Meat, Beer and Tuscan Wine

I wrote this piece for a Singapore magazine although it never made it to print. The editors wanted to change things, even though it covered the brief to the letter, and I refused to change things.

Did I tell you how much I dislike editors! They are an antibiotic for creativity; a writer’s condom and its strictly missionary position only. It’s a strange interpretation of the English language, in Singapore, where newspapers and magazines for the adult audience are written in primary school prose. Read More >

Best of the Lunar Year 2010 – Most Consistent Best Value Wine: Monte Antico 2007 – Tuscany, Italy

When you have been in the wine trade long enough, in my case 30 years, there are certain wines that you follow as benchmarks; a sort of palate calibration that you undergo every year (vintage) as an imperative to get a bearing and setting a course into an ocean of wines to be tasted.

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The Mood before the Food – Langkawi Island, Malaysia – July 22nd

Expounding on a recurring question, “When dining in a restaurant, do you choose the wine then the food, or the food first then the wine”? Logically, the food would normally come first, assuming one is heading to a restaurant with a particular cuisine or flavour in mind.

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Not too late for Tuscany
The Idyllic Villa Picelle, Azienda Agricole Fontodi

A hankering for the flavors of Chianti has Curtis Marsh planning a trip. In the meantime, he makes do in Wellington Street.

The best laid plans. Everything was set for the archetypal autumn holiday in Italy, two weeks in the heart of Tuscany luxuriating in the 18th-century Villa Pecille, in an idyllic vineyard panorama on the Chianti Azienda (estate) Fontodi, just south of the medieval village Panzano, halfway between Florence and Sienna.

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