VinoFictions

Vinogirl and I clash

2013-04-04T14:34:00.006-07:00

Believe it or not, Vinogirl and I did not get together on our mutual posts, even though they have the same theme.

Recently, thanks to my regular column in a Rochester, NY magazine--yeah, print--I received two emails last week from PR people applauding my column and then asking if I would like to taste some wines that they represent.

As I do with everyone who contacts me with that kind of request, I informed them that I rarely do wine criticism, and when I do it's generally for wine that I have bought at retail. In each case, I was thanked for my honesty and told the wine would be sent nevertheless.

They arrived--two wines form Italy and three from Portugal (they came form a PR agency in NY City). Last night, I opened one of them to have with dinner.

Because I hate wine criticism, especially when the wine is in a vacuum, as a tasting rather than in its true setting, with food, I will do this a different way. I'll tell you what I prepared for dinner and then tell you how the wine did with it.

I had an eggplant that needed to be consumed, but I had grown tired of the usual wok eggplant dish that I prepare every two weeks or so. This time, I decided to do something in an Italian mode to pair with one of the wines from Italy.

We have finished off the last of our tomato sauce from our 2012 crop, so I am reduced to opening a can. I know all about ragu: the long, slow process of cooking a tomato sauce, usually with meat. I don't cook much like that. I decide about an hour or two before dinner what I want to eat, which gives me half an hour to make a sauce. Easy task, as you really don't need a lot of time to make a tasty tomato sauce.

A can of crushed (organic) tomatoes, 1/2 cup sweet wine (Madeira), some chicken stock does the trick.

I take one of my basil ice cubes and melt it--yeah, that's how I preserve basil all winter. At harvest time, I select some bunches and whip them up with olive oil and then pour them into an ice tray. After they freeze, I remove them from the ice tray and dump the basil ice pieces into a plastic bag to store in the freezer.

Drop a basil cube into a 12-inch stainless pan, slice a couple of cloves of garlic thin with a razor and give them a quick saute in the olive oil, pour in the tomato, wine, and 1/2 cup of stock, add a few laurel leaves, and let simmer for half an hour, adding stock if it starts to dry up too much.

Turn on convection oven to 350.

Slice the eggplant into 1/4-inch thick pieces. Dip each into egg, drip and then dredge each piece into breadcrumbs. (I make my own breadcrumbs from the insides of whole grain baguettes that I eat. I drop the insides into a container and store them in the refrigerator so they dry out nicely--then I grind them fine in the food processor and store in a jar in the freezer.)

Lay the breaded eggplant on an oven pan and bake for about 20 minutes on each side.

Put water on to boil for cheese ravioli. When turning the eggplant over for its last 20 minutes baking, drop the ravioli into boiling water and cook until done--eight minutes or so.

Meanwhile, wilt some spinach leaves very briefly--about a minute, tops. Lay the spinach on a salad plate, top with fresh olives and some bean sprouts (we make our own sprouts).

That's the salad.

Chop some parsley for garnishing, and crumble some grana padano cheese into small pieces.

When the ravioli and eggplant are done, put them into separate plates and pour the sauce over them. On top of the eggplant, spread the little pieces of grana padano. Sprinkle parsley over ravioli and eggplant dishes.

That's dinner; now the wine.

Barba's 2009 Montepulciano D'Abruzzo (red). The grapes are grown organically and, based on its opaqueness as well as its gritty/chewy quality, I'd say the wine is not filtered.

It has a truly earthy aroma, but not Brett: elemental, with a black cherry undertone. It doesn't present fruit in the taste; it's on the vinous side. It's got a lot of body and heft to it, and it could not be mistaken for anything but old-style Abruzzo winemaking. In fact, the winery claims old vines.

I liked the wine with the food. The food toned it down a little, which was good, as the wine is quite hefty.

In all, it was a nice experience, but the wine is nothing that I would spend a lot of time seeking.

Sweet red wine: blech.

2013-02-19T12:56:00.001-08:00

Unlike the supposed progression that people make from liking sweet wine when young to slowly developing a taste for non-sweet wine as we get older, I gravitated directly to wines that did not taste sweet but that made my mouth feel puckerishly dry. It's not that I didn't drink the usual cheap, sweet wines of youth--who had enough money for anything else?--but when I had the money, I went straight for table wines, mostly reds, that were decidedly not sweet.

Don't get me wrong. I did then and do today like many sweet white wines, but not nearly as strongly as I prefer non-sweet reds (and non-sweet whites). Maybe I have old man Anton's wine cellar to blame for my delightful shortcoming.

Anton was a Neapolitan who lived in the building next to ours where I grew up in Brooklyn. He operated a summer-only outdoor candy store where he also sold the freshest lemon ice this side of Italy--so fresh we had to spit out the pits. He often let me help him produce the lemon ice in the backyard in summer. Either I poured sugar into the ice and lemons that he crushed and mixed in his homemade contraption, or I just helped him move bags around. Free lemon ice all summer was my pay.

I loved the summer work of course, but it was the autumn work with Anton that truly made me feel blessed--that was when I helped him with general wine cellar work, which consisted mostly of cleaning things. I loved to sniff the barrels after he emptied them, something Anton's grandson taught me to do. One sniff from a recently emptied barrel acted like a catapult.

For my pay, Anton rewarded our family with a few gallons of red wine each Thanksgiving and Christmas, wine as fiery as laying asphalt in August and, more important, as parching as Mohave.

So, here I am, many decades from those days with Anton's wine and what I have to show for it is an undying love for parching red wine met by an opposing distaste for sweet red wine. I also don't like any red wine that fizzes--pink is ok, but not red. So much for Lambrusco (yeah, yeah, Alfonso. I tried it in its home region, but still don't like it).

Yet, I keep hearing about a newly developing market for sweet red wine, and so I told myself that if I want to know what I am talking about when I tear down sweet red wine, I have to give it a try.

My first dip into the sweet red craze was a Cagnina di Romagna. Oh my, how do people drink that stuff?

My second dip into sweet red was a Dornfelder from the Rheinhessen. Nope.

My third dip...I dropped the idea.

Maybe it's low acidity, maybe tannin with sugar doesn't work for me (I never put sugar into coffee or tea), maybe it's the kind of fruit from red wine, maybe it's a combination of things, but something happens to red wine when it is sweet, and that something is quite unpleasant to my palate.

It's income tax time

2013-02-07T13:41:00.000-08:00

Every year at this time I try to determine what my income tax bill would be if we were allowed to deduct what we spent for wine during the year.

Last year, I spent almost $4,000 on wine. If I were an influential wine writer, that figure might mean very little as a percentage of my income. As it is, I am not influential nor do I have an income worth flaunting. That $4000 means a lot to me, which is why I daydream over a wine deduction on my tax returns.

Thanks to resveratrol, anthrocyanins (did I spell that correctly?), polyphenols, and whatever else is in there, wine should be considered a medical expense, but it should not be handled on the Schedule A Itemized Deductions. That schedule is where the IRS makes life difficult, with formulas and worksheets to follow in order to figure out how much of the actual money spent will wind up becoming a deductible amount. So often, I follow the worksheet only to find that I spent an hour serpentining from Schedule A, to Form 1040, to Publication this or Publication that, to a tax information booklet so-and-so, only to discover that I can't take the deduction. This is the kind of gyration that makes the Form 1040 Standard Deduction valuable only to those with an income worth defending with an automatic weapon, and not being an influential wine writer, I have yet to reach that income level.

I don't like it that the standard deduction for medical payments throughout the year is subject to a worksheet. The money is gone, all of it, including the $4000 for wine; why is only part of it considered spent?

The medical/wine deduction should be a dollar-for-dollar credit that goes on the first page of the Form 1040 (in fact, there should be only one page for tax returns, but that's a whole separate conversation that comes up only around election time).

You guessed it: I've been doing my tax returns.

As an aside: I have changed entry to this blog from allowing anyone to allowing only those who register. The people who occupy space with amoebas, the spammers, have made me do it. The Internet really is a cesspool.

