Female Wine Drinkers Less likely to Gain Weight than Non-drinkers

Another good reason to drink red wine (as if we needed one!) comes from a ScienceDaily report of a recent study done by researchers at Brigham and Women's Hospital, in Boston, who measured the weight gain over an average of 13 years of women who started with a body mass index in the normal range. Here’s what they found:

Compared with women who did not drink at all, those who consumed some but less than 40 grams per day of alcohol were less likely to become overweight or obese. Women who drank 15 to less than 30 grams per day had the lowest risk, which was almost 30 percent lower than that of non-drinkers.

‘An inverse association between alcohol intake and risk of becoming overweight or obese was noted for all four types of alcoholic beverages [red wine, white wine, beer and liquor], with the strongest association found for red wine and a weak yet significant association for white wine after multivariate adjustment,’ the authors write.

The women who were least likely to gain weight were occasional to moderate drinkers. Forty grams per day of alcohol is a roughly a glass of wine a day. As always moderation is the key, as is your choice of food pairing. A big chunk of brie with your glass of wine will not lead to weight loss.


flickr photo by salvis.are

2009 Guenoc Cabernet Sauvignon—A Crowd-Pleasing Value

My friend Linda recently brought over a bottle of the 2009 Guenoc Cabernet Sauvignon for a pot-luck Christmas party I was hosting. I had tasted this wine before but it had been a few years ago and I was happy to be reacquainted with this good value cab.

On the nose there was some big blackberry fruit backed up by some pleasing vanilla and spice. The wine was wonderfully mouth filling with flavors of cherry pie and earth. This was a surprisingly complex wine for its price (under $12.00) and it lingered nicely on the finish, a bit hot, but tempered with yummy mocha and stone fruit.

As you can imagine, our pot-luck buffet offered many pairing options. It paired well with the yam casserole and Linda’s roasted pork loin. It was equally tasty with the chocolate-coated éclairs.

If you are looking for an accessible Cabernet that will please most palates you can’t go wrong with the 2009 Guenoc Cabernet Sauvignon. And it’s cheap enough to share with all your friends!

2001 Cameron Willamette Valley Pinot Noir

In the spirit of full disclosure, I have to preface this post by admitting that I am a big fan of Oregon Pinot Noir.

I love the big fruit flavors, the diversity of microclimates and soils, and the passion these winemakers bring to crafting wines from this challenging grape. So when I opened a bottle of 2001 Cameron Willamette Valley Pinot Noir the other night I did expect that I would like this wine. What I did not expect was how well it had aged.

Close to ten years in the bottle, I did see a clear lip when I poured the wine into a glass along with a slight brick tinge to the bright art glass color I was used to seeing in these pinots. But on the nose there was no hint of a wine in decline. I inhaled raspberry, cherry licorice, clove, sweet tobacco, and new oak.

On the palate I picked up the plum brandy flavor that I associate with some age, followed by bramble and mineral and a refreshing sparkling acid on the tongue.

This pinot finished long with a mild but lingering cherry pastille flavor. Yum, just the ticket for a cold, blustery night.

If you have a bottle of this wine in your cellar, I would recommend you liberate it— perhaps when there’s a turkey roasting or when you need just a little something…for medicinal purposes.

Happy Thanksgiving!

What wine should you serve with the best-dressed bird? My preference has alway been a Californian Pinot Noir or a dry Rose. I will be bringing a 2008 Dry Rose from Valhalla Vineyards to our neighbor's home along with a couple of hefty mircobrews from Canada for my host Bob who enjoys a beer before his meal.

But really, I think you should serve whatever wine you think your guests will enjoy. That might mean a Beringer White Zinfandel for Grandma and a beer for Uncle Chuck. The reality is with all the dishes that are typically served at a Thanksgiving meal it's difficult, if not impossible, to choose one wine that complements both the spicy stuffing and the marshmallow-topped sweet potatos.

Don't sweat it. This is one day where no one will care. We will just be grateful for the food, the company, and a little bit of acid and alcohol to cut the grease and grease the conversation.

2005 Bargain Bordeaux

I had the privilege of tasting a barrel sample of the 2005 Mouton Rothschild when were visiting there in June of 2006. Despite its impressive showing as a young wine, I knew then that I would not be buying this wine by the bottle. The hype surrounding the 2005 vintage drove prices up quickly and even in this recession I would have difficulty finding a bottle of the 2005 Mouton Rothschild for under US$700.

Instead we stayed away from the top producers and their pricey real estate and have purchased quite reasonable 2005 Bordeaux wines for under $40. The Roanoke Fine Wine Society recently did a blind taste of eight bottles of 2005 Bordeaux wines from St. Emilion, Pessac-Leognan, and Medoc to see what these relatively bargain wines offered in the glass.

Some were in a funky stage but most were very drinkable now if you can endure the mouth-drying tannins. These are definitely food wines. We paired these wines with braised beef and potatoes and hard cheeses and we were richly rewarded. Some of the evening’s highlights included a 2005 Chateau Joanin Becot (St. Emilion), Rollan de By (Medoc), and a Chateau Larrivet Haut-Brion (Pessac-Leognan) all of which were rated 90 by Robert Parker and can be found for under US$40.

Of course, had we bought the 2005 Mouton Rothschild at release it would have been a very good investment but you can buy a case and a half of these less renowned Bordeaux wines for the $700 plus it would cost to buy one bottle of the Mouton today.

Which brings up the question: Are you a wine collector or a wine drinker?

Wine or Water?

My mother sends me jokes over the internet once in a while and this one made me smile:

As Ben Franklin said: In wine there is wisdom,
in beer there is freedom, in water there is bacteria.

In a number of carefully controlled trials, scientists have demonstrated that if we drink 1 liter of water each day, at the end of the year we would have absorbed more than 1 kilo of Escherichia coli, (E. coli) - bacteria found in feces. In other words, we are consuming 1 kilo of poop.

However, we do NOT run that risk when drinking wine & beer (or tequila, rum, whiskey or other liquor) because alcohol has to go through a purification process of boiling, filtering and/or fermenting.

Remember:
Water = Poop,
Wine = Health

Therefore, it's better to drink wine and talk stupid, than to drink water and be full of shit.

2005 Columbia Crest Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve is Still #1 in My Book

This month the Roanoke Fine Wine Society sat down to taste 10 of Wine Spectators Top 100 wines of 2009.

There were a lot of great wines on the table including the group favorite, a 2007 Two Hands Bella’s Garden Shiraz, but the wine that most impressed me was the 2005 Columbia Crest Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve.

On the nose it was yeasty with lots of black cherry and spice. On the palate it offered up coffee, leather, vanilla and charred oak and some gripping tannins that carried though to a 30 + second finish. It’s a monster of a wine sure to have a few more good years.

A whopping 5,000 cases of this wine were offered up for sale but the supply is quickly dwindling. At release a bottle of this juice could be had for around $27.00. Now you’re lucky to find it on-line for under $90.

How’s that for wine appreciation?