Gil Kulers, CWE

2009 Château Sérilhan, St. Estèphe, Bordeaux

• $25
• Two Thumbs Way Up
• Intense aromas of dark berry fruit with notes of roasted coffee, smoky dry earth and violets. This chewy, chunky wine offers flavors of dark berries and plum with notes of toffee, cola nut, mint and cloves. It will develop over the next three to six years.

If you describe the 2009 Bordeaux vintage as “da bomb!” (which it is, by the way), then you are probably older and less hip than you’d like to admit.

If you were to say the 2009s were “fly” (which my 12-year-old daughter, Erika, assures me is the current slang for “great”), there are some Bordeaux producers and enthusiasts who would like a moment of your time.

The grand and ancient wine-producing region of Bordeaux, France, is at a bit of a crossroads. Long considered the “it” red of the wine world, if you wanted to demonstrate your wine’s quality then you measured it against a fine Bordeaux. (Think the movie “Bottle …

Continue reading Kulers Uncorked: Disciples of Bordeaux »

One of the many signs of the vitality of American craft beer is the growing concern for quality. Beyond ingredients and brewing techniques, there’s a greater emphasis on proper storage and serving, and even the importance of glassware.

Matt with IPA glass @ BSP

Of course, Belgian and German breweries are famous for creating elegant glasses for their beers. More recently, American breweries, including the Boston Beer Co., have created special designs, such as the Samuel Adams Boston Lager Glass, that aim to enhance sensory perception.

In the past few weeks, the big news has been a glass touted to be so well designed it makes craft beer lovers’ favorite style even more of a sniffing and sipping pleasure.

American craft brewers Dogfish Head and Sierra Nevada teamed with the German glassware maker Spiegelau to create a new IPA glass they say will change the way you experience hop goodness.

It features thin, round walls to maintain proper temperature longer; a slender, bowed …

Continue reading Can the glass better the beer? »

Gil Kulers, CWE

2010 Tiger Mountain Vineyards Touriga Nacional, Georgia

• $19
• Two Thumbs Up
• Engaging and rich aromas of blackberry, tar, rose petals and a light vanilla note. Flavors of dry porcini mushrooms, black cherry, cola and touch of black pepper on the finish.

“I am very saddened to inform you that we are closing the vineyards and winery at Blackstock.” Thus began David Harris’ not unexpected letter earlier this year. We found out officially just after the New Year that he and his wife, Trish, were throwing in the towel after 17 seasons of growing arguably north Georgia’s best wine grapes from their vineyards outside of Dahlonega.

A freeze in April 2012, which left Blackstock essentially cropless, sealed the deal. Never heard of the Harrises or Blackstock? Not a surprise. From challenging weather, to a byzantine distribution system, to a largely skeptical market, to the preponderance of inexpensive, imported California grapes, Georgia’s winemakers face …

Continue reading Wine Kulers: Tiger Mountain Touriga Nacional »

Last year, Atlanta’s Frozen Pints hit the market with craft beer ice cream. Now, Roswell’s Happy Hour Confections is infusing sweet and savory baked goods with craft beer.

Lemon Hefeweizen Cupcake (Credit: Holly Pezzano)

During a recent conversation at Five Seasons North in Alpharetta, owner Holly Pezzano sipped a pint of Dark Star stout and explained how she made the move from home baker to entrepreneur.

“Actually, my husband started all this as a kind of challenge,” Pezzano said. “He made a chili recipe with beer and was so thrilled with the result he said, ‘What else can we try?’ So we started marinating and cooking all sorts of things with beer. Then I tried baking with beer.”

As Pezzano got more serious, she began dreaming up more recipes and testing them over several months, often taking samples by her favorite beer shop, Ale Yeah! in Roswell, for feedback.

“At one point, she would come up here at least twice a week,” said Ale Yeah! owner Eddie …

Continue reading Beer Town: Happy Hour Confections »

Gil Kulers, CWE

The 1970 Pontiac GTO provided engineers the opportunity to revamp the transfer of power to the rearend.

This week’s column will tackle the subjects of how to remove the transmission in a 1970 Pontiac GTO with the help of port tongs and the interesting connection between the wines of Barolo and the 3-4 defensive scheme used by the Green Bay Packers.

I will completely understand if many of my female readers take a rain check this time. I’ll see you in a couple weeks with less overtly masculine themes.

When General Motors beefed up its power plant for the 1970 GTO, it presented engineers with a unique opportunity to utilize transmission technology dating back to the early 1960s….

OK, fellas. I think we are alone now. What I really wanted to talk to you about today is one of the most stressful situations American males face every year: ordering the wine for your Valentine’s Dinner. If you blow this important call, you can expect the dreaded “eye roll of …

Continue reading Kulers Uncorked: Valentine’s Edition »

At a recent preview tour of the new Monday Night brewery on Atlanta’s Westside, our guide asked whether anyone could name the four basic building blocks of beer. Of course, a whole bunch of hands shot up, and at least one person shouted out the tried-and-true answer: water, malt, hops, yeast.

