Judging The American Wine Blog Awards

After Tom Wark announced the finalists for the American Wine Blog Awards, there was a lot of grumbling about who made the cut and who didn’t. This is inevitable; I judge the relevance of any award by the amount of controversy it causes. Few people care that they didn’t get an award they didn’t know about. But as bloggers and their readers grouse, I thought I’d offer my perspective as a judge.

The judging process was straightforward: Anyone could nominate a blog in any of the categories, and when nominations closed, Tom sent each of the judges a spreadsheet with all the nominees. As far as I know, every nominated blog was on the spreadsheet, except for the ones written by the judges and the ones that didn’t meet Tom’s eligibility requirements. Each of the six judges ranked five finalists in each category, and then Tom combined all those to come up with the top four finalists he presented to readers.

My Judging
Judges could use any criteria we wanted for deciding our top five. I gave 50 points for the “so what?” factor, which varied based on the category. For the Single Subject category, for instance, my “so what?” translated into a simple question: If I wanted to learn about your subject, would your blog be a good way to do it? Then I gave 40 points for writing ability: Can the blogger communicate in a logical way? Does s/he demonstrate good knowledge rather than knee-jerk, poorly considered opinions? Finally, I gave 10 points for mechanics: Does the blogger know that it’s and its are separate words? Does s/he drop words from sentences? I gave this little weight in the total because most blogs don’t have copy editors. (For the graphics awards, I just gave a single score.)

I read the front page of entries for each site, and then all the posts from last September — sometimes people beef up their posts at awards time. I took notes on each blog. Brutal notes, too: I summed up one site with “blah blah blah” and another with “who nominated this site?” It didn’t matter if the site’s author was a real-life friend, a social-networking “friend,” or a total stranger. I tried to be as objective as one can be in a subjective context.

Is This The Best We Can Do?
Tom wrote of the finalists, “The collection of finalists … is a stellar example of all the things that are outstanding about the wine blogosphere.” As someone who pored through all the nominees, I had the opposite view: Is this the best we can do? There were one or two categories where I wished I could submit just three finalists, not five. In my scheme, not one site scored above 90 points (though there was at least one 89).

I am guilty of many of the sins I noticed on other blogs. I’m not sure how I would grade OWF if I were looking at it through the objective lens I turned on the WBA nominees. So I used my Web-wide jaunt as a reminder about what I could do to improve this site.

Some of you may find these little discoveries interesting. Some of you may tell me to take a hike (or, you know, some other phrase). That’s fine, because I want to preface these comments with one bit of advice: Write your blog for yourself. Writing for rewards and recognition is a sucker’s game. I have felt the sting of being overlooked for awards, but I finally remembered that I write OWF for my own benefit; my readers seem to keep coming back, so who cares if I don’t have a little badge in my sidebar?

What I Learned From The AWBA Nominees
Context matters. If I want to read page after page of "berries-cherries-flowers" tasting notes and irrelevant scores, I’ll pick up one of the big wine magazines. If I want to read uneducated, fawning press about some new health effect of wine, I’ll turn to newspapers. As bloggers, we can tell our readers why a given wine matters (or doesn’t) and where it fits in the world. We have the ability to talk about how it moves us (or doesn’t). We can wrap news stories in our own opinions and research. We can take a reader farther than the magazines can. We can teach and inform.

Personality matters. As bloggers, we don’t have to adhere to a dry, third-person editorial voice. We can be ourselves. We can use the first-person perspective that few feature wells allow. Of course, too much personality can grate on the reader, but too much is better than none at all. When I read a blog post, I want to get a sense of the person who wrote it. I want to care enough to click on the “About” link at the top of your page. We should let ourselves shine through a bit more.

Writing matters. I’m not a prescriptivist about grammar, despite what you may think. But you don’t need to memorize Strunk & White to communicate ideas in a useful way. Writing is a craft before it’s an art, and almost anyone can learn the craft. Magazines and newspapers have hard-working editors who clean up a writer’s prose: We have to rely on ourselves. I gave some advice about this in an earlier post — and I would add A Writer’s Coach to my list of recommended books — but I think many blogs would benefit from a few hours between writing and posting and one last careful read before the author hits Publish.

We have the opportunity to transform the way people look at wine. Our readers bond with us, learn about our lives, and trust our recommendations in ways most wine writers can’t imagine. We can introduce our readers to something beyond the mass-market bottles and the everyday grapes. We can show them that high quality doesn’t only come from a big magazine.

American Wine Blog Awards

Last year, Tom Wark at Fermentation hosted the American Wine Blog Awards, and they proved popular enough to do a second time. If you read wine blogs — I consider OWF a food and wine blog, which means it doesn’t quite fit in either category — you should go to his site and nominate some of your favorites. Nominations close on February 27, so you have time to think about it. Right now he’s only taking nominations, so if a wine blog is mentioned you don’t need to nominate it again. You’ll get a chance to vote on the finalists in a few weeks.

What Is Bimbo Break?

I was trying to solve a puzzle in the latest issue of The Enigma, the monthly publication of The National Puzzlers’ League, and I decided the answer might be one of the Coca-Cola brands. I haven’t memorized them, of course, so I looked them up. Holy cats! They own everything. This isn’t a surprise — America’s favorite soft drink company is a sprawling mass of a corporation — but the list en masse is quite a sight.

Here’s one to ponder: What is Bimbo Break? It’s listed in their brands, but I’ve never seen it. Maybe I just don’t shop in the right stores. Or maybe, you know, Coca-Cola decided that that brand isn’t quite ready for market yet.

I’ll tell you what Bimbo Break isn’t: the answer to the puzzle. I did manage to figure it out, though.

Serendipity: A Bit Of Esoteric Wine History

I was searching the Government Printing Office’s site while researching an article, and I stumbled across the record for this 1986 document titled “Imported wines : identifying and removing wines contaminated with diethylene glycol.”

Sadly, the document’s not available online: Maybe I’ll look it up the next time I’m at the library. Because the reason why there’s a 1986 report about diethylene glycol in wine is that the year before, the international press went ballistic upon learning that a few Austrian producers in the Thermenregion had been adding that chemical to their wine. At the time, Austria followed Germany’s lead and made tankfuls of cloying wine. Diethylene glycol allowed wine makers to sweeten wine even when the grapes didn’t have enough sugar. This might not be a problem, except that diethylene glycol is related to ethylene glycol, an ingredient in antifreeze. (Diethylene glycol is significantly less toxic.)

When the additive was discovered, it obliterated the Austrian wine industry’s international presence. No one would touch the wines for years. But that event shaped the modern-day industry: It wiped out the large producers who had relied on voluminous sales and cleared the way for small producers with integrity to enter the spotlight. It also reversed the trend toward sweeter wines: Today, Austria’s non-dessert whites are bone-dry, in contrast to Germany’s. The incident also spawned every joke about antifreeze in the wine, including the one in the first season of The Simpsons.