The Wine Week That Was

2013-01-27T13:45:00.002-08:00

In this new feature of Vinofictions, we put our extensive, unquestionable knowledge to work as insightful analysts, recapping and commenting on some of the wine news of the week that is fit to print, but likely should be ignored.

It will be the words that matter, but this being a subject connected to wine, we have established a 100-point rating system. Unlike the other 100-point system, the one of incomparable accuracy, this system works in reverse. The news that we select each week is the kind of information that leans toward the absurd, the incredible, the comical, the truly stupid. Our rating system of a news item starts with 100 points just for being selected--each 5 points below 100 symbolizes our attempt at trying to be nice.

And so...to borrow from Murrow: here now, the news.

The Reviewer Card.

Few words can describe this one.

We won't give his name or his Web site address, because we don't want to give this fellow any traffic, but last week, a 35-year-old sharpie was reported to have come up with what in his mind is a brilliant idea: shakedown restaurants and retailers for wine (and food) freebies.

The idea came from the fact that people with more time on their hands than is probably good for the world can use that time on Yelp to do some good--for themselves. (Yelp is the most important social media happening since the Lascaux Caves.)

Now Yelp reviewers can show their blatant self-importance with the flash of REVIEWERCARD. We heard a rumor that the card comes with a supply of toilet paper so that the reviewer can offer some to the restaurant or retail manager to wipe up what he or she is supposed to do at the sight of the card.

95 because in the end, we decided that there are a few words to describe this one.

Drunks don't kill--cars do. Right?

The National Rifle Association (NRA) unveiled a two-step approach toward protecting our Second Amendment rights.

The first step in the NRA plan is to establish a relationship with one of those wine clubs that offers exclusive wine deals to everyone capable of believing that the deals are exclusive, which apparently counts as an awful lot of people.

Learning from Mother's Against Drunk Driving, the NRA's second step is to sell stickers sporting the slogan "Don't Drink and Shoot" intended to slap on all weapons large enough to kill groups of people within seconds. The sticker will be printed in blurry script, so that everyone who drinks will be able to read it.

According to NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre, purchases from the NRA wine club will directly benefit support of the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and "...the other basic freedoms of the American Culture."

95 because we cannot figure out what LaPierre is talking about.

Rather than being in a row, ducks on each coast are having a row

Napa Valley's Duckhorn Vineyards claims that by not putting Duck Walk Vineyard's geographic location on the front label of Duck Walk wines, use of the word "duck" by the Long Island winery is in violation of an earlier settlement when Duckhorn sued Duck Walk over a perceived duck-centric trademark infringement.

According to Duck Walk's attorney, Duckhorn does not have a trademark on the word "duck" and therefore has a quack case.

90 because we don't know how to do a duck sound on this blog

What the world needs: another Southern Wine and Spirits distribution facility

The Miami-based octopus known as Southern Wine and Spirits will open a 2,500 square foot facility in Salisbury, Maryland (a 2.5 hour drive from Monkton, Maryland, and rightly so).

This new plant marks just another regional location for the tiny family business that today spans 35 states, but we are certain is eying the remaining 15. Southern gives new meaning to the idea that Repeal of Prohibition removed questionable control over alcohol sales and distribution in the U.S.

85 for being big and probably able to do damage to the reputation of minor critics like us.

They still don't get it.

2013-01-16T13:00:00.002-08:00

I've been off the wine sales road for quite some time but what stays fresh in my mind about my years on the road with wine is the general intransigence of so many restaurant owners and managers when it came to staff training and pricing wine to sell it.

A few days ago, I had to make a trip to Albany, New York, which happens to be one of my old sales territories. After a meeting with the publisher of my next book, I went off to meet up with someone who lives in the area for a glass of wine and some catching up. We settled on meeting at one of that city's longest standing downtown restaurant and bar, which I shall not name.

Except for much needed renovations to the rest rooms, the place hadn't changed much at all, and in more ways than one. It looked and felt the same, and it still offered a fair number of mediocre wines at ridiculously inflated prices.

What's worse, the staff seems not to have been trained in wine service as much as it has been trained in pushy wine sales.

My friend and I sat at the bar to have a glass of wine each. I asked the bartender for the wine list. His response was that the restaurant has just about every wine we could imagine. He suggested that I tell him what I want and he was sure to have it.

I told him that what I wanted was the wine list, but that wasn't clear enough for him. He repeated what he had just said, and then followed it up with a sales pitch for a new wine they had just gotten in, a Napa Cabernet named after the football Jets.

I pressed more and got the wine list but by then my friend was exasperated with me and he ordered a glass of some Chardonnay. I took the hint, put the wine list down and said I'd have a glass of the same. We weren't there to talk wine anyway.

About midway through our time at the bar, the bartender came over with two Riedel glasses into which he had poured some of that Jets wine. He wanted us to taste it and give him our impression.

The wine smelled like an out of control barbecue fire that had created lots of smoke after it was doused with Cabernet Sauvignon in place of water, and the wine tasted like smoked pork that had been marinated in Cabernet Sauvignon-based brandy. I wasn't sure if the wood or the alcohol was the defining feature of the wine.

I asked to see the label and to my surprise, the wine was not from bulk juice. It was listed as a "Produced and Bottled by..." Yet, I was certain it could not have cost the restaurant more than between $8 and $10 a bottle; it was listed at $49, which was about $10 for each alcohol percentage above 10.

When I pointed out that the wine was quite woody, the bartender said--proudly--that others have told him that. The bartender suggested that the restaurant had bought up all the cases of that wine available to the city, which, if true, is of course the best way to price a wine however you want--and get away with it.

Is that the best way for a restaurant to sell wine?

Maybe so. Maybe the American restaurant customer is an easy mark. Maybe people with dull palates and full wallets are the norm.

I used to think that I had the answer for restaurants.

I used to try to persuade restaurant owners and managers that they could both give the customer a good and reasonably-priced experience and still make a profit. I used to try to persuade them that good pricing leads to a more fluid (no pun) inventory, which in turn leads to profit through higher volume sales, which in turn leads to returning customers seeking to maintain that good feeling when they pay a reasonable price and have a good wine experience.

I used to tell the owners and managers that important to a good wine program is a trained staff. Trained not to push but to educate, not to lie their way through, but to own some knowledge to back them up.

I used to tell the restaurant people not to order wine by its reputation but instead order wine that the trained staff liked and could get behind, and with which the menu married well, always keeping in mind the price of the wine as it related to the price of the main course.

I used to offer to provide staff training, and some used to take me up on that offer, but I fear many did that because it was a free offer.

It came out later that the reason the bartender in that restaurant in Albany didn't want to show me the wine list was that in this winter period of slowing patronage, the restaurant simply doesn't have in inventory all the wines on the list. Rather than update the list, which the restaurant can't do because even in this easy to master age of desktop publishing a distributor prints the wine list for the restaurant, the bartender was told to push that Jets wine.

When next in Albany and wanting to meet an old friend for a glass of wine, do you think that restaurant will come up as a contender for a meeting place?

...and they will never know that they lost potential sales.

Have you cheated on your spouse?

2013-01-10T08:48:00.005-08:00

Not that kind of cheating. I'm talking about a wine cheat.

For instance, let's say you made a New Year's resolution with your spouse or otherwise partner to limit your daily wine consumption to one bottle between the two of you. Have you ever found yourself taking an ever-so-tiny, nearly-impossible-to-see extra drop in your glass each time you pour for both of you?

Or, have you ever really cheated? I mean like having gone to the cellar to get a bottle for dinner, but you decided you'd like a glass while cooking. You bring up two bottles, concealing one under your sweater. In the kitchen you open one bottle, pour yourself a glass to cook by and stash the bottle somewhere so that you can do the same the following day. At dinner, you open the second bottle and you each have your share--perhaps you forgo that extra drop in your glass...

A relationship is all about trust, but let's face it: when it comes to a passion, an addiction maybe, trust isn't even a contender.