Nowadays, though, those ingredients are just the bare essentials. In the Belgian tradition, many beers are dosed with candy sugar and flavored with fruit and spices. Or in American extreme fashion, they’re jacked up with chocolate and/or coffee, or inebriated in wine or whiskey barrels.

Casks, once the vessel of English mild session ales, have become a delivery system for all sorts of wild flavors.

Some of the winners at the 2012 Sweetwater Brew Your Cask Off competition were named “Nuttin Butter,” “The Chubby Chocolate Bunny” and “The Elvis Peanut Butter and Banana Porter.” And at the most recent Atlanta Cask Ale Tasting, Sweetwater made “Sad Ending,” an Imperial …

Continue reading Beer Town: Beyond water, malt, hops, yeast »

The “Wall of Ties” — a towering neon-lit display tacked with layers of old neckties — is maybe the most conspicuous of the many playful design elements in the new Monday Night Brewing tasting room on Atlanta’s Westside.

Monday Night tap handles

But there are tie-shaped tap handles and tie-shaped door handles, too. And even the shiny stainless steel fermentation tanks out in the brewery are hung with giant ties.

Like their motto, “Weekends Are Overrated,” ties are proud emblems for the three Monday Night partners, Jonathan Baker, Jeff Heck and Joel Iverson, who met in a weekly Bible study, and decided to open a craft brewery together while concocting homebrew recipes in Heck’s garage.

“We started as white collar guys, and when we’d come home on a Monday, we’d loosen our ties and brew beer,” said Baker, who has the title, Marketing Guy and Master of Mind Control.

“Monday is traditionally a much maligned day of the week but for us it became a day to look …

Continue reading Beer Town: Monday Night Brewing opens »

Gil Kulers, CWE

2011 Sineann Red Table Wine, Oregon

• $20
• Two Thumbs Up
• Pleasant floral aromas with bright red berry fruit and red apple skin. It has sweet-tart, bright flavors of raspberries, cranberries and a subtle briary, menthol note.

Winemaking is tough.

Great wines are the result of blood, sweat, tears and plenty of trial and error. Every once in a while, in the midst of their toil, a winemaker has a bone thrown his or her way. That was the case with Peter Rosback, the well-regarded Oregon winemaker, and the “discovery” of his Red Table Wine.

Rosback’s winery, Sineann, is best known for its pinot noirs, but in recent years, Rosback has dabbled with cabernet sauvignon, cabernet franc, zinfandel and merlot from Columbia Valley. He also travels to New Zealand to produce sauvignon blanc and pinot noir from the South Island’s exciting Central Otago region.

Sineann makes about 20 wines in any given vintage with a preponderance of red varieties. Sineann is well …

Continue reading Kulers Uncorked: Sineann Red Table Wine »

Every fall, American Homebrew Association members team up with breweries from around the country to create homebrew recipes and enter them in the Great American Beer Festival Pro-Am Competition in Denver.

Bob Southard won Taco Mac’s Southern Brewer’s Challenge

Around the same time, the winners of the Samuel Adams Longshot American Homebrew Contest are announced and soon after, the winning beers are brewed, bottled and made available nationally in the Samuel Adams Longshot variety six-pack.

Here in Atlanta, contests and collaborations between homebrewers and brewpubs are becoming more common, too, including a string of one-off guest brews at Five Seasons, Twain’s Homebrew Challenge and the recent Max Lager’s Challenge.

This month, Taco Mac locations around Atlanta are featuring Red Brick Cherry Chocolate Porter on draft. The beer was brewed by Atlanta’s Red Brick Brewing Co. using a recipe from Woodstock homebrewer Bob Southard, who won Taco Mac’s inaugural 2012 …

Continue reading Beer Town: Homebrew to pro brew »

Gil Kulers, CWE

2009 Pierre Damoy, Clos Tamisot, Gevrey-Chambertin

• $75
• The Golden Thumb Award
• Deep, rich aromas of perfume-like lilacs, lavender with perfectly ripe red and dark berry fruit. Pleasing flavors of red raspberry, black cherry, blackberry with pinpoint acidity. It also had a mineral, slate-like tension with notes of dry mushroom and cocoa powder.

I’ve lived in the South for 23 years this week and (bless my heart!) have never really understood many phrases used by my adopted region. In the latter half of 2012, I came to appreciate one term, or at least I think so. I do believe I’ve had “the vapors.”

According to Wikipedia and several snarky, know-it-all websites, having the vapors is an antebellum expression for being overcome by emotion or ever-so-slightly stimulated by someone or something.

Yep, I’ve had the vapors alright.

What caused me to get all hot and bothered? Recognizing that you’re reading this in a wine column, you may have guessed it was a …

Continue reading Kulers Uncorked: Pierre Damoy Clos Tamisot »