Food Blog Awards

Menu For Hope is one end-of-year tradition in the food blogosphere; the Food Blog Awards are another. Go nominate your favorite sites for awards and virtual glory at Well Fed. As a former judge, I can tell you that this is a tough chore for the folks behind the scenes, so give a big thanks to Cate and all the judges for their efforts in keeping this annual rite alive.

Menu For Hope Approaches

Menu For Hope, the end-of-year food blogger charity drive started by Pim, is about to start. Bloggers around the world contribute gifts, and everyone buys raffle tickets for the prizes they’d like to win. The money — over $60,000 last year — all goes to the UN’s World Food Program. If you’re a food blogger and you’d like to contribute a gift, contact the appropriate regional host. Bidding begins on December 10, and I will once again be writing the program that does the raffle drawing, so enter your bribes as soon as possible — uh, which I will ignore, of course. Did I say that out loud? (Technically, I’ll just run the program I wrote last year, but I have some features to add.)

Around The Web

A number of you have asked about the survey I ran a while back. I’ll post the results soon. In the meantime, if you want a break from Thanksgiving prep, here are a few good links for your enjoyment.

The eloquent Mark Morford, columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle, wrestles with ethical eating in the face of yummy food. Avoiding all questionable food would be so much easier if so much of that food didn’t taste so good.

What does your Thanksgiving meal look like? Turkey on the table, cranberry sauce on the side? Wired offers a different view: through the lens of a microscope.

Finally, Jason Haas, of premier Paso Robles winery Tablas Creek, gave me a heads-up about a recent post in which he discusses how the TTB’s decision to stop granting AVAs has impeded efforts to subdivide Paso based on soil and climate.

Pardon Me, Turkeys

Want a safe topic for the family’s Thanksgiving dinner chatter? Snopes tracked down the history of the presidential pardon for turkeys. Who was the first president to issue a pardon for birds headed to the slaughterhouse? It may not be who you think.

And don’t miss their other Thanksgiving entries. Turkey doesn’t make you sleepy, and the day after Thanksgiving isn’t the biggest shopping day of the year.

Equator Coffee Responds

A few days ago, I posted about The Shot’s assertion that The French Laundry was using mediocre, expensive coffee in lieu of making a good cup.

Brooke McDonnell, the owner and master roaster for Equator Coffee, saw my post and commented in defense of her company. I know not everyone reads the comments, so I thought I should post her statement, unedited except for HTML friendliness, here for you all to read. As I said before, I don’t know anything about coffee, but I’m willing to let people defend themselves and correct misimpressions.

Brooke’s comment:

In response to the espresso critic quoted in this blog, a bit of clarification:
1. Equator coffees & teas does not supply, nor has it ever supplied, the espresso for the French Laundry which comes from Illy. (We supply their drip coffee). As a roaster I appreciate anyone who takes an interest in and promotes the crafting of specialty coffee in all its forms, yet, it is startling to read a review disparaging of Equator in the context of French Laundry espresso for the second time from the same critic.
2. As traditionalists we may have objections to the automatic espresso machines, however, in certain environments, where there are multiple servers, these machines eliminate inconsistencies and improve the execution.
3. Espresso preferences are subjective: Illy is just one style of espresso that when pulled properly has a strong constituency based on its balanced sweetness and moderate acidity. At recent barista competitions the trend was towards very tangy, citrusy, salty origin espresso. This is a big tent subject that leaves plenty of room to promote ones preference and appreciate other styles of espresso.
4. As any roaster knows, the key is always control over the variables that effect espresso, and, as any roaster knows, the same espresso can yield different results at different locations under different hands. The espresso critic's ratings confirm this. Even when there has been on-site training (which we do), the roaster has limited influence over the final espresso translation. Simply put, we cannot compel those on the front lines of retail to have a passion for the process.
5. Regarding the Panama Geisha served at the French Laundry: after visiting the Esmeralda farm, I arranged for one of owners to meet the French Laundry staff and provide background on the coffee varietal and microclimate prior to introducing this coffee. The staff took the time to educate themselves on the agronomy of this coffee farm. They also spent time evaluating different roast styles and brewing methods. I was impressed with their commitment to raise the bar on their brewed coffee program.

Wine Gadgets The World Needs

Lore Sjöberg, who often writes humorous pieces for Wired, has put his satirical pen to paper and pondered the wine gadgets missing from the world. An automatic wine twirler? A tooth-mounted flavor sensor? A temporal acceleration device to age your wine? (He’s obviously unaware of the devices that purport to do this.)

How about his idea for a first-person Champagne shooter? I could combine my love of video games with my love of wine, though I’m not a big FPS fan.

I can’t help but point out that his use of the word “varietal” — to my mind, a misuse — illustrates my belief that we shouldn’t use the word except in its very specific meaning of a bottle marketed as being made from a single grape variety. Why use jargon incorrectly when there’s a perfectly good non-jargon term? That’s part of why culture views wine geeks as objects of derision.

The French Laundry's Mediocre Coffee?

I know nothing about coffee except that I don’t like it. But my friend Tim does: He owns a popular coffeehouse in San Leandro that does its own roasting and blending. He forwarded an amusing post arguing that The French Laundry is trying to cover for mediocre coffee by impressing guests with its price. Or as the author writes:

Yes, the man behind America’s most esteemed of restaurants … has proudly announced to his customers that they[sic] will now offer Panama Esmeralda Geisha coffee roasted by the consistently underwhelming Equator Estate Coffees. … rather than get educated, train staff, and elevate the craft (if not also chuck their superautomatic Schaerer espresso machine for something less suited for an assembly line), they take the lazy short cut of espousing the merits of “the most expensive coffee in the world” on their menus

Any thoughts on this from you all? (Other than the misuse of the word “compliment” in the original press release?)

Wine's Carbon Footprint

I make some effort to source local ingredients for my cooking, but I gloss over the fact that my favorite wines come from Europe. Tyler, of Dr. Vino, is less willing to brush dust under his carpet. He puts thought into the environmental aspects of wine production, and he’s recently published a paper about calculating the carbon footprint of wine. Pour yourself a glass from a local winery and give it a read.

Around The Web

My bacon and egg risotto caused a little ripple in the food blogosphere. Check out elkit’s Flickr photo and Jen’s write-up to read about their versions. In a sort of culinary feedback loop, their versions may inspire me to make it again soon.

Tom Wark, whose wine blog Fermentations is a popular destination, has helped start a new blog named Wine Without Borders that aims to spread the word about American legislation that prevents a retailer in one state from shipping to a customer in another. Those laws give the consumer fewer choices and the retailer less opportunity to make money.

