"Vinotology"
Member Location:Lubbock, TX Member Since:January 2010 Website:www.vinotology.comProfile:Wino from the High Plains of West Texas, loving tasting as many different wines as I possibly can.
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Vinotology's Postings
Last Entry Posted 9/9/2010
GENERAL POST
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Posted
9/9/2010 at 8:54 AM PST
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My California Job Search Trip Continued
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Yesterday I posted some updates and pictures from my recent trip to California. As my wife told me immediately preceding my departure for California wine country, this trip was not a vacation. I did have a great time, but my activity was dictated by the fact that I was on the West Coast looking for gainful employment. The book is still out on how this whole story will unfold, but I did make some great connections, and had some really good interviews. I am keeping my fingers crossed, and continuing to work on landing my dream job in the wine industry, but for now I will finish my update for the week that I spent in CA. Yesterday I made it through Tuesday of last week, so I will pick up on Wednesday.From early on in my trip planning I knew that Wednesday was going to be one of my busiest days. I had been asked to be on Wine Biz Radio almost as soon as they found out that I was going to be in California for a week. The WBR guys have been crazy supportive of my...
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GENERAL POST
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Posted
9/8/2010 at 10:41 AM PST
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I'm Back! Update On My Trip to California
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I'm sure most of you have started wondering if I have fallen off the edge of the world after my prolonged absence and total radio silence since I returned from my trip to Napa and Sonoma. Well, I am here to report that I did not, in fact, fall off the edge of the world. I will fill in some of these events with more details later, but I wanted to get you something about my trip, just to let you know what I was up to while I was out there. I landed in Oakland last Thursday, and after an excruciatingly long wait at the baggage claim and rental car center, I immediately headed for the nearest In-N-Out Burger (no, I didn't get animal style), and then worked my way toward Deerfield Ranch Winery for a Facebook meet-up that was put together by my friend Sonoma William. I had the opportunity to meet a number of new people, including my old friend Brian Wing of Norcal Wingman and Shana Ray, as well as see some old Wine Bloggers' Conference friends again, such as Ed... ... View Full Post >>
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GENERAL POST
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Posted
8/30/2010 at 7:00 AM PST
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Food and Wine Pairing: You Can Do It, Too!
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Today's post is a guest post from Toni AmbrosiniThose of you who follow me on Twitter know that I have a healthy obsession with food. I am happy to share Twitpics of various pizzas and grilled meats. Then my followers can be envious that they don’t have any.I also have a fascination with wine, also well-documented on Twitter. If I didn’t, there is zero chance of me contributing this guest post to Vinotology today. Reading and tasting are two things I wish I could do all day, every day.But putting the two together can be a headache for some, and occasionally for me. With so many flavor and aroma combinations…where do you even start?Well, the great thing about food and wine pairing is this. You can largely do whatever you want! Eat what you like. Drink what you like. That’s what I say. If I want to drink a dry Washington Riesling with my bowl of turkey and black bean chili, that’s what I’m going to do.However, there are a few basic rules out there that can help you... ... View Full Post >>
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GENERAL POST
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Posted
8/24/2010 at 8:00 AM PST
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The Case for Beaujolais (not Nouveau)
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Today's post is a guest post by Frank MorganLast month I had the occasion to spend a few days in Paris at the end of a work trip in the region. Aside from the usual touristy stuff – visit to the Louvre and Eifel Tower, lots of photos I may never look at again, souvenir trinkets for those who were left at home, 10 pound weight gain due to overindulgence – I took away many random wine related observations for future blog fodder. My first, and most obvious observation – wine is ubiquitous in Paris – the local folk drink wine, and lots of it. I know, not a revelation. Although the volume of consumption didn’t surprise me, I did however find the ‘type’ of wine consumed interesting. Being a nosey tourist, I made a point of making a mental note of the bottles atop each table at the bistros I visited – the vast majority were drinking Cote de Provence rosé or Beaujolais. I get the reason for the mass rosé consumption – France was burdened by an oppressive heat wave the week I was... ... View Full Post >>
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GENERAL POST
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Posted
8/23/2010 at 9:00 AM PST
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Hug Your Local Wine Grape Farmer - Guest Post from Jennifer R. Thomson
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I know, I know – “God Bless Texas” where the cattle are bigger, the men aren’t afraid to wear hub caps on their belts, and you can’t get Chardonnay to grow worth a damn! Whoops, that’s sure to rile some of you Texans up. Farmers and ranchers don’t seem to be as much of a dwindling commodity in Texas for some reason. Here in California we’re scarce, few and far between. For some reason we aren’t the grower of choice by winemakers who instead prefer to work alongside vineyard management companies who fall into the “Big Agriculture” category managing not hundreds, but thousands of acres across the greatest wine growing regions of California. Napa, Sonoma and the Central Coast.I remember last year when we began working with a less than Infamous Winemaker who drives an Acura, gets regular manicures and refuses to drink cucumber infused cocktails because the taste reminds him of the cucumbers they put on your eyes at the spa. Anyhow, one thing he did have going for him is that he took... ... View Full Post >>
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GENERAL POST
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Posted
8/20/2010 at 12:26 PM PST
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The Wine Bottle is a Reliquary - Guest Post by Sam Klingberg
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You're rolling your eyes, but I'm serious. Judging from people's reactions to innovative wine packaging designs and marketing techniques, you could only assume that wine is a sacred object.I find that even in my young, totally bad ass perception of life, I prejudge wine based on my moderately secret desire to be a serious wine connoisseur.For instance, screw caps. Despite the affirmation of entire nations (e.g. New Zealand) and bastions of the faith (e.g. Jancis Robinson,) there are still plenty of skeptics, and we're still forced to post interminably long and boring tales about the avoidable horror of T.C.A.Or, How many people have you heard renounce any bottle that features an animal on the label as practically an Iconoclastic heresy? Why was my first reaction to the cross-branded Wines that Rock line, "You have gotta be f*n kidding me!?"How many of you look at a Tetra Pak and think, "There's gotta be some great juice inside of that!" Why must Black Box's marketing campaign...
