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I Love LA, Part One: Bacaro L.A. Wine Bar

31 May

LA*: what a world of possibility; what a world of great food and places to go!

I was meeting up for dinner with my friend Camille from high school and had to find a place to eat.  But where to eat?  I looked around the internet and scoured the annals of my own experience to come up with four or five choices, which I proffered to her to choose from.  She chose Bacaro, a wine bar in South LA.

(Thanks to Yelp! for the pic.)

(Thanks to Yelp! for the pic.)

Bacaro came recommended from one of my fellow bloggers, Horny for Food.  It was supposed to have a good, reasonably-priced wine list, and good, reasonably-priced small plates.  Note also the cool atmosphere–blackboard wall, wine bottle ceiling, good mix of yuppies, hipsters, and yupsters.

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How French Women Are Great for a Wine Blog and for Champagne Sales

21 May

One of the cool things about being the administrator of a blog–at least powered through WordPress–is that I am able to see what search phrases people are using to get to my site.  Some of the most direct are phrases like “joon song wine blog” or “vinicultured.”  Others are things like “wine blog” or “hip wine blog” (since when did my blog become hip?).  The most popular phrases involve “pinot noir” or “best pinot noir”–my most popular entry, actually, is suitably titled “Mission Wines Tasting: The (Second) Best Pinot Noir I’ve Ever Had.”

Then, others are… well… not what I would have ever anticipated for a wine blog.  “Wisdom teeth coffee” has come up–presumably for my entry on how getting my wisdom teeth pulled temporarily ended my wine drinking career.  “LegalZoom sucks” has come up 24 times since I started my blog–and I can assure you quite readily that LegalZoom does not, in fact, suck.  A morbid series of phrases deals with how to throw a party for a dying person–which is somehow derived from my post on the psychology of a dying party (as in a party that is winding down, not a party for… well… dying).

But perhaps one of the most enjoyable series of phrases shows how the Internet is truly being used: the second most popular search phrase on my site is “French women,” the fifth is “women smoking,” and somewhere lower on the list is “French women smoking.”  My post isn’t really about drinking per se but is about the relatively recent ban on smoking in France.  (Look out for the nasty comment comparing me to a Southern slaveowner!)

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Beautiful Berkeley

19 May

What a beautiful place, Berkeley.  I didn’t really enjoy the place until late in my college career–perhaps starting my fourth year, definitely my fifth year.  I have been back up numerous times, but through a number of reasons was unable to do so for nearly the past year and a half–far too long in my book.  Thus, I planned to visit the Bay Area for a spell of a few days after my exciting and rainy adventure in New York the previous week.

The concrete reason for my trip was to visit two of my former residents (and current friends), Semra and Kana, and their awesome apartment up in the hills on North Side.  There was a sentimental reason, too–namely, that all of my residents and thus the vast majority of the people I knew in Berkeley would be graduating and leaving for the big vast world after college.  

There was a oenological reason, too: I wanted to drink a lot of great wine!

Again, as in my New York post, I’m going to just write down phrases that will hopefully serve to jog my memory when I’m looking back after a few decades.  =)

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New York, New York!

12 May

ArtichokeI am currently typing this post a half-hour past midnight here in my friend James’s apartment in Williamsburg, New York.  I spent the past few days here, “recuperating” from finals and the first year of law school.  I say “recuperating” in quotation marks because I’ve done a lot here–a lot of walking, taking subways, eating, drinking wine and other alcoholic beverages, drinking coffee and espresso, seeing jazz recitals, etc.  It might not have been recuperation in the physical sense, but more in a… well, spiritual way.

I stayed away from Times Square and the touristy things.  I thank my friend James as well as my friends Jen, Jonathan L., and Heather–all Berkeley grads and transplants to the City.  It was good also to see Colleen and Jon S. here in New York as well.

I promise that I will write more on wine per se–for now, however, suffice it to say I visited four or five different wine stores (including the very awesome Chelsea Wine Vault in Chelsea Market), purchased seven different wines, and drank a lot.  This post, however, will serve as a journal entry to myself–not very detailed, but just phrases to jog my memory in the future.  

For an alternate telling of the deliciousness, click here for my friend James’s entry on his blog.

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More Joon!

18 Mar

Not too much in the way of news or drinking.  I’ve not been able to drink very much lately because I need every brain cell I have in order to finish this appellate brief which is due on Sunday.  I did go to The Wine Specialist today with my friend Waiching to pick up some makoli, which is fermented Korean rice beer.  I ended up picking up a new bottle of Bushmill’s 10-year, a new bottle of St. Germaine, a bottle of Allagash Black beer (a Belgian-style stout… wha?!), a bottle of Hakutsuru Junmai Ginjo sake (delicious), and a bottle of the 2006 Bourgogne-Passetoutgrain from Philippe Jouan.

I’m keen on trying this last one because it comes recommended from Trey at The Wine Specialist and seems to have received some favorable press online: the Bourgogne-Passeltoutgrain is a small appellation located in the larger Bourgogne (Burgundy) region.  By law the red wines of this region must consist of at least 1/3 pinot noir and no more than 2/3 gamay–thus, it represents a vinous transition from the Beaujolais region and its gamay-based wines and Burgundy and its pinot noir-based wines.

