On Friday afternoon, I snapped the above photo in the gorgeous Texas Hill Country where I was among the first guests at my friend Lewis Dickson’s new tasting room (on his La Cruz de Comal estate, where he grows Blanc du Bois and Black Spanish).
Here’s my profile of Lewis — criminal defense attorney turned Natural winemaker — over at the Houston Press today.
In the wake of a recent post on the absurdity of wine shipping regulation in Texas, a cordial, however tense, dialogue (online and a voce) ensued between me and my friend and colleague Alfonso Cevola, a 30-year veteran of the Texas wine industry, a high-level manager for one of the state’s leading wine and spirits distributors, and a top wine blogger in the U.S.
As we debated the value and implications of the ban on out-of-state retailers in our state, I expressed my visceral observation that the fact that I cannot buy wine and have it shipped from a wine store in New York City just feels “un-American.”
Alfonso responded by pointing out that, “in fact, it is very American.” He was right.
To understand our state’s (and nation’s) peculiar relationship with alcohol, we need to look back to the early post-Prohibition era, when the Twenty-First amendment made alcohol legal again in our country (national Repeal was passed in 1933; Repeal in Texas was not passed until 1935).
“The Twenty-first Amendment is a deeply contradictory instrument,” writes Thomas Pinney in A History of Wine in America: from Prohibition to the Present (vol. 2, University of California Press, Berkeley, 2005). “In its first part it enables the return of alcoholic drink, while in its second part it allows for the growth of an unprecedented tangle of restrictive and obstructive regulation. As one winemaker has put it, ‘Prohibition was never repealed, it was just amended.'”
…
Click here to read the rest of my post today over at the Houston Press.
We’ll be bringing little Georgia P home today. She’s passed all her tests with flying colors and she and Tracie P are doing great. We loved how the last page of her birth certificate form welcomed our “new little Texan.” :)
I know that every new father thinks that his little girl is the most beautiful of all and I’m no exception. I’ll have two gorgeous girls at home now… I’m the luckiest guy ever…
We are so lucky to have the support of our family: it’s been a joy to have Rev. and Mrs. B here with us and they’re staying at the house all week to help us get settled.
What a joy to watch Rev. B. rocking his new granddaughter! He’s so big and she’s so little! :)
Modesty won’t allow me to reveal a photo of Tracie and Georgia P nursing. But to see Georgia “latching” just minutes after she came into this world was like viewing a living and breathing allegory of maternity. This drawing by Raffaello will have to suffice: words cannot express the emotion we both felt in that precious, precious, unforgettable moment. We’re happy to report that nursing is going great.
The staff at the Seton maternity ward was fantastic. Maybe it’s Texas: everyone was so friendly and sweet and all the nurses shared their own personal experiences. Dr. Abikhaled, our ob/gyn, was awesome. And our anesthesiologist — the only male health care provider in the crew — wore cowboy boots.
And what did we drink to celebrate our joy? As if you have to ask…
Georgia P, Tracie P, and I would like to thank all the folks who commented, tweeted, texted, emailed, and posted on Facebook from the bottom of our hearts. Our lives are so rich right now: full of joy, full of happy tears, full of laughter, brimming with love for a newborn child, overflowing with love for each other… Our virtual community — spanning the Atlantic ocean and the continental U.S.! — means so much to all of us. G-d bless you all…
Above: My good friend Francesco treated me to a bottle of 1995 Chianti Classico by Castell’in Villa at the Enoteca I Terzi in Siena when I visited in October.
Castell’in Villa is one of my favorite producers of Chianti Classico. It’s actually one of my all-time favorite Italian producers: traditional-style, pure Sangiovese, grown in galestro-rich stony soils at excellent elevation and with superb exposure, and raised in large cask. The wines are remarkably affordable (I recently bought some of their entry-tier 2007 for under $25) and the winery continues to draw from what must be an astonishing cellar, offering importers library releases that stretch back to the 1970s (I’ve tasted back to 1979).
The only problem is that you can’t get the wines in Texas.
Above: We paired the 95 with housemade tagliatelle tossed with funghi porcini that night in Siena.
Well, actually, there’s another problem: the wine is readily available in the U.S. but Texas won’t allow out-of-state retailers to ship the wine here. It’s against the law. Unless, of course, you set up shop as a winery in Texas — even if you don’t make wine. Yes, a winery that doesn’t make wine…
I’ve already pissed off a lot of folks today with my post over at the Houston Press, “Absurdity of Texas Wine Shipping Law Reaches New Heights”, about Friday’s news that the Texas alcohol authority has granted a winery license to Wine.Com, eve though — in the TABC’s own words — Wine.com doesn’t produce wine. With the license, Wine.com will now be able to ship wine to retail customers within Texas.
I knew this issue would press some of Tom Wark’s buttons: he’s spent the last few years campaigning against the anachronistic, obsolete, gerrymandering laws that regulate retail shipping of wine in our country. I sent the link to Tom this afternoon and he responded immediately:
What’s really interesting is that Wine.com set up a physical presence in Texas and got the wine producers license in stead of a retailers license. You know why? Because a few years ago, when SWRA was suing texas for discriminating against out of state retailers, the TX legislature passed a law that limited Texas retailers to only shipping wine into the county where the physical retail outlet was located. However, a Texas “WINERY” can ship ship throughout Texas.