Come on, you tell me about your wine transgressions and I promise to consider telling you about mine.

Is this the way to start a New Year?

2013-01-01T09:04:00.003-08:00

It isn't often that I turn down a writing gig, unless it's one of those offers that gives me exposure for the privilege of helping someone else build an online business with the promise of future below minimum payments for more help--provided the business succeeds.

No, it isn't often that I turn down meaningful work.

Within three days of my final first draft edit of my latest book I received an email offer to write another book. This offer came from one of my previous publishers, so in my mind it already had promise. It isn't every day that a publisher asks for me by name; one that was dumb enough to have once published one of my books should know better!

I was flattered as well as happy that recognition may have segued into opportunity. So, why was I compelled to turn down the book deal?

Aside from the fact that the offer bordered on ludicrous--one of the shortest turn-around windows for a book deadline that I have ever encountered--it was a for-hire deal that paid rather little.

For those unschooled in these matters, a for-hire deal means that you write the book for a flat fee. You get no author credit on the book and you do not own the copyright. Oh, you get no royalties on book sales either. I have nothing against for-hire deals, provided as the author I feel as if I offer the book some value, and the only way for the author to feel that is for the publisher to show it in the way of a decent fee. In that regard, a peanut offer is insulting.

Money offer aside, the book's premise was wrong (is wrong; I understand the publisher found someone else willing to take the bad deal; I also understand, to my dismay, that I was the second choice; the first writer smartly quit).

Believing that every offer is negotiable, and one day I'm going to certify that belief with a successful negotiation, I made a counter offer. My offer was of course not accepted.

In that counter offer I upped the dollars but I also asked for the schedule to open up and for the freedom to write the book the way I thought it needed to be written.

For a book supposedly aimed at the young wine novice, I do not think the publisher is on the right track. The premise is to cover the same tired wine regions and the same tired format that must have been written for novices at least a hundred times.

Where the publisher wants to cover Bordeaux, Burgundy, Tuscany, et al., I wanted to cover Northwestern France, Southeastern France, Northwestern Italy, Northeastern Italy, and so on, juxtaposing the New Guard with the Old Guard.

Where the publisher wanted to show pictures of famous Chateaux and labels, I wanted to show pictures of the relative unseen small giants of winemaking and of labels that may not be all that familiar--today.

While the publisher wanted to track vintages, I wanted to track ideas.

While the publisher wanted to tell the novice the things that perpetuate what has kept the subject of wine out of the reach of the modern masses all too long, I wanted to talk to the guys and gals with $15 to spare.

Yep, I turned this gig down. It reminds me of the day I smartened up and realized that I was not fit for corporate employment. It was New Year's Eve about a thousand years ago. I went out at lunchtime, bought what was still back then a wine worth drinking, Dom Perignon, and two beautiful crystal Baccarat flutes, went back to the office, quit my job, went home, opened the Champagne at 11:55, poured, awaited the big moment and when the ball dropped I announced to my wife that I had quit my job that afternoon.

I had no prospects except the idea that I could make it in this world on my own, certainly without the help of corporate rules and annual minuscule percentage raises in pay. It was the same feeling that I had when I awakened one day while attending the University of Maryland to realize that I had ahead of me a few more years of mounting education debts. That simply was not something for me to look forward to, and so I quit that and moved into the wonderful world of commerce--it was a move that led me to extensive travel abroad and even two years in residence in Iran, where the bug to explore ancient wine bit me as powerfully as the bug that gave me amoebic dysentery while living in Tehran, not to mention the fabulous Riesling that northern Iranians produced.

Not knowing me during my college days, and of course not knowing me into the future, that New Year's Eve when I told my wife that I had quit my job all she could say was something to the effect, "Good for you. Now what?"

When I told her the other day about having given up the latest book deal my wife said, "Good for you. You don't need that kind of abuse."

It's nice to know that one of us in this marriage has matured. I promise my wife that in 2013, I will mature, too.

Am I Back?

2012-12-29T14:33:00.004-08:00

The question is directed at me, not at you, if there are any of you right now.

Yeah, it's been a long while. This week, I finished my latest book (my fourth). This one is about the rise and fall of a Finger Lakes winery that once ranked 6th in the domestic winery pantheon. It is important to big wineries that we know where they fall in the ranking. I have no idea why such a thing is important, but it is to them--they boast endlessly about their ranking, provided it's in the top ten.

This book took me more than two years to complete. It also took me on the road a few times, to the West Coast and the South. I had to find some people I needed to interview. It's a good thing I came up with the idea for this book when I did--many of the people involved are up there in years.

Before I got into the wine business I was in the business of creating and producing shows for corporations; mostly sales, new product intro, or promotional events. We took shows from initial design to production to presentation in what often took months to complete. These were big events in hotels and in theaters. The one thing that I could count on after every show was what we called post-show depression--a crushing sense that life or a piece of it had just come to a crashing halt.

When I left that business I also left post-show depression behind--until this week. This particular book was research-heavy and quite detailed. For more than two years, when I wasn't traveling my daily routine had me at the keyboard right after breakfast and the treadmill, until lunch time. I walked the dog, ate lunch, went downtown to get my mail from the PO Box and run whatever other errands I had to run, and returned to the keyboard for the remainder of the day.

All of a sudden, I have no set daily routine, at least not until I start another book, if I ever do. There are moments when I find myself wondering what to do next, and the terrible feeling of going back to the book--again--to do a few edits sucks me in if I am not careful. Art is the pursuit of perfection. An artwork is really never finished because it is rarely perfect.

Whatever it was that caused me to get back to the blog certainly hasn't given me much to say. I suppose I could say something nasty and snarky about a certain Canadian wine writer who made the wine news earlier this month, but I won't. I took part--minutely--in a little bashing on the HoseMaster's blog, but I felt unclean after that. It's too easy to type out snark and then go smugly on our way to doing what we normally do, much of which I am sure many others will find equally snark worthy as well. Sometimes, our little wine world is like a sandbox or schoolyard where we are challenged to get along but often fail the test.

Some wine bloggers simply get on my nerves with their opinions; some make me laugh with their comedic talent; some make me want to join the NRA for cover so that I can take them out. In fact, the Internet could easily be classified as one big snark fest.

Am I rambling?

Yes, I am.

Am I back?

Who the hell knows?

'tis the season

2012-03-02T14:05:00.001-08:00

Trite, perhaps, but it’s true that the simple things are the real things to treasure.

Here at Keuka Lake, I am inland, and even though it is a lake, you can’t get commercial fish from it—it’s a law!

What’s a fellow to do who was raised in a coastal city, has southern Italian blood, and can’t do without simple seafood?

What I do is drive every Friday 60 miles, to Ithaca, New York, to get my fix at Wegmens grocery, where seafood and other fishes comes from all over: Portuguese sardines, bronzini, whiting, real wild salmon (in season), cockles, oysters.

Now, it is the season for one water-borne simple fish that does not come from the sea, which reminds me of a story.

Last year, when the season rolled in, I noticed that none of my favorite February/March delicacy could be had at Wegmans. When I asked the seafood department lady what gives, she said the store had stopped carrying it because it has to be super fresh and we are so far inland from the delivery point.

I felt truly bad about it, but I had to tell the woman that this particular delicacy comes from a large river fish with great teeth that spawns at this time of year upstream, beginning in the eastern portion of the Southern states and continuing north via East Coast rivers, and that includes the Hudson River, which is only 4 hours east of Ithaca by car.

I am talking about shad roe, that reddish-brown sack of shad eggs that, along with the Maryland blue crab should have been counted as one of the world’s wonders.

Here’s how to prepare it: light dusting of flour with some crushed pepper; then, sauté in olive oil with garlic and Meyer lemon (I used to use butter and a bacon strip, but since prostate cancer, I’ve been eating less saturated fats—that’s what the information says to do).

You don’t want to overcook shad roe or it will be dry and taste like the collar of a flight jacket. Inside that sack are eggs, after all. They need to be tender and bursting with river-fishy richness.

