift...that doesn't matter a plugged nickel because Pennsylvanians aren't allowed to buy our booze anywhere else.

Someone suggested that we should hold a mass civil booze disobedience march: a thousand citizens march across the Burlington-Bristol Bridge, get a bottle of booze at the new Roger Wilco, and march back. Are they going to arrest us? And if they do...could we finally take them to court and put a freakin' stake through the heart of a 76-year-old piece of code that should have been shitcanned decades ago? I'm about ready to start seriously thinking about it.



*Again, as I've said before, I hold no animus against Garces for this. It was brilliant, the place looks as cool as an October morning, and he'd have been plumb crazy not to take the PLCB up on it. Love the food, love Village Whiskey. Hate the PLCB for doing this. 

Obama Still the Beer President

Sorry, wine folks: President Obama is still clearly a beer guy. When he made a bet with Canadian PM Stephen Harper on the outcome of yesterday's freakin' awesome Olympic hockey final, he didn't bet a case of California grape squeezin's against a case of Ontario icewine; he bet a case of Yuengling against a case of Molson. Oh yes, he did. Not that we're rubbing it in...just noting it.

(Philadelphia Inquirer, taken by Sarah J. Glover)

More on wine: some surprises

Don't have time to respond to the comments in the previous post right now -- sorry! -- other than to point out that it is about California wine, and not wine in general; hope to get more involved in that sometime.

In the meantime, here's some more stuff on wine that's interesting, from today's Wine & Spirits Daily:

Is the wine glass half empty or half full? Danny Brager, vp group client director, beverage alcohol at Nielsen, encouraged listeners to be optimistic and focus on the wine industry's growth opportunities rather than its roadblocks during his presentation at the Wine Market Council's 5th Annual US Wine Consumer Trends conference in Dallas.
WINE OUT-GROWS BEER AND SPIRITS. Although the wine industry has had it tough this past year, they posted more growth than beer or spirits. In the 52 weeks to December 12, dollar sales of wine grew 2.6%, beer grew 2% and spirits grew 1.4%. In terms of volume, beer declined -0.6%, while wine and spirits gained 1.2%. The rate of growth slowed for all three categories. Danny noted that consumers trading down and taking advantage of promotions has resulted in the rate of dollar and volume growth being closer together. Unlike beer, wine and spirits pricing is moving down.
The wine industry should be wary of craft beers, which have grown dollar sales 13% in the past 6 months. There is an opportunity for wine and craft beers to battle for certain occasions, particularly among millennilas who don't reserve wine for just "special" occasions. "Crafts are good marketers....we need to make sure we're as intense about telling our story to compete effectively," said Danny. Crafts are also popular among millennial consumers and have a lot of opportunity to grow among that generation.

The beat goes on...

California Wine is Upside-Down

I'm looking at a story in the LA Times about California's wine sales for 2009. Take a look. I've excerpted some of the pertinent bits (I'm snipping quite a bit here, but not to shift the context! Do go read the full story):

California's wine industry saw its shipments fall in 2009 -- for the first time in 16 years.
Consumption of wine is up 2.1% nationally, but...the American public was opting for cheaper bulk wine imports from overseas winemakers.
Last year, the state's seven largest producers saw sales overall grow by nearly 7 million cases.
But...overall...California wine shipments fell almost 4%, or by nearly 4 million cases of wine...
Nationwide, the domestic wine market dropped by 3 million cases compared with a year earlier. (Restaurant sales were sluggish too: Wine sales dropped as much as 10% at restaurants across the country.)
Wines from countries such as Argentina, Chile and Australia...bubbled up 87% last year, cornering about 32% of the U.S. market.

I find it fascinating that wine's experience is just about the exact opposite of beer in this economy. Small, high-end brewers are booming, and the big guys are sucking wind. Those high-end beers are selling in more restaurants than ever, including national chains, like Ruby Tuesdays and ESPN Zone. Sales of imported mainstream lagers are generally declining.
What's that mean? Well, for one thing, maybe brewers should be careful about following wine too closely. I've encouraged many craft brewers to read Paul Lukacs's American Vintage to see the blueprint of American wine's success -- focus on quality, talk to chefs rather than managers, develop a language of flavor -- and I still think it's a good idea, but I'm reminded of something Benton Fraser said in Due South: "Never follow a man over a cliff." California specialty/boutique winemakers may have focused too closely on the high end to survive a slowdown, a cautionary tale for some brewers.

