Owner: Random Ramblings of Food and Wine URL:http://vinotas.blogspot.com/ Join Date: Wed, 04 Jun 2008 08:56:20 -0500 Rating:0 Site Description: A wine broker shares his experiences as a complete wine, food and travel geek. Site statistics:Click here
The Peter Pratt's Summer Tasting 2008-06-25 09:16:00 This past Sunday another horde of intrepid wine lovers headed to the secluded PeterPratt
's Inn in Yorktown Heights, north of New York City, to graze on cuts of grilled meats, pounce on fried chicken breasts and feast on roasted potatoes and onions. And, of course, to sample a ridiculous amount of delicious wine, young and old.I had the pleasure of sitting at the Older California table. Here, we Read more:Summer
The Great Irouléguy Tasting & a Guest Blogger! 2008-06-20 11:50:00 The what? I know, I know, you are probably wondering what the heck is that word up there. It's the name of a region in the Basque area of the South of France, in the Pyrenées mountains separating France from Spain. If you want to pronounce it, imagine it's spelled "Ee-Roo-Lay-Guee" and you'll be close enough. I had visited this area in July of 2007 (links here and here) and found the food and Read more:Great
, Guest
, Blogger
, Guest Blogger
Au Revoir! 2008-07-14 21:05:00 I leave for a week in Florida on Tuesday, so I won't be blogging too much as I have no Internet connection there (Sacré Bleu! Hard to believe in this day and age but it's actually nice in a quaint sort of way). I will, however, still be tasting some great wines (I know a shop or two near us that stock some interesting stuff) and eating, um, well, I'll be eating. Let's just say I'm never too imp
I'm Sorry 2008-07-12 08:58:00 It's been pointed out to me (by my wife, no less, which means I really can't ignore her comments), that my blog has become somewhat commercial in the past week. That was never the purpose of this blog in the first place. Unlike some other bloggers, my main goal was to keep an electronic diary of my adventures in the wine business. If people liked my wines, so much the better.I was just so excit
They Like Me (Part Deux)! 2008-07-10 15:10:00 Well, yet again, not really me (understandable, after all I am an opinionated, stubborn SOB as most of my friends will tell you), but rather one of my wines. I was thrilled to see a review of my Chateau La Bouscade on the influential Mark Squires Bulletin Board. I guess I should preface this with a disclaimer that the poster is a friend, it's true, but sometimes friends are the best/worst critic
The Work-With 2008-07-09 07:36:00 The WHAT?A "work-with" is when the representative of a winery follows its distributor's salesperson to various accounts, such as restaurants and stores. There, he talks up and pours the wine for the various wine buyers. It's a way to generate interest in your wine with both the wholesaler's rep and the people who deal with the buying public, ie sommeliers and store salespeople.So yesterday I had
Happy Birthday Mrs. Vinotas 2008-07-31 22:01:00 The Table is SetIt's Mrs. Vinotas' birthday, so time to open a birth-year wine and cook some yummy things. Plus, it's been a great week work-wise, I managed to get two more wines (my Cotes du Rhône and my Minervois) into the biggest market in the US: New York, baby! If you can make it here, well, you know the rest...As per the wife's request, I picked up some lamb chops from the local butcher, Read more:Happy
, Birthday
, Happy Birthday
Friday Night Wines 2008-07-28 07:37:00 You meet a lot of people who share this passion for wine, and most are generous and quite nice. As in every relationship, a very few end up being close friends, and this past Friday
we were honored to have two couples that we call close friends over for dinner. It is nights like these where you realize how lucky you are, to share in the friendship as well as the wines.This was something we'd bee Read more:Night
, Wines
, Friday Night
Wining and Dining in South Florida 2008-07-22 14:17:00 It's good to be home after a week of sun, heat and humidity in SouthFlorida
. That said, the weather wasn't nearly as bad as it could have been, I got some major tan lines, did some serious laps around the pool, and still managed to find some good wines. Food, as usual, was another matter, to some extent. There were some good, and some bad experiences.There was Fifth Avenue Grill, where they tr Read more:Wining
, Dining
, South Florida
I Love New York- Summer Streets Program 2008-08-14 08:50:00 The Summer
Streets Program