You can follow boring Twitter feeds like mine, but the 140-character recipes in cookbook’s feed are much more interesting. Here’s just one of her tasty tweets: “Jam: boil 3c berries, 2t grated ginger, 1/4c lemon juice. Blend 1pkg pectin, 1c sugar. Heat all to rolling boil. Fill clean jars & boil 15m.” I’ve done this from time to time with wine reviews, but maybe her stream will inspire me to do it more. (via Jason Kottke)

Barrel Alternatives In Today's Chronicle

Last week, one of my students asked me about a practice he had heard of where winemakers add chips to wine instead of putting it in barrel. I replied, “I’m pretty sure that the Chronicle will run a lead story about that topic next week.” How did I know? I’m the author. (My original title was “Staving Off Critics And Chipping Away At Costs,” but the silly puns didn’t make it all the way through.) Be sure to check out the photos.

Also, thanks to a tip from Jack, I submitted my first Sipping News piece about an oddly shaped wineglass. It’s not a big deal, but it was fun to do.

Epicurious Brings Rebecca Chapa On Board

One of my favorite wine teachers is Rebecca Chapa. I had her a couple of times as I studied wine, and I try to emulate her in my own teaching, especially since one of the classes I teach used to be hers.

So I was thrilled when I saw that she’s doing wine education for Epicurious. Her first topic: How to store wine, before you open it and after.

Mr. Manners On Dinner Parties

Many of you know that I’m a devoted listener of the Grammar Girl podcast. In today’s episode, she mentioned that Mr. Manners, one of the other podcasts in the same network, recently talked about dinner parties. There are transcripts for part 1 and part 2 if you don’t want to download the mp3s.

His points mirror ones I made in my SFist piece about hosting dinner parties, but he also covers polite ways to invite guests and get rid of ones that won’t leave. Some of his food suggestions wouldn’t fly in our house — I don’t put cheese on the appetizer platter and Melissa prefers to serve French press coffee — but his two posts have good, solid information.

Tomorrow's Cooking Tricks Today

Popular Science has a fascinating slideshow of high-tech kitchen gadgets. From sous vide cooking to instant smoke flavoring, this gallery made me want to fill out my Christmas list early.

via Boing Boing Gadgets

Sim McDonalds

I’ve been super busy of late, but I hope that posts will soon resume with their normal vigor. In the meantime, check out this satirical Flash game about running a McDonald’s. Go the ethical route, and you piss off upper management. Start making compromises, and you win loads of cash you can use to bribe Third World leaders.

via Play This Thing

Thomas Keller's Frozen Food. What the Puck?

Tyler of Dr. Vino just sent me an article about Thomas Keller’s empire that casually mentions his forthcoming frozen food line. Is Thomas Keller the Wolfgang Puck of the Noughties? Have I just ensured that I’ll never get a reservation again at The French Laundry? How would that be different than now?

Anyway, it doesn’t sound like we’ll see his face plastered throughout the frozen food section quite yet. So far there are just two products, and stores still need to buy them (because that will be a tough sell).

Mark Morford On The Baconator Ads

In Mark Morford’s latest opinion column for the San Francisco Chronicle, he rants about the new Wendy’s ads — and our culture of gluttony — in his typical stream-of-consciousness style. I guess everyone’s writing about food today, even if they’re not writing for a food section.

Paul Levy Opts Out Of Bad-Boy Writing

In Slate today, Paul Levy articulates the ennui that I feel about macho food writing, which is either derivative of or popularized by Anthony Bourdain. Everyone has to swear and shock. Neither of these are really problems, but do it all the time and you become tiresome. Is anyone shocked by a Bourdain tirade anymore? Good writers use any trick with care so that it doesn’t lose its effect.

Or maybe I’m just yelling “Get off the damn lawn!” to the neighborhood kids. What do you think about the “shock treatment” of modern male food writers?

Sour Death Balls

My friend Joe sent around a link to this charming short film from 1993 of people eating Sour Death Balls. What do you look like when you eat one of these tart candies? Find out by watching other people’s expressions.

Batali's Blog

Some of you may recall Mario Batali’s June article about food bloggers. It caused quite a stir in our thriving community, even though he really vented about one non-fact that he wanted to clarify, changing a potentially interesting article into a portrait of misinformation.

But Regina at Gastropoda posted a note that Batali has started to blog at Serious Eats. I’m tempted to launch “snarky vituperatives from behind the smoky curtain of the web,” which is what his article suggested we all do, but I guess if he’s a food blogger now, he can do that himself. I’m sure he’ll show us veterans how it’s done, assuming he can sustain his blog for long enough.

(Note: Sorry for those who clicked on the earlier link only to find that it was an old, old blog. It just goes to show that when you snark about someone else’s misinformation, you always end up making a mistake yourself.)

Whence High Alcohol

Clark Smith, the head of Vinovation, has an Appellation America article about high alcohol levels in California wine. He looks at the complex array of factors that have led us to a world where every California wine has more than 14% alcohol. I see he’s listed as Appellation America’s technology columnist; it’s nice to see someone who knows all the ins and outs of wine technology across the state giving them content.

Superflavored Liquids

Please take a moment to fill out the OWF 5-Year Anniversary Reader Survey.

Harold McGee's latest New York Times article teaches the reader how to do gelatin filtration at home. I hadn’t heard the term until I saw the article, though the technique seems to be all over the avant-garde cooking scene. It’s a way to create high-flavor consommes without the finicky and time-consuming stovetop clarification. You add a little gelatin to the liquid, freeze it, and then thaw it in the refrigerator. The gelatin becomes a molecular sieve, and the melting water washes small flavor compounds through the net while the gelatin traps fat and other impurities. There’s even a recipe for brown butter consomme to get you started. You can do it with a wide range of liquids, and you don’t need any equipment besides a refrigerator and a freezer. I’ll be trying this as soon as I get a moment.

Not About Food: BlogDay 2007

Take the OWF 5-year anniversary reader survey.

Today is BlogDay, an annual event where bloggers point the way to five “new” blogs. I interpret that phrase to mean “new, perhaps, to you” rather than “less than one year old.” So I looked in my RSS reader for blogs you might like. (Of course I call out specific sites throughout the year as well).

Comics Curmudgeon - Nothing gets me giggling like Josh's sarcastic rundown of the morning comics page. (I’m less fond of his occasional guest blogger UncleLumpy.) Who knew there was so much humor in Mary Worth, Mark Trail, and Family Circus?

Terroir at Wine Library - I have a love affair with off-the-map grapes, and so does Tom, who uses his blog to write about oddball varieties and the wines they produce. He gives out lots of information and writes with a distinct voice.

The Wine Importer - Joe Dressner — like Terry Theise, Kermit Lynch, and Jorge Ordonas — is one of those wine importers whose name on a bottle is sufficient reason to buy it. He champions biodynamic wines here in the U.S., and his sporadically updated blog injects humor into the so-often-self-important wine industry.

Lexicographer's Rules - Grant Barrett is the co-host of A Way With Words, and his personal blog lights up the cave of language and dictionaries.