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GENERAL POST
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Posted
8/19/2010 at 7:27 AM PST
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The Five-Step Program to Recover Your Sense of Adventure - Guest Post by Tony Ambrosini
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We tend to take this for granted because of the era that we live in, but I am stunned by the amount of resources we have when it comes to food and wine. General information, recipes, publications, blogs…you name it. At the very least, you can find it on our good friend, the Internet. There is so much to experience that it’s really hard to keep up with it all.So that’s why I’m equally stunned when I talk to people about this subject and every now and then they tell me, “Oh, I only drink Chardonnay” or say, “I don’t really cook, it’s too hard.”Wait a minute…what? Really??Even when some folks tell me about their travels overseas, they only go to Italy. Why? Unless you have family or close friends out there, there is no need to keep going back. Seriously? Where is the sense of adventure?Look, I know times are rough for a lot of us. Either you are trying to sell a home that’s been on the market for a year, or you have small kids, or you might even have an...
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GENERAL POST
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Posted
8/18/2010 at 12:18 PM PST
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Eleven Reasons to Participate in #Cabernet Day
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The Twitter machine has been all abuzz recently with talk about the upcoming #Cabernet Twitter event that is being organized by Rick Bakas. There have been a number of this type of event taking place over the last few months, and this one has the potential to break all of the standing wine Twitter records. All you need to participate in this event is a Twitter account and some Cab, but if you need some encouragement to join in, try these reasons on for size:Hundreds of people tweeting about one variety of wine, what could be more fun than that?All the cool kids are doing it.Rick Bakas asked nicely.Because you never know what @nectarwine is going to say after he's got a few glasses of Cab in him.There are already almost 50 wineries from around the world confirmed to be participating in the event, including several hosting live events. This is a great opportunity to hear directly from the producers about some great Cabernets.Trying to set the world record for number of tweets in a 24... ... View Full Post >>
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GENERAL POST
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Posted
8/16/2010 at 11:22 AM PST
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It's Going to Be One of Those Weeks
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Sometimes you get to a point where you just know that there is no way that you are going to be able to get everything done that you would like to, and you need some help from some friends. This is one of those weeks for me.I like to keep you all updated on what is going on in my little wine world, and right now there's a ton on my plate. I've still got a lot of material lined up for blog posts, but with the job search heating up and another project that I'm jumping into right now starting to pick up steam as well, my days are pretty much overflowing with activity. I know you are probably worried that this means that you won't have much to read here on Vinotology, but fear not my friends, I have requisitioned the assistance of some awesome bloggers for some guest posts over the next couple of weeks. The guest posting action actually started last week, with my friend Tamara Belgard from Sip With Me contributing an awesome The Good, the Bad, the Ugly post on Friday.I'm still...
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GENERAL POST
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Posted
8/13/2010 at 7:05 PM PST
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August 13 - The Good the Bad and the Ugly - Guest Poster: SipwithMe
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Thi
s week’s Good, the Bad and the Ugly is being delivered by Tamara Belgard of Sip with Me.
The air was so heavy with dirt, with every breath; it coated your mouth and throat. It was so thick with tension; you couldn’t have swallowed it if you tried. It was a week of showdowns, barroom brawls and shoot-outs between the good, the bad and the ugly and once the dust settled, it was easy to see who had the quickest hands in the west. The Good
Armed with only a spatula, Bill Eyer of Cuvee Corner flipped wine reviews upside down this week with his creative look at a box of wine and his anti-ABC Chardonnay prescription (be sure to heed those warnings though!). Hosing most everyone down with his twisted take on the “Green Wine” movement is Ron Washman’s “A Healthy Brown Movement”. A post where the comment stream is as rich as the content, this article, though at first glance may appear to be just a load of crap, will actuall... ...
