Do Not Drink Wine Today....!!

According to the Lunar calendar we are in a 'root' day face of the moon and drinking wine may be a No No. Really now?
( Calendar courtesy of Domaine de la Vougeraie--click to enlarge ) According to a recent article in the NewsScotsman there are days you simply should not be tasting wines.Two of the UK's major retailers, Tesco and Marks & Spencer's, who account for at least one-third of all bottles of wine sold in Britain, "now only invite critics to taste their ranges when the moon-related biodynamic calendar dictates that wine will be at their best...
Our first choice is a fruit day. We seek to avoid root and leaf days."
Today and tomorrow we are in a root day and a lunar node. Really bad! Had a lady friend over for lunch today. Made a nice salad and served a beautiful Pinot Gris from the Desert Hills winery in the South Okanagan Valley in BC. Followed this with a hot beef dip on a bun served with the Desert Hills Mirage, a big bold Bordeaux blend. Guess what? It was delightful. Then we went to a new release tasting of the wines of Tinhorn Creek, another great winery in the South Okanagan. Same thing! Tasted ten wines. Could not find a fault with any of them.What's going on here? The wines were fruity not rooty.
One wine merchant in Britain who does not subscribe to this theory is my good friend Nick, over at Bordeaux-Undiscovered. Nick writes an excellent, informative
blog and did a good review on this.Check out his take on this called Drinking by Moonlight
Could not help but wonder what Alice Feiring's opinion might be. Alice of course is the author of a gutsy little slap at Parker with her book called "The Battle for Wine and Love or How I Saved the World from Parkerization"
Since she discusses Biodynamics in her
book in several chapters and had a very interesting interview with Nicolas Joly. Nicolas is the unofficial leader of the worldwide biodynamic wine movement. So I wondered. Well Alice does have days when her wines do not quite taste right but has not attached it to any particular fruit, leaf or any other type of day.
So the question remains "Does wine change with the phases of the moon or do individual palates change with the lunar period?"
Tell you one thing though, while I was still practicing vet med, I did have some "colorful" character clients visit me claiming that their pets were not feeling well, Could never find anything until I looked at the calendar and found it to be a full moon period. Thankfully my wines taste good any old day.
What sayeth thou?

Feel the Love,When you Are a Wine Critic !

I set out to do a book review of Alice Feiring's
The Battle for Wine and Love or How I Saved the World from Parkerization
but instead will refer you to a very good in depth review by Brooke Cheshier on Vinography.
Apart from getting hints about the loves in her life, there is an inspiring passion about her love for 'natural' wines and her loathing for chemically manipulated, scientifically engineered from vineyard to cellar wines.
Her book has obviously made its mark in Spain where a translated version will be available in 2010. You can read about that on Alice's own site 'In Vino Veritas'.
Besides her book being easy to read you will find yourself coming away and wondering about how natural the wines are that you now consume. Since reading her book, I have had the pleasure of meeting several wine makers and asking them how much of an influence Robert Parker has had on their wine making.

There is hope out there Alice!
During a delightful lunch with Johannes Selbach of the Weingut Selbach-Oster, I posed this question to Johannes. With great pride and perhaps a touch of indignation, he suggested that since his famly had been making wines for a long time before Parker came on the scene (since 1661) they have been making wines in traditional styles handed down from generation to generation. The Selbach-Oster wines are known for their purity of fruit and fresh and delicate aromas. The mineral rich slate soils of the 'MittleMosel' and the ripe, juicy Riesling fruit are evident in all their wines. Interestingly enough both Robert Parker in his Wine Advocate and the Wine Spectator rate these wines highly with their 'points' in the 90+ range.
Alice has written passionately and you will experience that when reading her book. I admire her fearless approach on this controversial subject.
The video below takes more than the usual few minutes of videos seen on YouTube but this one on Vimeo is well worth watching. You can 'Feel the love' or otherwise, in this one. Oh, the life of a critic is not easy.
Go Alice, Go!


Robert Parker's Bitch from Josh Hermsmeyer on Vimeo.