During my time Asia, I have been blessed with a great group of great friends and colleagues who have been my “family away from home.” There are a large number of expats living in Hong Kong and China, and we all reach out for the same sense of familiarity to home, which not only gives us something in common, but also pulls us together. I can easily say that the holidays spent away from the USA have been the most adventurous (perhaps I should write a separate blog on holiday bloopers abroad). This year I was very fortunate to have spent the holidays with my entire family. Although there were not as many outrageous events as I have experience overseas, my family is quite colorful and I can say there were plenty of laughs, copious amounts of comfort food and a few decent bottles of wine.

We can all agree that every bottle of wine has a story and for some of us a special memory. My humble cellar holds a rather eclectic mix of wines that mark past wine trips, gifts, special events and indulgent visits to the wine store. One of my favorite memories consumed was a bottle of 2000 Domaine du Chay from the Cotes de Blaye. The wine showed exquisitely and I was very pleased we did not wait another year to pop the cork. The bottles was given to me by the generous owner/winemaker, an elderly gentleman who only had three or four teeth from what I remember. Hailing from an area of Bordeaux that is often overlooked, Blaye occupies the northern end of Bordeaux’s right bank, an area that produces lovely white and red wines at tremendous value. This elegant red brought back fond memories of my broken French and a lovely meal among French friends overlooking the citadel. It is these rather unknown bottles that are at times the most memorable and enjoyable.

Sitting at the airport observing all of the post holiday traffic, I reflect on my trip. Not once do I think about the tree, Christmas carols, presents, fireworks or holiday food and fuss. Instead, I think of the people, my surroundings and spontaneous silliness that each day brought. It is these intangible details that are truly special about being home for the holidays. Now that I am heading back to Hong Kong, I look forward to the many adventures of 2012. Happy New Year!

Thursday, Chinese winemakers beat the French at their own game by winning the coveted award for best Bordeaux varietal at the Decanter World Wine Awards at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden. After years of producing millions of bottles of cheap “plonk” for supermarket shelves, a few Chinese producers have started invading the high end market. Winery He Lan Qing Xue’s Jia Bei Lan 2009 Cabernet blend was the wine of the night setting the record as the first Chinese wine to win such an international prize.

Jia Bei Lan, from the desert hills of Ningxia (Inner Mongolia) was tasted against other regional trophy winners from France, California, Australia, South Africa and South America and came out on top. Another winner was Domaine Helan Mountain from the western province of Xinjiang,  who took home a silver and bronze medal for its Classic Chardonnay and its Premium Collection Riesling, respectively. Most of the wines found in China are not made from local grape varietals but from French and German grapes owing to their global popularity. Having been fortunate to taste some of these wines, I can attest that there is tremendous talent and great potential in China, and I am so pleased to see these producers recognized at such a large scale.

Understanding China’s position in the wine market and their lack of wine laws makes these international achievements even more impressive.  Without boundaries and regulations, winemakers are left on their own to either look to European traditions or go with their own instincts and standard farming practices. For these few pioneers who have chosen the road of tradition and excellence are truly making a difference in the way the world views China and its wine.

There are many Chinese wines on the local market, and one must be choosy about which bottle to take for dinner. Aside from the wineries mentioned above, here are a few other gems  – Grace Vineyard’s Moscato Symphony, the Bordeaux blends Chairman’s Reserve and Deep Blue from Shanxi province and Silver Height’s Cabernet blend “the Summit” from Ningxia (Inner Mongolia).

Working at IWM helps me discover the terroir of Italian wine. I’ve sampled a multitude of wines in only a short few months, and my taste for Italy has been quickly piqued. I’m constantly amazed by the incredible wine selections IWM has accumulated—it’s the most comprehensive group that I’ve ever seen under one cellar. There’s Soldera, Giacosa and smaller producers like Hilberg, San Giustiniani—the list goes on and on. I’m realizing that Italy has so much to discover. It’s going to take some time, but it’ll be fun tasting each region. I want to visit. I will visit.

Travel is therapeutic. It’s good to break away from it all and recharge. Wine and travel together are even better. You can eat, pray and love anywhere you want, and if those activities require you to travel across the world, all the better. But whether I’m home in New York or I’m journeying through several time zones, there’s always something to discover, and I’m far from done searching.

