No, not drink a bunch of crappy, low-end Pinot Grigio. C’mon, I’m not insane here.

No, I’m talking about taking a vacation.  As in, a real vacation and not one in which I actually end up visiting something like 75 wine producers over five days.

Mrs. Dudette and I are going on a bit of a second honeymoon, flying off to the greater Tuscany area for the better part of ten days (!), and generally getting away from it all.  Including getting away (albeit briefly) from 1WineDude.com (though I suspect, given the location, that the wine bug will bite, we will visit some producers, and I’ll end up reporting on it from Tuscany – WiFi availability permitting – in some way/shape/form, mostly because I’m a compulsive and anal Right Coaster and generally-speaking am unable to help myself)…

Having said that, we’re not even taking laptop computers with us this time.  The last time the Mrs. and I did something like this, we ended up in some pretty remote parts of Kenya (you can read about some of that jaunt here and here – face-rocking photog evidence of Kenya’s overall stunning-ness is available from that trip here and here).  I even renewed the passport (yet again!), just to avoid the hassles I’ve encountered lately at passport control when coming back into the U.S. (apparently, Russian and South African visas, combined with stamps from Belgium, South America, and various parts of Eastern Europe, along with about one million visits to Heathrow airport arouses suspicion on the part of Immigration officials these days… I mean, c’mon, don’t I look trustworthy?!??).

Ironically, we chose a wine-country destination for this second honeymoon but the trip has nothing to do with wine whatsoever, wine press junkets, or the like – we just both haven’t been there and have always wanted to go, and we want to be annoying, in-love tourists on this trip, and not wine pros.  I.e., we’ll be drinking mostly, rather than tasting and critiquing, and trying to give our lives the Under The Tuscan Sun treatment, only for real and not in some over-Disneyfied way of making everything Tuscan by presenting it on earthen, sepia-toned colors and serving fresh-baked bread with it.

All of which is a long way of saying that 1WD articles will probably be infrequent (or is that frequently sporadic?) over the next several days.  Actually, what it means is that comment response by me will be infrequent over the next several days, and then articles might be a bit infrequent as I catch up on things.  But fear not, because your financial investment for 1WD content ($0.00) has already been automatically refunded into your checking account! You should stick around this week, though, because there’s an EPICLY wicked video interview posting here tomorrow that will melt your face with the guest‘s awesomeness.

More to come from Italy!  Stay tuned…

Cheers!

Copyright © 2011. Originally at Vacation? What Vacation?!?? (Nine Days Under The Tuscan Sun) from 1WineDude.com - for personal, non-commercial use only. Cheers!

Mentioned in this episode:

• WSET Certifications
• Society of Wine Educators Certifications
• Court of Master Sommeliers
• Bad-ass wine gal Mary Ewing-Mulligan [ insert whatever wine-related creds/initials here, she has just about all of them ]

Cheers!

Copyright © 2011. Originally at 1WineDude TV Episode 29: Certifiable (or “How–and Which–Wine Certifications Really Matter”) from 1WineDude.com - for personal, non-commercial use only. Cheers!

“A bottle of good wine, like a good act, shines ever in the retrospect.” – Robert Louis Stevenson

Stevenson had it right about special wines being eminently memorable, though he forgot to add the part about how wine tasting, like a hot date, owes so much to anticipation.

And as much as I like to think that I am inching ever closer to the Zen mystery, it’s really difficult not to put expectations on a tasting in which magnums of 1995 Champagne and Graham’s Vintage Port (1977), as well as bottles of 1981 Vieux Chateau Certan, take second billing.

Which is exactly what happens when you have a bottle of (genuine) 1929 Haut-Brion in the lineup.

That’s because the 1929 Haut-Brion is one of those extremely rare triple threats: world-class producer, renowned vintage (before every other release was deemed “vintages of the century” in Bordeaux) and rare old wine (in decent condition).

Or so we had hoped, anyway.

