Wine School Year in Review: The Greatest Hits & Some That Will Be

Class transcript:

Still on the road with Zoe and Sarah Thompson, back with us, Pride of Winchester, Virginia. Say hello to the people, Sarah Thompson. Hi. Welcome back, Sarah. Zoe is actively quarantining. Zoe stopped by the restaurant and I just dropped her wines by the door for her. She picked them up. She is back sequestering in her Adams Morgan lair. We're going to buy a little time here and I'm going to give you a bit of a year in review as well. Year in review. So, a few numbers for you. I promise I haven't forgotten a bit of verse. We're going to do that after the year review so that those late to the lesson get to enjoy it as well. We are on week 39. We started doing this at the tail end last Sunday in March of this year.

It was actually kind of my wife's idea. So I was wondering after the restaurant shut down how to keep our staff actively engaged and entertained in the restaurant project. And I thought wine classes might be a fun way to do that. And my wife said, if you're going to go through all that effort, you might as well invite a larger group of people. So we invited everybody and I was over the top. I was overwhelmed by the response. And 39 weeks later, you're still here. I'm amazed. But first and foremost, I want to thank you all for creating and sustaining this community throughout pandemic. It has been an amazing and unexpected experience for me to be a part of. And I'm hugely grateful for it. All right. So, year in review here.

We've done, we're going to do by the end of the year 40 weekends. 154,000. worth of lessons um if you uh have perfect attendance uh figuring on three four ounce glasses consumed uh over the course of those 40 odd uh lessons and i feel like for most of us three four ounce pours is probably the under um i'm going to take the over on this one but assuming uh relatively chaste three four ounce pours uh you will consume 480 ounces of wine which is kind of a uh difficult number to discern that roughly equals 19 bottles 19 bottles so good on you and again i think that's the the under uh for for most of us it should be said uh we have welcomed at least 20 guests uh 20 guests from all sorts of corners um of the world from france to italy to georgia um from maryland uh to virginia to oregon uh for the sake of these lessons and i'm hugely grateful uh that we have yet to um you know experience um or uh ignite a international or diplomatic incident uh closest we came i think uh was uh associating australians uh with one of their uh greatest uh winemakers chester osborne uh we did Get a letter from the embassy, uh cease and desist for the sake of, uh sharing this particular photo that we're violating, um you know, for the sake of our year in review, uh but, uh cheers to you,  Chester Osborne, um not all Australians dress that way, that's a very important PSA, uh for our Aussie friends, uh, uh Chester, an exception, uh to the rule, uh we enjoyed his Dead Arm Syrah from old vines, um in front of his preposterously modern, uh kind of, uh vineyard workshop there, um but you know, uh amazing, that you know, we've been able, uh to, uh welcome, uh 20 I guess, over the course of, uh the, uh 40 uh odd weeks and, uh an amazing opportunity. to uh create a sense of community um within um and amongst wine uh professionals um because we you know are a class of professional folks that really depend on um you know travel uh and trade uh for the sake of our livelihood and for the sake of sustaining our social lives and uh it's been really lovely to connect um with all of those old friends for the sake of these lessons you know on a more sobering note we've lost hundreds of thousands um of american lives we've lost millions around the world um we've seen uh millions of lives um you know irrevocably altered uh for the sake of uh this pandemic in our industry uh and uh in other industries um we have been uh proud of the charity work that we've been able to do um through uh the course of this class we've uh raised over uh thirty thousand dollars uh for at least a half a dozen bowis brown grandparents and uh uh i mean there's a reason for our time to be on the frontanc. Our worker's relief fund initially um Miriam's kitchen SEAL USA um for the sake of Lebanese humanitarian work Mfert wheelage for the sake of reproductive rights and uh women's health um in Washington DC Active Minds for the uh for the sake of mental health awareness and Campaign Zero for the sake of an end police brutality um thank you all um for participating um in those offend too many funds raised and um getting all your time and many funny dialogues behind me might not get to it throughout the show. And of your will as well. We've had three hosts. Joan is not with us. Big ups to Joan. We love you as well, Zoe and Sarah. Joan, actually the original host, it should be said. We dropped countless XF bombs. I've subjected you to the same pathetic rotation of about half a dozen t-shirts over the course of these lessons.