got off the ground this past Saturday with the closure to all car traffic on Park Avenue from 72nd Street all the way down to the Battery. What does this mean? Well, from 6am to 1pm you could walk, Rollerblade, bike or just be lazy on some of the busiest streets in Manhattan. In addition, there were activities such as bike-riding classes, music, exercises and dancing. Th
La Paulée (in Colorado)- Day Two 2008-08-06 17:07:00 Hey, look at that, I geeked out somewhat in my previous post! What a shock (not)!OK, sorry, but I was really swept up in the excitement of the memory of having tasted some real vinous delights. Most of these are extremely hard to get and shockingly expensive, so having them all at one sitting was a real treat. Especially to this old Burghead.So I promise I won't go overboard with Day Two... We Read more:Colorado
La Paulée (in Colorado)- Day One 2008-08-05 15:55:00 La what???La Paulée (pronounced Paul-ay) is the festival in Burgundy that marks the end of the harvest. For three days, winemakers party their exhausted butts off. This being France, there is an inordinate amount of wine drinking, cigarette smoking, and other assorted depravities.This festival now also takes place in New York and San Francisco, where it is an excuse for collectors to bring out Read more:Colorado
, Day One
Meet the Winemaker! 2008-09-08 10:23:00 Fabrice and his mom at ViniSudI am really excited, this week I am hosting the first of my winemakers to visit New York. Fabrice Durou, of Chateau Gaudou, will be in town to show his wines and answer questions. We will be visiting a bunch of stores in Westchester on Wednesday, then spending the entire day on Thursday in the city, hitting stores and restaurants that either carry his wines or are i
Meeting YOU, the end consumer 2008-09-05 10:39:00 I did a tasting at K&D Wines the other day, where they sell my Picpoul (and I'm happy to report it's flying out the door). I had the opportunity to meet you, the end consumer, and see your reaction to my wines. And this is where I get the real satisfaction out of my job. Yes, there is lots of hard work and stress, but when I see that smile on the face of someone discovering a new wine (and hope
Le Picpoul Est Arrivé! 2008-08-29 09:53:00 Screw the Beaujolais Nouveau, who still drinks that swill? I know I promised not to shill my wines too much, but I was so excited that I had to share this news: my Picpoul has finally arrived in the New York market! So the other day I joined the lovely Eva of Gabriella Wines for a work-with to show it to their customers. The reactions were, to put it mildly, fantastic. It's now in several stor
Learn About Wine- Riesling Rules Book (free!) 2008-08-26 09:28:00 It's been a crazy couple of weeks, but I wanted to take this opportunity to mention that the Pacific Rim winery in CA has just put out a free book called "Riesling Rules
". Now, if you've met me or read this blog or just been even remotely close to me, you know my first love and passion is and will always be Burgundy (ergo Pinot Noir and Chardonnay) and Champagne. However, I do enjoy wines from o
I Love New York- Momofuku Ssam Bar 2008-08-22 09:26:00 New York City has a lot to offer, but it is slowly becoming a Las Vegas version of itself, with soul-less glass and steel high-rises anchored by banks and drug store chains popping up like shiny weeds in once vibrant neighborhoods. Yet despite this mall-ification of our once wonderful city, one great thing about New York remains: the sheer magnitude of its culinary diversity. This is due, primar
Into the 21st Century... 2008-08-19 06:02:00 Well, after much puttering around, I finally managed to put up a page on Facebook, the annoyingly fun social networking site. So any of you reading this can now also become a "friend" of Vinotas Selections by going here:-Selections/13939566836And what does this mean exactly?For starters, you can see pictures of my wineries and the winemakers, chat amongst yourselves, or just bitch and moan about Read more:Century
A Miracle Occurred... 2008-09-21 11:13:00 I tasted some Australian wines and liked them (gasp!). Sacré bleu!Before you run for the shelters awaiting the Four Hoursemen of the Apocalypse, let me reassure you, gentle reader, that these were not the usual Australian wines that we see in the market. They were not the Yellow Tails that have polluted our fair shores for so long. Those wines are mainly from the South-East Coast of Australia,
