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California study theorizes that antioxidants and resveratrol in red wine may cut down on cancer risk...

A daily glass (or two) of red wine may reduce the risk of lung cancer in men, particularly in smokers, according to research published in the October issue of Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention.

Smokers suffer from an especially high risk of lung cancer. According to the American Cancer Society, 213,380 new cases of lung cancer were reported in the United States in 2007, with 160,390 deaths, making it a leading cause of cancer death in the country.

First off, allow us to congratulate Lenn Thompson of Lenndevours for the 50th Anniversary of Wine Blog Wednesday, and to Russ Beebe of Winehiker for choosing such an appropriate theme for WBW #50: wine you’d go hiking with

And oh how we wish we were hiking right at this very minute. To be up in the mountains hearing the crackle of the leaves underfoot, the gentle brush of the cold wind across your cheeks, and the awe inspiring vision of the valleys sweeping down below you, while perched on a small outcropping. Sigh, I wish I could teleport us there, feeling my head on the soft, slightly wet ground staring up at the wispy clouds. But alas, we are here, in Terrassa, imagining a beautiful, relaxing day in the mountains, pondering what we would bring.

At first, we considered a light red to pair with our traditional hiking cuisine, consisting of cured Manchego cheese and a freshly baked baguette. But then we thought, “what about a big bold Spanish red that is so tightly wound, it would take hours for that bad boy to open and relax?”.

After much contemplation, we both agreed that this would be a great way to go. Pack in some fuet, a sharp Manchego and a baguette, hike for 3 to 4 hours after double decanting your bottle, and voila, you’ve got a fabulous little lunch. The only problem being, you’ve got to get back down the mountain. And as many of you know, these big ass Spanish reds pack in a fair amount of alcohol. So unless you’ve spend the entire afternoon tossing around a Frisbee, while downing a few bottles a water, you might as well curl up and take a long luxurious nap, because we highly doubt you’ll be going anywhere anytime soon.

Hmmm, anyone for a hike?!

That said, we cracked open both the 2001 Bodegas Bilbainas La Vicalanda Gran Reserva from La Rioja, made with Tempranillo, along with the 2005 Casa de la Ermita Petit Verdot. And alas, the Petit Verdot was as mild and harmless as spring doe, with gorgeous dark fruit and spice aromas. Light, elegant and delicate, we fear that this one just wouldn’t make it for a full on arduous hike. It would however, make a killer pairing for a picnic in the park, but full on backpacking adventures are just not in this wine’s future. The Bilbainas however, is a fabulous choice for a long afternoon hike. Big, bold traditional Rioja wine, it could easily age for another 5 years before we see it in its full glory. However, the caveat being that the weight of the bottle is ridiculously heavy, and would be better used as a door stop than a wine to go backpacking with.

Thanks again to winehiker for a great theme and to Lenn for surviving 50 Wine Blog Wednesdays. Hopefully, we’ll celebrate with a hike in the mountains surrounding Terrassa soon! For now though enjoy a video of our last wine hike!

Saludos,

Gabriella and Ryan Opaz

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How do you keep up to date with the wine world these days? I’ve found out what works for me although I still suffer from information overload some times. My interests are as follows ?

• current hot topics such as closures, global warming, harvest expectations and so on
• recommendations on wines to try and buy
• educational material especially anything that helps me towards my WSET Diploma

I’ve found the following sources really help me

1. Harpers magazine. I wish I could afford their annual subscription but it’s just too much. However I subscribe to their daily bulletins via Google’s reader and this really works for me. I see a couple of lines summarising news items when I’m on the computer at home or work and I can always click the link to go their web site if i wish to read more
2. an unusual source of news items is South African Wines. They send out regular emails which summarise the key stories from around the world by directing you towards the various publications, web sites, blogs etc which have something interesting and relevant
3. there is no substitute for a monthly magazine which is good for those train journeys commuting to work. Decanter and Wine and Spirit are my favourites. I was working in the US last summer and enjoyed Wine Spectator and thought about taking out a subscription but the cost including mailing back to the UK was prohibitive
4. I love reading other people’s blogs. People like Jamie Goode and Andrew Jefford talk about people they have met, wines they have drunk and places they have visited. The problem with blogs is that there are so many (and yes I have one also) that it’s possible to subscribe to too many of them using Google’s reader that information overload soon takes over.
5. Podcasts are great for car journeys if you put them on a CD or train journeys if you play them on your phone. I’ve learned a lot from some of the podcasts from Grape Radio
6. For bedtime reading or sitting in a chair (with a glass of something nice of course) there is no substitute for the hard stuff ie: books. You can’t go wrong with a copy of the Oxford Companion to Wine by your side. I also try to look up every wine I try in at least one reference book such as the World Atlas of Wine, Wine by the Label or Oz Clark’s pocket wine book. These often give the context for the wine leaving the label to give the detail (unless of course it’s French!).

I may occasionally suffer from information overload but I do learn a whole lot of interesting stuff about wine which vastly increases my enjoyment of the stuff.