We've managed to record 36 now, 37 of them going on strong. There remain two lost lessons. Hopefully there's some kind of like Grateful Dead bootleg situation happening for the sake of sustainable Austria and Virginia, which remains one of my favorite lessons. I totally blew it on that one. And Sarah Thompson, all I want for Christmas is my two front teeth, my two front teeth. So two, I have two front teeth. So if you revisit, let's say number two, you will notice that they are missing. They are now hugely big, but permanent enough that I don't forget to put them in for the sake of our lessons. So amazing, good on you. We're gonna kick it off with a bit of versus, as we always do, and it's kind of by request, and as a word of explanation, we are broadcasting live from Reveler's Hour.

And the background of the A name of our restaurant owes itself to a bit of ancient Greek verse. This is Thomas More's translation of Anacreon. Sculptor, wouldst thou gladden my soul? Grave for me an ample bowl, worthy to shine in hall or bower when springtime brings the reveler's hour. Grave it with themes of chaste design fit for a simple board like mine. Display not there the barbarous rites in which religious disease delights, nor any tale of tragic fate which history shudders to relate. No, call thy fancies from above. Themes of heaven, themes of love, let Bacchus Jove's ambrosial boy distill the grape in drops of joy. And while he smiles at every tear, let warm-eyed Venus dancing near with spirits of the genial bed, the dewy verbiage deftly tread.

Let love be there without his arms in timid nakedness of charms. And all the graces linked with love stray laughing through the shattery grove while rosy boys disporting round in circlets trip the velvet crown. But ah, if Apollo toys, I tremble. For the rosy boys. It should be said that Apollo was not always good to his #rosy, #rosy boys. The #rosy boys had a very short lifespan. They were a bit like the Spinal Tap drummers of the ancient world. So, that poem ends with a bit of a warning to potential rose-y boys out there. Want to thank everyone who participated in the survey. I'm thrilled to have all your responses. We're probably going to go long. So, you know, everybody strap in, we've got a lot of wine to go through.

It's going to be amazing. I've got, you know, one more activity here. This is largely by request and I'm grateful I did the survey because I didn't know that I had a career as a sommelier slash rapper until we got many kind of responses to that effect. So I wanted to kind of revisit guys that were trying to get into this room. Year in Tail-Up Goat Wine School through the work of Hova. Hova, none other than Jay-Z, loves wine, has his own wine, purchased Armando Brignac's Ace of Spades. There is Hova. And he's not only celebrating Chris or Hennessy, you know, Hova's love runs deep for wine. And I'm going to drop a few lyrics from Choice Tracks. So this is for lesson number three, which we devoted to Cabernet Sauvignon.

This is off of Show Me What You Got. Give the drummer some shit. I already got the summer some. It's the winter's turn. Hovi Hov is the coldest. I'm just getting better with time. I'm like Opus, one young, no two alike, like a snowflake. So that is Opus One reference. Everyone keeping score at home. That is Opus One that Hova is dropping, which is one of California's most famous cabernets. Number two reference. This is actually, I'd heard this one before, and it made me fall in love with Jay-Z a little bit because he's dropping rhymes about rosé, which is amazing. You know, pink wine. This is in, they're off the track of 30-something. Y'all were blunts. I smoke Cubans all day. Y'all youngins chase. I'm particular. It's thrown in it straight.

I like South Beach, but I'm in San Tropez. Y'all drink dumb, but not rosé, hey. So he is celebrating rosé and San Tropez and pronouncing it correctly for the sake of his rhyme. So good on you, Hova. Number three is one of my favorite because not only do we get a wine reference here, we get a vintage drop. I can't think of another rapper alive today that is dropping not only wines, but vintages. Y'all can't even drink Crist Owl on this one. You got drink Crist Owl. Woo! Buy some red wine, a little Gaia 97. You're so contagious, I can't take it. This is for the grown and sexy. Have my baby. Let's just make it. So that's Gaia 1997. Gaia, one of the most famous barbarescos of all time.