Stop making pricey beers? No, absolutely not: it's working...for now, and the money's good. But should you think about adding other strings to your bow? Definitely. The little mammals beat the dinosaurs, you bet. But you don't see mammoths, sabretooth tigers, and giant beavers around any more, do you?

Thanksgiving, Wine, Beer, the Menu, the Family...the Redux

This piece I did last year pretty much covers everything I have to say about drinking on Thanksgiving. I don't see much point in re-writing it just to have something new.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone: there's room for every drink at your table -- beer, wine, spirits, cider, even mead -- and room for every friendly heart. Cheers!

Breaking story...Pernod Ricard sells off glögg brands...

In a shocking move, Pernod Ricard announced that they would sell off almost all the Vin & Spirit brands they purchased just last year. The French family firm, the world's second-largest drinks company, paid kr55 billion (about $8.9 billion) for the Swedish state-owned firm. They will be keeping only one brand and selling off everything else, including Blossa Glögg and 40 brands of wine, like the popular Chill Out brand.



Okay, it's not actually shocking: the one brand they're keeping is Absolut, which was the only reason they bought V&S in the first place. I just saw the story, and I wanted to put the word glögg in a headline. Sorry. Back to work.

Oregon Whinemakers flail ineffectively at beer drinkers

Uncle Jack beat me to it on blogging about Rick Nichols's very nice piece on craft beer on page 1 of today's Inquirer. That's right: Craft Beer On The Front Page of Philly's major daily. Very nice, and as Jack sez, nice piece, too.

So all I could do was blog about the pathetic closer: Oregon's winemakers are "fighting back" against beer's success. I'd already chased this story down earlier in the week and then run out of time to blog about it before leaving for Kentucky (I was writing that pumpkin beer story I mentioned on Facebook), and I'm glad Nichols and Jack both brought it up. It's too good to waste.

Here's the piece. First off, sorry, but...it's not that well-written. It jumps all over the place, and never really develops a groove. And then we get stuff like this:

At the bar, men outnumber women 5-to-1. And men, on average, say they prefer beer to wine, according to a Gallup poll last year. Other statistics show 70-percent of wine buyers are women. So, while the atmosphere at the brewery is pretty relaxed, there’s actually a spirited battle for customers going on here.
Ted Farthing: “We’re all fighting for share of stomach.” Ted Farthing is the executive director of the Oregon Wine Board. He says wine and beer and liquor are all competing against each other, for our limited beverage budgets.

The atmosphere at what brewery is pretty relaxed? And what spirited battle for customers is going on? I'm going to believe Ted Farthing, the wine guy, that beer and wine are "fighting"? The beer drinkers and brewers they quote in the article don't seem to be aware of the "fight" at all. The one brewer they talked to was, to be fair, pretty relaxed (though that was 6 'graphs after the 'atmo at the brewery' line): "It’s cool for guys to sit around and drink a bottle of wine," said the co-owner at Cascade Lakes Brewing. Pretty big of him, almost magnanimous.

From where I'm sitting, there's no fight. In fact, it looks like Oregon winemakers are shooting themselves in the foot with the dumb gun. Check this out:

For instance, Ted Farthing with the Oregon Wine Board [really, they say the whole thing again, just in case you forgot who he was] says Oregon’s wines are on average more expensive and more refined than other states. Ted Farthing [of the Oregon Wine Board Farthings]: “Given the shifting landscape, the Oregon Wine Board has actually narrowed our target to make sure we are still speaking to the people who are purchasing wines over $15 or $20 at least once a month, and this is only about 3 percent of the U.S. population.”

Is Ted Farthing with the Oregon Wine Board aware that the only sector of the booze market that's down MORE than wines over $20 a bottle is champagne? And they want to narrow their target to make sure they're only speaking to the people who are still buying those wines?

But don't worry. They've got a plan.

That’s not to say that Farthing [is that Ted Farthing with the Oregon Wine Board?] isn’t looking at new markets. In addition to men, he says winemakers in the state need to target millennial [sic]. One way to do that is to embrace the digital age – the Oregon Wine Board has already launched several Facebook groups to convince 21-to-30 year-olds that wine can be cool.

Cool? Hey, kids -- boy kids -- wine is cool! A brewer said so...

Guess we know why craft beer is on the front page. I was just telling someone yesterday that there is more coverage of craft beer than wine in the Philly media lately. Between dopey winemakers and the absolutely brain-damaged PLCB, it's not a wonder.

