Our JOURNAL
ARCHIVES
O.Fournier in Chile: Kicking Some Serious Butt
I won't be shy about it. I like O. Fournier wines. A lot. They have style. They are full of finesse and elegance. Soulful, balanced wines with depth that are totally accessible to any palate. Appropriate for any occasion from hamburgers to foie gras. And the price...
Banana Dark Chocolate Bread
I will admit that of all the foods in this world it has taken me years to get around to even putting a banana in my mouth. Something about the smell, the texture, the slimy sweetness, just wasn't happening for my palate. I occasionally buy bananas at the market for...
Mixer Melodrama
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...
The Irony of Buying Chilean Wine: Part 1
In a year's time, we receive a lot of people with our Culinary & Wine Tours business (www.lizcaskey.com) that are very savvy wine drinkers. They come to Chile and Argentina to experience the wines in their place of origin, taste the local terroir, and inevitably,...
A Wine Eulogy: Good-bye Paul Bruno
It seems that most wine buffs are obsessed with how long a wine can, and should, be aged. Will it taste better? Will those tannins round out? Will it turn into hidden gold? For those collecting as a commodity, will it become so valuable that I resell it to buy more...
The Queen of Breakfast Breads
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...
Diary of a Foodie: Chile Mestizo Episode
I wanted to give a heads up though about a great show airing in the US on PBS: The Diary of a Foodie. The Chile episode, called Chile Mestizo, is presently broadcasting across the US. It’s an episode rather dear to my heart since I was brought in to collaborate...
Smokin’: San Antonio Valley’s Sauvignon Blancs
For many years, Sauvignon Blanc in Chile has been synonymous with the Casablanca Valley–that foggy valley off of Route 68 on the road to Valparaiso and Viña del Mar. Mostly dairy farms until 1982, winemaker Pablo Morandé was the first to pioneer and plant wines here,...
When and Where Wine is Not Appropriate: Tropical Brazil
Lessons learned? Go with the local (beverage) culture, definitely pack lightly and if you really, REALLY want to take some wine, take one bottle, not four. But as they say in Brazil, TUDO BEM Okay, I will admit that there are times when wine just won’t fit the bill...
Me & My Microplane
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...
The Spice of Life
Published in Placeres Magazine-January/February 2007 When it comes to Indian food, what the majority of the world considers as authentic, being most of the food served in restaurants is in essence Northern Indian cuisine; a meat-based cuisine passed down from the...
Buenos Aires is Smoke Free
Well, back from BA on a recent business trip, I could hardly believe this shocker: BA is smoke free, that is the restaurants, bars, and (cough) even cafés. For years, I always contemplated and experienced BA and its culture through a lingering, thick haze of nicotine...
Wining & Dining Mendoza Wine Country
Appeared in LAN Airlines-IN Magazine: November 2006 Unedited version: In Mendoza, it seems that all roads lead to a winery given that more than 70% of all wine production in Argentina is concentrated here. Mendoza’s wine scene is booming and has come into its...
Is that a “horse” in my wine?
I asked this somewhat grotesque wine question at a dinner party not long ago, although my intentions were quite innocent; I simply wanted to understand why more and more I was running across these somewhat jarring “mousey”, “poopy”, “sweaty saddle” or “barnyard”...
Feliz 18: Empanada and BBQ mania
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...
El Principal: Pure High Maipo Terroir
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...
A Breath of Fresh Air: Casas del Bosque Syrah 2003
Last night we had the ultimate wine-food pairing task: Indian food. I find that wine is often shrouded by this highly condimented cuisine so I was at a loss of what wine to choose that would stand up to something as "assertive" as the three curries I had prepared....
Old grapes Find New World (Financial Times)
Perusing the international online newspapers yesterday, I found this intriguing (back) article from the Financial Times by Andrew Jefford on a topic close to my heart—and neck of the woods: Argentinean Malbec. I was particularly excited to read about them highlighting...
and the meaningful