The many faces of glassware. (Photo: Maya Borenstein)

Unsurprisingly, wine glasses have been around as long as wine, which is to say since the Bronze Age. For most of human history, humans drank their wine out of cups made of clay, leather, wood or metal—none of which are ideal conveyances for wine. Glass, not widely available until the Industrial Revolution, is the preferred material for the eponymous wine glass. Not only is it pretty—and let’s face it, wine drinkers do tend to like a strong aesthetic—but unlike other materials, glass doesn’t impart flavors to the liquid it contains. Thus glass, once the sole purview of nobility, is now ubiquitous. Where there is wine, in short, there is glass.

We have the French courts of the 17^th and 18^th centuries to thank for the exhaustive marriage of form and function that typifies the array of wine glasses today. As the tiresome bourgeoisie became able to buy their way into the upper classes, French aristocrats devised increasingly baroque etiquette as a means of separating themselves from the industrious common people, who were hot on their heels. Table manners, place settings and wine service were a way to put the populous in their place, and the creation of a glass for every wine (and a wine for every glass) was a great part of the division of class. It didn’t work, but every time we pick a big, bulbous wine glass for our Bordeaux, we are unthinkingly paying homage to the Sun King.

The modern wine glass has three major parts: the bowl, the stem and the foot. The foot provides a stable surface; the stem grants a gracious line to the glass and it provides a heat barrier to keep hot hands from gripping the bowl and warming the wine; the bowl offers the optimal air-to-wine ratio and channels aromas to the nose. White wine glasses have a more austere bowl, while red wine glasses offer a more voluptuous one. A wider, rounder bowl causes the wine to oxidize more rapidly, a quality generally more important to the enjoyment of red wine than to white–of course, once a generality is made in the world of wine, it must be discounted. For example, oaky white wines like Chardonnay should be served in wide, short glasses to enhance oxidation, if you’re a stickler to wine etiquette (and if you are, you know whom to thank).

The classic tumbler.

Much in keeping with the intent of the French aristocracy, you can find a dazzling array of glasses for pretty much every kind of wine under the sun. You can also, if you’re the more quotidian type, pare down the process to the wine glass essentials: a flute for Champagne, a modestly rounded glass for white and a taller, rounder glass for red. You can also do as the little old Italian men and drink out of wine tumblers. In any case, pretty much everyone agrees that the go-to glass comes from Reidel in Austria. It’s the industry standard, and it’s what’s in my cupboard (though, I do enjoy the little glass tumblers too).

At the end of the day, what matters is what you enjoy. If you like the pomp and circumstance of serving your Pinot Noir in the appropriate 35-ounce glass with a lip curled like a bracket, you should embrace it. And if you want to quaff your Frappato out of a vintage Tom and Jerry’s juice glass, you can do that too. Viva la difference (and la revolution).

American straight pull corkscrew.

One thing about a bottle of wine is that to enjoy it you need a corkscrew. A loaf of bread and thou are all well and good, but leave that corkscrew sitting in the pocket of your other jeans, and you two are sharing just a dusty mouthful. While there are ways to MacGyver a cork out of a bottle (they mostly involve shoving the butt of the bottle into your shoe and then whacking the shoe against a vertical surface until the cork pops out), these methods are only to be taken under duress. In short, a wine key is the key to wine. You need a corkscrew.

But which one? Corkscrews come in a dizzying array of styles, designs and technologies. A cursory search on Bed, Bath and Beyond shows a whopping 26 choices, ranging from the very simple waiter’s tool to the shiny wine ratchet to an electric bottle opener, presumably for the wine-lover who has everything but a DIY spirit, or possibly fingers.

Manual or electronic, a corkscrew is really a very simple and elegant device with one very clear purpose: to extract a snug cork intact. Rare are the tools created with such single-mindedness. Therefore, it’s safe to say that the choice of corkscrew says a lot about the corkscrewer.

Crescent-shaped French double action corkscrew.

