Warning: Irony alert! Items in red italics are used ironically. Please don’t send any more hate mail. I love the French, French wine and French food. Period.

Much of the press for the French wine industry has been pretty negative lately. They lost the reenactment of the famous 1976 France vs. USA tasting. […]

Now that there are more fat than starving people in the world, there must be a lot more foodies as well. But what’s a foodie? People who eat food? I took a trip to the dictionary to find out:
foodie (slang) a person keenly interested in food, esp. in eating or cooking […]

This article appearded in the August/September 2006 edition of Connections Magazine (Ireland)
It must be getting hot in California wine country. Randall Grahm, rock-star winemaker of Bonny Doon fame, was scouting out vineyards in southern England. England? I was driving around West Sussex earlier this year hoping to visit one of England’s best […]

(note: please click on any image to enlarge)
It seems like just a few years ago that the only quality wine makers using the screwcap (or Stelvin) were either in New Zealand or named Randall Grahm. They’re now practically everywhere as people are finally starting to realize that there may be a better way to […]

We all know of course what the best wine of all time is. That would be the 1811 Chateau d’Yquem which was awarded 100 points by both Robert Parker and the Wine Spectator (note: there was no such consensus on the 1847) How can I say this with such confidence? It may […]

This article accompanies the newly released Map of London Wine Shops
Things aren’t always what you expect. Moving to London last fall, I fully expected to be immersed in a vast wine playground.* After all, this is the home of the Masters of Wine, the world’s oldest wine shops and is the only city […]

Although wine is an ancient drink, it’s surprising how very young our perception of it is. Just take a look at our “classic” wine references’ first publication date:
The World Atlas of Wine, Hugh Johnson, 1971
Hugh Johnson’s Wine Companion, 1983
Sotheby’s World Wine Encyclopedia, Tom Stevenson, 1988
The Oxford Companion to Wine, Jancis Robinson 1994
The major […]

Ten years ago. . .
Man walks in to a wine shop and asks for a wine to go with a certain dish.
The clerk replies: “German Riesling”.
Man walks out of wine shop.
Wait, where’s the punch line? The badum-bump? There’s none of that because it’s not a joke. Times were really that hard for […]

When Diesel - the ultra trendy purveyor of $300 (₤160) jeans - decided to get into the wine business this year with equally expensive wines, they got the grape varieties all wrong. Sorry but Chardonnay, Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and Pinot Noir simply aren’t the vinous equivalent of denim. That honor would go to […]

This article appearded in the June/July 2006 edition of Connections Magazine (Ireland)
Well priced, massively fruit-forward, quaffable Australian wines seem fairly ubiquitous these days, and why not? Who hasn’t picked up a bottle of Jacob’s Creek, Rosemount, Hardy’s, Banrock Station or [yellowtail] lately? They’re the cheap, cheerful, user friendly wines that rescued us all […]