Out with the old, in with the new!

The demise of my band in Houston was a major bummer for me. The bass player decided he no longer wanted to play with us just a few days before our Labor Day weekend gig.

On any other week, I would have found a sub. But I was called away that week for a family emergency in California. On such short and shitty notice, there was just no way — practical or emotional — for me to cover his spot. It broke my heart to let the club owner down: she was going through a major life crisis herself. It was a real low point for me.

The good news is that I had already started playing with our longtime neighbor and friend Bela. At our last two open mic shows, she and I had done mini sets featuring her on vocals, with her on bass and me on guitar.

On Sunday, September 21, 1-4pm, I will be returning to my beloved Emmit’s Place in southwest Houston for our kid-friendly open mic. No cover.

Our new band, Bela and the Bangers, will be headlining. And in even better news, the Rhythmix, a band of middle school jazz cats will be returning as well! We are also expecting some special guests (stay tuned).

And if that’s not enough to get you off your butt and out on the dance floor, the incredible Evelyn Rubio will be sitting in with the Bangers on sax. She’s AMAZING!

It’s going to be a fantastic time, with kid-friendly food and mocktails as well as adult drinks for the grownups.

We hope to see you there! Thanks for supporting local businesses and local music. Emmit’s is a cherished community resource and the club needs us now more than ever.

What a thrill for an intrepid wine blogger to present a super sexy flight of Abruzzo wines together with one of our city’s top sommeliers last night!

That’s Mark Sayre (left), not only the wine director at Milton’s, the hottest Italian in the city right now, but also my first friend in Texas.

Mark was the wine director at the Four Seasons in Austin when I moved there to be with Tracie. The bar at the hotel became our clubhouse and Mark and his colleagues were all rooting for us to make it. When I look back on those magical days, I can’t help but think how differently it could have gone if I didn’t have the support of my friends. Today, 17 years later, I’d say it worked out pretty damn well!

I’ve been working as the Abruzzo consortium U.S. ambassador for more than three years now. But this event didn’t spring from my gig.

It was thanks to Mark and his literally insatiable curiosity which led him to put together a dream flight of these compelling wines. Mark’s never been to the region (I hope to remedy that!). But through his sheer will and deep-dive study, he has become a true scholar of Abruzzo viticulture.

The coolest thing is that his passion for Abruzzo was born out of tasting the wines. No matter how strong your marketing game (and Abruzzo has been upping their game for more than a few years now), if you don’t have quality and personality, your wines are never going to find their way to the hip wine lists.

My family ate dinner at a family event at Milton’s last week and the food and service was fantastic. It was so rewarding for me to return to speak about wines I also feel passionately about.

Last night’s event was sold out as is tonight’s, where I’ll also be presenting. I can’t wait.

Thanks again, Mark, for the nearly two decades of wonderful friendship and for giving the wine world a bright guiding light — driven by intellectual and aesthetic curiosity.

Photos by Pop Ratio.

Arguably the most interesting thing overheard by an intrepid wine blogger at TexSom this year was the following.

Wine sales are down, observed one speaker at a break-out session. But natural wine sales continue to stay steady. We need to start looking at natural wine as a way to answer the current demand for wine.

This was followed by something said wine blogger never thought they would hear uttered by a leading U.S. wine professional, words spoken by someone who runs a high-end wine program in an upscale market.

I don’t mind giving my guests a wine that I find defective if that’s what they want. I now have a natural wine by-the-glass on my list, they said.

Wow. I mean, just wow!

Beyond my own mixed feelings about natural wine, I believe that the wine industry passed up and over a golden opportunity when the category began to take shape in the U.S. in the late 2000s.

Natural wine remains the one partition of the trade that continues to attract younger people.

Just think about it: if I offer my 21-year-old Californian niece a by-the-glass of a natural wine and a glass of conventional wine at the same time, which is she going to lean toward? It’s a no-brainer.

Leaving discussion of what is natural wine? (and what is conventional wine?) aside, wine called “natural” is the only growing part of the business.

But now our community faces an even more daunting issue: tariffs are eliminating the small businesses that brought those wines to the U.S. If U.S. trade policy doesn’t change, it’s conceivable and even probable that many natural wine importers will shutter in the next 12 months. We’ll just have to see who’s still standing after OND — October, November, December, the trimester when 50 percent of all wines sales happen in this country.