Wine aficionados are not a shy lot. They may play their cards close to their chest, but they tend to opine long and loud about their wine loves and loathes. They tend to love the ritual of selecting, opening, decanting, pouring, sniffing, tasting and swallowing—and they tend to love that ritual as much as they love the wine itself. To this end, a great wine lover deserves a great wine opener, a corkscrew whose beauty, efficacy and drama befits that ’97 Ornellaia—a corkscrew, perhaps, with a history that matches the history of the wine—a vintage corkscrew, if you will.

To that end, I’m quite fond of this naughty German figural corkscrew dating to 1894. I can imagine it held by some fin de siècle bon vivante, in her delicate hands and wry smile gently wresting a cork from some vintage Bordeaux, the corkscrew a glimpse of the pleasure to come. This 1944 stainless steel model holds a glorious post-war promise. Its sleek lines and masculine heft makes you think of Bogey and Bacall and where they to set aside their scotch for an evening. And this no-nonsense American straight-pull summons to mind Teddy Roosevelt. Each one is singular, and each one tells a story—even if it’s only a story that you make up yourself.

A corkscrew tells you a lot about the wine drinker. Mine is a Good Grips waiter’s corkscrew. It’s not very fancy, but it’s functional. And though it’s not antique today, some day it will be. Perhaps 100 years in the future, someone will imagine me, the woman who owned it, and that someone will tell stories to herself about my fictive life. It could happen.

I was eating dinner with my grandparents, who spend most of the year in London and a few months in New York. Upon arrival, my grandmother handed me a glass of Bordeaux. As I sipped it, I discreetly perused their bar and noticed that every bottle of wine stored there was from Bordeaux. I remembered how often I’d drunk this wine in their presence. I continued pondering the Bordeaux connection, and I realized that Bordeaux is all they ever drink—in restaurants and in their home. In fact, it’s a taste that I associate with my grandparents. And I can’t help but think that they’re not the only wine drinkers their age who practice that sort of discrimination.

One school of thought would then be that this predilection for Bordeaux would have been passed on to my mother, and then on to me. However, it’s quite the opposite—my mom’s red of choice is Zinfandel and we rarely drink Bordeaux at family meals. So what is it that drives my mom’s relationship with wine? Could it be that because she is a baby boomer she has the cultural drive to try something different, to redefine traditional values? Does her choice of wine constitute a subtle act of rebellion? Is my mother’s Zinfandel the sign of an infidel? Or does she merely like it better?

I then started to think about my friends from California. While they’ll try anything new and different that they can get their mouths on, when push comes to shove, they’ll show their hometown pride in opting for a big Napa Cab any day of the week. This choice seems to fall clearly into the culture camp. To drink otherwise is not to support the home team.

And then I tried to decipher my own relationship with wine. Although I do have my everyday favorites and some wines that I crave above all others, I am like many people of Generation Y: I’m always searching for the new. Novelty may be the standard in my relationship with drinking wine, a habit I was allowed to develop early on because of my parents’ European love of always having a glass of wine with dinner. However, as much as I love pushing my oenophile envelope, I cannot credit any one thing for shaping my relationship with wine. But then, I’m still young. Maybe by the time I’m my grandparents’ age I too will have found my Bordeaux. (Though I doubt it.)

I’m curious about all of you. What would you say shapes your love of wine? Culture? Tradition? Taste buds? Generation? Or some combination thereof?

For the second year in a row, Chef Kevin Sippel and I had the pleasure of creating a Valentine’s Day Wine list and menu for an IWM favorite, Omar and Leslie Khan.  Together we came up with “Around the World in Eleven Courses,” a light-hearted culinary journey across to the globe that traversed some of the world’s favorite wine regions, as well as some off-the-beaten-path destinations.  Each course invited our guests to experience a different grape, winemaker, dish and story that all worked together to highlight what makes each region so unique.  As Omar pointed out to me, each of the chosen eleven wines on a different evening could be a centerpiece in its own right.  Looking back on the night, I’d highlight the 1966 Chateau Musar from the Bekaa Valley, which offered layers of complexity and very much held its own against the 1966 Leoville Las Cases. Then there was the Weinert Malbec Estrella 1977, which challenges everything you thought you know about Argentinean Malbec (aged 19 years in oak cask).

