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Rate a Wine – Wines and Wineries of California’s Central Coast: A Complete Guide from Monterey to Santa Barbara

Wineguy — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 17:00:16 +0000

Rabobank Report: Dramatic Growth in Bulk Wine Exports Has Shifted $1.4 Billion … – MarketWatch (press release)

Rabobank Report: Dramatic Growth in Bulk Wine Exports Has Shifted $1.4 Billion …
MarketWatch (press release)
Rabobank says in the report that the democratization, commoditization, innovation, and oversupply of wine, along with currency rates and changing trade flows, have changed both the conventional supply chain model and the distribution of value along …

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Starbucks Moves Forward With Extended Boozy Menu Hitting More Locations – The Consumerist

The Consumerist

Starbucks Moves Forward With Extended Boozy Menu Hitting More Locations
The Consumerist
Offering wine and beer (what, no double tequila shots?) and hot items like flatbreads and other savory snacks, a few cafes in Atlanta and Southern California will see the extended menus by the end of this year, says Reuters. Currently the menu is only …

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Wines and Wineries of California’s Central Coast: A Complete Guide from Monterey to Santa Barbara
In comparative tastings, wines from California’s Central Coast rival those from such renowned regions as Bordeaux, Burgundy, and Napa, yet they also offer superb value. This is the first comprehensive guide to one of the world’s most dynamic and beautiful wine regions-and the setting for the award-winning movie Sideways. An excellent, one-stop resource for touring and tasting at convenient wineries located from Monterey to Santa Barbara, the guide is organized into county-by-county alphabetical listings for this up-and-coming region.

Wines and Wineries of California’s Central Coast includes:
* Profiles of nearly 300 wineries personally visited by the author
* Profiles of individual vintners
* 5 maps
* Winery ratings, plus author and winemaker recommendations
* Visitors’ and contact information for each winery
* Discussions of regional wine history and terroir
* Descriptions of designated American Viticultural Areas and grape varietals

Customer Review: Good overview of Central Coast wines
Let me start by saying that I am a little biased toward this book because the photograph on the cover is the view from my parents’ living room. I did not take the picture but the oak tree and the grapevines in that picture have been a familiar sight for many years. This is a good overview of the wines and wineries of the Central Coast. It is a good place to start to build your own “Sideways” trip. I have my favorites as I am sure others have theirs. The Central Coast is often overlooked by many as a serious wine country but those who actually know what they are talking about know this region as the real wine country in California, not our Napa neighbors up north.

Make Wine – Napa Valley & Sonoma: Heart of the California Wine Country

Wineguy — Sat, 19 Nov 2011 11:00:15 +0000

Napa Valley & Sonoma: Heart of the California Wine Country
This award-winning book takes the reader through the breathtaking vineyards and quaint charm of California’s renowned wine region. A listing of wineries and tasting rooms is included, along with reproductions of the region’s legendary wine labels.

Customer Review: Excellent introduction to Napa Valley/Sonoma – wine country!
This is an excellent overview of the heart of California wine country, Napa Valley & Sonoma. Loaded with lush photography and insight into the tradition of winemaking, the author takes another leap and provides you with fine dining and lodging selections in the areas as well. I especially liked the pictures of all of the labels and listings at the end of the book of all of the wineries from this area. This allows you to date and check off when you sampled that particular bottle as well as motivate the pursuit to sample all that these wineries have to offer. If you are planning a vacation to Napa or Sonoma, this is a must have.

Customer Review: Everything you need for a great weekend!
We picked up a copy of this book last month for us to use on a weekend away in the wine country. Now we have bought several more for gifts to give for Christmas, and our copy sits on our coffee table at home. The author has captured all I needed to know about Napa and Sonoma, wihtout getting to bogged down in details/history. There are recommendations on where to eat, sleep, things to do, the history of the wine industry, how wine is made, and stunning pictures. With 15 minutes you can get so much info you wish there were more coffee table books with this much substance and this well written, with up to date info, but not skimping on the glorious photos.

Wine Tasting in San Diego & Beyond: Partake of the Grape in San Diego, Temecula, Baja, Rancho Cucamonga and Los Angeles

Wineguy — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 18:00:16 +0000

Grape travels: Finding fine wines for fall – Boston Globe
There’s a lot to consider when picking out wine, and with the holiday season coming up and wine being one of the top holiday gifts for parties and dinners, it’s important to know what you’re buying. After all, what you bring to the table leaves a lasting

Wine Tasting in San Diego & Beyond: Partake of the Grape in San Diego, Temecula, Baja, Rancho Cucamonga and Los Angeles
2nd Edition of Wine Tasting in San Diego & Beyond with over 40 wineries listed. Coverage includes wineries located in Southern California as well as Baja California. A book for anyone visiting or living in or near Southern California who enjoys the pleasures of wine tasting. Includes coverage of wine tasting techniques, local wineries and local happenings.