Will big wine step up to the challenge? At least one leading one professional — one who people listen to — is calling for change.

Above: a cellar-full of high-end Italian wine at a leading Italian restaurant in Florida. All Italian wines are now being taxed with a 15 percent tariff. There are no indicators that the Trump administration will lift those levies in the near or even distant future.

UPDATE: Times reporting confirms that wine and spirits will not be exempt from tariffs as final details of negotiations emerge. See article here.

In case you missed it, the Times reported this week that current tariff negotiations between the E.U. and U.S. will not make an exemption for wines and spirits shipped from Europe: “alcohol is still not part of the agreed-upon deal, and it increasingly appears that European negotiators are giving up on getting an exemption into this round of negotiations.”

The news has been greeted with gloom: “European producers have warned that the consequences of leaving alcohol tariffs at 15 percent could be grave. The Federation of French Wine and Spirits Exporters had previously said a failure to secure an exemption would create an ‘extremely violent shock.'”

Click here to read the Times reporting.

It’s certainly too early to determine whether or not the tariffs will prompt Americans to buy more U.S.-grown wine.

Gauging from everything I read and the conversations I’ve had with wine growers in California, the U.S. wine industry is definitely in need of help. Wine sales are declining overall, labor costs for the fall harvest are expected to rise (because of lack of workers due to immigration raids), and tariffs are inflating the prices of materials (corks and bottles, for example) and tools domestic winemakers buy from Europe (quite a bit from Italy where things like top-of-the-line bottling machines are produced among other instruments).

I’m heading to Dallas tonight to lead a few talks at TexSom and I’ll be back again next week to pour at a few walk-arounds. I’m really looking forward to connecting with wine professionals from across the country and the world. I’ll report back on what I learn.

Thanks for the support and solidarity. Drink some Italian wine tonight, folks! Help support the growers who have been sending such great wines since the Italian wine renaissance took shape in this country two decades ago.

One of my best friends in the Italian wine business — a Tuscanophile Paduan a few years older than me, a veteran of the industry and one of the wisest wine professionals I know — sent me the following query: “when it comes to the average American customer, which Italian wines are the most popular?”

His inquiry led to copious notes about my own thoughts on how Americans perceive Italian wines today. Of course, my reflections are based mostly on my experiences on the ground and anecdotal reporting from what I read online and hear from the street. I plan to share our dialog at some point here.

But I thought I would preface that by taking my Italian readers on a tour of the wine shop at my local HEB supermarket, where I shop on a nearly daily basis.

I believe that the Italian wine industry needs to be recast. And I strongly feel industry actors need to rethink their approach not by reading Eric Asimov (no offense, Eric!) and blogger/influencers (much to say about that down the road). Instead, they need to look at the way the majority of Americans shop for wine.

My go-to HEB has a high-end wine department, including high-priced wines from France, California, and Oregon. I buy a lot of wine there (mostly Jadot and California whites). Although I also buy a lot of wine from Houston Wine Merchant (my favorite shop), HEB is the kind of place where a lot of my (non-wine industry) peers will shop for wine.

Let’s start with the image above: France has its own wall while Italy and South America share a wall. That says a lot.

If they aren’t aware already, Italians should now that Americans still cognitively classify their wines as grape varieties. My European counterparts might be surprised to learn that Pinot Grigio (here listed as “Pinot Grigio/Pinot Gris”) has its own section.

Note the magnums of Italian Pinot Grigio above. But “Pinot Grigio” in America isn’t limited (in terms consumer awareness) to Italy. Feast your eyes on the Sutter Home Magnum of Californian Pinot Grigio (labeled as such) for less than $10.

I have much more to report and opine. But I hope this point will serve as a starting point for useful dialog. Please stay tuned.

Check out my Instagram today for more photos from my visit to my HEB yesterday.

The Roman writer Horace reminds us that you can chase nature away with a pitchfork, but it will always return (naturam expellas furca, tamen usque recurretet).

He wasn’t referring to Nature with a capital “n” but rather the “nature of things.” In other words, a leopard can’t change their spots.

As Tracie’s career has been evolving and expanding (poo, poo, poo!) and the girls need more support with their music and studies, I’ve taken a step back from the insane amount of traveling I’ve been doing over the last four years.