Violent Acres - She's often blunt; she's often caustic. She often paints in broad strokes of black and white. But she's also funny, introspective, and thought-provoking. If you don't like strong language, or if you love the mommy bloggers she so often attacks, stay clear of this site.

Technorati tags: BlogDay2007

R.I.P. Michael Jackson

I just noticed a note on A Good Beer Blog that Michael Jackson, the great beer writer, has passed away. No one else has done as much to educate people about the fantastic traditional beers that exist around the world, and his wisdom will be sorely missed. I've used a number of his books as reference material for my own research.

See the tribute to him, and his final article, at the All About Beer site

Crappyjack

While listening to a podcast from the New Word Open Mic event at the Dictionary Society of North America meeting, I heard the neologism crappyjack as a synonym for junk food. Anything you snack on that leaves you with a hollow feeling could be crappyjack, which comes from crap plus Cracker Jack (an American snack food of peanuts and caramel-coated popcorn, for those outside of its reach).

This seems like a fine word to use for the low-nutrition, high-calorie junk food that transports high-fructose corn syrup to our bodies, so I post it here for all of you to spread to the masses.

Plant Vines In Sweden!

It’s time for another article about the effect of global warming on wine regions. Next they’ll tell us that rosés aren’t all sweet fruit punch drinks. This time Salon is sounding the alarm. Unfortunately, the interesting news angle appears only briefly at the end of the article: “But he refuses to grow complacent or forget that his good fortune is an omen. That's why he and many of his colleagues in the Oregon hills have joined to make their wine industry the first ‘carbon neutral’ one in the country.” Wait. What was that again?

Financial Times On The Alice Waters Culinary School

The Financial Times has an article about the many Chez Panisse alumni who have opened up their own Bay Area businesses. It doesn't add a lot of new material, but Melissa and I were pleased to see Mary Jo Thorensen, co-owner and pastry chef at our beloved Jojo, get a prominent mention.

City Farmer Blog

As Melissa caught up on her blog posts, she noticed that her acquaintance Novella has started a blog. Novella has written for Salon about her experiences as a hard core urban farmer in Oakland, and she's working on a memoir about it as well. Check it out.

Salon Interviews Ed

Salon has an interview with Ed, my editor at The Art of Eating. It's written by J.R. Norton, better known to food bloggers as CHOW's James Norton.

Because if Bon Appétit is the food media's Newsweek and Saveur is the Economist, then the Art of Eating is the New York Review of Books: sometimes impenetrable, often spellbinding, and never, ever reductive.

I had to laugh at this quote: "A reader not long ago wrote to me saying: 'You are the guy who had the courage to say all coffee in North America is over-roasted,' and I probably did say something nearly like that." I saw that letter, because the rest of it fumed about letting me write about Vinovation.

Go and read what Ed, one of our country's best food writers, has to say about the culinary world. Go and read what one of my role models says about his influences.

Tablas Creek Talks Closures

If you've ever heard me talk about screw caps, you know I'm a fan. But Jason Haas, general manager of Tablas Creek, makes a more nuanced argument about closures at the winery's blog. Screw caps are great, he says, but so are corks. It depends on the wine.

Around The Web

The Sustainable Table folks, best known for the Meatrix cartoons that educate about industrial agriculture, have started podcasting. Now you can listen to short pieces about organic, local, and ethical food while you walk to work. Click here for the iTunes link.

Skip Lombardi wrote to me about his Food Stamp Challenge, in which he and his significant other are trying to live on Food Stamp amounts. He distances himself from the politicians who have done this recently, saying, "most of the participants we've read about made little or no attempt to actually cook! They simply went to grocery stores and bought foods that seemed cheap." The two of them, on the other hand, are passionate cooks. They want to stimulate discussion about the benefits of cooking and make constructive suggestions to diners on Food Stamp budgets. Pool resources, they suggest, among other things.

I had never read Peter Barrett's cookblog until he wrote me a couple months ago, but I feel like I've found a kindred spirit on the other side of the country. He salt cures his own meat, experiments with sous vide cooking, and loves good wine.

Terry's Latest Catalogs

Thanks to a post on Eric's blog, I see that Terry Theise has released his latest catalogs. As Eric notes, Terry writes with eloquence and passion about Germany, Austria, Champagne, and the larger world of wine. He drips fantastic quotes: You can't keep up with the shimmering pearls of wisdom that cascade off of him. I work hard for even the tiny glints of color in my text; Terry writes in rainbows as if it's the most natural thing to do.

I suppose I should mention that I have a bit part in Terry's Germany catalog this year. He and I had a friendly email exchange about my Vinovation piece—we get along well—and he reproduced snippets in the text. Terry and I agree about what makes good wine, but I am more accepting of Vinovation's role within the context of modern wine making. (I went to a recent tasting of his, and he said upon spying me, "Derrick, I was so hoping you would come." A perfectly timed pause, and then, "So you can remind yourself what real wine tastes like.")

Wired Deconstructs Red Bull

What do all those ingredients in Red Bull do? Wired Magazine deconstructs a can's ingredient list and offers real-world (not marketing-hype) information about the effects of each item. From the article:

Glucose
Like most popular soft drinks, Red Bull is largely sugar water. But don't count on its glucose to "give you wings," as the ad says. Multiple studies have debunked the so-called sugar high.

Bonnie's Real Food Campaign

Ethicurean's Bonnie Powell has gotten so riled up about the Hellman's/Yahoo! "Real Food" campaign that she wants to start a netroots campaign to reclaim the term real food. Go read her manifesto, and post your thoughts. I'll have to think about my real food manifesto a bit; I haven't had several hours on a plane to stew about it.

But, hey, Bonnie, I thought you were on vacation.

Croatian Wine Country Travels

My friend Frank sent out a link to his business's new blog, which chronicles the travels of Blue Danube's web designer and his friend through the wine country in the Balkans. Blue Danube is an importer, wholesaler, and retailer, so I imagine the bloggers are visiting wineries represented by Frank and his wife Zsuzsa. But you rarely get to read firsthand accounts of these wine regions, and Frank and Zsuzsa are good people worth supporting.

Self-Tending BBQ

Tired of tending your barbecue for hours and hours and hours? Maybe you should build a self-tending model like the one that Nathan Moore submitted to the Popular Mechanics do-it-yourself rally. It doesn't look too difficult, given the interview and the drawing. If I ever upgrade to a wood-fired smoker, I'm tempted to build one of these. Or recruit a friend who knows something about mechanics.

As a side note, look at how Moore refers to barbecue as a synonym for slow cooking. Not fast cooking on a grill: That's called grilling. Grilling. Barbecue. Grilling. Barbecue. (Pilotless Drone.) These are two vastly different cooking styles. It's not a barbecue when there's a grill; it's a cookout. (My co-workers once changed the name of our company's "barbecue" to cookout, just to avoid hearing me rant about this topic. I call that a victory.)