Customer Review: Overpriced and Underinformed
This book should have cost less than ten dollars, given the amount of useful information it actually provides. If we were to cull the empty half-pages (the author often had less than a page to write about some wineries; whatever happened to descriptive comments about all, or at least some, varietals, offered?), the useless recommendations on accommodations and shopping areas (I ordered a book billed to be about San Diego area wineries, not Bed & Breakfasts and mini-malls), and the author’s many references to a tasting room reminding her of something in Europe, we would end up with a book a little more than half the size of this book… and at $15 retail, the book is already overpriced.

There is some useful info regarding wine tasting, forming a tasting club, and comparisons of varietals, but this book could certainly have gone much further in identifying the relative quality of various wineries or different varietals within each winery’s list of offerings.

I bought this book as an out-of-towner with hopes of going to San Diego to sample some of the local wines. This book helps; but the reader could save some money by getting most of this information by searching the Internet for SD area wineries, and consulting area newspapers and tourist guides.

Customer Review: Superb!
I found this book to be very thorough. We visited some beautiful vineyards in San Diego County that we never knew existed. We’re going to have a lot of fun (and good wine) with this book!

Best Wine – Frommer’s Portable California Wine Country

Wineguy — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 06:00:33 +0000

Frommer’s Portable California Wine Country
It is like having a wine savvy travel guide in your pocket. Loaded with inside travel tips and detailed info on hotels restaurants tours pricing and local interest in and around Napa Sonoma.

Customer Review: Broad, Generic, Timid
This, like the other Frommer’s Guides I have seen, seems to be timid, generic and void of fun, gritty, insider information. It gave some useful information to read on the plane about various wineries, but I left it in my hotel the days I headed out to Sonoma, and this I did on purpose. Do your research and buy a better guide.

Customer Review: Touristy hot spots
Just because a travel guide rips into the Mondavi winery as being too touristy does not mean it has any special insights on how to see parts of Napa that are off the beaten path. Mondavi is an easy target. Nevertheless, this guide does have some good info about where to go to get some free drink–and do not worry about wine-drinking protocol. Because if you like it, that’s all the counts. The best vintage I ever had was still the ’53 Chateau Mouton Rothschild my uncle gave me as a present for getting my doctorate in material science, and I slurped down that bottle while eating a corndog.

Best Wine – Hugh Johnson’s Pocket Wine Book 2008: 31st Edition (Hugh Johnson’s Pocket Wine Book)

Wineguy — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 06:00:19 +0000

Hugh Johnson’s Pocket Wine Book 2008: 31st Edition (Hugh Johnson’s Pocket Wine Book)

Hugh Johnson has won a legion of fans with his keen ability to make the sometimes complex topic of wine wonderfully lucid—and every year, his popular pocket guide is a bestseller. That makes it number one in the market. Here, he has completely revised and updated this classic, offering more current news than ever on over 6,000 wines, growers, and regions, along with up-to-the-minute vintage information, recommended wines (including budget options), and star ratings. With this book in hand, wine lovers won’t need anything else to help them select anything from a bottle for an everyday dinner to a prestige vintage for investment. A new section showcases Johnson’s special, personal choices, and there are plenty of quick-reference maps, charts, and fact boxes for a little extra guidance.

Customer Review: great little booklet
This is a very useful and practical overview of wines and wineries. It’s informative and as objective as can be.

Customer Review: A great gift
I reviewed several pocket wine books before purchasing 20 copies of Hugh Johnson’s book to give as gifts. This edition has the perfect balance of content to educate the novice and inform the expert.

Store Wine – A Vintage Murder: A Wine Lover’s Mystery

Wineguy — Sat, 25 Jun 2011 20:00:06 +0000

A Vintage Murder: A Wine Lover’s Mystery
When things in the land down under start to heat up, murder steps in.

Nikki and her boss-turned-boyfriend came to Australia to visit the Hahndorf Winery, but it seems they’ve also walked onto a movie set. And when lead actress Lucy Swanson is found dead in her trailer, bitten by a poisonous snake, Nikki must comb the vineyards of the valley to catch a killer with a venomous streak—before she’s struck herself.

