Interest in food (and beverages) exploded in the late 20th century because the artisanal, farm-to-table, locavore, slow-food ethos of the food world is an antidote
Is Scarcity an Aesthetic Value or a Pricing Trick?
Rare wine has a peculiar power over us. Tell someone a bottle is hard to find and sold only through a mailing list and the
The Difference Between Rustic and Incompetence
I struggle with “rustic.” I have a glass of Aglianico in front of me. The aromas are bold with plenty of secondary and tertiary notes
What is a Great Wine?
As a wine writer and more importantly a wine lover, I have tasted a lot of wine. A small portion of it was dreadful, most
The Pleasure of Almost Remembering
One of the odd pleasures of wine occurs when an aroma seems familiar but cannot be clearly identified. You take a whiff and catch something.
I Miss the Old Days When Aesthetics Mattered
It wasn’t so long ago that the most intense arguments in wine were about aesthetics. They were philosophical, occasionally personal, and often quite nasty. But