Search On Food and Cooking

Harold McGee has been working with Google to provide a search tool for On Food and Cooking, the must-have book for every cook's shelf. His search field appears on the right side of the site, and the results appear on the right side of the Google Search site. (Don't use the search field at the top of the Google Books page; that's a generic Google Books search.)

In Search Of Real Food? Skip Yahoo

The other day, I got a press release that serves as a case study in trying to trick potential customers. Hellmann's (or Best Foods for those on this side of the country) has partnered with Yahoo! Food in a campaign they call The Search For Real Food.

Hellmann's. Real Food. No, I just can't make the math work. I don't have a problem with Hellmann's as a food product—none apart from a general stance against flavorless, chemical-laden industrial foods, anyway—but is there any food less real than the preservative-laden spread? Just as megaproducers have co-opted the terms organic and natural and the bucolic imagery they conjure, Hellmann's has tied itself to a term that has traction among modern shoppers. Even if they don't approve or edit the content—and I assume they do—every visitor to that site will conflate Hellmann's and real food. At the very least, they'll believe that Hellmann's actually cares about it.

The PR person who sent me the link mentioned that they'd be looking for good "real food" blog posts to highlight. Here's my recommendation: how to make your own mayonnaise at cookingforengineers.com. Taste the real thing, and you'll wonder how anyone considers Hellmann's to be mayonnaise. The real sauce is a snap to make, especially if you use a food processor. It only keeps for a week in the refrigerator, instead of the months and months that Hellmann's will hold up, but which expiration date sounds more like real food?

The Subjectiveness of Smell

Slate's Mike Steinberger continues his look at the physiology of tasting wine with a probing of the nose. There's some good information there, and it reinforces what I already tell my students: You are always right about what you smell and what you like.

Steinberger, quoting a researcher, mentions the classic "white wine" vs. "red wine" experiment in which a white wine with red dye results in red wine descriptions. He also alludes to the "label" experiment mentioned in Mindless Eating, in which the same wine with a Napa label gets more praise than when it sports a Montana label, though in this case he mentions "vin de table" versus "grand cru" as the variables. It makes you wonder about the lack of bias in those wine critics who claim to taste wines blind but in fact know the grape and region before they sip.

Brilliant McDonald's PR

According to the Chicago Tribune, McDonald's will allow six moms to investigate restaurants in the chain, work in the restaurant, and then blog about their experiences and their discoveries.

Who are these moms? I'll bet McDonald's didn't choose top-notch investigative journalists. While pundits quoted in the article say the move could backfire, I think McDonald's has come up with a brilliant idea. Let these women ask "pointed" questions, and then spin them a comfortable answer that they'll post for all their readers to see.

McDonald's will give them tours of the hamburger plant and apple orchards. How very open and transparent of them. I didn't see anything in the article about tours of pork farms for the bacon, slaughterhouses, or shantytowns where slaughterhouse workers live. Will they get to sit in on the meetings where the attendees discuss ways to make advertisements that get children into the restaurant? Will they get to look at the company's financials? And do you think McDonald's will let these women visit the plants and apple farms unannounced?

When I started to blog, and even when I started to write professionally, I found it hard to resist marketing spin. There's a reason none of my clients consider a P.R. person or a marketing rep a valid source. "Your wine won a gold medal? That's great!" "Oh! Alcohol levels don't matter because you balance the wine? Interesting." "You make your wine in the vineyard? That sounds reasonable." Everyone seems so sincere. Several years into this, I'll nod politely and groan inside when I decide not to call them on this pap: If it's not relevant to my article, I don't care what lies they want to tell me, but if it's part of the piece I know enough to ask pointed questions. (Some of my favorites: "So you weren't making balanced wines with low alcohol? Oh, you were? So why up the alcohol?" "Do you think they go well with food?" "If you make wine in the vineyard, why don't you use natural yeast?")

Will the McMoms fall prey to this spin? Maybe not. But six moms with who-knows-what backgrounds against a corporate giant with a well-funded and adept marketing group? My money's on the Golden Arches.

via Chow, which asks good questions about how deep the nutritional analysis will be.

Where Does Wine Lingo Come From?

Mike Steinberger has an interesting piece at Slate about how the modern wine tasting note, the "cherry-and-berry" style to use his term, came about. I have struggled to make my tasting notes readable, both here and in print, but I grew up in the "list all the aromas" school, and that's a tough habit to break. The old-school masculine/feminine language isn't any better, as it lacks the ability to communicate with anyone except wine geeks. This is a common subject at the Wine Writers' Symposium, where Karen MacNeil pushes us to write interesting tasting notes.

Cheapest Possible Ice Cream Maker

Can't afford a Glace-A-Tron 6000? Or a Cuisinart ice cream maker? Or the neato ice cream making balls that shuna mentioned?

How about two plastic baggies? kidsdomain.com gives a guide to making ice cream in plastic bags. Put ingredients in small baggie. Put ice and salt and small baggie into large baggie. Shake, shake, shake.

via boing boing

Pairing Wine With Indian Food

The Chronicle's wine section today offers a guide to pairing wine with Indian food.

If you ask about which wine to pair with Indian food, expect a one-word answer. Usually Gewurztraminer. Perhaps Riesling. Maybe Syrah.
An entire culture's cuisine to be paired with a single varietal? Ridiculous.

In fact, they suggest that Gewurztraminer isn't actually a good fit.

The New York Times On Dinner Parties

The New York Times has a close-to-home article about foodie dinner parties. Modern hosts worry about serving the best food, finding the most local ingredients, using the best china, hand making everything, receiving judgment about their food, and so forth. (I love the line, "his and her subscriptions to The Art of Eating;" I imagine Ed will also laugh to see his quarterly love letter to the traditional food of the world—often the product of rural frugality—cast as a must-have bourgeois accessory, though the demographic is probably accurate.)

Too bad the author could only find hosts who care more about the impression they make than the joy of friendship; these people sound dreary. Our dinner parties sit far to the right on the bell curve, but I don't cook the way I do to impress people: I cook the way I do because I enjoy it, and I want to do something special for our friends. I get to try out dishes I probably wouldn't do for Melissa and me. I buy special ingredients or hand make them because they taste better, not because I want to pass muster with my guests. We like chatting with our friends over good food and wine, and where better to do so than the comfort of our own home?

I stress about dinner parties, but only because I want the food to taste good, not because I'm worried that my friends will think less of me if something isn't perfect. I could probably name a dozen things I wasn't happy about for Clotilde's dinner party—from subtle flavor quibbles to components that never made it out of the kitchen—but I don't imagine that any of the guests went home thinking, "Well, too bad that didn't work out." Of course, as I've said before, the real secret is to not tell your dinner guests what went wrong. If you're not going to fess up, why stress?

