Osborne’s Spanish Wines
The following tasting notes accompany my article, Traveling Across Spain with the Osborne Bull. To learn more about Osborne's wine operations, as well as some of Spain's finest restaurants, click here. BODEGAS MONTECILLO of Rioja Crianza 2003: A typical tempranillo...
Eating Rutherford’s Dust 2005 Cabernet Sauvignon
When the Rutherford Dust Society was formed in 1994, it was with the thought that the Rutherford appellation brought with it that ineffable sense of place. Legendary Beaulieu winemaker Andre Tchelistcheff coined the term Rutherford Dust to describe the unique...
2003 Barolo, 2004 Roero & Barbaresco (and a Few 2001 Barolo Riservas)
text and photos ©2007 by Scott W Clemens Alba is always full of life. It’s a tourist town, in the best sense of the term — full of local color, interesting shops, tiny little restaurants that spill out onto the street, and a festival of one sort or another happening...
THE NEW BARBERAS
text and photos ©2006 Though Barbera is among the top tier of wine grape varieties in terms of quality, it receives very little attention from either the wine press or wine consumers. Not that it isn't widely planted; it's just unappreciated. In California, where...
The Pleasures of Bock Beer
To some, it's the unmitigated nectar of the gods - as if there was a mitigated nectar of the gods. To others, it's the dregs from the bowels of a moldy beer barrel, the rankest slime since grainy arachnids hovered behind a resolutely square-jawed Peter Graves in...
Liquid Gold at Mutari in Santa Cruz
Lovers of hot chocolate and mocha should run, not walk, to Mutari Chocolate House & Factory, located in downtown Santa Cruz, CA. This is melted—molten better conveys the unctuousness—dark chocolate in a cup: no cocoa powder or lecithin. According to the company's...
Go Locally Sourced at The Cookery in Door County, Wisconsin
Beautiful Door County, Wisconsin, located on a peninsula of land which extends into clear and gorgeous Lake Michigan on one side and several lovely bays on the other, has plenty of great dining choices. Locally caught whitefish, along with fried cheese curds, and the...
FoodSpeak
From the Bay area to the Mexican border, feed your mind at 10 AM Saturday mornings on AM 830. Co-hosted by Andrew Harris and Executive Chef Andrew Gruel, the SoCal Restaurant Show is a two hour broadcast on clear radio, its menu chock-full of zesty food,...
Sample the Delectable, Local Fare at the Harbor Fish Market and Grille in Door County, Wisconsin
Tucked away in tiny Bailey’s Harbor on the charming and beautiful Door County peninsula is a hidden and undiscovered treasure which you would do well to locate on your next trip. Harbor Fish Market and Grille is a wonderful, gourmet restaurant in a historic building...
Dining Our Way Around Savannah, Georgia
There are a lot of things to like about beautiful, sultry, romantic Savannah, Georgia. The gorgeous, grassy parks with fountains, statues, walking paths, and an amazing history. The beautifully maintained historic homes surrounded by equally beautiful gardens and...
Rome’s Best Gelaterie
Like pizza (January 2015), pasta, espresso coffee, and gelato are quintessential Italian foods. Gelato is the Italian word for ice cream, derived from the Latin word gelatus meaning frozen. Gelato can be made with milk, cream, various sugars and...
Jake Dell: The Owner of Katz’s, New York City’s Oldest and Best Deli
Katz’s Delicatessen, located at 205 Houston Street on the Lower East Side of Manhattan and founded in 1888 by the Iceland Brothers, is the oldest Jewish, but not Kosher delicatessen in New York City. Upon the arrival of Willy Katz in 1903, the establishment’s name was...
Quintessential PV: A Foodie’s Fondness
As we ventured south to explore our neighbor in Jalisco, Mexico, new regard took hold. Puerto Vallarta, famed in the sixties when Liz and Dick fell in love during the filming of “Night of the Iguana,” is so much more. Steeped in history and culture, this hilly...
A Foodie’s Introduction to Portland, Maine with Maine Foodie Tours
Portland, Maine was definitely not putting her best foot forward when we visited on a gray, rainy day in the fall. Our hopes for a lovely culinary walking tour were dashed by the icy, driving rain but being the penultimate foodies that we are, we persevered. We were...
Dining Our Way Around the Emerald Coast of Florida
There is a lot to love about the amazingly beautiful Emerald Coast of Florida. Sparkling white sand beaches, the turquoise water of the Gulf of Mexico, fabulous accommodations, and plenty of family friendly activities are just a few. But one of the absolutely best...
Marché
For the gastronomic traveler, there are reasons enough to visit Marché (pronounced Mar´kay). From the culinary point-of-view, Marche is a little more sophisticated than Molise or Abruzzo, sharing borders and culinary traditions with Emilia-Romana and Tuscany, as well...
The Epicurean Traveler in Alto-Adige
Text and photos ©2010 Tucked away in a steep-sided narrow valley in the Northeastern part of the country, Alto-Adige seems a world apart from the rest of Italy. It’s almost unknown to American tourists who stick to more traveled roads, though it’s a popular...
Ten Great Things about Whistler
Text and photos ©2012 The crossing: Getting to Whistler by air requires flying to Vancouver, a beautiful city that deserves at least afew days of your time. En route to Whistler, the awe-inspiring ambiance of the Sea to Sky Highway with its misty mountainous...
Turkish Fare
Text ©2013 Photos ©2013 by Sal Laterra I have two strong recollections of my first visit to Turkey more than four decades ago. In Istanbul I stayed in the Youth Hostel overlooking the Bosphorus. Then and there, I decided that Istanbul must be one of...
Inside Paris-Insider.com
Review by Scott W. Clemens For the most part, I prefer the country and small towns. Yet there are in this world a few cities that I look forward with eager anticipation to visiting again and again. With its intertwining layers of history, art, and the art of...
Rangoon Renaissance: Staying at the Strand
text and photos ©2012 Burma is now on many world travelers’ “A” list. With the release of Nobel Prize Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest last year and her subsequent triumphant election campaign, tourism to the country is at an all-time high. Decades of...
Not Enough Time in Padua
Alliteration conjures treasures in the Veneto. Venice, Verona, Vicenza come readily to mind, and a fourth joins them in an old folkloric rhyme: Veneziani, gran signori; Padovani, gran dottori; Vicentini, mangia gatti; Veronesi, tutti matti. Freely...
O’Keeffe Country: Looking for Georgia
© 2011 A painting made me do it. I’m not sure whether it was “Purple Hills II” or “LavenderHill with Green 1952” that gave me the itch but when a friend gifted me with a coffee table book commemorating Georgia O’Keeffe’s artwork, I knew I had to set foot on the land...
Souvenirs of Languedoc
text and photos ©2011 by Bill Marsano Languedoc-Roussillon is almost invariably short-changed. It’s blessed by lovely, lively Nîmes and dramatically walled Carcassone, but Provence just across the Rhone gleams with Avignon, Arles and Aix, with gritty Marseille and...
THE EPICUREAN TRAVELER IN: The Azores, Food and Culture
Text ©2010 Long ago, when Adam and Eve left the Garden of Eden, a compassionate angel, seeing the abandoned flowers weeping there, swooped down and gathered an armful of them to carry back to a happier home in Heaven. But as the angel flew across the Atlantic,...