Since the beginning of 2016, I’ve been writing restaurant reviews for BYO restaurants (meaning they don’t have liquor licenses) in the Philadelphia area. The only wines I recommend are those that can be found in Pennsylvania, one of three states that control the sale of wines and spirits in …
What is Beaujolais Nouveau and why all the fuss? First let’s talk about non-Nouveau or “regular” Beaujolais. Beaujolais is a light and fruity red wine made from the Gamay grape, technically Gamay Noir à Jus Blanc, though a small amount of chardonnay-based white Beaujolais Blanc is produced. Most Beaujolais is …
Since the beginning of 2016, I’ve been writing a restaurant review column for my Philadelphia neighborhood weekly newspaper, the Chestnut Hill Local. The MacGuffin (sometimes McGuffin), as Alfred Hitchcock used to say, is that all the restaurants are BYO (or BYOB), meaning they don’t have liquor licenses. BYO restaurants are as …
Christmas and New Year’s main courses are more varied than Thanksgiving and that means a broader range of wine possibilities. Roast beef offers the greatest opportunity for drinking those glorious reds we abstained from on Thanksgiving. For many holiday roast beef means a standing rib roast, a regal piece of …
I don’t get to New York for tastings and luncheons as often as I used to. So I have to pick my spots carefully. The Weygandt Portfolio Tastings are just the right size and usually have some interesting wines including the following: Sollner is a small Austrian producer of biodynamic …
Last spring I traveled to the Finger Lakes region of New York researching a cover story on beef I wrote for the September 30 issue of Wine Spectator. (Yes, they do raise cattle there!). On way to the farm of Jeff Rosenkrans (they call them cattle farms, not ranches in …