Is the article sketching a difference between New Yorkers and Bay Areans? Or just me and other foodies? How do you feel when you host a dinner party? Are you out to impress? I'd love to hear what you think of the article.

One last thing: I agreed with the idea that foodies who throw fancy dinner parties don't get many invitations in return. Our friends are often intimidated to have us over. But, really, you could order Domino's and beer and we'd be happy guests; the point is to hang out and enjoy each other's company.

via Ethicurean, whose digest writer and husband were actually at Clotilde's dinner, where I did in fact serve home-cured olives.

Random Web Links

You've heard of alternative closures for bottles? Today's Fart Party comic offers alternative openers.

My co-worker Young sent me a link to these French Wine 101 PDFs. They offer very basic information about key French regions.

People assume that we eat fancy meals every night, but we don't. I'm usually not even hungry come dinnertime; lack of appetite is a standard feature of computer programmers. The people who do trot out a drool-worthy meal every night are our friends Jen and Mike, and she chronicles those dishes at Last Night's Dinner

Sushi Bar Video

Put a video camera onto the moving conveyor belt of a sushi bar, and you end up with a portrait of the bar from the sushi's perspective. I find it very touching in a snapshot-of-human-life kind of way.

via Heather Champ

No, Not That Edward Behr

My condolences to the friends, family, and admirers of Edward Behr, the British war correspondent and prolific writer who passed away yesterday.

That Edward Behr is not, despite what the Associated Press says, the Edward Behr who wrote The Artful Eater and who publishes The Art of Eating quarterly. He is alive and, I hope, well.

The Chef Programming Language

I have a fondness for the esoteric programming languages of the world. I'm not talking about Smalltalk or Prolog, languages out of the mainstream but in general use; no, I'm talking about ones such as Befunge and Whitespace, languages that no one in their right mind would use. (Of course, some might say that about Prolog.)

Imagine my delight, then, to discover Chef, a programming language where the instructions read like a recipe. Commands include "put x in the bowl" and "mix together."

Stilton Perfume: Da Ba Dee Da Ba Die

Stilton has launched a new perfume that puts blue cheese in a bottle. Truffles? I could see. Chocolate? It could work. But blue cheese perfume? I'd have to smell it to believe it.

via Table of Malcontents

Clark Smith on Sweet Spots and Food

After my Vinovation piece came out in The Art of Eating, the magazine received a small flood of letters, some of which are published in the current issue. One of those came from Mark Anisman, who asked how a wine's sweet spot did or did not change in the presence of food. A wine's sweet spot is the alcohol level at which it tastes the most balanced; for any given wine, there may be 3 or 4 such spots, scattered about the field of possibilities.

Anisman argues that Vinovation works in a vacuum where food is not considered, even though most people drink wine with food. I agree that this is a failing of wine criticism, but I do wonder how much cellar work—which is how I would label sweet spot evaluation—is done with food in hand.

Anisman left a similar comment here, and I posed the question to Clark. He posted his response, with my original email, on his blog.

FTC To Investigate Food And Beverage Companies

A few years ago, I saw Marion Nestle speak at Cody's Books. She noted that food companies were worried about future obesity lawsuits. The message I got from her talk was, "They know they're vulnerable to attack." Or as Coca-Cola's Chief Creative Officer Esther Lee, says in this article at AdAge, "Our Achilles heel is the discussion about obesity." So you can imagine their concern at the news that the FTC will conduct a widespread probe into advertising aimed at children and the healthfulness of those products.

From the article:

And it's getting even bigger as the Federal Trade Commission takes the extreme step of issuing compulsory requests for information from 44 food, beverage and quick-service restaurant chains this summer. The goal is to get a "more complete picture" of their kid-marketing practices, especially in the unplumbed arenas of in-store promotions, events, packaging, internet marketing and product placement in video games, movies and TV programs.

Colbert on rBGH

Just in case you've missed the link on the other food blogs you read, go watch Stephen Colbert's satirical look at rBGH. rBGH: It's Jesus for cows.

Bees And Cell Phones

A decade or more ago, I bought a book called Why Things Bite Back, and one of its key points was that technology solves old problems but creates new ones. Call it the Law of Conservation of Anxiety.

I thought of that book when I read today's news that some scientists believe that cell phone usage has created Colony Collapse Disorder. CCD is a catastrophe breaking over world agriculture like a tsunami. Bee colonies have been shutting down left and right in unprecedented numbers for no good reason. Why is this a problem? Because a wide range of farmers rely on bees to pollinate their crops. No bees, no crops, no food.

But I have to wonder about this theory, which arises from the fact that bees won't return to the hive when someone's using a cell phone in their vicinity. Why this year? Shouldn't we have seen a gradual decline in bee colonies inversely proportional to increased cell phone usage? And how would it spread to Europe from the U.S., given that Europe has deeper cell phone penetration than this country? Or is there a tipping point at work here? Or is it not just cell phones, but the increasingly ubiquitous wifi networks?

Scientists around the world are scrambling to find an explanation for CCD, so you can expect to hear any number of theories in the coming months. Fingers have already pointed to global warming; as with the cell phone theory, no experiments have shown conclusive connections.

And if cell phones are the problem, how do we fix that? Tell everyone to stop using them? Or require users to only call from a shielded place, such as a car?

Where Did The Feast Move From?

A fellow National Puzzlers' League member posed a question to the mailing list: Where does movable feast come from? The answer isn't "the title of a Hemingway novel." A flurry of word geeks chimed in, and I guess it's no surprise that Wikipedia gives the full scoop. Christian holidays tied to a particular date, such as a saint's day or Christmas, are immovable feasts. Christian holidays that can shift around the calendar, such as Easter, are movable feasts. Now you know.

Speaking of movable feasts, the rules for calculating Easter's date for any given year are deliciously complicated and worth a look. Über-mathematician John Conway published the algorithm, an adjunct to his system for determining the day of week of any given date, in the second volume of the original Winning Ways series. I don't have the new versions handy as I write this, but I'd guess it's now in Winning Ways Volume 4.

To Get The Ungettable Table

Want a seat at a hot restaurant? Read this Wall Street Journal article before it disappears behind the paywall next week. My friend Aren gets a mention for his website, where he helps people get a table at The French Laundry.

Around The Web

The Onion did a "man on the street" segment about Burger King's small steps toward more humane food. The responses will give you a nice Monday chuckle.

My friend Louisa Thomas Hargrave, founder of the Long Island wine industry, gave me a heads-up about Zabibu, a blog chronicling Louise Leakey's efforts to make wine in Africa. Louise represents the current generation of the famous Leakey family, who have unearthed and explored Africa's role as the cradle of humanity.

Meanwhile, Tish reminded me about Martha Stewart's attempt to trademark Katonah. She'd like to use her hometown's name as a brand, but unfortunately other people live there as well, and for some reason they object to the idea. Would they have to put little ™ symbols on their return addresses? Would we, sending mail into the town? Tish has attacked the problem with his signature wit, putting out a satirical newsletter that skewers the Stewart empire.

