Krewe of Cork does Mardi Gras

posted by Annie in Wine Industry

Mardi Gras has hit the streets of New Orleans - Fat Tuesday is next week to be exact. When I think of Mardi Gras, I usually don’t think of wine. What comes to mind are Hurricanes, daquiris, Abita, crawfish, beads, parades, etc. I’ve never had the pleasure of attending Mardi Gras in NOLA, but I have seen a lot of pictures and experienced it vicariously through phone calls from my boyfriend, a Tulane alum.

Though most partake in gluttonous beer and daquiri drinking, it seems there are some folks who stick to wine when Mardi Gras comes around. The wine club “Krewe of Cork” makes wine an integral part of their Mardi Gras enjoyment, as well bringing it to the streets of the French Quarter. Krewe of Cork was founded in 2000 and holds monthly gatherings at a little bistro on the upscale, yet still charming Royal Street. Since its inception, KoC has become a staple in Mardi Gras happenings as well as in the wine indsutry.

Every year, KoC hosts a parade in the French Quarter, where members walk in wine bottle costumes (I’m serious, see below) with wine glasses in hand. They elect a king and a queen and a parade grand marshall. There are even “Wine Police” who drive the “Winemobile” and serve a selection of whites and reds to parade participators and viewers. At the end of the parade is a huge party at the Omni Royal Orleans hotel on Royal St, which features what else, more wine.

Sounds like I’ve been missing out. If the parade hadn’t already taken place this year (January 25th), I might have hopped on a plane to join in. Maybe next year. Any club where you can dress up like wine and who’s mission statement is “We celebrate Wine! Food! Fun!” is totally worth my time.

If you are interested in learning more about the club or you’d like to join, check them out at

www.kreweofcork.com

Proud to be an New Yorker! (I’m talkin’ Upstate)

posted by Annie in Wine

I went to college in upstate New York - in Ithaca to be exact. When I first realized that my school was in the middle of the Finger Lakes wine region, I got pretty excited. I figured there would be plenty of opportunities for some wine tasting with new friends *obviously* once i turned 21! helloooo!?! The first winery I remember visiting was Treleaven, on the eastern shore of Cayuga Lake. Though my palate of newly of legal drinking age was still inexperienced and unsure, I did enjoy a few of their Rieslings, a Cabernet Franc, and a Seyval Blanc. I left with a bottle of Semi-dry Riesling(with lots of residual sugar) and a 375 of ice wine to drink at home. (Yes, I totally loved ONLY sweet wines back in the beginning, who else is with me on that??)

Flash forward six years - Here I am, working at Snooth, I’ve just completed the Advanced Certificate for the WSET, and I have a much more experienced palate (Evidence!). Maybe its just me, but since learning about the magnitude of wine’s impact on world culture, I tend to be more fascinated by wines from foreign places, as they are, well, foreign. I’ve grown an affinity for wines from the Rhone Valley, Northern Spain, and South America. I definitely gravitate to these sections when I enter a wine store or search online.

I decided it was time to ask myself some important questions. When was the last time I opened a bottle from Upstate New York? Can I remember? Have I forgotten that I lived in this wine region for four years of my life and really enjoyed drinking the local wine? In one of my WSET classes, the lecturers asked why New Yorkers seem to be so enamored with famed French wines and classics from Napa, yet rarely enjoy our own state’s products. Its a good point. Why don’t we find more New York State wine on New York State wine lists and in New York State wine stores?

I decided to break free from the ’shackles’ of my love for Chliean Malbec and just do it. On Saturday night, I opened a Hosmer Seyval Blanc that I had been saving since my last visit to Ithaca. It was dry and crispy and had a very refreshing apple and citrus flavor, not too dissimilar from an Austrian Müller-Thurgau or Chablis. I proudly continued to drink, because whats not to be proud of? We New Yorkers make some good wines and we shouldn’t forget it.

Since I know the area surrounding Cayuga Lake better than the other Finger Lakes , I can wholeheartedly suggest trying Cayuga Lake wineries Hosmer (their dry riesling wins wine awards annually), Sheldrake Point, and newcomer Thirsty Owl.

What NYS wines do you like? Don’t you heart New York too?

An Exposé: The Wine Headache

posted by Annie in Wine

Everyone hates hangovers. There’s nothing redeeming about them. Seriously. They make my head throb like I’d been sitting inside a speaker at a Pearl Jam concert. My body always feels weak and the idea of eating food makes me want to lock myself in the closet for a week.

