O h, how we’ve aggrandized wine to a beatific eminence. It is the alpha, the omega. It is sexy. It is alluring. It is dangerous. And it’s ...

Originally posted December 28, 2008 W hen I was thirteen I thought I was going to grow up to be a photographer. I spent endless hours in t...

F or an Italian wine lover, or for anyone, the idea of having something like the best day ever in this life is a ponderous matter. Not hea...

L ife, after years of work and a "career," is an unknown until you get there. Just like life after school, or life after an even...

I n these moments, social media sites are ablaze with folks making their yearly pilgrimages to wine fairs. A few weeks ago, it was to Germ...

Image courtesy of Cantina Produttori Nebbiolo Di Carema I magine families, perched precariously on the side of a mountain, working the l...

“D o you want to know how good a winemaker in the Langhe or Monferrato is? Try their Grignolino. If it’s a good one, chances are their oth...

W hile I have, more than once, addressed the challenges of selling one’s Italian wine to America , it seems I haven’t touched enough upon ...

T here’s nothing more enjoyable and illuminating than to rediscover a wine, a grape or a region as if I’d never had an iota of exposure to...

S ometime around the late 1990’s I was working with an Italian importer and one of the owners brought up the subject of alternative red wi...

Originally posted Nov. 14, 2007 Vallee d'Aoste ~ Vigne de Torrette O ne day on the highway in Liguria, it hit me. We were driving ...

Tasting notes are a cinch. How does one tell the tale of Southern Italian wine with a single photograph?

Assisi 1977 T he wines of the natural world are something I do not take on lightly as a self-assigned subject of current interest. As ...

R egular readers of this blog have known for some time that I am retired from a working life. What many do not know, are the details of a li...

W ine as an obsession seems a bit odd to me these days. As I recede from the shores of the wine trade, the daily activities, the desires, ...