The 97 vintage, I had to do some searching on this. I didn't know as much, but Wine Spectator says that 1997 was a super ripe, opulent, flamboyant year. So that is a great hip-hop vintage, 1997. I promise I'm only searching two more of these for the sake of, but this is apparently by popular demand. So it should be said that Jay-Z got into it with a French doyenne named Frédéric Rousson, who is the chairman of Louis Roederer, who bit the hand that fed him. So rappers love Krug. They rhyme about it and rap about it a lot. They're responsible for the fact that Krug is a hugely successful luxury brand. When asked about the popularity of Krug, Frédéric Rousson said, 'We can't forbid people from buying it.' What the fuck, dude?

You are totally off base. The hip-hop community is responsible for your market share, but they're a little too dark-skinned for your taste. So Hova obviously got into it. He took so much time to do it that he wrote a diss track. So I used to drink Cristal, motherfucker's racist, so I switched to G.O., motherfuckers' racist, so you don't have another drink or you're going to do babysit onto the next one, somebody called The Waitress. So I like the babysit waitress, racist as shit. So all over the place there. And then on the final track, I promise this is ending soon, Tom Ford. This is by far the best one because he crams three prime wine references into one track. Paris, where we've been, pardon my Parisian. It's high time in no time.

It's 'f**k y'all' season. Piss Bordeaux and Burgundies. Flush out a Riesling. When hoes out them hoes, y'all put your weaves in. So we've managed to rhyme Riesling with weaves in. Bow down to Jay-Z, the true master of rhymes and wine. I apologize. I will never do that again for the sake of students. Hopefully you're minorly entertained. For the sake of that exercise. Without further ado, we're going to move on to the wines. Wanted to take you back. We are doing a blind tasting here for the sake of your exam. We're moving it back to the tasting grid. And the hugely successful, fondly remembered, discontinued season one of Flying Blind with Zoe and Bill. I want to take you back to lesson number one. It was devoted to Chardonnay and the basics of tasting.

We originally went through the tasting grid. We will do so today. This is me trying to figure out Zoom. I had never used Zoom prior to 2020. You know, show of hands if you hadn't used Zoom. Didn't know what Zoom was prior to 2020. I had, you know, absolutely no idea what I was in for. And, you know, hopefully I'm more proficient, you know, than I, well, I'm more proficient now than I was then. Although, not much. I had to find ways to mess it up week in and week out. I really, I enjoyed this particular screen grab for the sake of our inaugural lesson because I had yet to master the share screen function and was going analog for the sake of the share screen initially for several episodes.

And then one of our lawyer listeners said, Bill, you know, you can actually just, you know, share images on your monitor. So, thankfully, we went from card stock cutouts to this. So, thankfully, we went from card stock cutouts to sharing the screen. We're older and we're wiser. Now, when 2020 started, I had no T-shirts with my face on them. I thought Tiger King was a cartoon character and not, you know, a reality television star. We were younger then and more innocent for it. But we didn't know half as much about wine and we hadn’t, you know, fully become acquainted. And we hadn’t fully sussed out this notion of wine transmitting a sense of place, which is where we’re going today for the sake of our first lesson.

Without further ado, let's taste some motherfucking wine. Everybody. All right. Zoe, Sarah, I'm sharing the tasting grid. You guys kind of lead us through this first wine, wine number one, Blanc Blanc. But ironically, that was what you guys were going through sight, smell, and taste here first. You know, what strikes you guys about this alleged Blanc No. 1? Yeah, well it's kind of rosy. Yeah. In the glass. Yeah, so somebody was saying it smelled a lot like rose petals, which I totally agree with. Absolutely. And also has kind of this peaches and cream thing going on. Nice. It should be said that all the wines we are tasting today were kind of culled from your favorites over the course of the year, both via sales through the store and your responses to the survey.

So these are all wines that we have tasted and learned about through the course of our many weeks together. So what do you guys get on the on the nose? We talked about rose petals. On the palate, you know, let's assess this wine acidity, you know, dryness, level of alcohol, and tannins. This is the first time I've blind tasted wine since I was with you in the restaurant. This is amazing. Oh, amazing. It's like riding a bicycle. And at home, feel free to, you know, throw out, throw out the responses. Throw out those tasting notes as they arise. You know, this has a little bit of that old lady perfume thing going on for a bit of a rush. But I think it's, you know, remarkably fresh on the nose.