Beer-Wine Parallels -- is "easy to drink" an insult?

I came across an article by W. Blake Gray in the LA Times yesterday: "'Easy to drink' isn't an insult when it comes to wines." He was bemoaning the trend to rate "difficult" wines highly, while "easy to drink" had been kicked aside as a descriptor. "Easy to drink" used to mean a critic thought a wine was superbly rounded and balanced.

"These wines don't scream for attention, or tire out the palate, because they're balanced. You shouldn't notice the alcohol, acidity or sweetness because none is overpowering. If it's a red wine, it's essential that its tannins are smooth.

Yum. But now it implies that the wine is unsophisticated, not challenging enough. Essentially, if you like "easy to drink" wines, you're not up to drinking the really good wines.

"There is an American attitude that drinking wine is sort of like a wrestling match and it is not macho to get into the ring with a wimpy 'easy to drink' wine," wine importer Kermit Lynch says. "Better it is big, brawny, tough, and swallowing it should be an endeavor rather than an easy pleasure."

(The more I read Kermit Lynch, the more I like him.) Gray then observes what this means when critics get together to taste bottles at a restaurant.

Critics taste wine in groups of 50 or more, taking one or two sips of each. Bold wines get the highest scores in this format; wines that are easy to drink don't grab attention that quickly. If only ratings services used the "empty bottle test." At the end of a multi-wine meal, just see which bottles are completely drained. I have the pleasure of attending many such mini-bacchanalias, and it's amazing how often the kitchen staff gets to finish the highest-rated bottles. But nobody goes back and adjusts the ratings.

So. Do I have to belabor the obvious? I'll just tell you about the Malt Advocate staff party we had last month...well, a little about it, because too many details would be embarrassing. We still drink a lot of beer at Malt Advocate, because you can't drink whiskey all night. John's coolers and fridge were stocked with awesome beers -- tripels, DIPAs, imperial stouts -- and he had Lost Abbey Serpent's Stout and a tripel on draft. Now...the Serpent's Stout was excellent, the tripel was very good. But by the end of the night, every bottle of Deschutes Twilight Ale and Full Sail Black Session he had was empty. They were "easy to drink."

I know, I know... You always finish your bottle of Big Ass Triple Imperial Whatzit. Good for you, and you should; there are children in Somalia who are going to bed sober (thanks to Terry Sullivan for that one). But remember this the next time you "rate" a beer, either on one of the ratings sites or in your blog or for your own enjoyment: was it "easy to drink?" Was it balanced, did it lead you to another drink effortlessly, was it pleasurable and fun? Or did you have to work at it? Was it a one-trick pony -- tremendously hoppy, sour, roasted -- or did it wrap several components up in a beautiful whole?

Maybe that's why PhillyMag picked HopDevil as their Best of Philly beer this year (or maybe it's just because it's a really good beer that a lot of different kinds of beer drinkers enjoy: there's a good conversation about that building over at Suzanne Woods's I'll Have Another Stout blog; why not go join in?). It's easy to drink. Ron and Bill have been surprised from the beginning about how easy to drink people have found HopDevil. It's an IPA! It's 6.7%! But it is beautifully balanced.

Hello Kitty and Santa's Butt

Remember this little bit I put up about wine labels? Remember the annual controversies over the variety of cartoony labels on Wychwood's "Bad Elf" series of Christmas beers, about how they'd confuse children because of their cartoon images on a bottle of beer?

Decanter is reporting that the first Hello Kitty wine is on the market, and that it is available in the U.S. WTF? The bottle not only has the nightmarish image of Hello Kitty on the label, it has a little charm of the fiendish feline hung from the neck! (Not a bad thing, you must admit.)

I think the export manager may be full of shit, because they seem to think that the FDA regulates wine labels, and I don't see anything about this wine being actually for sale in the U.S., but just suppose they're right. What the hell does that say about turning down cartoon beer labels? More to the point, who will save me from all the Hello Kitty winos?

Vecchia Osteria, Newtown

After just saying that I don't like to write about food... That's all this post is about. When Cathy and Nora came home Atlanta yesterday, we came up the Blue Route because of heavy traffic on I-95 through Philly -- which meant Nora got euchred out of dinner at Memphis Taproom, which she'd been banking on. I told her we could pick up Thomas and try the new place in Newtown.

