So I Blew It!

On the Internet, no one knows you're a dog. My second year trying to do NaBloPoMo (National Blog Posting Month) and I came up short. Real short. The goal was to post every day for a month. But winemaking and Thanksgiving got in the way. Actually that’s no excuse. Although November is the official month, you can take the pledge every month. Sort of like AA. In fact, I have...

Thanksgiving: The Post Play Wrap-Up

Years ago, when I was a journalist, I had the opportunity to interview Julia Child. We talked French cooking for a bit and then I made the mistake of asking her, “What would you suggest to people who want to cook your recipes but want to reduce the calories, the butter, cream and fat.” Julia answered in her inimitable voice (and yes, she really does talk like that):...

The Donny Osmond Appreciation Society

Photo: ABC Television By now, most of you know that Donny Osmond took the silver disco ball trophy last night as the new reigning champion of Dancing With the Stars. Pretty good for a 51 year old Grandfather and the perfect opportunity for me to reprise one of my Donny Osmond posts. My faithful readers will remember when I first mentioned Donny Osmond on this blog. It was a throw-away...

And the Pilgrims are Rolling Over in The...

Image: http://whatscookingamerica.net The simplistic Third Grade explanation for the Pilgrims’ journey is that they came here for religious freedom, the freedom to worship in a church other than the Church of England. I know better. They came to America for freedom from British culinary tyranny — for the freedom to have a proper Thanksgiving dinner. Being married to a Brit...

Dropout!!

Whew! Didn’t realize the implications of dropping out of my life to spend nearly three months living in a barn with two terriers and making wine. Last year, I found myself at the Doctor Doolittle level of craziness — you know, where you think you can talk to the animals. This year, I became the world’s oldest juvenile delinquent. Yup, I’m now officially a...

The Last of the Wine

Harvest and primary fermentation seem to get longer every year. I’ve been wine babysitting in Sonoma since early September with hardly a break. That means living out in the wilds with two terriers, a bobcat, a newly resident coyote and a whole lot of fermenting wine. But today, we got the last of our Cabernet grapes out of primary fermentation vats (where they needed three times...