So, you know, we know we're dealing with a wine that, you know, potentially, in spite of coming from white grapes, you know, is picked up some pigment, you know, through the action of, you know, maceration, perhaps on the skin. So, you know, that is a spoiler alert for the sake of this particular offering, number one. Zoe and Sarah, do you guys want to hazard a guess about what you're drinking here? Come on. Because it's a floral, my, like, initial reaction was to go to something like a Vermentino, but I don't get the weight, although it does have a significant amount of body. I think it has that, like, what you guys talked about, that, like, pickled watermelon rind situation, along with all of the, like, lavender and beautiful florals.

It has a bit of salinity to it, as well. Like, that salty. It is really coming through, which I don't think that it would be your vertigeminer. And then, going off of just theoretical things, any other grapes that would have some pigment to it, I don't really think it's Pinot Gris, either, which makes me think it's, like, Moscafilero, and that's for all. Thompson. I'll keep that. Thompson. Thompson seconds the Moscafilero. Whose Moscafilero would this be, pray tell? Hoof and Lore. Hoof and Lore. We have one vote for Hoof and Lore. You're one for one. No! No! That is the Moscafilero, Hoof and Lore. Please, raise your hand at home if you got that one. Good on you.

I hope, you know, that through the course of these lessons, one of the things that, you know, you have learned is that, you know, in wine, as in life, you know, there are many shades of gray. This is Moscafilero on the vine. It is often considered a white grape. But in nature, you know, there, you know, are no, you know, you know, real, you know, kind of hard and fast, you know, rules about, you know, what is, you know, purely red or white when it comes to grape. You know, there are all sorts of, you know, shades of, you know, ruddy colored pink and, you know, rose and, you know, even on individual bunches, you know, multiple, you know, kind of levels of, you know, kind of red and purple.

On individual grapes. And, you know, Pinot Gris, Moscafilero, most famously, you know, are varietals that, if they're allowed anytime on the skins, give you wines that, you know, aren't quite purely white. And what you get there is this wonderful aromatic dimension that this wine has, which I think people really loved. And additionally, you know, you get a little weight that you wouldn't have otherwise. And I will say, you know, one of my favorite things about, you know, this particular offering is that, you know, in spite of you know, that weight and those aromatics, it is remarkably fresh. So, for the sake of this first wine, we were revisiting lesson number 20. And that centered around the Island of Pelops. So, this is an offering from the Peloponnese, from Montenegro.

It is Moscafilero on the skins for several hours, which accounts for the color. And it is styled by the younger winemakers as a wine inspired by their grandfathers. So, you know, it's a wine that's been around for a long, long time. So, you know, you know, traditionally in previous generations, you know, they would have given the wine a little time on the skins to add added depth and intrigue and aromatics. And, you know, that's something that Hoeffler has adopted. Our true piece is the winery Hoeffler, the name brand, inspired by, you know, Greek mythological figures, which appeals to us for obvious reasons, given that Anacreon, you know, stole the show to kick things off. So, tasting number one, you guys, for one for one, nicely, nicely done.

There's a rigidly enforced honor code at the Tail of Goat Wine School, for those of you participating from home. On to wine number two in Selection Blanc. So, wine number two, more conventionally, white, certainly, it should be said. Thoughts about this one, kids at home? Thank you very much. I get almost nothing on the nose. We're resetting, already resetting the nose, Thompson. Already reset. Zoe, coming, this is, this is hard, coming off of the Moscow Theatre, I think, you know, we're going from a wine that screams to a wine that whispers a bit. So, what you got on the nose, if anything, for the sake of this one? There's like a little bit of a white lifesaver thing going on. The pineapple lifesaver? Is that the pineapple? Yeah. Okay.

That's a good, that's a good lifesaver. It actually made Mare's family always gave out the holiday lifesaver pack, which I'm looking forward to in a few days time. I think that, I think the white, the white lifesaver, I think the white and then the, the cherry lifesaver are the best ones. Zoe, what else you got? This is the point where, again, I, I would try to rely on theoretical knowledge, but all I'm saying is, like, lemon balm and, like, river rocks. River rocks, cool. Which basically means it smells like not that much of anything. River rocks are a great tasting note to throw out when the wine doesn't really smell like anything. So, you're struggling, you know, to figure out.