Customer Review: Terrific continuation of this series
As the latest installment of this fun series, this book starts to get more into detail on the lives of the main characters. I enjoyed this one very much, but I’ve liked the series from the beginning. I love wineries and am fascinated by their inner workings, so this book series really works for me.

Customer Review: Delightfully Delicous Mystery
What’s to say, but once again a great book from my favorite author. I have enjoyed all of the wine lover’s mysteries and this one is no exception. Once again the reader is taken for a fun, comedic, mysterious ride and this one is set in Australia.

In this segment, Nikki has made a decision on which man is the right man for her and to no surprise for followers the series, it is Derek Malveaux.I personally loved the charming Andres, but Derek is a hard one to resist. Things turn deadly as usual, when a big time “wench” of an actress ( I am being nice here) making a movie on a vineyard that Nikki and Derek are visiting winds up dead by a snake bite. Nikki believes it is foul play and she sets out to prove her theory correct. Lots of twists and turns and a surprise ending that reminds one of Hitchcocks’s PSYCHO makes this book well worth the read. Pick up the entire series first though because it all leads up to this one and you’ll be happy you did.

I absolutely find this a fun and delightful series. Of course, Simon is a scene stealer. He is Nikki’s BFF and a reader can’t help but love him. Anyhoo, pick up the book and the series. I hope there’s more to come.

The Grape Cure

Wineguy — Sun, 19 Jun 2011 22:00:12 +0000

Federal judge awards nearly $680K in fees to wine association – Daily Business Review
The state law allowed only wineries that produce 30,000 gallons or less of grape wine per year to sell directly to Massachusetts consumers. In January 2010, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the that the law violated the Constitution’s commerce clause

The Grape Cure
Customer Review: Personal Experience
In 1992, my doctor told me that I would have to endure another ‘set’ of Silver Nitrate treatments for my bladder problem. (It was not cancer.) The first ‘set’ of six treatments and the second ‘set’ of eight treatments had not worked. My bladder condition was getting worse. These treatments were very painful, so I refused to have any more done. My stepmother suggested I go to a health food store to see if they had any ideas on what I could do naturally to cure my bladder problems. They suggested I read The Grape Cure. After reading it, I sent it to my stepmother. She advised that I carefully wash the grapes and not stay on the diet for too long, but since I did not have diabetes there shouldn’t be anything in grapes that would harm me for a short period even though they are high in sugar. I followed the instructions in the book, peeling the grapes in the beginning and never eating over a certain amount. For nearly 3 months, I ate nothing but grapes. I have never had trouble with my bladder since. I felt great and even lost 40 pounds. Although I know this book isn’t for everyone, I do know that it worked for me. Eating nothing but grapes for so long may not be a good idea for everyone, but it did cure me. I wonder if the doctor that so vehemently criticized this book has actually tried it.

Customer Review: Grape Cure
Good book! Would share with any and everyone even today. Alternate aid is the way to go.

Ice Wine – PAPOCHADO WINE COOKIES

Wineguy — Sat, 19 Mar 2011 04:00:17 +0000

Pamela Wambach of Nova Scotia Tourism Earns IFWTWA Award of Excellence in Destination Marketing – PRLog (free press release)
She knows all about the history, culture and cuisine of Nova Scotia. And she loves and is very knowledgeable about the local wineries, vinters and the best vintage wine! She took great care of us as a group but also connected with each of the attendees on

PAPOCHADO WINE COOKIES
PAPOCHADO WINE COOKIES 100gr

Make Wine – Hot Garlic Pepper Wine Jelly

Wineguy — Tue, 15 Feb 2011 22:59:59 +0000

You’ll find days of wine and roses at several romantic getaways – Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
At the host winery, ticket holders get a wine glass, recipe booklet and $5 voucher for wine purchase and a gift. Tickets are $35 a person and can be purchased online at www.lakeeriewinecountry.org or at three wineries: Penn Shore Vineyards, North East

Hot Garlic Pepper Wine Jelly
Sweet, sour, garlicky? then hot! A mouth-watering jelly whose natural flavors, inspired by fiery Asian cuisine, are layered for maximum effect.

Minnesota Grape Growers Association Membership

Wineguy — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 15:00:22 +0000

State Government to end McLaren Vale sprawl – News.com.au
Once they have got their development through they will put in some legislation. That is unsatisfactory.” The McLaren Vale Grape Wine and Tourism Association and wineries have campaigned against the Seaford Heights development. If passed in the Lower House

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Minnesota Grape Growers Association Membership
Covers all aspects of cold climate viticulture. Winemaking information is also published as it pertains to extreme northern viticulture.