If you’ve been a regular reader of this column, you should be able to pass this test with ease. All questions are worth 5 points except where specified for multi-part answers. Answers are at the bottom of the column. No peeking. If you score 90 or more points, you’re in the Wine Wizard class. If […]

Here are some my recent tastings that I think you might much to your liking. The Chardonnays and other whites are coming into vogue with the summer months, and I’ll be trying more of these in the weeks ahead. I have listed several here, oaked and unoaked, that are good values. I remain partial to […]

When the Wine Goddess told me several weeks ago she was planning a major announcement I reacted with a simple, inquisitive retort: “Should I break out Champagne, Prosecco, or the 2007 Ledson Cabernet Sauvignon from Anderson Valley?” She was amused. “How do you know if it is worthy of celebration?,” she said. “It could be […]

As a young boy, a favorite weekly trip came each Tuesday when mom would lead her twin sons to the “macaroni factory.” Holding hands, we’d make the 10-minute walk from home, past St. Agnes Church, to the old schoolhouse where pasta was produced by the ton. Lowellians over the age of 30 can likely recall […]

Several free wine tasting events are filling up the May calendar, beginning on Saturday, May 4, at Tutto Bene Wine & Cheese Cellar in Lowell. Richard “Riccardo” Rouke is planning a fabulolus take-off on the Kentucky Derby, which will be contested later in the day at venerable Churchill Downs. He’s schedule a Run for the […]