For a year and a half now, I’ve struggled. It’s been that long since I had my feet on the ground among the vines in Israeli wine country, and until now I’d yet to write a word about the experience, apart from a few social media updates and the odd mini-review. The mistake I’d made…
Category: wine review
Sweet Sixteen (Highlights From The 2019 Critics Challenge Wine Competition)
A few weeks ago, I visited San Diego for yet another stint of judging at the annual Critics Challenge International Wine Competition, now in its sixteenth year. As is always the case with CC, the organization, staff, and execution were all top-notch, allowing us critic-judge-types to give the wines their fair due under the palate…
Texas Four-Step (A Deeper Dive Into Texas Hill Wine Country)
While I enjoy the thrill of the new, in some ways I am a creature of habit. Specifically, I have both a habit of getting invited to wine regions that don’t make the usual list of media darling locales, and I have a habit of accepting those invitations because, well, new. And so it was…
Long-haired Hippy Good Guy (Spicewood Vineyards Recent Releases)
“It only took me… eleven years!” remarked Ron Yates, owner of the family-run Spicewood Vineyards, which produces about three thousand cases from about forty acres in the about-as-unlikely-as-they-come-at-first-but-upon-further-review-kind-of-inevitable fine wine region of Texas Hill Country. Yates was speaking about the fact that he and Texas-native winemaker Todd Crowell can now offer an all-estate tasting list….