The Wine Curmudgeon

Expensive wine 11: Domaine Leflaive Mâcon-Verzé 2007

You can buy decent Macon, the unoaked chardonnay from Burgundy, for about $10. And it's fine wine. Or you can splurge and buy the Macon-Verze (about $35, purchased). Trust the Wine Curmudgeon on this.

I don't often feel the need to wax poetic about wine in the manner of so many of my colleagues, but it's all I can do to restrain myself when it comes to this wine. So I'll leave it at this:

Pure. Clean. Acidic. Fresh. Fabulous. You name it, this wine has it. Is it expensive? You bet. Is it worth it? You bet. There is a reason why Domaine Leflaive has been in business for almost 300 years and is one of Burgundy's great producers, and you can taste the reason every time you take a sip of this wine.

Buy this wine for the holiday at the end of the week that shall remain nameless. Buy it if you want to taste chardonnay that hasn't been put through the California oak and malolactic wringer. Buy it if you love wine but have forgotten why you do.

expensive wine, French wine, Macon, white Burgundy, chardonnay, wine reviews

Wine of the week: Deinhard Riesling Classic 2006

The riesling renaissance in the United States is a wonderful thing to see. It means that Americans are becoming more comfortable with their own palates, and that they aren't embarrassed about drinking wine that isn't bone dry.

Which is where the Deinhard Classic (about $14, purchased) enters the picture. Germany's Deinhard family has been making wine for 200 years, so they probably aren't surprised to see Americans figure out that riesling can be quite enjoyable. And this wine is enjoyable.

The Classic may well be the best riesling the Wine Curmudgeon has ever had at this price. It doesn't have the wonderful lemon fruit that I like, but there was some of it nonetheless -- and the wine had the necessary stoniness and acidity to balance the sweetness and to produce a quality wine. Plus, it has a screwcap. Who says Old World producers can't be progressive?

Highly recommended, especially for people who want to step up from the Chateau Ste. Michelle riesling that has pretty much fueled the riesling resurgence. Drink this on its own or with spicy Aisan, Cajun or even Tex-Mex.

wine reviews, wine of the week, riesling, Deinhard, white wine

Winebits 116: Pinot noir scandal, minimum wine prices, wine critics

• Fraud charges brought: French authorities have charged 13 with fraud for selling millions of dollars of fake pinot noir to Gallo for its Red Bicyclette brand. The public prosecutor recommended prison sentences and heavy fines for the defendants, who included executives from two wineries and five co-operatives, as well as negociant Ducasse and conglomerate Sieur d'Arques. Only the latter denied the charges. Between 2006 and 2008, Sieur d'Arques allegedly sold 3.5 million gallons of wine labeled pinot noir to Gallo that was actually merlot and syrah. For background, go here.

• UK closer to minimum pricing? More than a dozen directors of public health in Britain's northeast have urged the government to introduce a minimum price for alcohol. The officials signed an open letter to ministers condemning the sale of alcohol at "pocket money prices." The on-going minimum pricing controversy is a reaction to increased levels of binge drinking and alcoholism in the UK, which public health officials have called a crisis. They said a can of beer can be bought for a little as 22 pence, or about 35 cents US.

• Dump the critics: Tim Hanni, one of the first Americans to earn the Master of Wine title, says that wine critics are bunk. He told Oliver Thring of the Guardian newspaper  "that the critics utterly misjudge their approach, and that 'matching' wine and food is lazily unchallenged bunk. Everyone's palate is different, their tastebuds their only guide, he says. It is an argument so radical that self-professed 'experts' wouldn't even bother responding to it, were it not for the fact that Hanni is one of them." Mr. Hanni is welcome at the Wine Curmudgeon's any time -- I'll bring the $10 wine. Interestingly, my colleague Janice Fuhrman wrote about this topic just last week, and reached more or less the same conclusion.

pinot noir scandal, minimum wine pricing, wine writing, wine criticism

2010 Dallas Morning News competition

Two day and 200 wines -- and about 100 of them were zinfandel. But it was still fun, and it's an honor to judge at The Morning News, which attracts some of the best wine people in the country and is one of the most prestigious competitions in the United States.

Plus, we got to taste some odd grapes, which is always a treat. That included the Eastern European saperavi, which earned two golds. We also gave a gold to a very reasonably priced California cabernet sauvignon. Plus, the others on the panel were terrific, and I learned a lot. Details are here.

Wine terms: Champagne and sparkling wine

Wine terms are confusing enough on their own, but the terms for champagne and sparkling wine offer their own style of confusion. For one thing, thanks to a trade agreement between the United States and the European Union, only sparkling wine that is made in the Champagne region of France can be called Champagne.

But that's only the beginning. After the jump, a glossary of champagne and sparkling wine terms -- in honor of my old pal Darryl Beeson, who always enjoyed a fine glass of the bubbles. We'll be toasting you tonight, my friend.

CNN expose: Restaurant wine is a rip-off!

Obviously, the Wine Curmudgeon could not pass this up. From a CNNMoney.com expose about the biggest consumer rip-offs in the country: Restaurants, from chains like Olive Garden to haute cuisine eateries, mark wine up by as much as 500 percent.

This, of course, is not news to regular visitors here. But it is nice to see a news organization where the bosses probably never noticed wine prices before the recession ("Just put it on the expense account") think it is important enough to write about now.

restaurant wine, wine prices

DrinkLocalWine.com conference headed to Virginia

First, the Winestream Media started to notice regional wine. Then, the country's top chefs said they appreciated regional wine. So what better time to announce our second annual DrinkLocalWine.com conference?

We're going to hold it in Loudoun County, Va., on April 24-26, and focus on Virginia wine (and, hopefully, work in some Maryland wine, which may be the best wine in the country no one knows about). Details are here. The conference will be even bigger and better than the first one in 2009 in Dallas, which did Texas wine. We're going to invite more wine bloggers and writers (send me an email if you're a blogger who wants to come) and we have a bigger venue, which means more consumers can attend. So if you're in the metro DC area at the end of April, save the date.

We have some big-name panelists lined up for the seminars, while the Twitter Taste-off should be even more amazing than last year. Our Twitting experts said that in 2009, by the time all was said and done, some 2 million taste-off tweets were floating around the cyber-ether. We should easily pass that this year.

Frankly, I'm excited about this. Which, for anyone who knows the Wine Curmudgeon, means this must be a big deal. How often do I get excited? The Virginia wine business has been incredibly co-operative. I'd start naming all of the people who have helped so far, but then this post would never end.

DrinkLocalWine.com, regional wine, Virginia wine