Last week, I made a foray into a (sort of) non-wine related piece of writing for Playboy.com’s Nightlife section, contributing to what they call the “1% Travel Guide.”

The idea behind that guide is to feature travel destinations so remote, or so extreme, or so exclusive, or so expensive (or some combination of the four) that 99% of us will likely never get to experience them.

Some of us get to piggy-back on that world, though. We usually go by the title of “winemaker” or “wine media,” and I fall into the latter category. Which means that occasionally I get hosted in surroundings that are ridiculously beautiful and/or ridiculously expensive, because I’m not fitting most/any of the bill myself. When I visited Napa as a guest of C. Milan Communications earlier this year, that’s precisely where I found myself, so I pitched the idea to Playboy about giving my hotel at that time – the Poetry Inn, owned by Cliff Lede (yes, that Cliff Lede, whose Stags Leap wine facility is visible from the Inn’s hillside perch, so this is actually a little bit wine-related) – a possible feature in the 1% section.

Since I got paid for the Playboy.com piece, I can now afford what I’d calculate to be a few minutes stay back in the Poetry Inn’s suite…

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Last week I was interviewed by the IntoWine.com folks (these are the same folks who engendered a great deal of controversy in the wine world when they released their first annual list of  the “Top 100 Most Influential People in the U.S. Wine Industry“).

IntoWine.com was (overly) kind in their introduction of me at the start of the piece (thanks, guys!), but otherwise you might find it readable so I’m mentioning it here. I’m not sure why I was so frank and edgy in my responses, maybe the Playboy.com gig is rubbing off (ha! sorry, couldn’t resist that) on me.

Speaking of the Playboy.com gig, my latest article in the Wined Down series posted last week, an interview with Master Sommelier Fred Dexheimer on how to successfully navigate a restaurant wine list (for more on Fred, check out the video interview I did with him a few weeks ago).

I mention the latest PB column not only because it gives you an excuse to go look at pictures of beautiful, scantily-clad women for a few minutes, but also because I happened to pen it and PB happened to launch it the same day that a minor sh*t storm broke out on Tyler Colman’s excellent DrVino.com, around the comments made about modern wine lists by NY Post restaurant critic Steve Cuozzo. If you think my take on retailers, distributors and importers was harsh in the IntoWine.com interview, wait until you see Cuozzo’s remarks in the comments of Tyler’s post…

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In what’s become a surreal state of affairs, the list of California cult wines that I’ve yet to try in some way/shape/form is dwindling. Quickly.

The surreal part is that there is no way that I could afford these wines on my own, and in some cases I wouldn’t want to pay the money for them, anyway.

That’s not quite the case for one of the newest wines to join the cult cadre, the worst-kept-secret Napa Valley Cab that I featured in the latest Wined Down column over at Playboy.com: Tusk, a new partnership with what-a-surprise-okay-not-really Philippe Melka at the winemaking helm.

The story over at Playboy.com has the whole, well, story on my initiation into the Secret House Of Tusk, from the former movie mogul mansion they are converting into their annual party crash pad, to their play to be one of the first real “populist” cult wines by eschewing ratings and implementing a “two degrees of separation” member list policy; so I’m not going to repeat it here, and will instead urge you to go over there and read it, and then buy 700 subscriptions for all of your friends. I will provide you with a bit more on the tasting note front, though, in case you’ve got a serious amount of wine fund money burning a hole in your rich-ass pockets…

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Okay, so there are a couple of reasons behind my pronouncement that people ought to be drinking rosé wine all year long and not just during the flowery, blooming, highly-allergenic (I really should have bought stock in a tissue paper company) months of Spring.

First is that a good rosé is often one of the most versatile, food-friendly wines that can possibly adorn your dinner table. The other is that… well… rosé will probably get you laid. So naturally that became the logical choice as the topic for the first article I submitted for my new column at Playboy.com (but for scheduling reasons became the second in the series to be published). For those offended by the nature of that theme, I apologize; for the other 99.8% of you reading this, I’ll accept your thanks for saying what was on your mind already (you’re welcome, by the way…).

I loved writing that article (which was penned a couple of months ago, and posted last week at the re-launched, safe-for work – but only just! – Playboy.com). It’s fun (sometimes, anyway) to face into a widely-held perception, especially an edgy one, but then sort-of turn it on its ear (in this case, building an argument for rosé that actually speaks to female empowerment and compromise in a relationship), hopefully without it all ending up either too trite or too stodgy. You’ll have to let me know if I came close to the intended goal on that one.

I mention in the article one of my personal favorite rosé wines, and one that I’ve found myself recommending often over the course of the last few years:

2010 Paul Jaboulet Parallele 45 Rose (Cotes du Rhone)
Price: Around $12
Rating: B

My “mini-review” for this wine consisted of the following note: “Bring on the Provençal fare any time. And bring on the the dancing girls, too;” which just about sums up the two major thematic points I was trying to drive home about a good rosé in the Playboy.com article. Red berries, flowers, even a tiny hint of meat dazzle like a well-rehearsed Kenjutsu display, and then tangy red fruits unleash palate kung-fu for a close-in,hand-to-hand bout with your food. If we take fighting as more of a kick-ass dance between equals in the martial arts sense, I mean, and not in the awkward-battle-inside-your-mouth sense. Okay, you’re right, that comparison totally doesn’t work… I should have stuck to the sensual stuff…

Cheers!