As it turns out, that fabled bottle that had me (and several other guests at the Columbia Firehouse restaurant in old town Alexandria, VA) buzzing with anticipation last week had apparently leaked at some point in it’s 81-year history.

Uh-oh.

We (a group of about 15 people) were assembled as the hand-picked guests of my buddy Jason Whiteside, DWS (Washington Wine Academy instructor, friend of the Dude and frequent guest poster here) to celebrate the achievement of his WSET Diploma in Wine & Spirits (a pre-req for entrance into the Masters of Wine program).  It’s a difficult and hard-earned achievement, well-worthy of opening some special bottles.  As our generous host put it after inspecting the most special of that night’s bottles, “this wine could be deader than Lincoln”…

Haut-Brion, of course, has been special for a long time, having first come to the attention of the wine-loving public outside of France in the 1600s – or so goes the story as taken from the diaries of Samuel Pepys, who on April 10, 1663 recorded his first encounter with HB:

“…a sort of French wine called Ho Bryan, that hath a good and most perticular taste that I never met with.”

Haut-Brion kept up its reputation into the 1800s, being classified as a First Growth in the oft-cited but never-intended-to-have-any-staying-power 1855 classification of Bordeaux wines (the only producer outside of the Medoc to be included in the top tier).  Most  modern critics agree that Haut-Brion has been consistently stellar since the mid-seventies.

1929 is widely regarded as a special and superb vintage for Bordeaux, and it’s been speculated that the dry and warm conditions that year created an almost “cooked must” situation during fermentation that is partly responsible for the longevity and aging potential of that year’s wines.  Rainfall was about half of its normal amount that year, and the temperature sum was 103% of the average at the time.  According to HB itself:

“A hot, extremely dry year, the driest since the start of the century. The juices were very concentrated and the wines characterized by an enormous richness of tannin. Wines slow to mature, but with exceptional structure.”

Now, you’re patiently waiting for the tasting note on that `29, right?

But the theme of this article is anticipation, remember?  So, you’re gonna have to wait.  I know, I’m incorrigible…

Retail prices of the 1929 Haut-Brion reflect its rarity and the general perception of the vintage’s quality.  Expect to spend somewhere around three grand USD for a 750ml bottle (if you can find one).

It was a long lead-up of excellent wine and food pairing courses to the “main event,” and we tasted several stellar wines from Jason’s stash; not that you care, but here’s the list (you see, not unlike those really lengthy and dramatic Catholic weddings, I’m all about keeping you as long as possible from the “consummating act” of this article):

• Bollinger NV Special Cuvee Brut (tasted from magnum) – Green apple, bread, and a ridiculously luxurious finish
• 1995 Pierre Moncuit Champagne Blanc de Blancs Grand Cru (tasted from magnum) – Sour red apple dominated, still very fresh & fruity
• 2005 Domaine William Fevre Chablis Grand Cru – Refined and smooth, with citrus & tons of minerality; beguiling, really, apart from some unpleasant reduction notes
• 2006 Bouchard Père et Fils Santenay – Stellar; very “feminine” with a light touch of bright red cherry fruit and smoke
• 1981 Vieux Chateau Certan – Major-league earth, cigar & tobacco, with a killer palate of savory soy sauce
• 2002 Geyser Peak Reserve Alexandre Meritage (tasted from double magnum) – A little heavy-handed but I found it quite solid with good black fruit notes and not too extracted; it was clearly despised by a majority of my Francophile dinning partners, however, for its blatant “California” / New World style
• 1977 Graham’s Vintage Port (tasted from magnum) – Dried fig flavors were prominent, but it lacked the velvety texture you’d expect, and was very “spirty”on the palate

Which leaves us with that `29 HB.

Fortunately, the tales of this wine’s demise were greatly exaggerated.  Improbably, the wine was not only still drinkable, it was downright lively and it still had perceptible fruit.  At 81 years young.  I know, right?!??