Otherwise, my law school’s newspaper just launched an online version!  I’ve been writing pretty regularly for the paper, which is published biweekly.  Check out my last article here!

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Ruminations on Home

6 Mar

Home.  For the longest time I called a small gray house on Westminster Avenue in Alhambra, California home.  My family lived there since a few years before I was born: my parents had graduated three children from Fremont Elementary and Alhambra High.  This house remained home until early in my college career, when we sold it and moved to an apartment in South Pasadena.

It was strange coming back to a place I did not know, strange sleeping on a couch when I used to be able to sleep on a bed.  I didn’t know the new area very well, passing through South Pasadena only to get from Alhambra to Old Town Pasadena.  And my father had recently been diagnosed with kidney disease, meaning his health was always uncertain.  That apartment on Huntington Drive, new and without the comfort that came from years of familiarity, certainly didn’t feel like home.

Some years have passed.  I graduated from Berkeley, worked for two years at LegalZoom.com, and am in the middle of my second semester at law school in Washington, DC.  Although I started to really like South Pasadena during my two years as a working stiff, it wasn’t until I left California for the far-off Eastern Coast that I truly started to consider South Pasadena home.  We are still living in that small apartment on Huntington; it sounds a bit strange for someone coming from the historical hubbub that was the site of the Inauguration, but I can’t think of anything better than returning to South Pas for good after graduation.

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From the East Coast to the West: the “Tres Picos” Garnacha from Borsao

4 Mar

I am at home, taking a much-needed break from law school.  First semester was a breeze compared to the marathon of mock trial, briefs, classes, and journal competition!

Having lived in DC now since August, I feel like I have a sense of the city.  True, I haven’t really explored too much, but enough to realize a few things.  First, DC is a nice city–to visit.  Second, there are nice restaurants–in the $$$ range.  Third, there are some good cafes–if you’re willing to take the Metro and walk a while.  Fourth, there ARE some good wine shops, though the District of Columbia isn’t exactly the Bay Area.  I am pretty certain that I will be returning to California after law school.

I really do like certain aspects of DC.  I do like the cold weather, for instance, and the snow (although it can be a real pain when you’re trying to walk in slush and frozen ice).  I do like that you can generally get around using public transportation (traffic today in LA brought back some bad memories).  But, after all of this, and despite LA’s problems, LA is still home to me.

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Newsflash: A Small Victory!

27 Feb

I just received word that The Wine Specialist at 2115 M Street has received its exemption from the ban on the single sales of beer.  Trey, one of their associates, tells me that they’re getting beers back in stock but that it might take a little while for The Wine Specialist to get back to its former beery glory.

One note: the days of the “mix and match” six pack are over.  DC won’t allow mixed-producer packs, though it will allow singles of specialty beers (e.g. Belgian and German beers).

That being said, head on over to The Wine Specialist and receive a special 15% discount on singles of specialty beer until March 7.  I wonder if there are any other stores that have received an exemption…

Jumping Junipero Gin!

10 Feb

After I am done being a lawyer, I would like open up a coffee shop where I could help people wake up to hot cups of artisanal coffee.  I would also like to open restaurants, a jazz club, bookstore, a bar or two, and, if my other money-draining schemes have not bankrupted me by that point, open a winery, brewery, or distillery.

If I chose to open either a brewery or distillery, I would do well to take as an example the esteemed Anchor Brewing Company, the world-renowned San Francisco establishment that started the craftbrew movement (with the help of Maytag heir Fritz Maytag, apparently!).  Not only are they great at brewing delicious, delicious beers such as my personal favorite, Liberty Ale, but they are great at distilling quality, small-production spirits like whiskey and gin.

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Reminiscences on the Bay, Part I: Books and Brunch

7 Feb

Today I woke to gorgeous weather: the bright sun shining unhindered by cloud, smog, or fog, the temperature reading at a relatively warm 55 degrees.  I then had the good fortune of scheduling a Sunday brunch with my friends Dre and Mia from California (Dre works in California, and Mia works for the State Department), and, feeling warm and good and content I decided to postpone work by calling Megan for a cappuccino at Illy.

Based on Alex’s early-morning observation that a jacket was unnecessary, I decided to dress in a shirt and light sweater, and instead of wearing shoes decided on my much-neglected pair of Rainbows.  Thus clad, I went outside and was greeted by the most beautiful weather I had experienced in a while.  It was so wonderful, in fact, that Megan and I decided to take our drinks outside, where we talked at the little patch of grass between 22nd, M, and New Hampshire.

There are certain moments that seem archetypal, aren’t there, where sipping a coffee in the sun isn’t just a contemporaneous event but a continuance from your past.  It’s like having two mirrors facing each other: you look at one mirror and see your reflection repeated endlessly and endlessly behind you.  This moment with Megan drinking coffee on the bench transported me back to memories of Berkeley, where you could find me on any number of their infinite perfect days reading a novel with an iced Americano underneath shady trees.

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