This was truly an evening of the esoteric to the iconic, and to do it justice, I thought I would share the words and review from one of our special guests:

Valentine’s…Eve?
This entry was written by Omar Khan, posted on February 20, 2010 on his blog.

Well, we enjoy Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve, so this year, as Valentine’s Day was falling on Sunday, we opted to have our amorous outing on the “eve.”

Many pooh-pooh this holiday calling it commercially contrived, historically dubious (as if our other holidays aren’t?) and more.

It’s irrelevant. It’s a day to focus on love, and you don’t have to succumb to an orgy of candy purchases to express one of our deepest sentiments. And you can be as extravagant, as imaginative, or as corny as you like. You have license. We are “excused.” After all, there’s an “official” day to blame!

We went back to our favorite spot for Valentine’s and much else: the Italian Wine Merchants, pioneers in Italian wine appreciation in the United States, and one of the primary conduits and channels for extraordinary wine of irreproachable provenance overall.

We had the lovely space to ourselves. We were surrounded by masterful chefs putting their show kitchen to the best possible use, and were “serenaded” (oenophilically) by Italian Wine Merchants’ Vice-President and a masterful commentator on the joys of the grape, Chris Deas.

Together he and Chef Kevin Sippel (a true culinary innovator), formerly of Alto, took us “Around the World in Eleven Courses.” Not quite around the world perhaps, but the circumnavigation was quite extensive. This could as easily have been called “Around the World in Eleven Wines.” But why quibble? Both are implied, and both were experienced.

Menu highlights included the palate puckering Paccheri Verdi, Braised Snails and Gorgonzola; one of the last orchestrations of Didier Dagueneau via his masterful Pouilly-Fume Silex 2006 enhanced and enchanted this remarkable dish.

Another menu highlight was the crispy sweetbread, manchego and toasted allioli, married exquisitely and tantalizingly with Descendientes de Jose Palacios Corullon La Faraona 2006. From one of the best vineyard sites in Bierzo Spain, La Faraona is the gem of Alvaro Palacios’ (of Priorat fame) art in this region. Only 65 cases are produced annually, and other than the Italian Wine Merchants, this exceptional wine isn’t available anywhere else in the United States.

Hot on the heels of this came another winner! A hen egg cooked slowly for two hours, and then lightly fried, with Serrano ham and baked sardine! Extraordinary!

A number of amazing wines, from Gaja Sperss 1998 to La Rioja Alta Rioja Gran Reserva 1995, all could have been the centerpieces in a lesser dinner.

But for us the 1977 Bodega Malbec from Mendoza Argentina showed us a style of Malbec we almost can’t experience any more because of the unsettling “globalization” of wine tastes. The two “birth year” wines for my wife and I, the Leoville Las Cases (one of fifteen second growths in Bordeaux and one of our favorites) 1966 (a vintage that seems among the better Bordeaux to be drinking quite beautifully now) and the beyond rare 1966 Chateau Musar from Lebanon (slightly sweet herb-like aromas, elegant, a bit more Burgundian), were luscious, fitting and truly memorable.

We went home with a lovely Pinot to accompany artisanal chocolates, a dozen red roses (a “classic” rather than a “cliché,” though many people can’t tell the two apart), and memories we will savor and which will reverberate happily for years to come.

James Thurber once opined, “Love is what you’ve been through with someone.” Most people take that to mean what you’ve survived together. Well, partially that’s so. But it’s as much what you’ve experienced together, exulted in together, and celebrated together! Salute!

AROUND THE WORLD IN ELEVEN COURSES

CHAMPAGNE — FRANCE
Selection of Raw Fish, Oysters and Caviar
Jacques Selosse Champagne Brut Initial NV

LOIRE VALLEY — FRANCE
Paccheri Verdi, Braised Snails and Gorgonzola
Didier Dagnueneau Pouilly Fume Silex 2006

BRDA — SLOVENIA
Grilled Sepia with Sea Urchin
Movia Lunar 2007

BIERZO — SPAIN
Crispy Sweetbread, Tomato, Manchego and Toasted Allioli
Descendientes de Jose Palacios Corrullon La Faraona 2006