Psst! Hey, you! Want some cheap Brunello?

Jack sent me links to a guest blogger's posts at Brooklynguy's Wine and Food Blog. Deetrane is a wine bargain hunter, and found a great source for bottles well below market value. But you'd be right to suspect a wine source who provided awesome deals as long as you met him on street corners.

Read Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 of this tale of intrigue and suspense.

Wolfgang Puck Throws Himself Behind Ethical Food

The Humane Society of the United States sent me a press release pointing to this New York Times article. Wolfgang Puck will seek out ethical foods for his restaurants and, most importantly, his sprawling consumer-product line.

He's taking fairly small steps: no pork from producers who keep breeding sows in gestation crates, no eggs from battery chickens, no foie gras, no veal from anyone who uses individual veal crates. But he's a major buyer and one of the most famous of the celebrity chefs; it sends a message that the Americans who buy his products or eat at his restaurants care about ethically raised food.

Don't Drop That Fork

My co-worker Aaron sent me this link to Dinner in the Sky. It's not airplane food but a table suspended 50 meters in the air "by a team of professionals." Twenty-two diners get the table for eight hours for about 8000 euros. Don't worry if it rains; the table has a canopy. I assume dessert is "pie in the sky."

Too bad this didn't exist—or I didn't know about it—when I went to Belgium for IPP; I'm sure I could've rounded up a few people to try it with me.

Clinking Glasses

Why do we clink glasses during a toast? It's not to prove the wine isn't poisoned, says urban legend debunking site Snopes.com. Read their explanation of this tradition.

Burros on Whole Foods

Brett mentioned this in the comments to my recap of the Pollan-Mackey event, but I know not everyone skims the comments. Marian Burros wrote a piece in today's New York Times asking if Whole Foods is straying from its idealistic roots. Worth a read, though be sure to check out Ric's response in my previous post.

Pankegg

Videoblogger ze frank demonstrates how to make a pankegg, "not quite a pancake, not quite an egg." The demonstration is near the end of the video, so skip ahead if you'd like.

Violent Acres On Children's Diets

The caustic voice behind the Violent Acres blog asserts, with only a few points of empirical evidence, that processed food and special attention turn kids into picky eaters. It's worth noting that she doesn't have kids (or I don't think she does), but Jacques Pepin suggested the same principle. He's always seemed to have a good attitude: This is what we're eating for dinner, and if you don't like it the kitchen is right over there.

But I'll let you parents make your own decisions about her post.

Slate on Pollan's Latest

Every food blogger has pointed to Pollan's sprawling New York Times article about "nutritionism." I'll add my voice to the multitude: You should read it.

Because I enjoy being perverse, however, I'd also suggest that you read Slate's rebuttal. I generally side with Pollan, but I'm happy to read critical analyses of anyone's work.

Whole Foods Advertises Violation of Its Own Rules?

Many of you know that I'm always happy to bash Whole Foods. I disapprove of its anti-union philosophy, its phony "we love local food" stance, and its bullying of Grimaud Farms.

So you can imagine how happy I was when Erik Sherman sent me a link to his post about dyed salmon in Whole Foods. He noticed a tag informing the consumer that the fish was dyed, which is a good practice, but then he wondered how this fits into the company's stated policy to avoid all foods with artificial colorings and flavorings. Of course, the dye is probably a "natural" dye in the way that soda has "natural" flavors, but I'd argue that dyed fish goes against the spirit of the company's marketing message, if not the letter. The PR representatives haven't responded to his emailed queries yet, says Erik.

Update: Erik received a response from Whole Foods and dissects it on his site.

Achewood Had Dinner At Alinea

Or so I assume from today's comic strip about molecular gastronomy, complete with gratuitous quote marks.

via Phil

A Rare Convergence of Hobbies

Some of you know that alongside my passion for food and wine, I have a deep-seated love for puzzles of all shapes and sizes. So you can imagine my excitement when I learned that Hanayama, one of Japan's best commercial puzzle producers, has partnered with the chocolate company Meiji Seika to produce chocolate polyonimo puzzles. (The fact that I can also enthuse about several Japanese artisanal puzzle makers should tell you something about my other hobby.) I have a plastic polyonimo "chocolate bar" puzzle somewhere in my collection of mechanical puzzles, but not one with a famous Japanese chocolate maker's name on the label.

via Josh

The Perfect Guide to Choosing Wine

For those who like tongue and cheek, see Todd Levin's guide to choosing wine.

When the waiter arrives with your wine, you'll obviously need to remind him that his station is beneath you by barking demands while he pours, like, "Keep it coming, Robespierre," or, "Don't forget that I can buy and sell you, you miserable cur." Then, when your server has completed the pour, it is customary to raise your hand as if to strike his face.

via Phil

Around The Web

Melissa and I were away for the long weekend, and we find ourselves catching up with a few interesting pieces.

Dan Barber wrote an in-depth op-ed piece for the New York Times that articulates many of the problems with our current agricultural system. Unfortunately, he uses taste as the lead-in to his many useful points. A cry for flavor smacks of food snobbery to many, even if he's right that small farms and local distribution networks make for better-tasting ingredients. Most people in the country don't know or don't remember that non-industrial food tastes better. When factories have placed uninteresting eggs into every store in the country, who knows about small-farm eggs? Food snobs and those lucky enough to live in an area where they can buy that level of food.

Food and Wine magazine offers advice on cooking locally, if you live in California or Vermont. I don't envy a national magazine that has to cover local eating, since by definition readers' options will be different in different parts of the country. Still, it's always nice to see the topic brought to national attention, and the article does offer some insights for the locavore in winter.

Chow provides a primer on the cutting-edge science used in famous kitchens. The writer even knows to warn you away from the term "molecular gastronomy."

Catherine Finishes Writing About My Class

Catherine's been posting tasting notes from my Wines of Germany and Eastern Europe class. She posted about the last two classes, Hungary and Croatia, Romania, and Slovenia. I found a moderate amount of wines from these regions, some good and some less so.

There's still time to sign up for my Spring class, Fundamentals of Wine II (note that you don't need to take Fundamental I first). It'll be a fun course, so buy a seat for yourself and 15 of your closest friends.

Positive Study Results? Check the Funder.

HealthDay has an article about a study of studies. When beverage companies fund a study, the results are more likely to come down in the beverage's favor.

Shocking, I know. But it's worth remembering when you see scientific studies trumpeting the health benefits of your favorite beverage.

