The Culinary Timeline is a side-project that I've been working on since October. I'm hoping to have most of it complete by the end of January, with any luck. Until then, updates around here will be weekly, rather than twice weekly. Do stay tuned.
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In “The Great Wines of America,” author Paul Lukacs assembles a melting pot of wine that portrays the current diversity within American viniculture. Lukacs’ book devotes individual chapters to 40 different wines, ranging from nearly-impossible-to-find Napa cult wines, such as Harlan’s Proprietary Red, to nearly-unknown wines from east of the Mississippi, such as Horton Vineyards’ Viognier. As Lukacs explores the American landscape, his book also touches upon various styles of wine, from Dolce’s botrytis-influenced dessert wine to the sparkling wines of Roederer and L. Mawby.
To be sure, a large percentage of the bottlings profiled [... read more ...]
"The Billionaire's Vinegar"
For collectors of wine, books, coins, trading cards or anything else, the lines between an interest and a passion — or a passion and an obsession — may become blurred over time. “The Billionaire’s Vinegar,” written by Benjamin Wallace, explores the often fanatical world of the rare wine market, offering a behind-the-scenes glimpse into some of the personalities who have purchased more wine than they could ever hope to drink. These are the collectors with tens of thousands of bottles in their cellars, who engage in bidding wars for past vintages of [... read more ...]
“A Very Good Year” chronicles the making of Ferrari-Carano’s 2002 Fume Blanc, offering a behind-the-scenes look at the processes and the personalities involved in ushering a product from the vineyard to the market. Author Mike Weiss, who originally penned a portion of the book as a recurring feature in the San Francisco Chronicle, does a commendable job explaining the nuts and bolts of winemaking, while also portraying a handful of the personalities at work.
Weiss selected Ferrari-Carano as the subject for his book because the label represents an average among California wineries: its production is [... read more ...]
For the American wine connoisseur, George Taber’s “Judgment of Paris” reads like a favorite movie. Although we may already know the ending before we have even read the first page, watching the plot unfold provides great enjoyment nonetheless. “Judgment” examines the historic 1976 tasting that pitted a handful of upstart California wines against the greatest wines of France, resulting in a stunning upset that created an instant paradigm shift among the wine community.
As Taber acknowledges at the outset of his book, however, the tasting was not even supposed to be a competition. Nor was [... read more ...]
For most folks, visiting the Napa Valley simply means cruising the main drag, Highway 29, between Yountville and St. Helena. It’s what tourists have been doing here for the last 30 years. But, given the high concentration of wineries along this particular stretch, you can’t really blame people for taking the road most traveled: for the uninitiated, staying within the boundaries of this eight-mile segment has the dual benefit of being (a) easy to navigate with (b) most of the wineries offering decent enough wines. For tourists in the know, this stretch also provides an address for [... read more ...]
A longtime contributor to Wine Spectator magazine, Matt Kramer represents the contingent of wine drinkers who eschews overly-alcoholic wines in favor of those with subtlety and nuance. Among wine critics, Kramer seems to be in the minority in this aspect, but those of us who share his tastes can take umbrage in the fact that Kramer is an outstanding, knowledgeable wine journalist. His book “Matt Kramer’s New California Wine” underscores this notion, and is an indispensible guide to the dizzying California wine landscape.
Kramer begins his book with a thoughtful introduction to California’s short history of serious wine production, [... read more ...]
“Real Wine” by Patrick Matthews details how various winemakers have returned (or held steadfast) to traditional approaches in an era when many corporate interests have driven down the bottom line with pesticides, chemical additives and increased mechanization. Matthews analyzes the steps to natural winemaking in nine chronological chapters, beginning with site selection, touching upon subsequent topics such as growing the grapes and maturing the wine, and ending with a chapter on turning a profit.
For the most part, “Real Wine” focuses heavily on California vintners, such as Ridge’s Paul Draper and Bonny Doon’s Randall Grahm, [... read more ...]
Originally published in 1988, Kermit Lynch’s “Adventures on the Wine Route” is required reading for anyone who wishes to gain a deeper understanding of wine. Although “Adventures” does not intend to offer a comprehensive view of any particular area of viniculture, it does succeed in conveying the essence of true wine appreciation.
Lynch, perhaps America’s most well-known wine importer, is an icon in the American wine community, equally as important as the Mondavis and others who, beginning in the 1970s, helped place American wine alongside the elite wines of the world. Although Lynch does not [... read more ...]
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