Which wine would I serve with shad roe?

After many years of experimenting, I have settled on Cabernet Franc—not the Bordeaux style, but the Loire style. Shad roe is super fatty, requiring an acidic bite in the wine; it is also quite rich in a gamey way, requiring red not white to stand up to it.

Speaking of wine: I have one more racking to go before I decide whether I will filter the Gewurztraminer and Riesling or let them clarify themselves before bottling. If I do that, the Gewurztraminer being relatively dry is not much risk, but with the Riesling measuring beyond 1% residual sugar, it is a risk not to filter, as it can ferment again when spring rolls in. Instead of filtering, I can add potassium sorbate to prevent fermentation, but I don’t like to add that stuff—or any stuff—to my wine. Besides, that stuff makes wine taste like lemon Life Savers.

What to do?

What would you do?

Oh well, not to worry. I have shad roe to keep me going for two or three more weeks before the fish move farther north. A filtering decision can wait.

Copyright Thomas Pellechia
March 2012. All rights reserved.

Final for 2011

2011-12-20T14:11:00.000-08:00

Here we are at December 20 and I still have a wine fermenting. That’s what I call a slow fermentation. The other day, I wrapped the carboy in a heating pad to warm it so that I could help the Riesling fermentation come to an end—it’s been more than seven weeks!

For next year, if I do this again, I will have to remember that the cellar temperature in my home is not warm enough for a reasonable fermentation, cool or otherwise. I’ll have to take action to warm things up.

If my warming attempt doesn’t work this time, and I get a stuck fermentation, I’m afraid that I will have an alcohol level that is too low for my taste. Worse, however, is that I was counting on the Riesling to blend into the Gewurztraminer to adjust for acidity. I don’t want to add sweetness to the Gewurztraminer.

Woe is I…

Also, at this time of year I truly get excited because, after the winter solstice we start to see more daylight each day. From summer solstice to winter solstice daylight lingers about a minute less each day—the reverse takes place from winter solstice to summer solstice.

In our northeastern locale, it gets dark by 4:30 pm at this time of year, and it gets dark at almost 10 pm in June.

I love the longer daylight. Always been a daytime fellow. Therefore, I rejoice during the winter solstice, and I am almost certain that the change in daylight must have some biodynamic effect on my wines—make them better perhaps?

This year, we have lucked out thus far, having escaped major snowfall—hardly any of the white stuff at all. Today, I bought snow tires for my little four-wheel-drive Geo Tracker. That ought to solidify that we get no snow at all this winter, and if so, the money will have been well spent, for as much as I love daylight, I hate snow much more. The only good thing about snow is that I can use it to help cool down my wines for tartrate precipitation, which, in my cellar, may not be necessary, so to hell with snow—forever.

I know that a curmudgeon should never break this rule: but happy holiday to all my readers—every last five or six of you. This time next year, I might offer a toast with my own wine, if I don’t finish them off before then.

Oh, for those who have asked: I am deeply involved in researching and writing my next book, which is why my comments on blogs have been short and sweet, and fewer.

Year-end best

2011-12-09T13:13:00.001-08:00

And now, Vinofictions presents its ten best wines, ten best wine books, and ten best wine blogs of 2011:

Gimme a drum roll: paradiddle, paradiddle, paradiddle, paradiddle, paradiddle, ad-infinitum-diddle.
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Get real. Did you seriously expect something more???

For the love of it

2011-11-22T14:32:00.001-08:00

About two weeks ago, I racked the Gewürztraminer (took it off its fermentation lees and moved it into another storage vessel).

Three tests convinced me that the fermentation was going no where at that point, even though the tests showed that between ¼ and ½ percent residual sugar remained—that is the risk of a cool fermentation. I know that fermentations generally do not truly end with zero sugar, but I did want no higher than ¼ percent.

Perhaps, I could have avoided the problem by using some other yeast or maybe by warming the fermentation, but I wanted all the aromatics and fruit forwardness that a cool fermentation promises. In winemaking, as in life, having it all is not an option, but in winemaking, if we know what we are doing, we get a fantastic chance at taking what we are handed and balancing it, and so...

The Riesling percolates toward the end of its fermentation. This wine will be my balancing material. Its pH is so low, and its total acidity so high compared to the Gewürztraminer that before me is the opportunity to see if I know what I am doing. By managing a blend between the two wines, I will attempt to correct Gewürztraminer’s mouth feel while subduing the Riesling’s acidic nature.

This is fun. It’s also been enlightening, as I never evaluated how much I missed making wine since that last batch at my winery in 1993.

Sadly, had I been able to hold out financially a little longer I might have been able to ride the wave that swelled in the late 90s and into this century, producing an effervescence of new wineries in the Finger Lakes, like a hot fermentation foaming over the top of the tank.

Knowing that I had struggled with bouts of depression throughout my life, my wife worried greatly that closing the winery would send me into a downward spiral. She had seen some of my worst spirals (something to do with childhood trauma, although I always thought that growing up poor on the mean streets of Brooklyn was the next best thing to Nirvana!). But the depression did not come. In fact, I was relieved after closing the winery.

I worked so hard and so much through the eight years that I operated the winery, doing things that I loved, and for that I was grateful to have had the chance. I also, however, worked hard doing things that I hated, like having to listen to the inanities of the tourists that traipsed through the region, having to deal with retailers that demanded free wine in order for me to “sell” them a case of my wine, having to fill out myriad federal and state forms, and having to make so many decisions—every day, decisions.

It was a relief to get the business side of winemaking off my back. Nope, there was no depression.

More important, there was no regret either. I had done what I set out to do. The fact that it didn’t work out the way I wanted it to work out was merely the consequence of bad planning and bad timing, and timing really is everything.

So, as low key and small as the effort is, I am back to making wine—and loving it.

Winemaking 2011

2011-10-22T09:24:00.000-07:00

Leave it to me to select a problematic vintage to decide to make wine again.

Up to August, the Finger Lakes region looked quite on track for a decent 2011 vintage. I had already decided that this would be my return year to dabbling with the nectar, and so I anticipated some fine Gewurztraminer and Riesling from my own hands.

September and October had different plans.

I had already placed my order with Fallbright Winemaker’s Shop before the rains came—and stayed. Being an honorable gent, I did not cancel, but I knew full well what was about to take place; the rain was not only torrential, it came down all too frequently, leaving room for only a few sunny days between rains.

The Gewurztraminer was scheduled for an October first harvest, and Fallbright just about stuck to that schedule, but the juice had to remain in cold storage for a while longer, as the proprietor of the business hurt himself while working the harvest. I picked up the juice on October fifth, not too late.

As suspected, the stats were not so good: 20 Brix; 3.55 pH; 5.55 grams total acidity per liter. The problem, as I saw it, is that the high pH and low acidity would require high alcohol in the finished wine, for both mouth-feel and stability. But you can’t get high alcohol from 20 Brix. Luckily, flavor was solid, as was the marvelous aroma of that grape variety, like a rose garden that had been sprayed with essence of ginger.

I went to work. Didn’t like doing it, but I brought the Brix up to 22 (potential for 12% alcohol); then, I added 1 gram per liter of tartaric acid. I figured that after fermentation, I’d take some readings—or maybe I’d just use my taste buds, to see how good I really am—and then either adjust with a little more acidity or not.

Last week, the Gewurztraminer was at 1% sugar—fermentation is getting close to shutting down. The aroma is yeasty, no H2S detected, and it also is flowery—the color is like popsicle.

Riesling was to be picked on October twenty-second. The rain that kept—keeps—coming down moved that schedule to October 14, and it was almost too late. Botrytis rot had set in, and the lack of sunshine to promote photosynthesis had halted sugar development at 18.5 Brix.

Once again, didn’t like to do it, but I added enough sugar to get the juice to 20 Brix, for a nice 11% potential alcohol. With a pH at 3.0 and total acidity at 7.8 grams per liter, I did nothing to the acid—I don’t at all like lowering acidity, as the methods available generally change the flavor profile too much for my liking, and this juice has great flavor—of lemons and tangerines, to be exact.

