I'm the Expert!

Hey baby! I've drunk wine since I was even shorter than I am now. I live in New York. I convinced a major publisher to publish a book I'm trying to write. I don't like Robert Parker. So there! Don't believe me? Look at my main blog:

http://alicefeiring.com/

They Think I Know About Wine?

Julie Brosterman of Woman & Wine---the intelligent wine website targeting a female audience---asked me to help out with an event she was staging for The Bank of America.

I came up with the concept of Greek wines. I did my ordering from Chambers Street, and at the end of the order I asked for my favorite, “Do you guys have Yellow Tail?” Tim almost choked on the request. It was an odd one when you put it in the context of the other wines I ordered like Riunite and Chateau la Heave. Most favorite wine stores don’t carry that 85-point Yellow Tail so I had to do some legwork. Finally, I hit pay dirt, Astor Place had it. The guy on the phone guilelessly asked me, “What flavors are you looking for?”

”What about shiraz?” I asked.

Buying the bottles I felt furtive--as if buying drugs on the street. Would I be recognized? The checkout woman asked with a wink-wink, "Having a party?"

Four bottles and $21 later I carried them to the event site, a slaughterhouse on 56th street, not to get pampered and poodled, but to run the dog and pony wine and food pairing; half of the pimps attending the event would get spa-ed while the other half got wined. Then they’d change places.

While the caterers were setting up in the spa’s ‘hair salon.’ I tasted the shiraz. I knew its reputation I knew what Parker said about it. I expected it to be inoffensive. I poured a half-inch into a glass, smelled it. At first sniff the wine seemed clean enough, low on aromatics, then hints of the garbagey rotted fruit came through. I took some in my mouth. The sugary fruit popped out like one of those pieces of gum that squirt in your mouth, explosive and delicious. I was confident that my financial world guests would feel similarly.

When my audience arrived I saw they were an enthusiastic bunch, more eager for this experience than I expected. I posed myself as the anti-Parker. “The wines I am going to present, except for one wine, our mystery wine, is off his radar,” I said.

It didn't have the laugh effect I hoped for because only of twenty people in the room only three knew who Parker was. Back to reading "Famous Jewish Comedians."

Wine Good, Parker Bad

Real wine, that is. Natural wine without modern-age laboratory engineered yeast strains, oak chip tea bags or the like. It's a real nuisance to have to rely on growing good grapes on good vineyards, then having to fuss with actually making good wine without adding additional acid, sugar or sulphur dioxide. Look to Coturri as a shining example of how to do it right.