Entries from February 2010

February 26, 2010

Women in Wine: Wines With Ancient Lineage & The Silk Road, A Talk By Mollie Battenhouse

Last week, Feb. 17 to be exact, Mollie Battenhouse, Wine Director at Maslow 6 in Tribeca, gave a fascinating talk on wines with an ancient lineage. She was joined by Peter Cousins of Cornell University and together they traced the path that some grape vines may have taken along the silk road. The talk was [...]

February 25, 2010

Chile Day 13 & 14- Trip To Easter Island

Last year I had the good fortune to spend almost three weeks in Chile traveling happily up and down the country. One of the last things I did on the trip was take a plane to Easter Island, some five hours off the coast. When you first get off the plane, you are greeted by [...]

February 24, 2010

Skiing in Valle d’Aosta Sipping Blanc de Morgex et de la Salle D.O.C.

I’m sitting at my desk in New York but I am armchair traveling to a time, not in the too distant past, when I used to ski in the Valle d’Aosta. I am lucky enough to have dear friends with homes in some wonderful ski towns such as Gressoney in the Valle d’Aosta. Gressoney is [...]

February 23, 2010

Quick Updates About Wine Tasting In Coming Days In NYC

Just a quick note about some wine tasting that will take place in the New York area: Lucio Caputo’s Gala Italia will be held on February 25 at the Marriott Marquis, as always. Last year I tasted some wines I really enjoyed including a few from Sicily that knocked my socks off. On March 1, [...]

February 22, 2010

Tre Bicchieri Tasting In New York

Today was the Tre Bicchieri Tasting in New York. I didn’t go. For the past few years I have worked at the event for a producer friend whose wines always win a Tre Bicchieri classification. This year, things were a bit different and I had too much to do to be able to go and [...]

February 19, 2010

Women in Wine: The Rosina Sisters At La Mesma Make Gavi DOCG, A White Wine From Piedmont

Gavi always seemed to me to be an old fashioned wine, one that little old ladies drank. Somehow, it seemed declasse’. Boy was I wrong. Actually two Gavi wines were among my favorite wines tasted during the long marathon otherwise known as Vino 2010 held in New York from February 3 to February 5. They [...]

February 16, 2010

Carnevale – How I Ended Up Moving To Italy

People always ask me how and why I chose to live in Italy for 15 years. The answer is of course complicated but one simple truth is that I went to Florence on the last day of Carnevale, Fat Tuesday, over 20 years ago today and fell madly in love. I was studying French in [...]

February 14, 2010

Olympics, Georgia, Leonard Cohen and Valentine’s Day

I love the Olympics. I always have. I think it’s the spirit of community or the idea of the world as a village that appeals to me so much. Of course, the athletic prowess of the competitors is beautiful and exciting to watch but that’s not what made me teary as I watched the opening [...]

February 13, 2010

Women in Wine: A Chat With Stellekaya’s Ntsiki Biyela

I met Ntsiki Biyela, a 30 something South African winemaker who was born and raised in Kwa-Zulu Natal, about a month ago during her visit to promote Stellekaya’s wines in the United States. Ntsiki is one of only two or three black female winemakers in South Africa but that isn’t the only reason that she’s [...]

February 8, 2010

Women In Wine: Susanna Crociani From Crociani Winery in Montepulciano

I have been meaning to write about Susanna Crociani since we first met at Vinitaly 2007. In the interest of transparency, I want to point out that I have spent considerable amounts of time with her and we are good friends. In fact, Susanna was just staying with me for the past week during Vino [...]