But the world of wine still calls. Here are some great tastings and dinners I’m leading or working on in coming weeks.

On Friday, I’ll be giving two talks about Abruzzo at TexSom in Dallas. On Monday and Tuesday, I’ll be pouring Abruzzo at walk-around tastings at the conference. I’m really looking forward to reconnecting with some many colleagues and friends I know I’ll see. Please stop by and taste with me!

Then, in a just a few weeks, on September 3 and 4, I’ll be leading two public-facing Abruzzo wine dinners at Milton’s in Houston with my good friend and super sommelier Mark Sayre (I need to share the wonderful story of how he and I met in an upcoming post; he became one of my first friends in Austin when I moved to Texas to be with Tracie). These sell out quickly, Mark told me, and I will share the registration info as soon as I get it.

In October, dates to be determined, I will be leading an Abruzzo tour through Texas, with stops most likely in Houston, Austin, and possibly Dallas. These will be trade-focused events. I’m hoping I can convince them to do Tulsa as well (but we’ll see). Our event earlier this year in NOLA was so amazing. I know these dates will be great, too.

And then, dulcis in fundo (brush up your Latin, people!), I’ll be heading to Boulder in late October for Boulder Burgundy Festival where I’ve been a festival media consultant for 15 years (!!!).

See? You can take the wine out of the boy, but you can’t take the boy out of the wine. Hope to see you at one or all of these events. Thanks for the support and solidarity! The wine world needs you now more than ever.

It was probably inevitable that our family would be drawn into the hype about the “And Just Like That…” revival finale last week.

Some of the themes are arguably too mature for our girls, 12 and 13. But how could we refuse to let them watch it when they knew their mother had been following the once one-off mini-series and was excited for the last episode?

I missed all the shows except the last when our family gathered for dinner to watch.

As Tracie filled me in on all that had happened in my three-year absence, I couldn’t help but fixate on an episode of the original series, which aired when I was living and working in New York.

My first real job in the city was as an editor and writer in print media. My office was in the “toy building,” literally across the street from Madison Square Park where my co-workers and I would see them filming.

During those years, I was tasked with interviewing one of the earliest celebrity mixologists, Dale DeGroff, who was erroneously credited with inventing the Cosmopolitan — a cocktail recipe, he claimed, he poached from an Absolut vodka campaign. For anyone living (and dating) in the city at that time, Cosmopolitans, as seen in “Sex and the City,” were the cocktail of choice.

I had so many indirect connections to the show, including the fact that a boss at another job had a brother who worked on the show and the cast would party at the restaurant where I often worked the floor.

But the thing I remember more than anything else about the show was the 2004 episode (season six) where Mikhail Baryshnikov served Carrie a Barolo and would subsequently prepare a risotto while complaining that she didn’t have a proper “risotto” pan (whatever that is!).

Back then Barolo was hardly a household word. Burgundy, Bordeaux, and Napa (and maybe Brunello) were the go-to wines for entitled New Yorkers. It was the first time I heard the then esoteric (to most Americans) appellation mentioned on TV.

To me it was an unforgettable zeitgeist moment that made me think to myself, maybe Italian wine is going to become big in the U.S.

Some 20 years later, it’s incredible to think back on how Americans’ perceptions of Italian wine changed during those years. Thank you, Carrie!

Late on Thursday last week, the wire came in: the new tariff rate for all goods from the EU rose to 15 percent, a five-point increase from the 10 percent that had been imposed since April (before the current administration, the rate was 2.5).

For those inclined to read the fine print (read the entire White House statement here), there was also a vital piece of info: for European wines to avoid the new tax rate, they would need to be “on the water” by end of day on Wednesday, August 6.

As a result, Italian wineries and the partners are scrambling to get their wines to Livorno (where most wine is shipped from Italy) no later than 12:01 a.m. on August 7 (EDT).

The wine must arrive in the U.S. on or before October 5. In the case of a mishap or delay (caused by, say, rejected paper work), importers will be on the hook for the new tax. It’s risky.

And the danger is compounded by the fact that the dollar is growing weaker against the Euro.

I’m seeing numerous reports of importers asking their suppliers to lower costs to assuage the tariff pain. Today, they are counting on even more support from bottlers. On both sides of the Atlantic, actors are hanging in there. But there is a growing sense that the situation is not sustainable, especially now that the 15 percent tax will likely stay in place for a while as the dollar continues to decline.