The way I start a fermentation is to draw off a volume of juice into which I make the sugar and/or acid adjustments. I bring that volume up to 18 degrees center grade and then add the selected yeast inoculant. Usually, the juice that’s left in the carboy starts to ferment from ambient yeast; I don’t mind that; the inoculant will take over. In both cases, I’ve inoculated with a yeast that withstands cool fermentation, which is normally a slow fermentation that highlights the variety’s flavor and aromatics.

Because of the Riesling stats, I have been thinking that instead of adding any more acid to the Gewurztraminer, it might be better for me to draw off about 10% of each wine later on and blend what I draw from the Gewurztraminer into the Riesling and vice versa. In fact, I will try that route—unless something happens along the way to change my mind.

Joe Dressner

2011-09-20T08:02:00.001-07:00

Joe Dressner and I met once and talked once more on the telephone. Each time, it did not turn out well.

Fact is, Joe and I didn’t much get along, and I am sorry for that, because I am certain that his crazy sense of humor and his impeccable taste in wine, not to mention his outspokenness, would have helped me to solidify a personal relationship with him. I am less certain that my personality would have done much to get him to that same point with me: Joe held a grudge as tenaciously as he held his passion for “real wine.”

Joe Dressner died on September 17, 2011 after almost three years living with brain cancer and all the injustices that the disease throws at those who have it. During that time, Joe was gallant, funny, morose, vicious, beautiful under fire, which is to say that he was not much different than he had been before the diagnosis.

The most telling thing, to me, about Joe and brain cancer was his passion to stand up to it. He was a passionate man to the end.

Now that I have been dealing with prostate cancer for almost a year, it’s time for me to admit that I looked forward to Joe’s entries on his blog, the Amazing Misadventures of Captain Tumor Man. When he addressed the cancer and not a member of his family, the blog was inspirational, not for any insights about the disease but insights about how to handle it. (There were times when I wanted to comment on his blog, but my IP was blocked.)

When faced with our own slow demise, many of us get religion. Not Joe Dressner. He was gruff, strident, and irreverent at times, but he was not a hypocrite. I particularly liked his attitude with those who wished him well—he objected when someone placed the weight of God on his shoulders, as he professed no belief in such things.

As I’ve said, I am sorry that Joe Dressner and I didn’t get along; I guess I figured that it was his loss, and I assume that he figured it was my loss.

What I know for certain, however, is that his death is the wine world’s loss.

It is for Joe’s taste in “real wine” that we wine drinkers are compelled to offer a farewell toast, and we should do it often.

The Definition of Insanity

2011-09-06T12:30:00.000-07:00

For the past two weekends I have been cleaning out the cellar, for two reasons: it badly needed to be cleaned and organized; I need space to make wine.

Yep; that’s right; you didn’t misread. After nearly 20 years away from it, I am planning to make wine this vintage.

Don’t get me wrong: I am not going to apply for a commercial winery license—never again for that. But I do miss the smell of fermentation, especially if that fermentation is the floral-spicy Gewurztraminer.

My plan is to produce Gewurztraminer and Riesling, about two cases of each. It isn’t much, but it will be enough to stimulate me, and if the wines turn out to be both potable and palatable, it will be a fine personal achievement.

Cellar cleaning ended last weekend, followed by cleaning a couple of old glass carboys to get them ready to receive the juice that I am buying from a supplier, Tom Mitchell, located directly across the lake from me and who was my supplier when I operated the commercial winery. Tom was a vineyard manager at Gold Seal and then at the Taylor Wine Company. He also has operated his own vineyards for decades, as well as, along with his wife, Marcy, a supply business for home winemakers named Fallbright Winemakers Shop.

While scrubbing the inside of a 6.5-gallon carboy, I had flashbacks of the old days at the winery. I particularly remember that 20 percent of winemaking is making wine; the other 80 percent is cleaning up.

I also remember my first crop of Aurora grapes that went into that first Finger Lakes wine (I had produced wine at home before moving to this location). That first batch was not commercial yet. I had secured my federal permit as bonded winery number 713, but was awaiting my license from Byzantium (the New York State Liquor Authority).

The Aurora vineyard was already in operation when I bought the homestead, but the Taylor Wine Company contract had been pulled out from under me, so I grew the grapes and sold half the crop to a small local winery and the other half to a small grape juice operation. Aurora is probably better for grape juice than for wine, but it was decent blending material, mainly as a stretcher at the winery.

For me, the small amount of Aurora grapes that lingered at the lower end of the vines, where the mostly volunteer family and friends enlisted as pickers either could not bend to or would not, became my crop for my first batch of Finger Lakes wine.

In preparation for the arrival of the state’s stamp of approval on what would inevitably become my errant venture into commercial winemaking, I bought some equipment, but no wine press. The press that I wanted (a bladder press) came too big for both my production level and my wallet. For the Aurora, I settled on borrowing a screwpress from a neighboring winery that recently had bought a bladder press. The screwpress contraption came with a number of slats with cloth stretched across each where grape juice was pushed through by the screw while the pulp and skins was held behind—had to clean those damned things every few minutes.

Luckily, I had a small crusher/destemmer that split the grapes and removed the stems, without which pressing would have been virtually impossible, unless I wanted to spend about a week pulling garbage out of the juice by hand and produce wine that tasted like putrid plant material.

My first “employee” was an accident-prone brother-in-law who has spent most of his 50-plus years in emergency rooms across the United States. While residing with us for a few months, he managed to fall off a horse, dent a truck—my truck—and slice a piece of his leg while cross cutting a two-by-four with a circular saw; these many years later, I still find it hard to understand how anyone but a contortionist could position his leg right at the end of the path of a circular saw, but he did it.

The worst of all of my brother-in-law’s accidents was when he dropped a 5-gallon carboy filled with fermented Aurora. No one was hurt, physically, but my mind played many tricks that day, all of which had to do with crime and punishment of some sort.

I did manage to produce enough Aurora wine so that there was upwards of ten gallons in storage that winter, and when the wine was ready for bottling, its major flaw was that it was just a little too sweet for my taste—I had not learned the necessity of doing stringent and regular tests throughout the process to determine the true nature and makeup of the finished product, and that was because I was still learning to make wine; I simply hadn’t thought of everything—yet.

This year, I will buy already pressed juice from the reputable “juicer” Tom Mitchell so that one situation will be handled well enough. I also plan to handle the rest of the process by applying what I have learned over the years—that gives me a reasonable shot at producing stable and tasty wine.

I’ll keep you posted on the progress. Gewurztraminer is due for pick up on October 1 and Riesling on October 22. Stay tuned, or at least stay in the feed…

Léon who?

2011-08-31T15:13:00.000-07:00

Keuka Lake Vineyards’ 2010 Estate Bottled Léon Millot (Finger Lakes) was voted Best Red Wine at the recent NY Wine and Food Classic Competition held in Watkins Glen, NY.

How do I know this?

Because it seems that everyone is talking about it in the Finger Lakes.

Why is everyone talking about it?

Because, well, as much as wine industry people like to tout the continuing revolution when it comes to the establishment of Old World grape varieties in this New World of ours, especially in the Northeastern part of our New World, there seems to still be room for inter-species hybrids, but only when they are evaluated in a blind tasting.

It shouldn’t be the case, but blind tastings always seem to shock us. When you have no idea what you are tasting you are apt to like things that you say you don’t like and the other way round. That’s because tasting wine is as infallible as we are, and I want to meet the person who isn’t fallible. With wine, even the pros among us can be fooled by our perceptions.

I was told by those who tasted the winning red wine that it tastes nothing like a Léon Millot should; suffice to say that what that likely means is that people refuse to believe that a wine can step out of the class that others have assigned to it: generally, red inter-species hybrid wines are not supposed to be so good.

