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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Hakutsuru Superior Junmai Ginjo Sake

17 Apr

When many Americans hear the word sake they usually hear another word in quick succession, followed by a loud banging on tables, a volley of splashes, and quick chugging.  Sake bombing is not only a big source of income for lower-end Japanese restaurant/karaoke bars but also an introduction to this drink–perhaps, then, it is sort of like white zinfandel, serving as a gateway to the world of alcoholic pleasures waiting just beyond.

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A Few Parting Words Before Finals

12 Apr

Chances are, dear readers, that I will not be posting anytime soon.  This is on account of law school finals, upon which–like a red wheelbarrow–so much depends.  But, I fully expect to post with more regularity after April 30, a date which happens not only to be the day of my last final but also the day of my birth, 26 years prior.

This post won’t be one of my long narrative spiels but rather a placemarker for a few wines I feel I should record for perpetuity.  The first I purchased for the occasion of James’s (of The Eaten Path fame) visit to DC: the 2006 Mas de Daumas Gassac from the Languedoc ($49.99).  This wine is billed as “The Grand Cru of the Languedoc” and contains merlot, cabernet franc, tannat and pinot noir, as well as a collection of Italian grapes (nebbiolo, barbera and dolcetto), chardonnay, viognier, chenin blanc, petit manseng, marsanne, roussanne, sercial, muscat and more.  It’s a crazy wine, and I was aching to try it.

daumas-gassac-logo

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How Do You Cook YOUR Steak? Or, Helping Alex Recover from the National Half-Marathon with Filet Mignon and the 2001 Arrowood “Le Beau Melange” Syrah

23 Mar

While waiting for my dinner to cook (just some spaghetti, pre-made alfredo sauce, and a frozen seafood mix from Trader Joe’s) I’d like to write about YESTERDAY’s dinner: filet mignon served with steamed fingerling potatoes tossed with leeks and goat cheese.  To wash this down was a fair amount of the 2001 Arrowood “Le Beau Melange” Syrah from Sonoma Valley.  Altogether, a great meal.

le-beau-melangeThe impetus for this meal was a half-marathon Alex ran the previous day–the National Half-Marathon–as practice for the true full marathon he was planning on running in early May.  He did very well, coming in I believe 74th out of hundreds if not thousands.

The wine was to help celebrate; the steak was to help him recuperate.

True to form, Alex and I had a bit of the Arrowood before dinner–it got us crunk.  At 15% alcohol, this one was a heavy hitter.  However, it didn’t taste hot, nor was it too big and bold for our tastes.  It reminded me of one of my favorite wines–the Chateauneuf-du-Pape from Domaine La Roquete.  However, THAT wine, being from Southern France, was made primarily of grenache, while the Arrowood was composed of syrah.  It felt more like a “French” wine–apparently, too, Le Beau Melange is Arrowood’s Rhone-style offering.  It succeeds despite the higher alcohol content.  Australian shiraz it ain’t.

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Wine Note: 2006 Philippe Jouan Bourgogne-Passetoutgrain

20 Mar

Just a short note on the wine I mentioned the other day, the 2006 Philippe Jouan Bourgogne-Passetoutgrain.  As stated in that previous post, this wine hails from a subappellation of Bourgogne (Burgundy) and is made from at least 1/3 pinot noir and at most 2/3 gamay.  I am assuming that this particular example is made more or less from those two grapes in that proportion.

I opened the bottle yesterday for dinner, which was completely Trader Joes: spinach and ricotta ravioli with tomato sauce, and vegetable pizza supplemented with goat cheese.  Good dinner, and I bet that the wine–which was described as acidic–would go well with the tomato sauces and cheeses.

Transparent purple color, with a promising nose which smelled like a Cotes-du-Rhone, actually–but my roommate and I found the wine a bit too insubstantial, too acidic.  Some cherry and minerality, but there was no heft.  It was like a pretty girl with no substance behind her smile.  It wasn’t a bad wine, just perhaps a touch too acidic.

Not to write it off too soon, I corked the bottle and put it in the fridge to see if a day to “breath” would round out the wine.  Now I’m drinking it with some more pizza–straight-up cheese–and it’s still acidic but a bit more open.  I noticed a little tinniness on the (short) finish I hadn’t noticed before.  Good with the pizza, actually, and better than what Clive Coates, MW described:

“A blend of Gamay and Pinot Noir might promise to be barely drinkable.  In practise as this wine is largely from grapes which barely ripen in the coolest parts of the  Burgundy vineyards the results are usually worse.  Someone must like it, for the amount produced each year is not negligible.”

from An Encyclopedia of the Wines and Domaines of France

The coolness leading to the low ripeness must lead to the wine’s low alcohol and light body.  Though more pleasurable than Mr. Coates warned, I would probably not buy this wine again.

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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