I am still at stage I devour stories on web, magazines, wherever I may find them about wine.

I keep thinking I’ll use this blog to drink about the 2-3 bottles I usually open per week. Maybe I will.

But today, looking for something else at work, I stumbled across a piece in the New York Times about wine. “Wines Pleasures: Are they all in your head?” is a fascinating read.

It talks about a couple of different consumer taste tests where customers were given a sip of a very expensive and a very cheap wine. Of course, “average consumers” often piced the less expensive. The formally educated eonophile often picked the more expense. No surprise, really!

But the article built a convincing argument that larger, less sophisticated segment of the market is largely manipulated by marketing, wine magazines, critics, and wine snobbery.

I’ve probably fallen guilty to each of those. But with that being said, I agreed with much of what I read. I’v elinked the story to its title above. If you like and care about wine, it’s a great read.

Just a short entry. I’m a newshound and admit it. I regularly monitor MSNBC.com for the latest news. Great site, easy to use and I highly recomment it. They link to lots of the nations top newspapers and bring little gems to my attention that would otherwise go unnoticed.

Today – another example of how the current Republican administration has undermined the very process of good government. Same old stuff you say – and you’d be right! Same old stuff they’ve been doing for seven years.

Read this story in the New York Times about how former Attorney General John Ashcroft got a sweetheart contract from a federal prosecutor with no bidding process. The contract is estimated to be valued at $28-$52 million dollars.

It may draw a congressional inquiry.

As a side note, Ashcroft visited Wabash last May and in a public speech spewed the usual neo-conservative point of view to no one’s surprise. And for anyone who has followed his career, equally not surprising was what a jerk he was to a couple of students during the question and answer period.

This adminstration has surely had some cast of characters!

I havent’ been keeping up with the wines I’ve been drinking … at least as far as blogging about them. Tonight I drank one of the best value reds I’ve had in a long, long time.

The wine is a Casillero del Diablo Carmenere 2005. Wow! This is a wine you can find in lots of wine stores under $15 bucks, or less … that was a Wine Spectator 2006 “Best Buy” and has won a number of awards.

They advertise it with bottle neck tabs as the smooth, rich flavor of Merlot and the spicy flavor of Syrah. And – surprisingly – they are right!

Wine Spectator said: “Nice supple texture, with a mix of plum, cocoa, tobacco and vanilla. The smoky finish gains flesh as it opens. Drink now.” I can’t argue. My comment would be the smooth flavor of a big red wine without the price!

The winery also has the craziest website I’ve ever seen. And you might guess, I’ve seen a few. It’s the only one I’ve ever seen with a built in video game!

Amd read about the winery’s long history here: http://www.conchaytorousa.com/hist.html

They have a full line of wines from Cabernet Sauvignon to Reisling and Rose. I’m anxious to try the others. I’ve read about Casillero before with generally rave reviews of this Chilean winery!

Here is another site to read more about Casillero Del Diablo: http://www.conchaytorousa.com/wines/diablo.html

This is a great buy and a GREAT value wine! I found it at Village Bottle Shop in West Lafayette. But is is widely distributed. My previous experience with Carmenere was not a positive one. Now, I’m sold on the varietal.

I haven’t posted in awhile, but seems like 9-11-07 is a good day to get back in swing of things. I remember 9-11 … 01 … like everyone else, in detail. I was in a newsroom in Noblesville, Ind., and noted to the boss some plane had flown into the World Trade Center. We all speculated it was a small aircraft.

You know the rest of the story.

We moved from that day and published stories related to 9-11 for more than 70 consecutive days. It was an interesting journalistic challenge and experience.

My time at Wabash College has really given me a different perspective on 9-11. It was a horrific event that could have been prevented. I don’t believe for one second anyone in our government had put all the pieces together – but that’s the problem. The “intelligence community” – an oxymoron if I’ve ever heard one – had all the pieces but was as dysfunctional as ever.

During my time at Wabash I’ve had the fortune to hear 3-4 very prominent experts on the Muslim world. When I read in news accounts, blogs, “they hate us and our way of life” I cringe.

Muslim people by and large, minus a few real whackos, do not hate us and our way of life. They hate our government and out bully attitude toward the rest of the world. We make no attempt to understand the Middle East and its people and assume we know what’s best. If you think that’s just left-wing babble, I challenge you to ask your Congressman to offer up an explanation of the difference between Sunni and Shite.

