Blogs

Much has been written about the death of restaurateur/chef Charles Phan. Deservedly so. He is the one responsible for elevating Asian cooking in the Bay Area ...

Dave McIntyre, the longtime wine columnist might be gone from the Washington Post, but his words and thoughts as a living......

The following thoughts are running though my brain as if in a pinball machine, whose theme is, Is It Really All Over Now, Baby Blue?

Whenever my grandkids – ages 13/10 – utter something sweet or funny that I think is nevertheless naive, silly, or just plain unclear on the concept......

“This must be the place. They said the entrance to the cave was behind this forest of huge empty stainless steel fermenters......

The other night I went to a dinner at Scoma’s restaurant on Fisherman’s Wharf in San Francisco to taste some Willamette Valley wines with the winemaker. I’m not sure why I went.

They had a chance. And they blew it. Just like the discredited minor league baseball player-cum-somm, all dressed up in a dark suit.........

Item: During WWII, attitudes began to shift in the latter half of the occupation. New Vichy policies forbade the advertising of alcohol and levied heavy taxes.......

I’m sick of it, I tell ya! After having scrolled through 2½ months of the L.A. Times’ food section, I didn’t see one mention, not one article, not one picture, not one tasting note. Nothing about wine.....

Waiter, taste the soup. “Is there something wrong with the soup, monsieur?”......

The following has a lot of porosity (see amphorae below) but when I saw that a San Francisco Tunisian restaurant isn’t being allowed to serve food in its culturally appropriate vessels, I threw my pots.....

Note: This was written before the war between Israel and Hamas began – in a more “frivolous” moment. In thinking about whether or not I should publish this piece......