So, let's make some, as Sarah's cat makes a guest appearance, let's make some, you know, broad stroke generalizations about what we're dealing with in terms of old or new world. Does this, you know, initially on the nose, do you guys feel like something from the old or new world, you know? Old. Old. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, these wines that whisper classically tend to be from, you know, the continent more, more often than not. And, you know, inspired by a set of traditions that values nuance and, you know, a certain level of kind of food friendliness in wine as opposed to more bombast. All right, let's drink it.

Does the palate confirm the nose for you guys? Ah. You've got nods? Yes, so far you get river rocks on the palate, Zoe. It's all about the minerality here. Here, minerality, layered that layered in apply as a tasty note. So, you know, you got an ubiquitously mineral driven old world white. I think, you know, a lot of you at home who are actually, you know, treating this as a blind tasting might wonder: You know, is not necessarily what you're going yourself; you know how the hell do you go from you know this ubiquitously you know crisp you know kind of um clean uh wine to a discernible guess about you know what we're dealing with? And this is where you read the tea leaves and you know you try to parse hairs um to get a sense of what you're dealing with.

And I think you start to rule things out; so, we ruled out you know uh the new world. I think you know we ruled out you know some grapes um that you know a thicker-skinned white varietal or tend to be you know more ripe, opulent uh white varietals. You know leaning into uh white grapes that are you know kind of higher in acid. So, what you know classic old world grapes does that encompass? I mean, I don't think it's a Chardonnay um a call of Chablis which I think it's really smart, but I still don't get that weight. Um, and Chardonnay is a bit of a chameleon, you know. Chardonnay is kind of all things to all people; it can be crisp and flinty, um, you know, smoky, um, and you know intensely chalky, um, like Chablis, um, you know, which you know itself you know, these chalky, uh, famously chalky Kimmeridge soils, uh, Kimmeridge and Devonian soils, um, or you know, Chardonnay can be this, you know, lush, um, you know, uh, dancing hippo, um, of a wine, um, uh, though this doesn't say Chardonnay; why doesn't it say Chardonnay to you? Well, specifically on the Chablis, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know. I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, it just doesn't... um, I don't get the um, I don't get the Chimérine uh soil like I don't, it doesn't taste like the decaying seashore to me um, there's a lot of talk about um, it being like an Anjou oh, oh that you're saying it's not an Anjou blank never mind, I'm trying to read the chat  that is a that is a great guess or a great reveal uh for the for the audience um, this is indeed uh the Anjou Blank um, this is Mary Taylor's wine uh, I think Anjou Blank a surprise hit uh, Mary Taylor's wines in general were a surprise hit um, it should be said that initially uh, we were hoping to have both Pascaline la pettier and mary taylor um on the uh shannon blanc program uh uh little did i know that they had like old like uh new york psalm rappers beef um from back in the back of the day so they like canceled each other out um but i feel good about team mary chenin blanc uh she is a two-time uh you know a guest star on the taylor goat wine school and um i have to say you know i haven't checked the figures on it but this has to be uh you know one of the bottles we sold the most of in the store and i think it's because matter of matter of fact delicious matter of factly delicious um you know For those of you at home wondering, how do you tell this is Shannon Blanc in a blind tasting? Uh, for me, you know one tasting that we didn't touch on um is this wet wool, kind of thing uh that this has in spades, um, uh and you know the smokiness, um, you know kind of like um uh then the French take PFC so like this notion of uh which sometimes Sancerre has as well but uh, you know coupled with that wet wool you know leans more into this kind of um, you know uh kind of zesty, you know preserved lemon direction that takes you into a Shannon Blanc place um and what's additionally kind of cool about this wine is that um, you know it is uh Two reflects two different soil types in the region, so uh, you're dealing with both um, uh, you know, on your block, you don't do more, so chalkier, um, so you're dealing with more like the more, um, you know, uh, like the the more, um, uh, more of the more darkish soils from the Paris Basin and then, uh, more kind of dark just soils from the mossy American, and those two sites come together to give a line that's wonderfully well-balanced, but still easy drinking.