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GENERAL POST
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Posted
8/13/2010 at 7:34 AM PST
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Getting My Feet on California Soil
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The hardest part about relocating is the timing of trips into the perspective new job markets. Things never seem to work out in a manner that is both cost effective and time efficient. The perfect situation would be to have 5 or 6 interviews magically line up over the course of about a week, and each of those interviews be willing to wait long enough that you are able to book travel inexpensively. Alas, I've never seen this perfect storm play out, so I'm always left to try to get a little something going with at least one perspective employer, and then fly out to the area and stay long enough to at least lay some groundwork for other possibilities. Such is the case in my big push to move into the wine industry, a task that might be even more taxing than the standard job search.This time I decided to get out in front of this whole process early. I do have a couple of people in Napa that I have been in contact with, but I certainly don't have the dream 5-6 options lined... ... View Full Post >>
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GENERAL POST
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Posted
8/11/2010 at 11:23 AM PST
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Maybe We DO Need Some Stinking Badges
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By now many of you who are regular readers of my blog are aware of my past contemplations on the subject of wine scoring. While I realize that wine scoring definitely serves a purpose, and that maybe we all score wines in one way or another, I still have misgivings about the systems that we use to quantify the wine experience. Given my feelings on the subject, I was really excited when I read about a project on Paul Mabray's blog that is being headed up by several different bloggers to use a new system to score wines. Enter, the badge system. The idea of using badges as rewards is right in line with the zeitgeist of social media and Web 2.0. Perhaps the most well known example these days is in the mobile app Foursquare. Users are awarded badges based on activity. These badges can be shared with others, giving users a way to publicize their accomplishments within the "game". The badges being used by reviewers like Steve Paulo of Notes From the Cellar, Mark De Vere MW,... ... View Full Post >>
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GENERAL POST
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Posted
8/10/2010 at 8:47 AM PST
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What Makes a Good Social Media Campaign for a Winery?
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There have been a couple of things that got me started asking this question on my Facebook page the other day - "What kind of content do you most like to see on social media from wineries? What makes a good Facebook page from a winery?"There are lots of examples of both good and bad uses of social media within the wine industry. Jennifer Thomson from Thomson Vineyards, a social media #rockstar in her own right (see their Twitter account and blog), mentioned some bad social media behavior from six Napa wineries yesterday. The wineries are Tweeting from an API, meaning that if you followed all six wineries you would be getting the exact same tweets six times. This is lazy social media at its worst. My assumption is that there is a third party contractor behind this, who has really given these wineries some bad social media advice. We are all familiar with the examples of wineries that only ever tweet or post sales messages on Twitter and Facebook, which is another way to... ... View Full Post >>
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GENERAL POST
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Posted
8/9/2010 at 8:30 AM PST
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A Glass That Just Won't Quit - Eisch Sensis Plus Glasses
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I have a natural skepticism about manufacturer claims that I hear about new products. I work in marketing, so I may have become even more jaded than the average consumer when it comes to what I read in promotional materials. Just because I'm skeptical, doesn't mean that there aren't products that really do live up to their billing. I was recently sent samples of two Eisch glasses by Balzak Communications. One of the glasses is the standard Eisch glass, and the other is the Superior Sensis Plus series glass. The two glasses are practically identical in appearance and shape. The Sensis Plus glass feels slightly heavier, but both glasses feel comfortable in your hand.Through some combination of trade secret and the fact that Eisch lost a court case, which originated with Riedel, forcing them to stop claiming that the glasses were "breathable", I have been completely unable to determine what is actually going on in the glass that would be any different from a standard...
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GENERAL POST
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Posted
8/6/2010 at 9:12 AM PST
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August 6 - The Good the Bad and the Ugly
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First of all, I want to thank everyone who has given me support in my search for a job in the wine biz. You guys are all awesome. A special thanks to the guys at Wine Biz Radio for mentioning my search on their show this week. The Good Man, this is another week where I found so many Good posts that I just couldn't narrow it down to one. I actually left off some other great posts this week, but these are three of my favorites:I love it when people think outside of the box for a post, and this week on the A Long Pour blog, there was a really creative post featuring an interview with that chain smoking misanthrope of a grape, Merlot.Another great post comes from one of the really great wine writers (just ask him), Ken Payton of Reign of Terroir. This one touches on a topic that I've posted on recently, as has Jeff Lefevere of Good Grape fame. The topic at hand is Biodynamics, and Ken has posted an open letter (due to Ken's comments being blocked... ... View Full Post >>
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