By Campbell Mattinson
Publisher, The Wine Front

Torbreck’s top shiraz – the Run Rig Shiraz, priced at well over $200 per bottle – is probably Australia ’s most hedonistic wine. It leaps out of the bottle like a rattlesnake, all fanfare and bite. It is, always, dangerously drinkable. It is thick with flavour and accented by sweetness, its spicy, gravelly, smoky complexity ramping its class through the roof. There’s always been a question mark though: this tastes so bloody good the day it is released – what happens if you stick it in the cellar? Is it Australia ’s best early-drinking wine, or will it develop and evolve if given time? A tasting in the Barossa Valley recently of every vintage yet made of Torbreck Run Rig Shiraz (including the just-released 2005) threw a crust of clear answers.

The full article is available to subscribers only. Click here for the full article. 

This merry band of merchants, flying the flag for small, artisanal wineries with distinctive, regional wines came to Fulham last week to give both press and public a chance to see what they have to offer.

The lower and upper ends of the wine market are well served by supermarkets and the "establishment"  but there is increasing demand for wine between these extremes. The best value for quality of wines with integrity and interest.  These merchants are really passionate about their lists and usually have personal relationships built up with the producers so they have fairly extensive knowledge of the vineyards, wineries and vintages.

Some of the listings are inevitably idiosyncratic and not all the wines will be to everyone's taste but these are dedicated people who will help you find treasures you will come back for again and again.

Jim Monks from Decanter Wines is a private collector who started by bringing in pallets for his own cellar, his approach is unashamedly personal (all the wines are aged in his cellar until he feels they are ready to drink and only then offered to the public) and any commercial success is second to his goal of providing himself with the kind of wine he wants to drink. Luckily, his taste seems to be shared and his wines show very well.

Also showing was Nick Dobson a self-proclaimed "niche player" with some outstanding and unusual wines from Switzerland, Austria and Germany.  With these countries slowly garnering a following for their wines it is worth knowing where to track down some great examples.

Also well-represented were Amordivino, Italian importers; The Big Red Wine Company showing mainly the Southern Rhone on this occasion; Abbe Arrous whose "Cyrcée, Collioure 2002" was the outstanding wine of the day for me; and Leon Stolarski with a wonderfully diverse selection of regional French wine.

The full list of tasting notes will be put up on this site but have a look at their website and sign up to their free monthly newsletter asdw.org.uk it is always going to be worth finding something a little bit different and a little bit special.

Riesling is currently the fastest growing white varietal in the US, increasingly sought out for its food friendliness and its aromatic, vibrant character, however, its variety of sweetness can make it a challenging purchase for the consumer. Join Riesling producers for a discussion of this versatile grape and the new ?Riesling Taste Scale,? read more.

Rediscovering Riesling Walk Around Tasting
Sunday, October 19 ~ 1:00 - 4:00 pm
Elegant, aromatic and food-friendly, Riesling?s making a comeback! The perfect pairing for Asian, Indian, and of course, German and Austrian cuisine, ?The Other White Wine? abundantly deserves its growing popularity. Taste dozens of domestic and international dry, semi-sweet, sweet and sparkling Rieslings paired with artisan foods ranging from sausage to sushi. You?re sure to find the perfect match! read more
Pub.: 2008-10-08 09:18:37; Udt.:

Portsmouth, NH- Portsmouth-based wine expert Carla Snow has opened registration for her new session of wine classes: Uncorked Level 2 Tuesdays November 11th to December 2nd 6:30 TO 8:30; Four weeks $195.00 This ...

I did a search on Google Scholar for wine. A lot of articles were returned in the search result. At first glance, I could not figure out why these results had been returned. At closer inspection, the author of the first few articles had the last name of Wine.

RH Wine has written many articles in the field of biology. JJ Wine has authored many papers on Cystic fibrosis. RN Wine writes on topics in the field of toxicology. These are just three of the authors with results dominating my search for wine on Google Scholar.

I changed my search in Google Scholar from wine to red wine. The first scholarly article returned in my search for red wine was ?Inhibition of oxidation of human low-density lipoprotein by phenolic substances in red wine?. This article was published in 1993 in the British edition of Lancet.

An article entitled ?The red wine phenolics trans-resveratrol and quercetin block human platelet aggregation and eicosanoid synthesis: implications for protection against coronary heart disease? was published in Clinica Chimica Acta in 1995. There were five authors cited on this paper.

The American journal of clinical nutrition published ?Consumption of red wine with meals reduces the susceptibility of human plasma and low-density lipoprotein to lipid peroxidation? in 1995. This paper has been cited over two hundred times. The author credited with writing it is B Fuhrman.

There were over sixteen thousand results returned when I did my Google Scholar search for red wine. The article entitled ?Antiplatelet activity of synthetic and natural resveratrol in red wine? is another article that has been cited many times. The International journal of tissue reactions published this article in 1995 and now it has been cited 116 times.

The Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry published an article in 1980 entitled ?Wine aroma composition: identification of additional volatile constituents of red wine?. The article has been cited five times. The author, P Schreier, has also written an article entitled ?Flavor composition of wines: a review?.