Restaurant Wine Cellar to Save Business

It is one of Europe's oldest restaurants, a Paris landmark with a renowned wine cellar of nearly half a million bottles dating back centuries. Now, to clear space – and to raise €1m for renovation and investment – a selection from the cellar of La Tour D'Argent is going under the hammer for the first time. Brilliant? Yes! Note of interest is that this restaurant (and the critic who nearly ruined it) can be seen in the Disney film "Ratatouille".

This sale is accomplishing a few things in one fell swoop:
1. Press. Yep, I'm writing about the restaurant.
2. Money. In a market where luxury sales have declined it's going to generate cash for the business and for the remodel.
3. It's getting rid of some over purchases. 20 years ago French wine was all about Burgundy and Bordeaux. Now wine drinkers have expanded their tastes and the wine in the cellar needs to reflect this.

It's a wine collector's dream. David Ridgeway, the restuarant's chief sommelier, said. "Every one has come from our cellar, has only made one journey in its lifetime and has been handpicked." He goes on to mention his hopes that the bottles sold will be drunk – even the 1788 cognac. "That's what it is there for," he said. "I would rather people enjoyed it, rather than collecting wine for the sake of it." I'm all for that!

Read the full article from The Guardian here.

Entrepreneur Recognizes Beer

Craft beer is on the rise and Entrepreneur magazine recognizes it. They're a little late to the party since we've seen craft beers taking over for some time. So ingrained in our culture now, the large breweries have started to emulate the small ones, with new products that sound more unique and advertising that emphasizes the brewmaster and creative making of fine beer. Most of us are not fooled, but the general public does actually want better beer. There has been a 6% rise overall in the sale of premium craft beers this past year with the thoughts that it is an affordable luxury.

You can read the article from Entrepreneur Magazine here.

Castle Lite Vanilla Ice Commercial

I saw this on The Barley Blog here but I had to repost it because it just made me laugh. It's not newsworthy at all so you're just going to have to cut a girl a break!

Homeopathy and Grape Growing

What's the connection between natural healing techniques and growing grapes for wine making? This doctor found a great way to incorporate both in an explanation of what biodynamic farming really is and how it actually does make a difference in the wine you're drinking.

Twitter Wine

Yep, just in case most of our lives haven't been taken over by social networking, now Twitter is invading our wine cellars.

Starting today, you can reserve your Twitter-branded bottle of wine for $20, $5 of which goes toward Room to Read (the rest pays for production costs). Every case sold will buy 60 local language books in support of an organization that, to date, has established more than 700 schools and over 7,000 bilingual libraries with five million books.

O.K. so it's for a good cause and I can't fault them for doing something that benefits literacy but I need to know - are you really going to buy wine from Twitter? Read the full article from San Francisco Weekly here.

San Diego No1 Beer Town

That's right, when it comes to beer San Diego has it going on! According to an article on the top 5 beer towns in the U.S. in Men's Journal Magazine, Southern California is making a name for itself in the craft brew arena. I'll post the parts on San Diego here but to find out who else is on the list and why, check out the full article here.

San Diego isn’t just surfing and LaDainian Tomlinson anymore — it’s the new beer capital of the U.S. Stone (maker of our number one ale) exemplifies the local approach, with aggressively hopped but completely drinkable brews. The variety of beers across the city is the most eclectic in the country.

Where to Drink: Thirtieth Street in North and South Parks is easily the nation’s best beer boulevard. Start with any of former firefighter Pat McIlhenney’s range of tap-only ales at the laid-back Hamilton’s Tavern (which taps special casks every Friday), then head to the beer-focused Linkery restaurant, which has frequent beer-pairing dinners. For your after party, hit the Toronado. The beer lists at all three are deep, stacked with the freshest local beers and exotic imports.

Beer Culture: The sheer number of breweries (33) blows us away. (It has crept past Portland, which has 29.) Visit almost any of them and you’ll find the brewmaster on hand, happy to chat over a pint.

Best Brews: Alpine Ale, Lost Abbey Duck-Duck-Gooze

Cheap Wine

OK - I'm a big fan of not spending a lot on my wine... it enables me to drink more. I am a sucker for Cost Plus wines, but they don't have online shopping (for the wines yet at least)... so here's where I go. Enjoy!