But when we got to the Green Parrot, they told us all they could serve was pizza, "because our computer system is down." ??? Thomas and I had just had pizza for lunch, the women had just had it the night before, so, rolling our eyes, we left. ("Computer system"? Did all the paper and pens break?) Now where? Damn, damn, damn. "What about the place by the barber shop, where Sal's was?" Cathy says. I growled, uncomfortably. Sal's had been the third place to fail in that space in 12 years, and the space just felt cheap and cold to me, and I didn't want to go back. Cathy leaned on me. I gave in.

I'm glad I did. Vecchia Osteria was clearly a different proposition. Some love had obviously been spent on decorating the place, we were greeted warmly as soon as we entered, and one of the first things they asked was if we wanted some wine. VO doesn't have a liquor license...they are a BYOB, and they also make use of a loophole in The Almighty Liquor Code: they can't sell wine, but they can give it away. I enjoyed a small glass of Barbera d'Alba, ordered, and decided to run home (15 minute round trip) for a bottle of Cat Amongst the Pigeons Nine Lives Shiraz I'd picked up (not available from the PLCB, by the way). When we got back and our waiter had opened and poured it, we were both wishing I'd picked up a few more bottles: it was a luscious thick purple, full of layered fruit and a wonderful balance of acidity and sweet.

I stuck to water with my carpaccio, though. I'm used to getting shaved ribbons of beef criss-crossed on a plate with some kind of dressing artfully drooled across it. This was much more rustic: cloud-tender ravelings of beef relaxing on a lively-fresh bed of arugula dressed with lemon juice (which was why I held off on the wine) and olive oil. It was the very best carpaccio I've ever had. The kids both tried it, and -- wonder of wonders -- split an order of mussels, and liked them.

Main course? Papardelle with rabbit and marinara sauce. Just wonderful, silky with fresh oil and cheese, the rabbit firm and flavorful, the pasta with the perfect bite. And the wine was wonderful with this. Cathy had the rigatoni with bacon and artichokes, Nora had spaghetti with clams, and Thomas had the sauteed salmon with mussels. He was not wild about his, but I think that was more a Thomas thing; the bite I had was good. Cathy's was excellent, and Nora's was a textbook example of how to meld simple ingredients into something beautiful.

We split a small piece of ricotta cheesecake and two small cannoli. Our waiter offered me sambucca (!), but I reluctantly declined. I'd had enough, and the wine was warming me enough.

A great meal in totally unlooked-for surroundings. We'll definitely be back.

Cooking with big meat

Everyone's been passing around the Bacon Explosion link (sure, I'll pass it on: what's one more server melted down?), and it got me looking at my fridge. I had a chunk of ham I was waiting to use, some Canadian bacon, half a pound of double-smoked bacon ends (I picked them up at the Amish butcher at the farmer's market, figured I could add some flavor to something -- "everything tastes better with a little speck"), some bockwurst, and four German frankfurters I got at Rieker's. I also had 4 lbs. of kraut I'd bought to do a second New Year's dinner, and never got to. What's got a ton of meat and kraut? Choucroute garni!

Turns out I had everything I needed, even the juniper berries. I fried up the bacon ends with onions and carrots and two Granny Smith apples. I diced the Canadian bacon and ham, sliced the bockwurst, and left the frankfurters. Rinsed the kraut, and made up a cheesecloth bag of juniper berries, peppercorns, cloves, and bay leaves. It's all bubbling away in my Dutch oven with a bottle of Riesling/Gewürztraminer blend and some broth; after it's simmered for a couple hours, I'm going to chill it, then re-heat it for dinner tonight with parsleyed potatoes.

Beer? Oh...something dark and lagery, maybe some of that Shiner Commemorator. Hey, Alsatian's practically German, right? Ah... Eat a big dish, have a couple beers, and fast tomorrow...

Obama to Congress: Drinks, my place, tonight; we'll talk

President Obama continues to bring an adult attitude about drinking to the public eye. According to the New York Post, he invited 24 Senators and Representatives -- from both parties -- to the White House for cocktails tonight. They're going to have a few drinks and talk about the stimulus package.

That's great, I love a chief executive who isn't afraid to openly say "come over for a few drinks," but the very best part is that all the pictures accompanying the story at the Post and in the blog post about it at The Huffington Post show Obama drinking... BEER! Ha ha! Suck it, wine people.

Oh, my. Fun to relax at the end of the day.