Above: A San Francisco-based retailer shipped me the wine regardless of the TABC restriction. It’s a great value and one of my favorite wines.
For the record, I side with many of my colleagues in the trade when it comes to the three-tier system in the U.S. I believe, like them, that the three-tier system helps to keep costs down and it protects the consumer by making it difficult for importers and distributor to monopolize brands.
But what the hell, yo????!!!! Ain’t America a free country? As a U.S. citizen, shouldn’t I have the right to purchase a bottle of wine from a retailer in San Francisco or New York and have them ship it to me?
Most retailers ignore the TABC restrictions anyway. And I have a secret for you: the rich folks in Texas? They spend so much money at the high-end retailers in New York and Northern California that the sellers will always find a way to get them their high-cost wine.
Me? I just want my under $25 bottle of Chianti Classico by Castell’in Villa! And by golly, it went great with a bottle of ranch dressing from Walmart! So there!
Had fun with my post for the Houston Press today.
Turkey chili, Fritos, French’s mustard, football, and Vouvray: who would have thunk it?
Buon weekend, yall!
Cousin Marty had a hunch about what wine I’d be bringing to our BYOB dinner last night in Houston with friends. And when I arrived and revealed my bottle of 2006 Brunello di Montalcino by Il Poggione, he opened the evening with the line of the night: “If it’s a blend, I will not attend!”
Of course, he was referring to yesterday’s news that Montalcino producers voted NOT to allow international grape varieties in Rosso di Montalcino, a step that many of us feared would irrevocably reshape the appellation.
According to results posted by the Brunello producers association, roughly 2/3 of voting members voted not to adopt either of the two options proposed by oligarchy that controls the body’s technical council. One option would have created two categories of Rosso; the other would have created three; in either case, international grape varieties would have been allowed in wines labeled Rosso di Montalcino.
But that figure is misleading because consortium president Ezio Rivella had called for an “ordinary” assembly whereby the number of votes is allocated according to the size of the winery. In other words, larger wineries had more voting power than smaller wineries. If the voting had been based on a one-vote-per-winery basis, the results would have been a landslide against the proposal to change the appellation.
I am fully convinced that efforts by my colleague and partner in VinoWire, Franco Ziliani, played a fundamental role in shaping public awareness of the issues in question.
Chapeau bas, Franco! IF IT’S A BLEND, I WILL NOT ATTEND!
The 2006 Brunello by Il Poggione was gorgeous last night, rich in body, bright in acidity, with ripe red fruit and that wonderful horse sweat note that often distinguishes great Brunello. The wine was muscular and still very, very tight, young in its evolution. But the green notes that emerged the last time I tasted the wine about 6 months ago have disappeared. There’s no doubt in my mind that this is going to be a great vintage for Il Poggione.
In other and sadder news…
I wanted to share these photos that I took on Hwy. 290 from Austin to Houston of the Texas fires.
In the first photo, above, taken about 20 minutes west of Giddings, the fire had just started and the firefighters had just arrived. Man, it was scary and you could see the fear and the stress in the faces of the firefighters. G-d bless them.
In this second photo, you can see a plume northwest of Houston. Pretty spooky and so sad.
In this last photo, you can see the smoky haze over Houston this morning. That’s not morning mist. It’s ugly, brown smoke. My eyes are burning and my throat is itchy. It reminds me of LA during the riots when I was a grad student at U.C.L.A.
Tracie P and Baby P are fine and even though there are uncontained fires burning not far from our house in Austin, the smoke is not affecting us there.
Please say a prayer for all the folks who are suffering here… It’s so sad…
Here in Texas, everyone says that Boudreaux’s Butt Paste is the best. We’re only 6 months pregnant but we’ll be stocking up on butt paste pretty soon.
Crawfish boudain: if that ain’t country, I’ll kiss your ass.
Pork boudain. We also got some smoked boudain and some green onion pork sausage.
Folks around here are serious about their seasonings.
Impulse buy at checkout.
Nick’s Grocery: HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.
After services at Rev. B’s church this morning in Orange, Texas, we headed over to Peggy’s on the Bayou where I met George the Gator (above).
Technically, George is “homeless,” one server told me, but he returns every couple of weeks for the French fries and other food that guests offer him. I’m not sure how they know that George is a he but they recognize him by the hole in his snout that never healed after someone shot him there.
Here in Coonass country, “po’ boy” can be pronounced with the accent on the second syllable: poh-BOY.
The oyster po’ boy was pretty good.
We got there too late for the gumbo (they’d sold it all already)… :(
Peggy’s not kidding when she says her place is on the bayou!
…I point my camera at her.
…even when it’s over sausage and sauer kraut kolaches at Hruška’s on Texas Hwy. 71.
Mamma and Baby P are healthy and happy and pregnancy cravings have evolved into “snack attacks” (as they are called in Parzen parlance) and Tracie P is more beautiful than ever.
I just keep falling in love over and over again…
I filed my report on the Texas Sommelier Conference today over at the Houston Press.
Click through to the post and see why Master of Wine and Master Sommelier Doug Frost was asking: since when is Texas a Muslim country?
Everyone was looking sharp at the opening session of the conference yesterday, including D’Lynn Proctor (left) and Devon Broglie, one of the two new Master Sommeliers in Texas.
The other new Texas Master Sommelier Craig Collins (right) posed with winemaker legend Serge Hochar at the panelists dinner party the night before.
Do Bianchi 