In recent weeks, I’ve been asked by clients to join marketing/sales calls with Asia and northern European countries. Italians are increasingly looking to markets beyond the U.S. to rebalance their businesses.

Remember when Trump 1.0 essentially decimated the Burgundy market in the U.S. as growers pivoted to Asia? As supply dwindled, prices skyrocketed. In many cases (excuse the pun), only the ultrarich can afford the wines today. As Italians look beyond Trump’s America (which they increasingly disdain), similar patterns might emerge for italo-centric oenophiles.

There is so much uncertainty facing European winemakers and their U.S. partners today. The only thing they know for sure is that the European wine industry will be radically and indelibly reshaped by current U.S. policy and its wishy-washy execution.

When the subject of tariffs came up with a Trump-supporting friend the other day, she didn’t have the faintest idea of how it is decimating the European wine trade in the U.S.

Wow, she said, it never occurred to her that it would affect an industry that she otherwise took for granted.

Trump supporters are among my best friends and I get it: they voted for that outer-borough bastard crook out of their interest and not mine.

Yesterday, Trump and the EU entered into a nominal agreement that would set the tariff rate to 15 percent (before Trump it was 2.5). But as with all things having to do with the great American dealmaker (ha!), the devil is in the details.

As of today, it’s still possible that wine could be exempt. Steel, cars, and hi-tech are where what Trump cares about, after all. It’s also not clear whether or not the new tax will be applied to importers who “have their wine on the water.” Hopefully, these sticking points will be ironed out soon (excuse the mixed metaphors).

The bottomline, we may be closer to clarity and certainty but the future still remains cloudy and impossible to predict. This continues to be a huge issue for importers for whom long-term planning is key to their success.

The other hopeful news to arrive from Europe (although not reported by U.S. media) is that Italy has promised a billion Euros worth of subsidies to farmers there, including wine growers. The move was a necessary step to help keep the struggling wine industry alive (the U.S. is Italian wine’s biggest foreign market).

The best news comes from Houston: my good friend Stephanie Franklin launched her wine brand yesterday in our city. She has planted vines on her family’s land in Shankleville in Southeast Texas (about an hour north of where Tracie grew up).

Her story is as compelling as it is exciting and her first release, a fantastic Tannat (made from sourced fruit), was delicious last night.

Check out her story and how you can get involved here. Stephanie is a wonderful friend and a leader in our community. I am so excited for her and can’t wait to taste more!

Monday, Bastille Day, was my 58th birthday.

Tracie, the girls, and I spent the last two weeks in San Diego at my mom’s. She’s 91 going on 92 and is in good health, especially given her age. But we are all making extra time to be with her.

We spent most of the last 14 days filling her home with the girls’ music, laughter, and sweetness. More than one photo album was dusted off as she shared faded images of the past with her granddaughters.

The biggest news back in Houston is that Tracie’s success as a realtor continues to grow. She’s been working full-time now for nearly five years and her blood, sweat, and tears — and believe me, in real estate, it’s blood, sweat, and tears! — have paid off in ways that we couldn’t have imagined. Poo, poo, poo…

With the ongoing tariff war, my work is, well, to borrow an expression from Mel Brooks, “in the toilet.” (“I’m not going to the toilet! I’m getting into the wine business!”)

A handful of my most faithful clients have stuck with me. (Thank you!) But others have just stopped calling. Tracie’s so busy these days that I’ve taken over all household duties and kid care.

Before we left for California, the girls completed two weeks of music camp. Their final chamber performances were great but nothing could top the symphony performance they did on the final day in the gorgeous auditorium at the high school for the performing arts (where they both want to attend).

Tracie and I are saddened by the ongoing wars and suffering in the world.

We are sickened by the U.S. government’s ongoing cruelty, myopia, and incompetence.

The flooding in central Texas was tragic and I can’t imagine the catastrophe hasn’t touched every corner of our state. I know it’s touched our community. Our hearts and prayers go out to the victims’ families.

Workwise, I’m planning to expand our activist footprint. More on that later.

In the meantime, Tracie and I are praying for the vulnerable. And we haven’t lost hope that our kids can grow up in a better world than this.

G-d bless America, G-d bless us all, everywhere.