PIEMONTE — ITALY
Frog Leg Risotto with Veal Reduction and Leeks
Gaja Sperss 1998

RIOJA — SPAIN
Fried Egg, Serrano Ham and Poached Sardine
La Rioja Alta Rioja Gran Riserva ‘890′ 1995

TOSCANA — ITALY
Crudo of Veal with Hot Bone Marrow, Pancetta and Pecorino Fondue
Fontodi Flaccianello 1995

MENDOZA — ARGENTINA
Smoked Venison with White Polenta, Chorizo and Porcini Mushrooms
Bodega y Cavas de Weinert Malbec Estrella 1977

BORDEAUX — FRANCE
Foie Gras Tortellini in Black Truffle Consomme with Offal
Chateau Leoville-Las Cases Bordeaux 2nd Growth 1966

BEKAA VALLEY — LEBANON
Rack of Lamb with Controne Bean, Pickled Eggplant and Lamb’s Tongue
Chateau Musar Rouge 1966

ITALY
Chocolate Cake and Bombolini
Antonio Ferrari Solaria Jonica 1959

When we consider the differences in a wine from one vintage to another, we may find it very difficult to ascertain the actual quality of the wine.  We have already addressed in earlier blogs how inaccurate a critic’s perspective may be, and this issue certainly poses a considerable challenge to laypeople. To add to their confusion, there is the reality that wines continue to evolve after they are released. For years the collectible wines like Barolo, First Growth Bordeaux and Grand Cru Burgundy were made with such developed tannic structure that they did not show their true majesty for years, particularly in the great vintages. Indeed in many cases, the vintages that were good to very good provided more immediate drinking satisfaction than those that would later show themselves to be great.

To add further to this confusion about drinkability, there are other external factors that can negatively affect the manner in which a wine is drinking. Delicate wines like Pinot Noir don’t like to travel. They will often go into a “dumb” or “silent” period, and they won’t show their full spectrum of components as they are adjusting to the bumping and jostling from being shipped. Then there are some people who contend that Burgundy and Barolo simply never taste as good as they do in their native land. But aside from all of these various quibbling points, the vintage variation continues to provide its own not inconsiderable challenge. Consumers are taught to look at specific vintages and typically follow that doctrine as though it were gospel. However, at IWM we hold a very different belief: we follow producers, absolutely and religiously.

We know that great winemakers will always make very good wine, even in off years. We also know that in extraordinary years there wines will provide a transcendental experience. We know that while it is helpful to be aware of vintages, it is more important to understand what role producers take in creating a wine. Because we really “get” producers, who they are, what they do, and why they do it, we are not afraid of “off” years. For one thing, we understand that wines from those vintages often provide more immediate satisfaction. We are more concerned with popular producers making consistently high alcohol, fruity, over-oaked wines. Because those are the ones we want to avoid.

To know a producer and to love his or her wine is to choose well—year in and year out.

When I say vinotherapy, I’m not referring to the medicinal glass of wine so many of us look forward to after a stressful day at the office. Rather, I’m talking about a genre of spa treatments and products that range from massages with grape marc (the seeds and skins of grapes), to hot tubs constructed out of oak barrels, to manicures employing grapes as nail buffers. Vinotherapy began in 1993 in France, where a young couple (one of whom is the daughter of owners of Chateau Smith Haute Lafitte) decided to explore the possibilities of the grape parts usually disposed of early in the winemaking stages. Caudalie, this couple’s brand, now has spas in or near three major winemaking regions: Bordeaux, Piedmont, and Rioja, as well as one in New York City. A major piece of their business is in the product line, many targeted at firming, anti-ageing and toning. These products flaunt the power of resveratrol and polyphenols, grape skin components thought to make wine not only good, but also good for you.

When I first started hearing about vinotherapy, I had my doubts. I can imagine it feels nice to have a bunch of grapes run along your back, but why would I opt for that over a normal massage? Do the grapes break and leave you with drips of sticky juice all over? Is forty minutes really long enough to even retain any of the benefits of the grape components? I am a proud skeptic—I like to think of myself as a realist—but I certainly needed more evidence to justify my dismissal of the trend.