As you know, I love me some wine, but I don’t overdo it. I will admit I am a lightweight though. Sadly, there are times even after ingesting the proper food to alcohol ratio, I wake up with our friend The Wine Headache. Come to think of it, last weekend’s Chianti gave me the mother of all wine headaches. As much as I’d love to blame it on the fact that it was cheap wine (which it was), I don’t think that was the problem. I most definitely have gotten headaches from excellent bottles of wine, even some which still stick out in my head as favorites (*cough* this ridiculously good Rioja *cough*).Since its seems ridiculously unfair to me that a favorite wine could have it out for my nervous system, I decided to learn more about what is actually going on here.

There seem to be many reasons why people think wines cause headaches. Some say its the oak barrels used in vinification (particularly American oak which is more commonly used in the US than Europe). Some blame the histamines found in grape skins - they say red wines will cause headaches more frequently as the wine has more contact with the skins than white. Others claim it’s the sulfites, used as an antiseptic and stabilizer in vinification, that are the culprits. Sadly, there is no one scientific answer to this question which, yes, makes this headache within headache. Haha! - life has done it again!

Though my research proved useless in finding a cure for TWH, there are a few things you can take away. Sufferers of The Wine Headache should monitor what wines give them headaches, which ones don’t, and drink accordingly. If you find red wine gives you headaches yet you love red wine, maybe try a Beaujolais(like this one). Since these light bodied wines are vinified via carbonic maceration, the skins have less time to release evil headache-fuel into the wine. If you find oak might be affecting you, try sticking to European wines as they are more likely to use local oak over the problematic American Oak. If you want to avoid sulfites, organic wines are a good choice - they have regulations limiting the amount of sulfites that are added (try this one).

And please, if you find theres some trick to avoiding TWH, please let me know. I want them to go away!

Bar Wine.

posted by Annie in Wine

Its NFL playoffs season, hooray! Now, time for me to head off to the bar.

When I go out with the guys, theres never really much of a choice as to what kind of bar we go to. We go to ‘the bar.’ It’s not like it is with my girlfriends, where we belabor the decision by making distinctions between “beer bars” and “lounges” and “wine bars.” ‘The bar’ has the game. We go to ‘the bar.’ End of story.

As a wine drinker 99% of the time, I find myself in a pickle when we go out to ‘the bar.’ ‘The bar’ doesn’t really put a lot of energy into the wine selection -sometimes it only consists of the red wine and the white wine. For those wine lovers with a more fine-tuned palate, it can be a tough swallow. I pride myself on my ability to not let my knowledge and love of wine get in the way of a fun night out with my friends. So, I need to make the decision between ordering a glass of some very iffy bar wine, or give in to hops and barley.

In the spirit of good sportsmanship, I avoid making a scene and just go for the wine. Since it’s not so easy in a loud bar to scream “what types of wines do you have and from which countries are they?” at the bartender, I just go for the Cab, which 9 times out of 10, is too sweet and overly oaked. (Cabernet Sauvignon, Shiraz, and Chardonnay are the most popular types of bar wine according to my research). Although the increasing popularity of wine is causing establishments like ‘the bar’ to start paying more attention to their wine offerings, I still find its hard to come by a truly tasty glass.

What do you do when faced with this issue - do you just go for a Stella Artois instead of rolling the dice on the bar wine? Or, have you found that your favorite bar has jumped on the wine train and is stocking some decent bottles? Moreover, who thinks Jessica Simpson is still going to distract Romo’s game on Sunday?

Let’s go Cowboys!

Snooth and Triggit

posted by Annie in Snooth

For all you wine bloggers out there, theres a new tool for linking called Triggit. The Triggit tool allows you to highlight text and create a specific hyperlink for that text with the simple click of a button. Snooth is one of the options for linkable websites in Triggit’s private alpha release.

For example, if you want to link out to a 2005 Duckhorn Merlot, all you do is highlight that wine name in your text, click on the triggit toolbar, and it creates the right hyperlink for you, which is then inserted back into your blog. Its a quick way to add in more information about the wines you discuss in your blog without creating too much extra work for yourself.

I’ve played around with the tool a little bit, and it seems to be really helpful and a good time saver for those who find it clumsy to find your links through a search engine and ad them via copying and pasting.

We’d love to get your opinion on this tool - Is it helpful for linking in your blogs about wine, wine pairings, and Snooth? What can be done to make it easy/easier for you to use? How can we expand on this to make it more useful?

To get the Triggit toolbar, go to triggit.com.

Happy linking!