Anyway, Léon Millot was created in Alsace, France, in 1911 by crossing a hybrid of two North American species (Vitis riparia and Vitis rupestris) with an Old World, German variety within the Vitis vinifera species. The resulting grape variety was named after a French winemaker and nurseryman. (The same crossing trials produced Marechal Foch, a grape named after an important French martial during the armistice negotiation of WWI.)

The variety is suitable for cold, moist climate cultivation as it ripens early and is supposedly highly resistant to fungal diseases, and this particular vineyard plot in the Finger Lakes was planted about 60 years ago by Charles Fournier, who was from Champagne and came to Gold Seal in the late 1940s to be managing winemaker.

Mr. Fournier not only knew what he was doing, he teamed with Konstantin Frank to produce the first successful commercial Vitis vinifera wines in the region, in 1962.

The official take on Léon Millot is that it gives off an aroma that some identify as “foxy,” a common descriptor for wines produced from North American species. For that reason, probably, the grape variety was initially banned for commercial winemaking in the European Union. That ban has been lifted for grape varieties that include a portion of vinifera pedigree, but very small amounts of Léon Millot are grown in Switzerland and in Alsace. Canada has plantings of the grape, too.

So, I sampled this recently voted Best Red Wine a few days ago.

The wine did not smell like a native grape to me. In fact, it had a subtle and sophisticated aroma, slightly milky, which might mean the malolactic fermentation is coming through loud and clear for my schnozz.

The wine's color is deep and close to purple, like a bishop's cloak.

The taste, well... Remember that I was not tasting blind, so my perception may have gotten in the way, but I found the subtlety in aroma did not follow through on the palate. In fact, the wine seemed to me too forward and edgy for a red, which is what I usually dislike about most red wines from inter-species hybrid grapes--they seem too rough and earthy.

While we are on the subject of awards, top honor in the New York Wine and Food Classic, the Governor’s Cup, was awarded to a Long Island winery, Martha Clara Vineyards, for its 2010 Riesling.

I understand that the wine was produced with Finger Lakes grapes, which proves once again that great wine is produced in the vineyard.

A Plan for the Future Online

2011-08-20T07:47:00.000-07:00

Over the past eight or so years, I’ve had occasion to write online for others. While one experience proved fruitful, after a fashion, the other experiences have left me cold to the so-called social media revolution.

In a few situations, my writing went directly to an existing or developing Web site, and while I was paid for my effort, credits did not come my way, which was ok with me. In fact, those experiences are not the ones that leave me cold to the potential of social media. It’s the blogs that give me a jaundiced view and, as in one case, providing snippet writing for one of those AOL “information” sites that are akin to fast food: the site editors demand adjectives and nouns as verbs (sugar and salt) to make everything go down pleasurably and to hide the minimal to no information (nutrition) inside; that gig lasted only briefly, and, thankfully, my name was not attached to the entries. I understand that after Arianna Huffington merged her site with AOL, the direction of that particular site was changed.

Blogging-for-hire gigs ran for me the gamut from useless to discouraging.

The first blogging I did for someone else was intended as a favor—until I discovered that the site owner was planning to use the free writing to help move his online career forward without so much as even a promise to take care of the “volunteers” later on.

The second blogging was for a new site that started out with a mission in which I played a role, and was paid for my part. Within just a few months, however, the mission had changed and my blog was moved out with the old mission.

The third blogging went on for almost a year albeit, chasing payment each month made it seem like two years. But over time, I noticed the site’s overall bent had changed and that all the bloggers that had started with me were gone (what would be next?).

When I started to write for a living, many of the present blog owners were still shitting in their diapers. I say this not to boast, certainly not to point out our age differences, but to point out that while so many of these start-up geniuses were being told in school that they are special and that they cannot lose, many of us were in the trenches having to prove our “specialness” and the battles that we lost built scar tissue as well as experience—we were forced to learn something.

In business, whether print or online magazines, ideas are cheap when they are not accompanied by due diligence and a good business plan. The many start-up and crashed-down online sites that I’ve seen over the years plainly illustrate that their owners and originators spent most of their time thinking about the idea without understanding how to implement it.

To bring this particular diatribe of mine to a wine analogy, starting an online business is no different from starting a winery. In either case, the first consideration of the business plan is to identify who will buy your product and why, and if you can’t illuminate others concerning your target market within a few concise paragraphs, you probably have a weak future before you.

Oh, sure, some people blindly stumble into horseshit, as we used to say in Brooklyn, referring to the notion that stepping in the dung would bring good luck. But trusting in the cosmic belief that “I am special, as is my idea” will work for only a small portion of us. The rest of us will go the way of a previous era’s advanced product, the Ford Edsel, or more closely related, television, which four generations ago made promises that it broke about three generations ago. That’s fine, except when our failure causes us to break promises and to treat others like commodities rather than as valuable, talented assets to help move our ideas forward.

To put this blog entry into concise perspective: it’s about time that the many people who presently apply hyperbole to social media grow up and come back with a real plan—and a market for it.

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Shining Star

2011-07-14T07:03:00.000-07:00

On June 30, 2011, the Finger Lakes wine and culinary community lost a bright star in our galaxy to a car accident on the New York State Thruway. The following is the unedited eulogy that I wrote for my weekly local newspaper column.

Normally, the joy of an event at Red Newt Cellars Winery and Bistro began at the door with a greeting from Dave and Deb Whiting. Sometimes, especially if you entered through the bistro, Deb greeted you with her radiant aura, wide smile, and open arms.

Deb was not at the winery and bistro event on July 5, 2011, but her spirit was there a thousand fold.

When the email from the Wine and Grape Foundation’s Jim Trezise arrived in my in box just before the July 4th weekend, I learned of a serious two-car accident that injured Dave Whiting and took Deb’s life.

Jim’s words, “Deb is gone,” hit hard. First came shock, then denial, anger, and mourning. Soon, however, came time for remembering, which is what the July 5th event was all about.

Based on what looked like about 1,000 people attending the memorial, the memory of Deb Whiting will be durable and strong, which is as it should be.

My memories of Deb began about 20 years ago when Dave brought his future bride to the monthly winemaker dinners that we used to hold at the Pleasant Valley Inn in Hammondsport. Smart, attractive, energetic and outgoing, Deb certainly held her own at a table filled with mostly male egos—she also had an infectious smile.

Looking at Dave and Deb seated together at table it was obvious that the two were in love. They seemed cut from a mold that made their union inevitable. At the time, she was a microbiologist working with bugs in immunology; he worked with microbiological bugs as a winemaker. Their intellects and interests were in harmony.

I don’t know how long it took Dave to fall in love with Deb, but for me it was love at first sight. At future winemaker dinners, I found myself willingly performing for her benefit, in an effort to make her laugh, which she so easily did.

Deb developed a passion for cooking, which first manifested itself to admirers like me through baking—cheesecakes, to be specific. Hers was the best New York style cheesecake that I have ever found outside of New York City.

Soon, Deb left immunology for baking; soon after that, she operated a catering business out of a small place in Burdett; soon after that, she and Dave (they had gotten married by then) talked about operating their own winery and restaurant.

Not long after the talk came a deal in the late 1990s that put the couple in the old Wickham family winery facility off Route 414.

The Whitings were off and running, with Deb seemingly setting the pace, if only because she exuded boundless active energy to Dave’s deliberative style. But Dave proved no slouch in the energy department. While building Red Newt Cellars Winery and Bistro, a process that takes monumental fortitude, Dave and Deb did crazy things like take evening ballroom dancing lessons after a hard day at Red Newt, and they raised a couple of kids, too!

If there was doubt about their future, it was put to rest by the middle of this century. Dave’s wines, as well as his collaboration with other winemakers in our region, established Red Newt as a serious player in the Finger Lakes wine industry. Deb’s success at the bistro was equally dynamic.