Last weekend my roommate attended a spa conference in the Finger Lakes region of upstate New York at a spa that has its own vinotherapy treatments featuring grape seed oil in massages and facials. She said the massage was relaxing, though she isn’t yet ready to make any conclusion about the effects of the grape seed oil on the tone of her skin. But the most notable judgment she made about the experience is that vinotherapy worked at the August Moon Spa because it sits in an actual winemaking region. I have to say I agree—soaking in wine barrels in the middle of Manhattan cannot possibly feel as invigorating as soaking in wine barrels in Piemonte overlooking vineyards. And what would make that experience even more therapeutic would be sipping a glass of Barolo at the same time.

But then, as we can all agree, a glass of Barolo makes everything better. Or maybe I just like my wine better in me than on me.

One night I had the opportunity to lead a tasting from an avid collector’s collection.  For the grand finale of the tasting, our gracious hostess had three Bordeaux wines for us to taste, all from the legendary 1975 vintage.  They were all astounding estates: Beychevelle, Cheval Blanc, and Petrus!  I tried to open each of these bottles with great care, but only one would let me. I figured I’d go for the big boy first and, man, the Petrus cork came out without a fight; it was in perfect condition!  I felt pretty optimistic when I next attempted to open the Cheval Blanc. However, the cork seemed to be glued to the bottle and would not move at all, so after trying my Ah-So double-prong corkscrew with no luck, I essentially drilled a hole down the middle! And the last wine was the worst for me to open-the Beychevelle’s cork crumbled into a million pieces even using the Ah-So!

Because of the state of their corks, I didn’t have high hopes for either the Cheval or the Beychevelle, but I certainly did for the Petrus.  The bad news is the Beychevelle was corked; the good news was that this was a learning opportunity for most people at the tasting.  While I was correct in my assumption in the Petrus, and while the wine certainly showed its greatness that night, it was not the wine of the night. There was very little hint of age on the Petrus, and I believe it was too early for this wine, which needs maybe fifteen more years for it to show its best self.  The Cheval, however, was astounding. This night was the night that I had my greatest Bordeaux to date!  The wine was incredibly balanced with deep, thoughtful flavors. It had a deep garnet color and was so rich without being heady.  Still sweet with fruit yet showing an older wine’s woody flavors, this wine held complexities that I had never tasted before. The Cheval won me over that night, but I have a feeling if we did this tasting again in ten years it may not have the same grace.

The second night of best wine came during a big celebration my wife’s birthday. The night started right with a 3L bottle of Billecart 1985 Grand Cuvee, which was going to be a hard wine to top. The earth and flowers in this wine melded together with its minerality to create a very exciting palate. Next, we drank a Felsina 1990 Fontalloro from another 3L.  What can I say about this wine? It’s Sangiovese the way it should be-a tremendous amount of black fruit and a finish that just did not want to stop. Finally, I had a trick up my sleeve: 7 bottles of  Giacomo Conterno 1969 Barolo.  This wine proved to be one of the hardest wines to pour for a group because every bottle showed a bit differently, so you couldn’t just refill someone’s glass. You had to make sure that person drank all of what was in the glass before adding more.  It was such a complex process that I had to take over the wine pouring for the remainder of the night.   I tasted each bottle, which I had opened at 4:00 p.m.  At around 11:00 p.m., I discovered I had a game-changing Barolo!  One of those seven bottles had the perfect balance of leather, spice rose and violets.  The beautiful amber color made me stare at the wine in awe, and the smoky nose kept me coming back for deep inhalations. It was a stunning, glorious wine-drinking moment.

I could talk about these wines for years to come. They were so good that they changed my standard of great wines. On the other hand, given a stellar enough experience, I could have a new standard tomorrow night. The one thing that I’m sure I’ll be talking about is which wine is the best-even if I don’t know the answer. It’s just such a great question and one that can be debated endlessly.  It’s the same as having to choose the best car between a Lamborghini or a Maserati, the best album between Exile on Main Street or the White Album, or the best director between Kubrick and Hitchcock. When viewing Picasso next to Rembrandt, which is best? I can’t say, and I’m not sure I want to.