The Wine Idea

A BRITISH-BORN FRIEND now in his 70s remembers a time when high quality red Burgundy was commonly found on the tables of clergymen, schoolteachers, and other folk of quite modest means in the Liverpool he remembers. It seems amazing that wines now so sought after could once have provided everyday enjoyment for ordinary middle-class people…

In a post a couple of weeks ago I mentioned researching the 1967 Chateau Beychevelle that my friend Bernie told me he intended to serve at an upcoming dinner party in celebration of his 75th birthday. The search led me to a 1973 New York Magazine article by Alexis Bespaloff, observations on his career, the…

ISTANBUL, Turkey.   I snapped the photo at left in at the Ancient Orient Museum here – a handsome enclave of buildings hard by Topkapi Palace, but with many fewer visitors.  This is hard to fathom since the Ottomans were robbing the Near East of its treasures long before the British or French got into…

ISTANBUL, Turkey.  Some cities are wrapped in fog or smog; Istanbul is swaddled with antiquity and exoticism. No doubt when the emperor Constantine established this city as a purpose-built Imperial capital in the fourth century of the common era he did so with the idea that it would remain eternally youthful and relevant – such…

ISTANBUL, Turkey — As in any big city you can eat both high and low here, but the sheer number of restaurants per linear foot of sidewalk is unparalleled, at least in our experience. Many are tiny kebap and kofte (meatball) shops occupying six-or eight-foot-wide storefronts with no room to sit. One day, lost in…

The tag at left is affixed to the capsule of the 2008 Renato Ratti Nebbiolo d’Alba, a wine I discuss in a column to appear in the Globe Food pages at the end of October. It’s a beauty, by the way. The theme of the column is how to use a simple technique well known…

THE POLITICAL AND MILITARY conflicts between the Roman Empire and its German antagonists lasted hundreds of years, concluding, as we’ve been told, with the germanification of the Western empire.  But did it?  One could easily argue that in overrunning the Latin West, Germans were eventually colonized by Roman culture with its literacy, urbanity, and money…

In addition to putting us in the path of tropical storm Irene, a recent visit to southwestern Vermont put us back in the neighborhood of artisan bread baker Doug Rountree. We profiled Doug, left, in a December 2010 story in the Globe’s Food pages.  To say the guy makes wonderful old timey bread doesn’t begin to…

No, not that bucket list. We’re talking about the list of red wines we prefer to drink only after they’ve had a good long sit in an ice bucket – enough to bring the temperature down to something distinctly chilly. If you know something of the pleasures of young, light-bodied red wines sipped cool, it’s likely…

Giorgio Milos is master barista for the high-end Italian coffee company illycafe of Trieste and maintains a blog at the Atlantic. In his first post there last May, he criticized American baristi for not knowing their business; in particular, he took them to task for not knowing how much coffee to use when making espresso.…

This is (part of) the set up for the by-the-glass wine program at chef Michael Leviton’s spanking new spot, Area Four, on Main St. between Kendall and Central in Cambridge. Except for the couple of sparklers on offer, all the wines here come out of stainless steel kegs (tops with their fittings are just visible…

In a column to appear in next Wednesday’s Food pages, we’ll be highlighting a category we’re calling extreme chardonnay. The common thread is the crisp, dry fruit, shimmering acidity, and mineral interest higher latitude chardonnay offers.  We’ve been tasting a number of French wines that fill the bill.  Two surprises: the number of wines from the…