In addition to her dynamism in the Red Newt Bistro kitchen, Deb began to stretch her culinary influence in many directions: she led the call for promoting and serving locally farmed meats, cheeses, fruits, and vegetables; she helped to establish a Finger Lakes culinary movement; she traveled the state teaching others to cook; and she made special efforts to highlight the healthful and commercial benefits of pairing Finger Lakes wine with meals made up largely of Finger Lakes foods.

Just as anyone who knew her, I shall miss Deb Whiting tremendously, and my heart goes out to Dave and the Whiting family, as well as to the Red Newt Cellars Winery and Bistro family. When she started the bistro, I briefly became part of the family after I asked Deb if she would let me gain some extra experience for my wine and food writing by allowing me to work in her kitchen—for free.

I believe it was those two last words that got her to agree; after all, hers was a new business.

I worked the kitchen during July, my birthday month. One night, after all the dinners had been served, Deb and I talked about yet another upcoming birthday of mine; then, I recounted a story that she had not heard before.

On my 50th birthday, my wife, Anne, threw a surprise birthday party. Quite a crowd filled three rooms in our home that night. Knowing of my madness for Deb’s cheesecake, and also knowing that many from my family drove up from New York City for the party, Anne ordered a number of cheesecakes from Deb to serve as the birthday cake. Unfortunately, for me, by the time I had gotten around to getting my slice of cheesecake, our guests had gobbled up every last morsel.

On the next day that I was scheduled to work at the bistro, my birthday was only hours away. At the door of the kitchen to greet me, stood Deb with a dish in her hands, on which rested a slice of cheesecake with a lit candle stuck in its middle.

Today, that candle conjures a bright and energetic light in the firmament that exudes its warmth—it is the image of Deb Whiting.

California, there I went...

2011-06-25T12:58:00.000-07:00

As the jazz pianist and composer Bobby Troupe wrote, “…won’t you get hip to this timely tip; when you make that California trip, get your kicks on Route 66.”

It wasn’t exactly the way Troupe told it, but the Amtrak train that took me home from Los Angeles through the Southwest to Chicago and then to New York, followed a great deal of the old Route 66, even made stops at some of the places mentioned in the song. The return trip was delightful.

On the way to the West Coast, however, the story is not so pretty. In fact, it was a nightmare, thanks to the floods and fires that caused Amtrak to cancel all trains.

In any case, I got to where I was headed in one piece and then Wednesday, June 15 came and it was time to meet some new friends.

That evening, I reconnected with Tom Wark and Jack Everitt, two guys that I first met online and then came to meet in person on a couple of past trips to the West Coast. That was a blast. But the real treat for the evening was to meet other Internet friends that I had yet to meet face-to-face: Samantha Dugan, John Kelly, Ron Washam, Charlie Olken, and Marcia (whose last name I didn’t get) plus Wark’s new wife, Charlie’s long-standing wife, John’s winemaking assistant, all of whom I was introduced to by name, but in my oncoming dotage have not held in memory. I apologize for that gap, and should have taken notes.

What I do remember of that evening wholeheartedly was conviviality. We ate good food served at Harvest Moon in Sonoma (oh, those sardines), drank fabulous wines brought by each of us, and talked trash as well as serious. (Have you ever sat at a table of nearly a dozen self-confident people with opinions? If not, don’t try it without some practice.)

I was especially pleased with the overall good reception of the Finger Lakes wines that I brought to the dinner.

The memorable evening fell in the middle of my trip, and that made it all the more wonderful, as it was a fine break from the combination work and scouting that I was doing while on the West Coast (in seven days, I racked up 1800 miles on a rented car). The work was to interview a few people for research pertaining to my next book, which is under contract. The scouting was to satisfy a sense that I had that it is time for me to move on, to relocate.

Unfortunately or not, the places I had planned to visit in southern Oregon as candidates for that relocation did not live up to expectations. Or maybe it is simply that I am not ready. Whatever, I have decided to stay put for the time being. It didn’t help that, despite a proliferation of coffee kiosks throughout the region, or maybe because of them, I could not find a decent cup of unadulterated espresso in southern Oregon.

People who deal with and survive cancer are also faced with our mortality, and that often makes us believe either that what we have may not be enough or it may not be the right thing for us. In the past few months, while facing mortality, and although I’d like to claim exceptionality, I proved to myself that I am as ordinary as any man. But after searching on this trip, and doing a lot of thinking as well, I have come to the conclusion that what I have is enough and it is right for me.

The only thing that I need to do to make comfortable the time that I have left on this earth is for me to escape the deep winters that often afflict this part of the country. For that, I don’t need to go to a warmer place; I need to be in a place that provides me with access to things that I cannot have while hibernating in my rural community, and that includes a good unadulterated double espresso—daily.

My latest thought, then, is to find a temporary apartment each winter in Manhattan. There, I can indulge in what truly makes me happy—cultural events. To do that in the Finger Lakes in winter it takes clearing the driveway of snow and ice, warming the car, driving in snow and ice for a minimum of 35 miles one way, and then trying to enjoy the evening while thinking of the energy-draining drive home in the dead of night and winter.

In Manhattan, all it takes to enjoy cultural events is to get dressed, go downstairs and either walk or take a taxi, whatever the weather is.

I am so glad to have reached a stage in my life where I get to enjoy conviviality more often and to also make decisions mostly on my terms. So, fuck cancer. It has nothing on freedom, friends, and conviviality.

I think I'll need another conviviality trip to the West Coast soon—better still, maybe some of my new friends would like to see how green is our valley during a Finger Lakes summer here in the East.

Copyright Thomas Pellechia
June 2011. All rights reserved

Lifting a blog entry without the author's permission (and without recompense) is a copyright infringement--period.

Rainy Friday afternoon musing

2011-05-27T12:52:00.000-07:00

If the majority of wine bloggers don't get paid, from where do they get the money to attend a convention; more important, why do they spend money on a convention?

Is anyone making money from the convention? If so, who and how much?

Is there a tangible award, like a plaque or medal. If so, who pays for it? If not, why not?

If no one makes money on the convention, and most who attend are not paid bloggers, and the annual conversation at each convention covers how to cash in on wine blogging, can someone please explain to me what's going on?

Blogging awards

2011-05-27T06:46:00.000-07:00

It's that time of year for the annual blogger awards, when humility and insincerity clash to make bloggers seem both desperate and unusually ambitious.

In any case, I believe that vinofictions and Hosemaster of Wine should be nominated for our silence. By shutting up, we have done more for blogging--as well as for readers--than any blogger that I can name.

Since we each are silent, and since it is a desperate act to nominate one self, we ask that readers nominate us for our silence. If enough do, maybe we can put this annual freak show to bed!

Explanation

2011-05-16T09:37:00.000-07:00

Within the past two weeks, a few people have asked about or commented on my absence. Being a man of insistent "responsible genes," I’ve decided to pass along this explanation, feeble as some may think it is.

First, radiation for prostate cancer ended April 25. Now, I wait, get checked periodically, and take shots that I hate having to take.

Over the nine weeks during radiation, the round trip drive of almost three hours each day, five days a week, plus the fifteen minutes of radiation saw to it that I had great amounts of time in which to think—always a dangerous thing for a guy like me, who never stops thinking to begin with (I listened to books on CD, but still managed to think).

When I began this blog, my intent was to pass along to consumers some of what really goes on in the wine world as opposed to what others want consumers to think goes on. I also had a decided bent against ever becoming a wine critic, as my view of aesthetic criticism is not the mainstream view of that occupation.

If I am to be honest with myself, the secondary intent for vinofictions was to gain access to people who might be in a position to buy my writing services.

In truth, neither of the intents seems to have panned out much.

After initial interest from some important online bloggers who sent readers my way, my lack of flashy, some might say sensationalistic writing ultimately relegated vinofictions to the low end of the readability scale. I have no idea how many people read or have read the blog (I have tracked the hits, but that baloney isn’t as telling as some believe—hits are not necessarily readers).