Good luck.

An update: I’m dieting, my doggy got neutered, I bought a new car!

I’ve been off work for a week and had a couple of experiences I should have written about, but alas – it happens.

Second, I’ve had a number of people tell me the link for this blog didn’t work when they first tried it – so I guess I need to ‘modestly’ re-send it to friends and co-workers!

But I’m writing today – again – about wine. I’ve bought several dry Rose’ this summer and none better than one I picked up Thursday evening at the Massachusetts’ Avenue wine shop in Indy.

It’s an absolutely fabulous granache-based Spanish Rose. From Cruz De Piedra and Calatayud. I couldn’t find a web page for the winery but did find several hits to buy the stuff.

I had purchased two Tavels (the holy grail of Rose from the lower Rhone valley in France) a few weeks ago that were so-so. This wine had a nice fruit taste but retained the characteristic dry finish. The back side had no bitterness, it was a great, great summer evening wine. I had chilled it pretty good – which I’d recommend.
The best part? I only paid $9.99 for it. The Tavels, as I recall, were $16 and $18 each.

If you haven’t tried Spanish wines you should try some Crianza Temperanilla from the Roija region. It’s great redwine that will hold up to steaks or drink alone year round.

But the best summer evening chilled wine of the summer is Crus De Piedra Granache 2006 Rose!

There is nothing like a nice Pinot Noir. My two trips to California in the past 12 months really heightened my appreciation for Pinot. I tasted some great ones, and brought back some crazy good Pinot from Gary Farrell, Arista, and Robert Stemler.

What’s tough is finding a good cheap Pinot for a Tuesday evening on the front porch. I had two this weekend to mixed reviews. Saturday evening I opened a bottle of Toasted Head Pinot Noir I bought in a new wine shop on upper Main St. in Lafayette. Toasted Head is probably most famous for its ownership. The winery is owned by comedian Robin Williams’ brother. The wine was actually one of the best Pinots I’ve ever had for under $15. I paid $14.95. It had a nice nose, a good Pinot flavor and balance.

Unfortunately the Sunday night Pinot was not nearly as good. Red Bicyclette is a French company shipping thousands of cases of value wine to the USA. Perhaps you’ve seen the label in your local grocery store. There was nothing wrong with wine but predictably nothing right with it either. It had little flavor, almost a water-down quality. The label is showing up everywhere so I’ll probably give another of their varietals a try – but the Pinot is not worthy of even supermarket prices.

Wine is a hobby – no, not just drinking it. But I love learning about it and sharing with others. So, one of the big reasons I started blogging again was to write about wine.

It’s hard to find fun summer wines better than the supermarket undrinkable swill. But instead of the standard white, try a Rose’ – make that a dry Rose.’

When most people see pink wine they recoil and expect a big glass of Kool-Aid. But the history and tradition of great dry pink wine is substantial. The motherland of great dry Rose is the Tavel region of France.

The southern Rhone region is famous for its dry Rose wines. If you go into a decent wine shop and find the French wines, there is a good chance you’ll seem some Tavel during the summer months. The good ones are usually dry to even quite dry. Often there is a strong hint of strawberry to the taste. They’re wonderful.

There are dry Rose’s being made everywhere from many different grapes. In France, Cabernet Sauvignon and Grenache are often used for Rose, syrah has been used to make Rose. A bit sweeter versions have been made from Pinot Noir grapes. They’re all over the place.

One of the things I enjoy about my wine hobby is trying new things. So the other day I bought a dry Rose from South Africa. It’s called Bon Bon in a floral label. I bought it in a wine shop on Massachussets Ave. in Indianapolis. I had never purchased a South Africa wine before.

The wine wasn’t bad for an $11 bottle. It had the hint of Strawberry/cherry typical to the wine. It was dry enough for me. It did improve a little after opening up (being open awhile for the novices). It didn’t have as robust a flavor as I would like, but not bad for the price point.

Try a dry Rose this summer. They are a great value. Even great French Tavel’s sell for $18-$25 bucks. You can often find others even cheaper. They’re great with cheese or fruit for snacking and not overly sweet like some Pinot Grigio or a Reisling!