I Left My Heart in Barbaresco

High on a hill, it calls to me

What is it about a place that marks one’s soul? When a place seems more than recognizable the first time one walks in that place, although one had never been there? And that the spirit of the place infuses upon that soul and being, a sense of belonging, of an intimacy that transcends mere time and place? Such is the effect Barbaresco has had upon me for the greater part of my adult life. And it surprised no one more than myself, this attachment, this passion, for a place and its wine.

Everything I know about Italian wine I learned from the French

Well, almost…

"My favorite" - Jacopo Bacci @ Four Seasons Hotel - Hong Kong."

Bordeaux − I’m [virtually] in the modern center of the business of wine – for the world. Not New York. Not Hong Kong. Not Rome. Bordeaux. Right now, wine experts, critics and influencers, are migrating to this epicenter for wine, to taste wines that are, at this time, undrinkable, and will only be released three years later to the public, before which they will have already been bought and paid for. These wines, the 2017’s, will follow two highly hyped and sought after vintages (the 2015 and 2016), and which was a vintage (2017) that was challenging, at best. Frost, hail, drought, extreme heat, another potential dystopian vintage of the decade. They will sell. And they will be unaffordable to 98% of us. Yeah, the Italians have something else to learn from their French cousins.

So, You Want to be an Italian Wine Expert?

from the "notes to myself" dept.

We Americans spend a lot of time alone. In the car, in front of a computer, and if one is lucky, taking long walks (or runs or bike rides) in the neighborhoods, in the country or deeper in nature. The monkey mind that is constantly chattering is set aside, and peace, and eventually clarity, arises.

Over the years, my inner Carl Jung has been giving this chat to me, in order to focus my purpose in this livelihood I have been given in the wine trade. It has been an epiphany, of sorts, for me. It is raw and unexpurgated. Proceed with caution – it is not for poseurs.