In addition, others have pointed out, and I have come to agree that the majority of wine blog readers are either in the business, wannabes in the business, or hard geeks. And in addition to that, I’ve learned that few want to read a blog for information beyond the opinions concerning the drinkability of this or that wine; in some cases, telling the truth behind the many myths that continue to circulate concerning myriad subjects connected to wine has gotten me into more trouble than the blog is worth.

Speaking of worth, the blog did manage to pull off a few incidents concerning my second intent—to attract an editor or two—but not nearly enough when I compare what my print writings (including books) have garnered for me when it comes to getting future writing gigs. Either not enough editors read wine blogs or I'm a poor excuse for a writer--or both. Still, in spite of the possibility concerning my talents, the fact that I have had the good fortune over the years to become a professional writer, who needs the time to write so that I meet my deadlines, often came into conflict with trying to maintain a blog that brought no direct revenue at all.

In sum, vinofictions may or may not be around much longer. I haven’t made a definitive decision about it. I know only these two things: right now, I am not inspired to write anything on the blog; and I have just received a contract to write what will be my fourth book, a project that requires much research and that will take up much of my time. The new book, plus the three columns I continually bang out on a regularly scheduled basis, the wines.com blog entries that I produce twice each month, and the scattered magazine articles that diminishingly, but still come my way will conspire to lessen the energy if not the ideas necessary to maintain regularly scheduled vinofictions blog entries.

Finally, not only have I faced a health ordeal, I’m getting older and less inclined to spend as much energy on speculative concepts as I once had.

To my four or five die-hard readers, I say thanks for reading, commenting, and overall support under the radar through emails. Vinofictions will remain online and maybe one day soon I’ll actually have something worthwhile to post to it.

Lifting a blog entry without the author's permission (and without recompense) is a copyright infringement--period.

Blogging comment contest--everybody's doing it, why not I?

2011-03-30T13:18:00.000-07:00

If you are really into wine, you must have heard of the MS, MW, and WSET certificate programs that teach all you need to know about the subject—I think.

Because some of us, including me, aren’t sure whether or not those few wine education programs really do the job, a small group of divorced moms who receive large alimony checks came up with a solution at one of their afternoon drunkfests; they call their endeavor the Perspicacious, Pretentious, Presumptuous School of Wine (PPP).

The women sought to bring wine education to the people, more specifically, to people like us. In other words, they want to educate fools, and take it from this fool, the single moms with a two-ton drinking problem have come up with a foolproof wine education program…and now, vinofiction readers have a chance at benefiting from it.

For a brief time only—about twenty-five minutes—PPP offers my readers a chance to gain their highest-level wine education certificate.

Yes indeed, my readers have a chance at bypassing levels 1 through 4, which cover such mundane topics as grape growing, wine production, grape variety identification, sensory analysis, and winemaking as well as wine marketing to skip right straight through to the real meat of the program, the Pusillanimous Wine Professional Level 5 certificate (PWP5), the one that guarantees the world of your vacuous credentials as a talker rather than a doer.

You won’t have to memorize dates, smells, vintages, names, or even alcohol levels. Plus, to enter this contest you don’t have to hold either a WSET, MS, or MW, but it helps to hold very high self-regard, even if you are a fool—especially if you are a fool.

To enter this contest all you have to do is be the 53rd person to comment on this blog entry. Using fewer than 140 characters, tell us all that you know about wine.

Your entry will be printed out and dumped with other entries into a large red hat with a feather boa that sits on the table where the drunken ladies meet. The first lady who manages to grab an entry, and can focus her eyes enough to read it aloud, will pick the winner.

Fool that you are, you probably already have thought that to win this contest all you’ll have to do is wait until the 52nd comment is made and then dump your vanity on us. But think about this: right now, hundreds of people have read this blog entry (maybe thousands). Surely only one or two readers are smart enough to fully comprehend its contents. The rest are already clamoring to show what fools we mortals be, so hitting the 53rd comment mark will be quite random with high odds against you, and that means that only a lucky fool can win. Are you that lucky fool?

Disclaimer: I have absolutely no affiliation with PPP, although I do hold a PWP5 which I gained fair and square. In addition, I have received no compensation from PPP to post this contest and promote their brand, unless you count the check and two cases of wine PPP sent me for the wallboard work I did to remodel their ugly office, which was in fact a truly ostentatious living room of one of the ladies whose ex-husband had no taste.

Lifting a blog entry without the author's permission (and without recompense) is a copyright infringement--period.

Compulsion

2011-03-23T07:27:00.000-07:00

It’s been a while since my last post. I have an excuse, but I don’t want to take time making excuses. Truth is, I haven’t much to say right now about the subject of wine. In fact, I haven’t much to say about anything these days. That’s part of my excuse.

Still, almost without fail, at least once each day, the thought of me ignoring vinofictions crept into my mind. It bothered me almost the way a nagging control freak bothers us.

For days, thoughts of finally abandoning this blog for good gave me guilt feelings. The idea that I could walk away from something that I had created made me feel almost ill. This deep sense of responsibility has always haunted my psyche. Every dog or cat I have ever had as a pet figured that out about me and used that knowledge to mold my habits to suit their needs.

For the past three days, the compulsion to write in vinofictions tugged at my sense of responsibility until, today, I could no longer take it, and so I decided to write something, anything, to get this drag on my day to ease up.

Many years ago, I learned that the best way to face writer’s block was a combination of keep writing and keep taking breaks. It’s a contradiction, but it often works. You spend time each day, the same time of day, too, writing whatever pops into your feeble mind until, “voila,” you often find that you have begun to write something if not important at least intelligible. After each session, you do something that you truly enjoy doing—walking, running, biking, shopping, dining out, meeting friends, etc.

With that in mind, and noticing that I have yet to come up with anything either important or intelligible, I think I will go do something that I enjoy, expecting that tomorrow I’ll come up with a real vinofictions entry.

Oh wait: I have to drive over an hour one way for my daily radiation treatment.

Now you know my excuse for having not been writing in the blog.

Lifting a blog entry without the author's permission (and without recompense) is a copyright infringement--period.

Don't wait for me Argentina...

2011-03-03T13:30:00.000-08:00

Sung to the tune from the Broadway play of the 1970s, “Don’t wait for me, Argentina…”

Thanks to the “Wines of Argentina team” I can plainly state that more than three read this blog. Also thanks to the “team” I can plainly state that marketers are sometimes funny, if not downright unscrupulous—or maybe they think that bloggers are unscrupulous—or maybe some bloggers are.

Here’s one way to calculate the scruples of a blogger: if a blogger writes this month about the white wines of Torrontes, be careful. You see, the blogger may be writing about that subject for the chance to win a free trip to Argentina, courtesy of the “Wines of Argentina team.”

Get it?

No?

Here’s how it works. The “Wines of Argentina team” sends the following email to bloggers:

"We've seen your wine blog and would like to invite you to write a post about Argentine Torrontes and participate in our Blogger of the Month contest. You will have the chance to win a free trip to Argentina! Here is a link for more info http://www.winesofargentina.org/en/bloggerofthemonth
Looking forward to reading your blog post!"

The email is signed by the Wines of Argentina team.

If the “team” made an effort to read my blog it would know that I am a rather cantankerous old journalist who takes ethics extremely seriously, and that I would likely consider this “contest” a breach in ethics.

Here’s why: a journalist neither writes a story for a marketing entity nor does a journalist write a story to enter a contest for freebies.

I know that the official Argentine language is Spanish, and I know that there’s a large Italian contingency in Argentina that speaks a kind of SpanItalian.

Still, every member of the team should know what this means: quid pro quo.

This situation reminds me of an offer made to bloggers concerning a wine refrigerator and how to get yourself one. In my view, that, too, was an ethical breach in the waiting.

Now I know that there are some in the blogosphere who consider my attitude “old school.” I know because some bloggers have told me so after I’ve pointed out what I consider their actions as skirting on thin ethical ice. But I refuse to back down, and so I repeat to my three other readers: if you read a blog entry this month about Torrontes, remember that old “grain of salt.”

Lifting a blog entry without the author's permission (and without recompense) is a copyright infringement--period.