Make Your Own Wine!

I just came across a really cool service website based out of San Francisco that allows customers (either virtually or physically) to have a hand in making their very own California wine. Crush Pad offers you, either by yourself or with a group of friends, to make an entire barrel of wine. From start to finish, picking to bottling - you can have as much hands on experience as you want.

And, if your somebody like me who lives on the East Coast but wants to try it out anyway, they've got options to let you watch the process via streaming video on the net. Sure, it's not as great as being there to actually get your hands dirty, but I do like the idea of watching what you're drinking turning from one thing (ie, grapes) into another (ie, wine). Not to mention that when the process is over, you've got the equivalent of 25 cases of home-made vino. Which is pretty great, assuming that it turns out to be tasty. Anyway, I've linked to the site at the top of this post. Have a look for yourself and enjoy the weekend!

Temperature Makes a Difference.

There's a great article in St. Louis Today from yesterday that discusses why it's so important to drink wine (and beer and spirits, for that matter) at the appropriate temperature. It may seem like nitpicking to some, but there can be a tremendous difference between two bottles of the same wine if they're consumed at two different temperatures of ten degrees difference.

After discussing why getting the right temperature is important - too cold the flavors lock up, too warm wine tends to get "hot and flabby" - the article breaks down the right temperature to consume wine, beer and booze. As it turns out, most beer is served too cold, as well as white wine. Red's tend to be served too warm, and spirits depend upon what you're drinking and rely more on personal preference. If you really want to make the most out of the bottles you bring home (not to mention impress dinner guests) this article's well worth checking out. The links at the top of the post, enjoy!

More on Science and Wine

Looks like the guys in white lab coats are at it again - this time using fancy-shmancy particle accelerators to accomplish the lofty task of accurately dating vintage wine. The story comes courtesy of Reuters (Paris), and talks briefly about how French scientists have utilized particle accelerators to test the age of wine bottles - not the wine itself. I guess this can't really put an end to those pesky counterfeiters who dumpster dive at fine dining establishments for rare bottles then fill and re-sell them for a small fortune, but hey, it's still kind of cool, right? All this talk about x rays and ion beams makes blogging about wine feel one step shy of the Sci-Fi channel, and it's good to mix things up every once in awhile.

How Big is your Carbon Footprint?

A study of two Italian vineyards in the same region - one organic, one not - released over the weekend highlights just how dramatic the effects of going green can be. According to the study, which you can read a little more about here, the organic vineyard had a carbon footprint of around half the size of the traditional vineyard, less than fifty kilometers away.

Organic vinting includes using all natural fertilizers, no pesticides and handling most of the grape-growing, picking and mixing by hand rather than large industrialized machines. According to the findings of the study, a single bottle from the organic vineyard had an eco-footprint of approximately 7.17 square meters and the non-organic bottle had one of 13.98 square meters. Pretty impressive, right? Now my only question is, which one of them tasted better?

Forbes Lists For Labor Day

Eric Arnold over at Forbes' website has a fun (and timely) article/list titled Ten Sauvignon Blancs for a Lazy Labor Day. As you all probably know, Labor Day marks the end of summer and the start of the long slow descent into crisp fall evenings.

That being said, it's high time to bust out the whites one last time and celebrate the nice weather! In a few months time we'll be discussing all of the bold and complex reds that go best with hearty wintertime meals, but for the moment lets all sit back and smile about still being able to drink something chilled in the great outdoors. The link's at the top of this post. Enjoy!

Rosé on the Rise

The reports are in and it looks like rosé is finally getting its due as a tasty summer treat. According to Decanter.com, the consumption of rose's has grown by up to 60% during the past three years. Long pegged for a sibling to well-known and almost universally despised pink and sweet white Zinfandel's, the more pleasant drier version of rosé has been breaking out of the stereotype and delighting wine drinkers looking for a refreshing drink during the hot summer months.

WSTA Chief Executive Jeremy Beadles said, 'Even without a good summer it seems the taste for rosé continues to spread. Interestingly, the figures show women have increased their rosé consumption the most'.

French Vintners Look to the Sky

I just came across a very cool technology meets wine world story courtesy of Reuters. According to this neat little piece, French vineyard owners are harnessing the power of a cutting-edge satellite and aerial photography driven technology called Oenoview to assess the potential of vineyards across the South of France. Here's a quote from the article:

"The technology, called Oenoview, is a combination of aerial photographs and satellite imagery in the near-infrared, which provides growers and buyers with a complete picture of the vines' vigor and the plot's 'terroir' before the harvest. Oenoview is based on an existing service for agriculture, but because of the smaller size of the plots a higher resolution was needed, Infoterra's Innovation Manager Herve Poilve said."

It's simple, but a neat meeting of the old world and the new. If you want to check out the rest of the article, you can follow the link I've created at the top of this post.