AUTHOR j f grossen
I think this bottle is from one of our first visits to Shinn in Mattituck on the North
Local Wine Events have been around for years - a go-to listing of wine-related gatherings in your city. With Covid, Zooming with a glass of wine doesn't just
I dug around the NYC event sites and the dozens of email blasts for something to do on a waning summer (yes, its still summer damnit!) weekend and found The Last Supper Festival 2010. It purported to feature live bands, DJs, new media artists installations, experimental films, a writing salon, and other random performance art - sounded perfect. Liz and I would find these events throughout SF - many of them being Burning Man derivatives - and have been hard pressed to dig up the same type of ADD-inducing nights in NYC. I'm sure we're just not in the right crowd.
That's right. Canada has wine. Gallons of the stuff. And not just Inniskillin Ice Wine found at better boutique wine shops - like Duty Free at JFK. I'm talking some amazing Cabs, Pinots, Zweigelts, Merlots, and Blaufrankischs that rival the best of the US west, Germany and Austria.
I chose an out of the way place...a little wine bar name Pinkerton on the corner of 'where the hell am i' and 'this doesn't look like brooklyn' street in Williamsburg. The intent was to meet up with a friend of a friend who just so happen to be in the wine importing / distributing biz just to get an idea of what it might take to bring in the delicious wines from Canada to share with our friends here in NYC.
Despite 2000 years of struggle to unify the country's various peoples -- from Emperor Qin's forming of the Dynastic period to Mao's forcing of the Cultural Revolution -- there still is great division on one of the most important topics -- wine. Ordering a glass of wine in this country is akin to Russian roulette with a .45 pointed at your taste buds. Depending on what region you are visiting and the ethnicity of the server you are ordering from you might get variations from a clear moonshine-like liquor to a cloyingly sweet grape-based wine beverage.
We only visit L.I.C. for two reasons - babies and backyards, but tonight we found another one. This petite bar right next to the (7) train subway entrance is reason enough to cross the filth of the Newtown Creek or venture towards the glow of the Pepsi sign like a wayward moth.
If you haven't tried the new Chocolate Cheerios you are missing out on one of the great breakfast pleasures. Sure, they taste like Cocoa Pebbles or the delicious crunchy parts of Count Chocula. They must be healthier...and would you believe they work just as well with a nice merlot from Vancouver Island as they do with cold milk.
We lazily made our way towards the quaint Niagara-on-the-Lake stopping to take in a taste of the local grape in an area just south of the lake and west of the St. Catharines referred to as the Niagara Escarpment. This area has shale and limestone cliffs from the glacial movements that provide good drainage for the rain and melting snow and allows the roots of the vines to grow deep. Over 40 wineries have cropped up over the years further establishing the Niagara Peninsula as a strong appellation and the jewel in the VQA crown.