Uh, moving on, why number one, number three, go Zoe, what do you got behind, behind, and behind, Thompson? Are you ready, no, uh, come on, I warned you, I warned you, to break out the amphetamines. Prior to the station recovering, 12 lines damn it um, you know speaks to the the tasting get progressively longer um, you know speaks to the the tasting get progressively longer um, as the wine you know we're gonna have like a uh, it'll be like the the readings you know it'll be like the readings of Joyce on Bloomsday, we'll have all-day tastings in no time um, uh what do you got, wine number three hit me this smells like okay, this is like this brings me back to an old tasting note that I used to bring up that you used to make fun of me for but you know those rubber bouncy Balls and children's great pacing note, um or you get them in uh like for a quarter, um yeah yes those yeah those are awesome, uh that is a, I can smell it actually reminds me of the, I have a different like you remember the little finger puppets you put on like the, yeah it has, I think they use the same plastic, um yeah they're probably all made in China, uh but and so yeah, um mass produced, you know Chinese child toys is the, uh there's the, yeah exactly, um Zoe got beyond the, uh the bouncy balls sweet plastic for sure, um I second Lisa Marie saying petrol, um which is you know with a lot of like pretty florals to it this one's showing well Um, and I think it's a great example of a wine that you know kind of defies expectations a little bit. Um, on the palette, you know, I think you get that like, uh, rubberized, um, you know, kind of plastic thing on the on the bottom of the glass, um, but I think it's a great, uh, nose, but much more honeyed, uh, much more of that like golden graham, um, you know, kick, uh, on, on the back end.

And wine's high acid, but has this lovely weight, um, and it's like kind of sun-kissed fruit component, um, so, uh, you know, and you know, kind of I think it's as broad as it as it is long, um, you know, uh, for the sake of our, our, you know, inquiry, um, and definitely more substantive. Than the orange you belong, we just uh tasted so you know for the vine tasters at home, you know that would you know kind of point us to a warmer region, um you know still dealing with the wine that you know is medium plus in terms of acidity, um but you know from a slightly warmer region than um which is you know famously chili, um uh any guesses as to what you're dealing with here, um uh from the chat, Josh and Rachel say that it's definitely ovum off the grid, which I think is a really solid answer, I do think it's definitely Riesling, um the thing is because of you we've had so many reasons so yes,

and I was worried that I it should be. It should be noted that I intentionally, um, didn't ask, uh, you know the class about their least favorite, uh, episodes, um, because my confidence is fragile at the moment. It's been the end of a long, a long year, we're still waiting, you know, for additional relief from the government. I just, I just couldn't take it; my ego couldn't stand it, you know, um, you know. In a few months' time, you know, we'll uh open the floodgates for all the wine school trolls, um, I got one one brief note about Sherry being the least favorite lesson, but that's okay, Sherry's not for everybody, but um, uh, at any rate, um, uh, I was glad that we didn't get, you know, too many.

Respondents, uh, saying what the is with all the Riesling, uh, more often than not you all, uh, graciously opened yourself up to, uh, the summer thereof, uh, and, uh, you know I'm glad to welcome you to all the experiences, at least a couple of years ago, uh, um, you know again, you need niceness has been very conscientious about the world and about our providers, and why does she marry Sherry and you know she's really interested in taking part in how to disadvantage in matters of health and our students, uh, aren't seeing uh all the world from heaven and I this is up in Florida which is, uh, certainly getting published, uh, and I, I don't know if Sherry Could talk about that as well or with folks, but you know I know that just everyone wants it from Portland, um, you know, but like when Sherry talks up and they're just, uh, themes, uh, I was actually looking for each of these, uh, lessons so Oregon recently is number 13, I was trying to find online if I could get, you know, notes about you know the number one Netflix show in streaming for each week, I thought that would be a fun thing to revisit, but um, that data is more difficult to to come by, uh, than you might imagine, but uh, this was our introduction to concrete eggs John House um at Ovum Wines who participated from his backyard um, does a lot.