Here are my (expanded) tasting notes:

“Visibly aged but still has some shine. The first sniff is a huge whiff of crushed walnut shell that I will probably never forget and will clearly be a reference point for any long-aged wines that I taste from this point onwards.

Seems impossible but there are notes of dried cherry fruit still on the palate once the walnut action calms down, and the fruit is very pure.  A hint of soy on the nose, with smoke and some game, followed by truffle.  Palate is very, very savory and the mouthfeel is really smooth.  “Elegant” and “stately” come to mind.

The most improbable aspect of all is the acid. This wine, at 80+ years on, has enough acid that it could easily be paired with food, which is by any practical measure a chemical miracle. I’m shocked – and would have considered it an impossibility after seeing the crumbled cork and leakage when the bottle was opened.

Still strong after about 20 minutes, but the savory notes are beginning to take over.  Will be gulping the last remnants down before it turns into vinegar in the glass.”

And I did, in fact, gulp the remaining bit down in one big slurp – better to do it then, I figured, and enjoy it, than to wait until it was nigh-undrinkable.

I’m tempted to say that this was a once in a lifetime experience, but I think that Jason has a second bottle in even better condition… so I plan on staying on his good side for the foreseeable future…

Cheers!

Copyright © 2011. Originally at Tasting A Legend: Going to Head-to-Head with Haut-Brion 1929 from 1WineDude.com - for personal, non-commercial use only. Cheers!

And it got me thinking that YOU probably should get a wine certification.  it also got me thinking about the remote area of Shompole in Kenya, where even in a place where you have to buzz the runway in a small Cesna to scare zebras off of it before you can land, they saw value in the WSET certification (more on that in a minute).

Chances are if you’re reading this, you’re a passionate wine enthusiast, a wine professional, or a wine writer (or any combination of one or more of those).  Actually, according to Alexa.com stats on my blog, chances are you’re a female between the ages of 25 and 44 with a decent amount of disposable income, living in the U.S. and surfing this blog from your work computer (shame on you!).

Anyway, I am growing increasingly convinced that wine certification suits 1WineDude.com readers, and is growing more an more applicable to a larger and larger audience of wine lovers.  And I’m gonna give you three reasons why YOU should get a cert.  And No, I don’t work for any of those certification bodies.

I know what you might be thinking, which is something along the lines of “Why do I need a certification to be an expert on how much I like or dislike what I shove into my mouth?!??” And the answer of course is that you don’t need a certification for that.

You need it for other reasons.  Hear me out before you shut me out – first I need to take you to the hot salt flats of the Great Rift Valley in remote Kenya…

First thing you need to understand is that there are tons of wine certs out there, and most of them don’t mean bumpkis outside of the town in which they’re based.  Gaiser’s article contains a table outlining some of the wine certification / education bodies that have the most clout, and while it’s still admittedly a bit of alphabet soup in terms of confusing multiple acronyms following people’s names, it’s a good place to start to find a cert. that will mean something to the world at large.

Which brings us to Shompole.

A few years ago, my wife and I spent our honeymoon touring through Kenya. Our first stop (after landing in Nairobi and being escorted through security in what I now think might have been a bribery scenario to get us through customs… not sure…) was via Cesna to the remote salt flats near Mt. Shompole, where we stayed in a Zen-like resort structure built into the surrounding hillsides.  The area consists of a) a Maasai village, b) Mt. Shompole, c) the resort, d) lots of intense wild animals that could kill you within seconds.  In other words, it was amazing, but difficult to convey just how remote this place is.  It borders Tanzania, and one day we drove through a dust storm to Lake Natron, which technically sits over the border in Tanzania.  the border was marked by a small obelisk, and a lone male wildebeest grazed nearby. Dennis, our Maasai guide, turned to me and jokingly asked, “we are at the border with Tanzania – do you have your passport?”  Borders mean nothing to these local people – or to the wildebeests.