Latest Obama Effect: makes wine people pee themselves

Expectations for the new President were so high during the election that he made fun of them himself: "Contrary to the rumours you have heard, I was not born in a manger," Obama said at a NY fund-raiser. "I was actually born on Krypton and sent here by my father, Jor-el, to save the planet Earth." Dunno about you, but I laughed my head off at that.

I'd like to laugh at things like this, but I can only shake my head. It's a Bill Daley story in the Chicago Tribune, "Wine suggestions for President Obama." It's full of wine folks uttering spine-tingly stuff like this:

"Mr. Obama will be a champion of wine and bring new insight to the White House," predicted Mark L. Esterman, wine buyer for Meijer, the supermarket/department store chain. He thinks Obama will present a "wine-centric image" that will go over well with foreign guests coming from areas where wine is a major part of their culture and industry.

and this:

"They're going to be a much more wine-friendly first couple than, obviously, the Bushes," said Todd Hess of H2Vino, a Chicago distributor. Just the fact the Obamas drink wine with meals gives wine a positive boost, he said.

and, God help me, this:

"For the red, I hope Mr. Obama serves a zinfandel from either Lodi or Paso Robles. Nothing in the world screams 100 percent American-made like a heady-alcohol zinfandel, complete with spice, fruit and bold flavors which are indicative of the American spirit. In regard to wine, the message should be: 'We have arrived.' "

People, people, people. Have we all forgotten this?

(Philadelphia Inquirer, taken by Sarah J. Glover)

That's the New President, campaigning at Bethlehem Brew Works, a brewpub, and drinking a Fegley's ESB. And do you want to know what's really sad about this delusion? If you do a Google Images search on "Obama Wine", this is the first picture of the man that comes up! There are no pictures of Obama drinking wine that I've seen, and the man tried to get beer to the Inauguration and was denied by security. Like to see that happen to wine. (Is it our fault that draft beer comes in things that look like really big pipe bombs?)

Look, I know Daley had a column to write, I do too sometimes. But this kind of willing suspension of disbelief stuff really makes me wonder about the people in the wine biz. Do I think Obama is going to be "a champion of" beer, or present a beer"-centric image that will go over well with foreign guests coming from areas where" beer "is a major part of their culture and industry"? Hell, no. I don't think he's going to be drinking a lot of bourbon or rye, either. I don't think the man's going to have any impact at all on the booze biz.

To expect him to suddenly embrace wine, though, when he's given no real evidence of it at all before... that's kinda psychotic. ( I notice that Tom Wark didn't partake of the Obama WineGod Kool-Aid.) Thank God for the Binny's guy at the end of the piece who mused that Obama might start state dinners with Old Style. Nice.

Farewell to "corked" wine?

Okay, kind of an odd post for me to return with after a week away from the blog (sorry about that, it's been a busy week, and I'm still a bit under the weather): there's news that a technology developed by NASA to remove contaminants from fruits and vegetables headed to the space station may also effectively remove TCA (2,4,6-trichloroanisole) from wine corks. Best of all, the process doesn't just filter the TCA, which would leave the possibility of it slipping through, it chemically destroys it.

If you're not familiar with TCA or corked wine, it's a big deal that most folks in the wine industry don't like to talk about. TCA occurs in natural cork; it's a contaminant (I think it's mold-generated) that doesn't show up until the cork is put in a bottle; when the bottle is opened and the wine is poured, it's pretty much nasty and undrinkable. If you ask folks in the wine or cork biz, it affects 1-3% of bottles (which is actually a huge number: imagine if 1-3 out of every 100 bottles of beer you got were just shite? Oh, wait, that's how craft beer was back in the 1990s...); if you talk to wine critics and industry analysts, it's more like 5-10%. A big problem when you're talking about flushing a $20 purchase down the crapper, and it's been a major component behind the move to screwtops, synthetic corks, and box wines.

But all those other closures have issues, to varying extent, and the wine industry would mostly rather use cork. Now, maybe they can:

Airocide was originally developed in the 1990s to keep fruit and vegetables fresh on a space station. It has been proved in concept trials to remove 90-95% of TCA (2,4,6-trichloroanisole), which causes cork taint in wine, from a sealed room within 24 hours. The process works by sucking air through a box containing a 'bed' of titanium dioxide catalyst. This is irradiated by UV bulbs, oxidising any organic contaminants.

