Talk-A-Vino

Meritage Time!

Let’s start from the answer for the Wine quiz #52, The Oak Trivia. In the quiz, you were supposed to answer 5 questions related to the oak usage in the wine making.

Q1: True or false: American oak typically imparts stronger flavor than the french oak?

Correct answer: True.

Q2: There are 5 major forests in France from which the oak is used in the wine making. Oak from which forest is considered least suitable for use with the wines and more used in production of the Cognac?

A. Allier

B. Never

C. Limousin – correct answer. Limousin oak is often used for production of Cognac

D. Troncais

E. Vosges

Q3: Troncais forest was planted by the order of Napoleon. Do you know what was the intended use of the oak trees from that forest?

Correct answer – shipbuilding. Yes, this is what oak originally was intended for.

Q4: True or False: The use of Oak chips is illegal in France?

Correct answer: False. in 2006, European Union approved usage of the oak chips in winemaking process, and it also became legal in France. Here is the link to one of the articles on the subject.

Q5. True or False: When barrels are made from the trees in the same forest by the same cooperage, all the barrels will be identical and will impart flavor of the wine in the same way?

Correct answer: False. It is possible that every plank used in the barrel will be coming from different side of the forest. When charred, all the planks can be charred unevenly. Thus there can be significant difference in the impact on the wine between the different barrels.

There were quite a few answers provided, and it seems that everybody did a very good job. Question #4 proved to be the culprit – nobody expects that oak chips can be used instead of oak barrels in France, right? But they actually are – since 2006 adding oak chips is legal in France. The armchairsommelier got closest to the winning with 4 correct answers. Both armchairsommelier and foodandwinehedonist also correctly answered bonus question – the logo in the picture belongs to the Williamsburg Winery, which makes very good wines (if you ever in the Williamsburg area in Virginia, make sure to visit it). Eatwithnamie gets an honorable mention as she participated in the quiz for the first time.

And now, to the interesting stuff! Today, it is not so much about the actual news, as much as it is really an interesting information around the net which deserves attention.

First, this past Monday was April Fools day, so [rather as expected] there were a number of interesting posts of all kinds. I liked (sorry!) my own post with various wine news, including new Target and Walmart wines, CocaTour cocktails and DudeChuk joint venture. Then there was an excellent piece from OmNomCT blog about Munchies Brewery ( I think those guys are onto something). And then there was a story from Wining Daily about Billionaire’s Vinaigrette, which I pretty much believed…

Next I want to bring to your attention a couple of very useful resources for all of us bloggers. I follow the blog called Eat and Sip in the City which is written by Michelle Levine and it is all about food and wine happenings in the city of Boston. Michelle also has a regular post called “Worthwhile reads from the web this week”. In her last post, I found two interesting references. One of them is called “33 Unusual Tips To Being A Better Writer“. You might jump at the tip number two, but overall, I think those tips make a lot of sense, and I’m definitely aware of some which I clearly need to enforce for my own good.

Another link in Michelle’s post was for “Food Bloggers: 150+ Links to Everything You Need to Know” – I didn’t have a chance to go over it in detail, but it seems to be a great collection of useful information.

Here is an interesting piece of infographics for you  – Corkage fees facts and figures – you can compare corkage fees in New York, Chicago and San Francisco, as well as by the type of cuisine – I think this is very interesting info.

And the last note for today – profile of Amarone producers in Decanter magazine. I understand that this is an article from 2007 – but if you are an Amarone junkie like myself, it is very interesting to see all the different producers being presented in this article.

That’s all I have for you for today, folks. The glass is empty. Until the next time – cheers!