In 1993, Stephen Jay Gould wrote an essay entitled "Cordelia's Dilemma" describing the aversion to publishing negative results. Few scientists put forth a hypothesis and then publish results that don't support it. At best, they silently discard the results, ensuring that other scientists have to duplicate their work. At worst, they run the experiment until the results support the hypothesis, and then they publish those results. You don't see the 99 other trials that failed. It's easy to see how a corporate funder could create a "Cordelia's Dilemma" for a research team.

via BodyHack

Spit Like A Pro

A co-worker pointed me toward this Slate article about professional wine-spitting technique. I am not a great spitter, but I can feel Steinberger's piece tugging at my obsessive streak.

Foie Gras Without Force-Feeding?

In a post at The Ethicurean, I noticed a link to an article describing a Spanish foie gras that received the Coup de Coeur award for innovation at the Paris International Food Salon.

The surprise here isn't the country of origin: Spain, like Belgium, produces a small amount of foie gras. Look instead to the farmer's technique.

The producer claims he made the foie gras without force-feeding the birds, relying on their tendency to bulk up for migration. If he's got the real thing, he would be the savior of the foie gras industry. Animal activists focus on the force-feeding; take it away, and their argument disappears. Of course I felt the urge to comment.

It's always been possible to produce high-fat livers without force-feeding the birds through gavage (using a tube to feed the birds, a practice that dates back to Roman times). But consumers have never accepted the product as foie gras. Well, not for a couple hundred years. I note that the article doesn't mention how the innovate foie gras tastes next to traditional foie gras.

Geese, which Pateria de Sousa uses, might adapt to "free range foie" more than ducks would. Geese sometimes eat more on their own than they get in a foie gras feeding, though they don't sustain that eating habit as long as gavage lasts.

But geese cause headaches for foie gras producers. You can't artificially inseminate them, so a farmer can only sell fresh foie gras during the winter season, when Spring's goslings have come of age. And they stress more readily than ducks. When the stoic Mulard breed came on the scene in the 1970s, it transformed the industry overnight. Fifty years ago, 90 per cent of the birds for foie gras were geese. Today, only 20 per cent are.

I'm skeptical of the Sousa product; if it were that simple to produce good foie gras without force-feeding, someone would have done it. As I say, non-force-fed foie gras is the Holy Grail, and everyone's looking for it. Still, if anyone has more information, I'd love to hear it.

Engineering Mad Cow Out Of Cows

File this under "Two wrongs don't make a right." Scientists have announced that they've genetically engineered cows to be resistant to mad cow disease, according to Wired's Bodyhack blog. The prions behind the brain-wasting illness didn't take hold in the engineered cows.

The company that did the work isn't interested in cows destined for beef, and the results are still early, but how long do you think we'll have to wait until the government approves GMO cows as a solution to mad cow disease, itself a by-product of our industrialized agriculture and our demand for cheap meat? GMO will become the new irradiation, applying a Band-Aid to a problem instead of dodging the injury in the first place.

Tracking E. Coli With Technology

Ever wonder how the CDC traced the sources of the recent E. Coli outbreaks—one in spinach and another at Taco Bell? Computerworld has an article about the software the government used. Tracking DNA fingerprints sounds like an episode of Numb3rs, but our real abilities are almost as impressive as the fictional feats of mathematics from the TV show.

via Slashdot

Wired Rattles Its Sabers

Wired offers advice on sabering Champagne bottles—slicing off the top of the bottle, cork and glass and all. Too bad Wired couldn't find any actual sabering adepts to teach the flamboyant move. I can name a few people in the Bay Area who are experts at the technique, and I've done it once or twice (with mixed results). Instead, the technology magazine consulted one person at K & L Wines who has "seen the move in a movie" and then the author links to YouTube video demonstrations, which are fun to watch if you've never seen someone saber a bottle before.

Noka Over The Coals

I've never heard of Dallas confectioner Noka, but I found this wordy analysis of their high-priced candies to be an amusing read. The unidentified writer notes that the hefty price tag pays for simple confections made with common chocolate. Nothing in the ten-page article will surprise anyone who knows the basics of chocolate-making, but it's still worth a skim to see how the writer attacks their prices and their claims.

via boing boing and Jack

The Freshest Fish?

I don't know if chefs forage for seafood outside the world's first undersea restaurant, but wouldn't that be a great show for the tony dining room?

The restaurant serves the Hilton in the Maldives, and it's sort of a reverse aquarium: You don't surround the fish; they surround you.

via Wired's Table of Malcontents blog.

Lenn's New York Wine Club

Originally uploaded by Lenn Thompson.

New York's wine regions have received good press, but it can be difficult to find the wines outside that state. Our friend Lenn, who champions the Empire State's wine regions in print and from his blog LENNDEVOURS, has started a wine club to showcase interesting New York wines. Each month he'll choose two wines, and the Green Grape Wine Company will send them to your door. Lenn's palate and interests should produce some great choices.

Regina Schrambling on Olive Garden

If you have never found your way to Regina Schrambling's gastropoda, you're missing one of the best sources for pointed commentary on the food world, with not-so-occasional swipes at the current Presidential administration. She wields a skewer like an expert swordsperson, and nothing escapes her gaze.

It's a good thing I wasn't drinking my water as I read her commentary on Olive Garden; I might have shorted out my laptop.

Figuring out what caused the food poisoning at Olive Garden may be even trickier than it has been for Taco Bell. Investigators are asking diners to bring in both their doggie bags and their stool samples. The mystery is how they will be able to tell the difference.

Austrian Wines By Catherine

Catherine at Purple Liquid has posted her notes and pictures from my class's third meeting, where we discussed the wines of Austria's Kremstal, Kamptal, and Wachau regions. Sadly, Catherine missed the fourth class (Austria's Thermenregion, Burgenland, and Styria), but I'll let you know when she has the fifth and sixth classes up.

FarmPolicy.com

I learned of the FarmPolicy.com newsletter from The Ethicurean, but I just caught up on the emails the other day. Keith Good pulls key news items off the web and summarizes them in a daily message, providing an ongoing snapshot of the national debate about the state of American farms, which are of course the source of American food.

The newsletter is required reading for anyone who cares about the domestic food supply and the policies that shape it.

Vinegar-making and Rowan Jacobsen on The Restaurant Guys

Rowan Jacobsen took the managing editor position at The Art of Eating about two years ago. He's a good editor, pushing me in different ways than Ed, and he has a colorful writing style that I like. One of his recent articles for the magazine covered umami, the fifth taste that Westerners have just begun to discuss and study in an overt way. The Restaurant Guys had Rowan on their show to discuss the subject. That would be reason enough to listen, but the first 15 minutes focus on vinegar-making, a subject dear to my heart.

Here's the link to the MP3.

Chronicle Wine Gift Guide

Need a holiday host present or stocking stuffer for the wine lover in your life? The Chronicle has posted a sprawling gift guide to aid your buying decisions. Books, glassware, and, of course, wine all have separate sections.

It won't take long to figure out my favorite item in the guide: my byline as one of the contributors.

Photo by John Lee of the San Francisco Chronicle