Independent UK wine laboratory Corkwise performed the trials on behalf of Airocide. Airocide is already used in hospitals, research facilities and for food storage - but is relatively new to the wine industry. Potential uses exist throughout the supply chain, from wineries to warehouses. The cost ranges from £1,500 for small units, to upwards of £7,000 for large ones.

Will it work? Is it economical? Can't say. But getting rid of TCA would sure take some of the pucker out of buying big-ticket wine, at least for me. Because once you've been burned by corked wine, you don't open a bottle quite the same way. At least for me. Pretty interesting.

Your Thanksgiving Table

I could get all wrought up about this...but I'm just gonna sigh. Craig LaBan, who seemed to be on "our side" with beer more lately (witness this brilliant little bit on rye beer from Oct. 31), has a piece in today's Inky about wine for Thanksgiving. And --

Well, wait. Some background. There are a few things I need to tell you about my experience with wine, meals, and wine people. Thanksgiving is a wine disaster almost as big as Thai food, ham*, and chili. You will never get a straight, consistent answer from wine people on what to drink with these foods. Why? Well, with Thanksgiving you've got a variety of traditional foods on the table, usually simple, and generally not sourced from wine-country cuisine.

At my house, it's turkey -- quickly overwhelmed by wine -- mashed potatoes, broccoli, mashed rutabagas (the big yellow turnips coated in wax), sweet potatoes (I skip those, sorry), filling/stuffing/dressing/ramming (whatever you call it), succotash -- can anyone give me a wine that goes with lima beans? -- and my Aunt Carol's favorite, scalloped oysters (this recipe is close, but use Ritz crackers instead of Saltines; we used to use Falcon crackers, but they went away...). Rutabagas and wine? We cook our succotash in thinned milk, and there's milk in the oysters, which is a bit yucky with wine.

So we drink beer, and it works well. Roasted fowl? No problem, we've got caramel touches in the leftover Oktoberfest beers or something like Brooklyn Local One or Rare Vos. Scalloped oysters? Cut against the richness and emphasize the brine of the oyster liquor with a dry stout (which ain't bad with the turkey, either). Succotash, rutabagas, spuds? Pilsner or pale ale. And the sweet potatoes work well with a bit of bourbon; I got no problem with that. Dessert? Don't get me started. The only thing that's a bit tough is my Aunt Alice's zingily tart homemade cranberry sauce, and you know? You don't have to drink with everything.

But wine people can't do that, and, well, I guess I understand. I'd rather drink my favored beer. It's just that they can't make wine work, and the gyrations they go through, every year, are kind of amusing, almost like the vegetarians trying to get around the turkey (some are more graceful about it than others).

I've seen wine people fall back on three approaches to this holiday. There's the Shotgun Solution, which is to throw a variety of wines at the table, while bitching about the boring menu that your mother insists on providing for your annoying, unsophisticated relatives. (Charming. When did Thanksgiving become the official opportunity for writers with dysfunctional families to make the rest of us feel uncomfortable about enjoying ourselves?)

The second approach, which grows directly, forcefully, out of the Shotgun Solution, is the Drastic Course Correction, in which you completely surrender and throw the entire traditional menu overboard -- screw your family -- and serve something else, anything else, so long as it goes with wine. So there.

The third approach, the Wine Above All Cipher, suggests you try "Riesling, Gewürztraminer, or Beaujolais!" It has been my experience that when winefolk suggest these wines -- with Thanksgiving, with barbecue, with Thai food, with Tex-Mex -- what they mean is "Wine doesn't go well with this food, beer would be better." They just can't bring themselves to say it.

And Craig Laban can't, either, though he is more honest than most: "Thanksgiving, the most food-centric holiday of the year, is a wine lover's lament." And then he goes to work. "To begin with, there's the guest list: my relatives." He loves them, he says, and I don't doubt it, but like some of my relatives, they're not as into it as he is, and will drink the box wine with nary a care.

Then he admits that the real problem is the menu. "Thanksgiving is a beast of a feast when it comes to pairing wines...No single wine can handle all these flavors with equal aplomb -- which is liberating in a way. Because there's almost no wrong answer." At which point he hauls out the shotgun and blows eight suggested wines onto the table, keeping them under $18 a bottle...mostly. Keep in mind that a bottle is about four holiday pours, and compare that to the $9 six-packs of craft beer you'll find in most bottleshops, or even the $30 case of 24 bottles. Ouch, in times of reduced budgets (which was the subject of the lead story in today's Food section), wine don't come off so good.

