In France, youth binge drinking (15 – 25 year olds) is experiencing a major rise.  A proposed solution?  Give university students wine tastings in lunch cafeterias to teach them how to respect and enjoy wine.  “Why is there sexual education and not viticultural education? You can learn wine too.”  This is being supported by a well-known gastronome and a former director of the Sorbonne.

Actually, that’s a very very French solution, yes?

I am utterly bewildered by the criteria people use to buy wine.

I was standing behind a couple (?) at my local grocery store a few minutes ago.  He had four bottles of wine for checkout, she had one.  I was looking sidelong at the bottles, trying not to be too obvious.  We’re well below having the commonality be “well-reviewed” or “from good wineries”.  I entertained other ideas, such as consistency in vintage, region, varietal: as far as I could tell, nothing linked them.  They weren’t even all behind pretty labels.  I’m scanning them one by one: dishwater, graywater, bilge-water, bong-water, hello, 2006 Charles Krug Yountville Cab blend.  The latter is not a great wine, but compared to the rest, it’s a Petrus.

The cashier says, “If you get another bottle of wine, you save 10%” — the half-case deal which is ubiquitous in Southern California and maybe elsewhere.  The cashier explains to the confused couple what that means.  The woman says, “OK, I’ll pay for all of them.”

The cashier looks at her for a beat, and says, “You’ll need one more.  Which do you want me to double?”

I lean over and point to the Krug.  “That one,” I say in a quiet voice.

The couple look at me a bit oddly, simultaneously let out a little giggle, and say, “OK, that one.”  The cashier doubles it; the woman waits for the man to go fetch the second bottle; I pay for my carrot juice and leave.

I believe that I have been reading too much dialogue between kittehs: when I saw the URL for the (sublime) doihaveswineflu.org, I pictured a photo of a hung-over-looking tabby asking “Do I haves wine flu?”

I had contended for years that I so loved the flavors of my favorite alcoholic beverages that, were they available non-alcoholically (or Star Trek syntheholically), I would actually drink much, much more, and that I actually don’t enjoy inebriation.  Only one person called me a liar to my face, but I’m not sure anyone else really believed me.

Well, Ariel non-alcoholic vintage Cabs have made a truth-teller out of me.  I love the stuff.  It doesn’t taste fake, it doesn’t taste like juice, it just tastes like wine with a little less body.  The flavor is exquisite.  It’s less caloric than wine, less caloric than juice or soda, and probably is still full of antioxidants.  When I have it around, I drink a whole bottle in one go, usually Vedder-style, straight from the bottle.  The only thing limiting my intake is price, and that’s only about six bucks per bottle.  Otherwise it would probably be the only thing I’d ever drink.  Try it if you haven’t.

I’m going to be very suspicious of anyone other than “regulars” posting about other non-alcoholic wines they like, as I know this is a fierce marketplace and there are likely to be plants.  But if you are one of Ariel’s competitors, feel free to advertise: I’ll accept a case of dealcoholized product, postpaid, for 30 months’ placement with all the bells and whistles.  Email me for my shipping address.  If you win my palate, you win my heart, and if you win my heart, you win my wallet — and you’d get a nice recommendation from me, on your wine, on this site (even if I didn’t like your wine, I’d praise your wise investment.) 

worldwineboutique.com (no link) is an internet wine shop.  And a spammer.  As this site has higher traffic than their own site, I’m sure this will show up in Google searches, and probably higher than theirs.  If you oppose spam, don’t order from the site.

Bracing yourself for a sip of cheap, over-oaked Chardonnay and getting a mouthful of even cheaper Sauvignon Blanc is a hideously blech-inducing experience.  With the sting of acid and lack of vanillins, your brain goes, “Bad!  This wine has gone BAD!”

Why am I drinking crappy S. Blanc?  Because it’s open on the table, and I needed a sip of something to take my medicine.

Why am I using wine to swallow my medicine?  Good frakking question.

By the way, whoever thought of crossing “crisp” (watch for that one, it’s a euphemism), wild, and grassy Sauvignon Blanc with thin, testy, weedy Cabernet Franc was out of his head, but ended up with noble, thick-skinned, tannic Cabernet Sauvignon for his trouble.  Go figure.

The Wine Info Site.  Learn about your grape varietals.  They don’t have much info about Aghiorgitiko.

I opened a corked bottle of Chateauneuf-du-Pape this evening. This time it was an inexpensive wine, but last time it was a $135 vintage Jaboulet Hermitage.

From wineanorak.com: “A slightly dangerous response is that in old world wine countries there is less emphasis on product quality and greater tolerance of what could be considered wine faults by consumers and even the wine trade. The fact that the wine industry trades heavily on tradition may imbue it with a degree of inertia, and thus a significant change such as changing closure type is perceived as more problematic than a 5% taint rate.” This from a very interesting article on screwcap closures.

Trader Joe’s has a Zwack 3 year old plum brandy at 47% abv, distilled entirely from plums. It’s also Kosher, curiously. Apparently the Zwack distillery produces the self-proclaimed “national drink of Hungary”, Unicum. More here.

Calpis concentrate.  Grey Goose.  Water.  Ice.  Combine at will.  Drink.  Yum.

Trader Joe’s has a Saint-Vivant armagnac in an attractive crooked bottle for $21.99 right now.  I’m no armagnac expert, but this is absolutely delicious stuff.

Jennifer asked in the mcgees.org QuickTopic forum that I mention the wines I chose for dinner with my parents this past weekend.  We were having Italian cold cuts (some spicy), bread, and sharp cheeses.  I wanted massive Italian wines that could stand up to the onslaught.  I chose two that are currently available at Trader Joe’s in Southern California.  The first is a Barolo, a wine from Piedmont made from the nebbiolo grape.  It is the 1997 “Tenuta La Loggia”.  It is full-bodied, tannic, complex, and dry.  It spent some of its life residing in chestnut casks and is a gorgeous, deep blood red.  It is drinkable now about an hour after decanting, and should cellar well for several years.  It costs $12.99 per bottle.

The second was an Amarone, labeled “1997 Amarone Classico D.O.C. Conte di Bregonzo”.  It is also massive, highly tannic, and could easily use more years in the bottle.  It is thick and fiercely dry.  If you are planning to drink it now, open it well ahead of time, decant and aerate it well.  The wine is only $9.99 per bottle.  Many locations are out of the ‘97 now, although bottles of the ‘98 remain (I have not tried the ‘98.)

If you have a policy against responding to spam you get, skirt around that problem by responding to spam I got.  Go to the Bombay Sapphire (gin) website and participate in their gorgeous interactive contest.  You could win a beautiful piece of art valued at over US$5,000; but even if you don’t win, the site design and the artistic merit of the content makes the trip worthwhile.

An exchange from the adjacent table at dinner last night:

“Yeah … we’ve been trying a lot of the wines these days.  We like the, uh, pie-…”

“… pea? …”

“Yeah, uh, pea-noe noo-ars.  And the shy-razzes.  But the shy-razzes are just mixes.”