Monthly Archives: June 2008

These are times that try our wines. If you don’t have a wine cooler at home or keep your wine at a local wine storage facility like Esquin’s, you risk “cooking” your better wines if it gets too hot -like … Continue reading →

Last Monday, I met with Hans Vinding Diers, winemaker at Argiano, one of the Brunello producers first implicated of adultering their wines. He was in town for a trade tasting with his importer, Vias. Diers, who seemed upfront and sincere, … Continue reading →

Wednesday evening I had the great pleasure of tasting the great Gaja wines with Angelo Gaja himself and a few close friends. What a treat! He is a living legend but it’s what he has done and continues to do … Continue reading →

What on earth…? The reputation of Tuscan wine is unraveling faster than the thread of a Paula Abdul conversation. On top of the crisis in Montalcino, come revelations of adulteration and fraud in neighboring Montepulciano. According to the web site … Continue reading →

The Brunello Consortium’s credibility has just flown out the window. One day after they make a grand announcement, revealing a new, unprecedented Guarantee Board, supposedly in conjunction with the Ministry of Agriculture, when said Minister, Lucca Zaia, repudiated the new … Continue reading →

Montalcino is in crisis. An investigation, made public in late March, raised suspicions that international grape varieties like Merlot, Cabernet and Petit Verdot, have been added to some wines sold as 2003 Brunello. Brunello must be 100% Sangiovese, so the … Continue reading →