Didier Dagueneau RIP 2008-09-18 13:49:00 I was going to post about a very interesting tasting I attended on Wednesday, but word just came through that one the wine world's most innovative winemakers died in a plane accident in France.Didier
made wines in the Loire Valley, making Sauvignon Blancs that were always amazing to taste. There was a purity to them that was just stunning. Saying "delicious" would be an understatement, they were
And away we go... 2008-09-15 08:38:00 It's that time of the year again, harvest, when the grapes are ripe (hopefully), the sugars high and the pips not too green. It's also a race against the clock, as you rush into the fields to pick those cute little berries before rot/birds/weather/deer get to them. And to those of you who think it's easy, I offer my report of the 2006 Burgundy harvest, where I learned how difficult a job it could
Au Revoir! 2008-10-13 10:29:00 It's been a crazy couple of weeks, both professionnally and personally, which is why I haven't been writing that much. The tasting at the Wine Library two weeks ago went phenomenally well (24 cases sold in 4 hours but more importantly I got to meet some of you, which is always awesome). I've also been visiting many of the wine bars in the city lately, and I'll post about those in a bit. But rig
Falling in Love Again (yes, Burgundy) 2008-10-02 14:56:00 The Village of Vosne-RomanéeOK, enough with my shilling the wines I represent, what about the stuff I only drink on special occasions? What about those once a year splurges where you don't look at the prices and just let your knowledge and love of a particular wine region guide you? Nights where you just say "screw it" and let your palate, heart and soul lead the way? Has that ever happened to Read more:Again
Meet the Wine Geek (me) 2008-09-30 10:22:00 Who?Well, me, to be honest. I have no qualms about referring to myself that way, I assure you. I love to talk, no, babble incessantly, about my wines, and I do know a ton of geeky, er, let's call it esoteric, information about them.I will be pouring my wines at the Wine Library, in Springfield, New Jersey (directions), on Saturday, October 4th, from noon to 4pm. This is a part of the job, one I Read more:Geek
93 Points! 2008-09-28 12:51:00 Whoa! I just found out from the Wine Library that the irrepressible Gary Vaynerchuck, he of the Wine Library TV fame, just rated my Viognier, from Montfaucon, 93 points. Wow, that's pretty cool. What does this mean? Well, I don't really know his palate that well, and as wine is all about a subjective experience, it means he liked it. Not a little, but quite a lot, actually. So I guess that's Read more:Points
The United States of America 2008-11-05 09:15:00 Note: I am taking a small break from reporting about my last trip to France to say a few words about this election.I have never been prouder to be an America
n.The election of Barack Obama to the Presidency is an amazing event. No matter who you voted for, no matter what you think of him as a person or as a politician, you have to admit that this is a singular, momentous occasion for this nation: Read more:United
, States
One Day in Avignon 2008-10-30 14:59:00 I found myself in the ancient walled city of Avignon, in the Rhône Valley, where I was to meet up with one of my winemakers, Jean-Marie Popelin of Château Haut-Musiel, for lunch. I love this city, it’s beautiful, full of energy and history and winding, medieval streets. You really expect a knight on horseback to come clip-clopping by at any moment.From 1309 to 1423 the Catholic Popes set up Read more:One Day
Two Days in the Languedoc 2008-10-27 03:46:00 Only happy Picpoul grapes here!I next found myself in the far South of France, only an hour’s drive from the Spanish border, where the sky is bright blue and the sun’s dappled light inspires artists, philosophers, and writers. Except that when I got there it was cool, grey and rainy. Just my luck…I was picked up at the Béziers train station by my Picpoul de Pinet producer, Claude Jourdan. Read more:Two Days
Monday in the Minervois 2008-10-26 01:41:00 Talk about "garagiste": David and Jo in front of their winery's doorI found myself in the ancient walled city of Carcassonne after a lovely weekend in the Cahors visiting my family and one of my wineries, Château Gaudou. I was met at the train station by Château La Bouscade’s winemaker, David Cowderoy. With a bright warm sun and blue sky, this was a nice change from the cold dampness of the Read more:Monday
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