AWESOME!!! A Chilean wine made the Wine of the Year (2008) for Wine Spectator. That means it beat the Premier Grand Cru, some rockin' Pinot, many, many others. Wow. Clos Apalta is the creme de la creme of Casa Lapostolle winery, a sultry, slinky vintage of 42%...
For years, I dreamed about owning a Kitchen Aid Mixer. A bright cherry red one. It was my ultimate baking toy. I thought of all the amazing Christmas cookies I would whip up, the creamiest mashed potatoes I would make. Then I realized that my love for the mixer...
Of all the edible things I am pining for at breakfast from the US (short list: light organic soy milk, Go Lean cereal, sesame bagels, and 0% greek yogurt), English muffins still rank as number 1. I think I literally ate them close to every other day for almost a month...
Living down here in South America, at times I feel a little out of the gourmet loop in terms of kitchen gadgets. While we have the basics, there is no Williams-Sonoma, Sur Le Table, and imagine, Food Network. Back in October, a couple food-and-wine minded clients were...
Ahhh, the smell of meat grilling. Santiago has gone up in a big cloud of smoke--from the carbon on the grills that is. Today is Day 4 of the 5-day Independence Day long weekend here in Chile; today being the actual Independence Day, September 18. Festivities...
The Story, The basic story is one repeated time and again in South America: French know-how plus Chilean terroir equals outstanding wines—or in the case of El Principal winery, that is how the story originally started, but from their it morphed into its own. The late...
I just stumbled upon my gastronomic discovery of 2006 in Santiago: Emporio Nacional. It is a “Made in Chile” goodie store; a gourmet delicatessen sporting Chile’s finest temptations from jams like Cochayuyo (that seaweed I never know WHAT to do with) or spicy...
I just finished one of the most insightful and intelligent books about the wine world I have had the pleasure of reading in some time: The Accidental Connoisseur. Part of its lure is its engaging text written by Lawrence Osborne, a terrific writer who is...
I recently had the chance to try “G”, the new super-Chilean wine from Emiliana Vineyards, Chile’s pioneer organic and first fully certified biodynamic vineyards. The private tasting, held in (parent) holding company Viña Concha y Toro’s wine store, Vinos CyT,...
In Chile there has been a major increase in good quality, low-acid extra virgin olive oil production in the past couple years, although still only a fraction of it is being exported. That picture is rapidly changing and soon, I imagine that many Chilean oils will end...
This text was written this text for the Sunday Travel section of the La Tercera newspaper on February 26, 2006 (translated here from Spanish) as part of a large calendar of wine-related parties and activities in the many valleys surrounding Santiago. Harvest is...
Another weekend, another asado. Such is life in Chile in the summer. Asados, otherwise know in English as barbeques, are much more than grilled meat and outdoor eating here; they are a full on event and social ritual. We were invited over to our friends’ new...
Here’s the deal on the Abs Diet. You eat a lot, every 3 hours. You never should be hungry. There is no portion control—you oversee that. Eat until you are satisfied. Since the foods are high-protein, high-fiber you will fill up quickly and not get hungry for hours...
Alan York, Biodynamics master-extraordinaire looks in his mid-50s. He has thick, shiny, silver hair cut stylishly, framing his tanned and weathered face with tiny, piercing eyes. His voice sounds youthful with speech that is paused and thoughtful. There is something...
“En cinco, cuatro, tres, dos, uno, vamos con Liz!”. The lights flash on and the cameras swivel around to lock their focus on me in the studio kitchen. Here we go. We are broadcasting live; cooking for all of Chile for the next five to ten minutes. In those brief...
Today the 3rd annual Chilean Olive Oil "Summit" was held by Chileoliva, the Association of Chilean Olive Oil Producers. Most people (including many Chileans) don't realize it, but olive oil in Chile is quickly becoming the next hottest gastronomic commodity,...
The other night at a wine dinner, engrossed in intense conversation among people in the food and wine industry in Chile, the most memorable part of the evening was perhaps the description of wine by the winemaker of Amayna (Viña Garcés Silva), Claudia Gomez. She...
“Mirror, mirror on the wall whose stand looks best of all?”. Certainly this could have been the familiar nursery rhyme that many of the 2,400 exhibitors were silently singing to themselves at the recent Vinexpo 2005, the 13th, held from June 19-23 in Bordeaux,...
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