We arrived at Shompole at the end of the “busy season” and had the entire place more-or-less to ourselves, and most night we dined with the proprietors.  When I expressed an interest in the South African wine that we we sharing at dinner, they asked me how I knew so much about wine and I told them about my then recent WSET certification.  They had heard of WSET and instantly invited me back to stay for a week, for free, if I was willing to come up with (and teach) a wine introduction program for their resort staff.

That’s the kind of opportunity that you won’t get without a certification – and it speaks to the power of the WSET brand worldwide.

So, apart from free lodging in beautiful, exotic, and dangerous remote locals, here are three other reasons you might want to consider getting certified:

Reason 1: You Will Taste Your Palate Off

If you want to get a bit more serious about your pursuit of all things gloriously wine, you need to taste.  A lot.  It’s the single most important thing that you can do to gain knowledge about wine, as well as to gain knowledge about your preferences in wine.  A good series of wine certification classes will give you the opportunity to do both.

Reason Two: Everyone Else Is Doing It

Ok, it’s not the greatest of reasons and your parents warned about the whole friends-jumping-off-of-bridges thing, but the fact of the matter is that it is becoming increasingly more popular to pursue and achieve these certifications, to the point where they are becoming harder to get into and are changing their exams and evolving their curriculum to become more challenging.

Reason Three: Show You Know

Do you need more justification on this than my Shompole story?  Really?  Ok, how’s this – there are a lot of people trying to get into the wine industry right now, and thousands of wine bloggers.  If you’re in either or both of those camps, then getting a well-recognized cert. can help you differentiate yourself in a crowded field.

Cheers (and happy educatin’)!

(images: 1windude.com)

Copyright © 2011. Originally at 3 Reasons Why YOU Should Get a Wine Certification (A Tale from Remote Kenya) from 1WineDude.com - for personal, non-commercial use only. Cheers!

The rage is relentless
We need a movement with a quickness
You are the witness of change
And to counteract
We gotta take the power back

Sometimes I wonder if the Internet should have a theme song.  I’d nominate Rage Against The Machine’s Take The Power Back, given the possibilities of democratization that the connected economy presents to us nearly every day.

That’s an overly-dramatic introduction to a couple of on-line surveys… but what the hell, why be afraid to revel in our time, right?

Anyway… frequent 1WineDude readers will know my good buddy (and uber wine-geek) Jason Whiteside, who is currently finishing up the challenging WSET Diploma program (the stepping-stone into Master of Wine qualification).  Jason is taking on a bit of wine consumer research as part of his WSET work, and he needs your help!

Below you will find links to two (very, very quick) surveys that Jason is running to collect consumer’s views on two hot topics in the wine world.  The first, rising alcohol levels, is a topic that generates just about as much passion as any other being discussed around wine today. The second is a more specific exploration into what wine consumers think about Sauvignon Blanc (which surprisingly also brings out strong opinions among true wine geeks).

I’ll defer to Jason to introduce the surveys:

“These surveys represent a small amount of consumer research, which is being done for the WSET Diploma (the Diploma is divided into six learning Units, and one of them is on “The Business of Wine”). Both surveys are about ten questions each, and should take less than three minutes to complete. Consumer preference doesn’t garner the attention that Wine Critic preference does, but surveys like this can help swing the power back to the people. Thank you very much for your time in filling out the surveys. Your answers will remain confidential; even I will not be able to see who answered what.”

The results will be published in a future 1WineDude article, so do us a favor and take 5 minutes to tell us your thoughts!

Have your say about Alcohol Levels and Wine:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=phsAHStgKrfzRRTWFmGFoQ_3d_3d

Tell us what you think about White Wine and Sauvignon Blanc:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=95Sodl9Wgd0d2i9iTu2gXw_3d_3d

Cheers!

Copyright © 2011. Originally at Take The Power Back: Have Your Say on Hot Wine Topics! from 1WineDude.com - for personal, non-commercial use only. Cheers!