Category Archives: Wine Education
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Some Reasons to Drink Cava
Cava is Spain’s answer to Champagne, although a case can be made for Cava offering more of a rebuke to Champagne than a retort. After all, Cava hails from a different climate and terroir than Champagne, and Cava is produced primarily or entirely from indigenous Spanish grape varieties such as Xarelo-lo, Parellada, Viura, and Macabeo, Read More
Posted in Interesting Wine Info, Notes from the Panel, Wine Education
- May 14, 2013
- by Don Lahey
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Bordeaux: What’s in a vintage?
In some wine regions of the world, the quality of wine doesn’t vary tremendously from year to year. The reason is that the weather in some wine areas remains fairly consistent and predictable. In other wine lands such as Bordeaux, vintage means everything. The weather in Bordeaux varies enormously throughout the growing season and from year to Read More
Posted in Interesting Wine Info, Wine Education, Wine Regions
- April 16, 2013
- by Don Lahey
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Wines are a lot like kids
Wines are a lot like kids: on any given day they can make a liar out of you. One day they’re perfectly well behaved, and the next day . . . well you get the picture. Johnny is an angel in school but a devil at home. Mary is just the opposite, sweet as pie Read More
Posted in Interesting Wine Info, Wine Education
- August 6, 2012
- by Don Lahey
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Shiraz or Syrah?
Whether we refer to this great varietal as Shiraz or Syrah, we are talking about one of the world’s most illustrious red grape varieties. It is also one of my personal favorites. Grown for centuries in the Rhone Valley of France, where it is responsible in all or part of many of the greatest red Read More
Posted in Interesting Wine Info, Wine Education, Wine Regions
- June 26, 2012
- by Don Lahey
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So, What’s That In My Wine?
So, what’s that in my wine? This is the question I hear when tartrate crystals appear in a wine, affixed to the cork, or clinging to the sides of the bottle of a fine wine. And lately, we’ve been seeing more of these welcome but unsightly crystals. Why is tartrate a welcome sight? The short Read More
Posted in Wine Education
- June 8, 2012
- by Don Lahey
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Are You a Terroiriste?
The word terroir sounds like a less savory term we are all too familiar with and hear far too much about today, but happily terroir shares no affinity with the English word that so closely resembles it. So, what is terroir precisely? Terroir is a French word, which means literally soil or ground. However, when Read More
Posted in Interesting Wine Info, Wine Education
- June 1, 2012
- by Don Lahey
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How to Setup Your Own Blind Tasting
Blind tastings should be simple – those tasting should not know the identity of the wines being tasted. When it comes down to it, there’s 8 basic rules to always remember: 6-12 people is the best for wine tasting. This way you only need one bottle per wine. Arrange the wine tasting so they are Read More
Posted in Wine Education, Wine Events
- April 26, 2012
- by Kristina Manning
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Not All Wines Are Created Equal
Anyone who has known me for awhile knows my mantra: “You can’t drink a label or a price tag, or anyone else’s palate.” And I do hold these truths to be self-evident to paraphrase Thomas Jefferson, our nation’s first devotee of wine. Although it should be evident that not everyone shares the same taste in Read More
Posted in Interesting Wine Info, Wine Education
- February 28, 2012
- by Don Lahey
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A Barrel and Wine Marriage
I decided to try out a new Chardonnay tonight and I noticed some nice smokey, vanilla notes which caught my curiosity as to what type of barrel they could’ve used to age this wine. You can find a ton of wines aged in an American Oak, French Oak, or even Stainless Steel Barrel and they Read More
Posted in Wine Education
- January 27, 2012
- by Kristina Manning
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