The Vintage Caper

Here's this book in one sentence...Ready? France is awesome. The characters and story are purely secondary to this premise.

I thought about making a little game: Excerpt from this book or excerpt from a travel guide?

It would be difficult to imagine a more agreeable place to have lunch on a fine sunny day than the terrace at Peron. High on the Corniche Kennedy, the restaurant offers an irresistible combination of fresh fish, fresh air, and a glittering view of the Frioul islands and the Chateau d'If. It is a setting to sharpen the appetite and bring on a holiday mood.

Yes, that is an actual part of this book. There is so much about the scenery, the people and the food and wine of France that if you whittled the book down to the actual story, it would probably be about forty pages long.

In the middle of reading this, I watched the Pierce Brosnan version of The Thomas Crown Affair. There are quite a few parallels. Whereas the TC Affair is about art, this book is about wine. A whole bunch of wine, between two and three million dollars worth, is stolen from an arrogant collector in Los Angeles. Crook turned investigator, Sam Levitt, is hired by the company that insured the wine to investigate the theft (just as Rene Russo is brought in by an insurance agency to find the stolen painting in the movie). Like Russo, Levitt is a little more clever than the police and has no problem breaking the law to justify reacquiring the assets protected by the company.

I'll spoil the ending for you here. As in The Thomas Crown Affair, the thief is a wealthy European who stole for the thrill. Also as with the movie, the thief is painted as being a sympathetic, likable figure. In this book, the thief is a French hero, a billionaire who gladly pays his taxes to support his country and is a Francophile in all regards. Meanwhile, the guy from whom he stole the wine is an arrogant jackass American. So who cares if he gets his wine back, right?

There just wasn't much to like about this book. The fact that it is a wine theft instead of art is a little different. For a mystery, there is zero suspense and no surprise twists and turns (outside of Sam not really caring about getting the wine back to the guy from whom it was stolen). When the initial crime occurs, there is virtually no evidence as to who might have done it yet Sam finds a loose connection which just happens to be the correct one. Dialogue is awful. One of our patrons recommended it to me as being a book for guys but I think that is true only if you view guys as being chauvinistic. There's a lot of that going on in the book.

Despite the vast number of shortcomings, it was at least somewhat entertaining. I wavered on putting it in the "don't read" level of reviews but it isn't quite that bad. If you're a fast reader, it might not be a bad book to knock out in an afternoon by the pool. With all the advertisements for the French, I could see it being fun to think about traveling over there as you while away the time poolside. for the most part, though, you're not missing anything if you don't read this book.

Wine Review - 2007 Achaia Clauss Mavrodaphne of Patras

As much as I disliked the organic wine of my first wine review, I love the wine of this review.

I've always had a fondness for sweet wines; German Rieslings and Kabinetts, Australian Gewurztraminers, Japanese plum wines. I've enjoyed them all. With my renewed interest in wine, I decided I wanted to explore the dessert wines a little more.

To the best of my knowledge, this is the first Greek wine I have ever had. Achaia Clauss has been making wine since the 1850's and the Mavrodaphne is one of two that the winery has been making since it opened. There is something to be said for 150 years of experience. This wine tastes fabulous.

Unlike the other wines from grapes I mentioned above, this is a red dessert wine and has a much different taste profile. I get tastes of berries, raisins and coffee when I drink this but I mostly enjoy how the flavors come across. If this wine were a musical note, it would have a fermata over it. From the time it enters your mouth, the flavor just holds until you swallow. It has nice alcohol content so when you do finally swallow, that little warmth at the end kicks in. It's reminiscent of other fortified reds like port but much, much more mellow and tasty. The ports I have had tend to feel more like hard liquor to me than wine.

I also like the appearance of this wine. There is a brown tinge to the red, almost like iced tea was blended with it. The viscosity is great, too. I get a kick out of wines with legs (no idea why) and like watching the shapes on the glass after the wine has been swirled or consumed. As to aroma, well, I'm still challenged there. I don't really pick up much.

This is a very affordable wine and one that I strongly recommend, especially if you haven't had a red dessert wine.

First wine review - 2007 Verdant Circle Organic Zinfandel

Way back in my early 20's I tried to take wine seriously. I "specialized" in Australian wines which were overlooked and affordable. Perfect for me. It was a lot of fun but by the time I had my second son, priorities had changed and my interest faded.

Fast forward a decade and I come across the entertaining and knowledgeable Gary Vaynerchuk. If you can watch him and not want to drink wine, well, I admire your willpower and ability to be swayed. You should apply for a job as a gargoyle.

I'd like to find an area on which I can focus but for now, I'm just enjoying a bottle here and there.

Or in this case, not enjoying. I've read that organic wines aren't very good. Something about the lack of sulfites apparently causes the taste to differ (not in a good way) from non-organic wines. While shopping at Total Wine (note to Pennsylvania government officials. Thanks for your tremendous botching of alcohol sales in this state. I have to go to Delaware to get any sort of selection in wine) I came across this bottle marked as recommended. One of the employees there saw me looking at it, told me they had had a tasting of it the weekend before and that many people liked it. The clerk who checked me out when I was done shopping also commented on the number of people who enjoyed it. So I had some high hopes for it.

Hopes dashed. This was one of the worst wines I've ever had. I don't have the palate to tell you what fruits it tasted like. I can tell you it attacked the palate on the front. Very acidic and bitter. Then it all went away. Nothing on the mid-palate or end. No aftertaste. It was almost like taking a sip of fruity moonshine. It just had that up front cringe. There was nothing else to it at all. It didn't have much of a smell. Had a pretty purple-red color. But I drink wine because of how it tastes, and this tasted bad.

Did it taste bad because it was organic? I don't know. I just know I didn't like it and I won't have it again.