He does stick largely to the traditional menu -- points for that -- but sure enough, there's riesling and beaujolais in there. That shouldn't come as any surprise, because there is no mention anywhere, not in the body, not in a sidebar, nowhere...of beer.

Which is too bad. Beer's come a long way in mainstream press, but when it comes down to the nubbin, to the big food-drink stories of the year, beer's still swept aside, ignored, not taken seriously. Do I really care? Yeah, some, though I realize that what probably happened was that LaBan was asked to write a wine piece for Thanksgiving, and did just that. But I'll have a glass or two of beer at my family Thanksgiving dinner, and we'll talk, and eat, and enjoy ourselves. I'm sure LaBan will too. And his family, whatever they're drinking.

Tip of the hat to Jay Brooks for finding that fine illustration!


*On the ham thing...we do a caroling party at our house most years, and I insist on serving a big roast ham. Beer's great with it, of course, but I'd like to have some kind of wine to go with it for the wine drinkers, so I asked wine people. Suggestions ranged from "Er...ham's tough to pair" to (inevitably) "Try a Beaujolais or a Riesling!" (To be fair, I do like a cold bottle of Riesling with a really hot pork and hominy chili I make...but beer's good, too.) The first year, I tried the Beaujolais and it was a disaster: clashed with the salt and the roasted crackly surface of the ham. However, I did get one suggestion that has worked out well...for me, at least: Domaine Chandon Blanc de Noirs, a rather tasty sparkling wine made with pinot noir grapes, that goes quite nicely with the ham. The only problem is that no one but me ever wants to drink it; damned sunny-day wine folk. Still, lemons, lemonade...after everyone leaves, and the family goes to bed, I make myself a big ham sandwich, grab what's left of the blanc de noirs, and watch Blade Runner. It's become a weird Christmas tradition for me, and I've invited Thomas to join me this year. For the ham and the replicants, of course.

A little speculation on skin and wine

We went out to dinner last night to an Italian-themed BYOB here in Newtown, Florentino's (which is excellent, BTW: a great find for us, and it's become our celebration spot). We were celebrating Cathy's latest promotion; she's doing very well with the new company. I took along a bottle of wine I picked up last week (and I was surprised to learn that it's available by special order from the PLCB), "Drink 'n' Stick," from "Some Young Punks," an Aussie outfit we were introduced to at a wine tasting in Portland, ME, last year.

Drink 'n' Stick is a Shiraz blend, a type we've come to enjoy, and we enjoy the irreverent labels and attitude of the Young Punks, too. Drink 'n' Stick, for example, has a "paper doll" label with a young woman and a variety of plastic press-on clothes to dress her with. As you can see by the succession of pix on the right, you can undress her, too, right down to the skivvies she's wearing in the actual paper label. Woo-woo and ooo-la-la, eh? (I apologize for the quality of the other two labels: they're small copies of two of SYP's other wines from the back of the Drink 'n' Stick label, but you get the idea.)

I swear, that's not why I got the bottle. I got it because we'd had a bottle of one of their other wines, "Passion has Red Lips," and really enjoyed it (better than this one: it was a bit inky and thick, and the fruit and acidity were smothered), and they were both quite reasonably priced. (I've yet to have a bottle of wine that cost more than $25 that I really thought was significantly better than a $15 bottle. This troubles me.)

But as we were eating, Cathy picks up the bottle, looks at skivvies-girl, and asks me, "If this was a beer label, would they have approved it?" Good question! Given the stuff that has been banned on beer labels -- Santa, the Mannekin Pis statue, Delacroix's "Liberty Leading the People" (and just why didn't Liberty take a minute to pin up her magnificent decolletage, anyway?) -- and then seeing this, it sure looks like a double standard to me.

Wine gets other breaks, too. For instance, wineries are often considered "farm" businesses, which gets them special considerations on taxes, permits, and sales...even when they have no vines on their property and buy all their grapes. Wineries are usually allowed to sell bottles of wine for take-home at festivals. Wineries in PA get to have stores to sell their products, other than at the winery. Brewers get none of that (don't even ask about distillers, the PLCB keeps a tight rein on spirits).

Fair? Well...no, but neither are the wildly different rates of taxation on beer, wine, and spirits: beer gets a huge break there. Federal's different, but most states are even more so: Pennsylvania, for example, charges only 8¢ a gallon tax on beer; wine is much more (and much more complicated, too). So it's not all one-sided.

Made for a fun conversation over an empty bottle of wine, though!