Of work in concrete eggs, um, this is a wine aged in concrete eggs, and he said kind of strips away John's, a musician, but he said it kind of strips away uh the treble and amplifies the bass notes on these wines, so this is kind of like the the low rider um, the dub music of uh Rieslings here um, but uh showing really beautifully, fun to revisit I haven't tried this in a while, so um, I'm grateful that uh as many of you um identified it as a favorite um, as you did, and should be said you know um, as long as I've been doing this um, I'm continually uh surprised by what resonates with me and what resonates with me and what resonates with me and what Resonates and, and what doesn't um, and you know I, I really adore and enjoy uh, those those um, you know pleasant uh surprises um, you know less pleasant when you know you're really excited about something and you know nobody else likes it but you know that's never stopped me uh from knowing 14 things on the drinking public before so um moving on, why number four um uh another one um, you know what we call this color? What is this madness? Amber amber yeah I like amber, you know. If you're if you're yeah yeah if you're more profane, you say orange can I get one of those orange wines um but we're not going there saying amber amber is a more a More poetic, uh, word than orange and uh, you know, you all have uh, like, uh, you know, Riesling indulged um, you know, orange orange wine, uh, you all were very excited, uh, about orange wine.

It should be it should be said it was one of our most requested lessons um prior to um, you know, actually, uh, unveiling uh, you know, a full class uh devoted to it. This is definitely an orange wine um uh but which orange wine are we dealing with Sarah Thompson? Any guesses, oh man! Okay, next level nerdery we're blind tasting orange wines. This is this is not on the court's um, you know, traditional tasting method um like grid #cancelthecourt um but uh. you know it should be said uh that you're not going to be tested on this um i'm not going to be tested on for the sake of your advanced or master song test that you should never take uh to begin with but uh what do you got it's a little toasty toasty i've had three glasses of wine already i'm just i'm just here for the ride all right all right hey she's toasted actually i was we did a private tasting uh with a group of um georgetown oncologists um they were as you know hammered and unruly as you might imagine georgetown oncologists to be uh but uh they suggested a real-time blood alcohol graph uh for participants which i thought Would be a huge and amazing innovation, uh, for the sake of our wine school, uh, but that would involve a lot of finger flicking, uh, over the course of the lesson; I don't know that that feels, you know, not very enjoyable, uh, so you've got to guess. I think it's Georgian, uh, it could be Cazatelli, it could be Mitsvane, it could be Mitsvane and Cazatelli.

I went almost exclusively with monovarietal wines for the sake of wanting to maintain the integrity of the tasting exercise; um, Joey, I'm going to put you on the spot; um, which Georgian varietal are you dealing with and what region are you dealing with first? You know, enough about Georgia to tell me. What region, uh, are we are in Kirkatty, yes, yes, um, so uh, I would hope that uh, you all at home know more about Georgia as a country than you ever expected to, otherwise I haven't done uh, my job uh, I'm not really on the payroll but uh, the Georgian government tangentially paid for me to go there a few years ago, so I feel like I have to pay it back um, but Kirkatty is the hot dry arid California of Georgia, albeit you know, on the uh, east you know end of the country as opposed to the west end um, this is made in the traditional Kirkatty style um, aged for six months and then it's been made in the traditional Kirkatty style. Um, aged for six months on the skins in cave-riés which are Sarah Thompson's what, what every are yeah come on let them know these big clay pots, big clay pots, buried in the womb of the earth um yes exactly sure they're massive and ancient fermentation vessels for wine uh Sarah, your final chance what Georgian varietal are we dealing with the sake of this Kirkatty and wine made in big clay pots so I initially said Orgo and then I'm now I'm reading the chat and I'm gonna go with the crowd and go Orgo Svania, you guys are killing it this is the spawning uh this is uh at home and um this is another one like I love this wine um but it was one that i was worried uh about you know kind of uh dropping uh for the sake of tasting just because you know this is orange wine for you know the orange wine drinking crowd you know it is unapologetically orange um in a manner of speaking and i dig that about it but um you know uh the the lesson being never underestimate your your wine school students at home without further ado we're gonna switch them out uh red wine uh red red wine so uh if you're at home um you know uh finish uh your existing glass and we move on now to a flight of uh red wines here um and going in order um of course uh like a new star wars franchise um but uh uh zoe i see you Jumping there, um, Thompson, are you with us? Rogue One, what do you got here? Yeah, I got it. Um, what do you smell? Which one?

Oh, we're resetting again. Uh, for those of you at home, Sarah Thompson is resetting uh her olfactory cavity there. Um, and that's important because um, you know the nose not unlike staring at the sun, you know which is fun from time to time but you know uh, you lose a spot in your vision. And very often, smelling wine, you know, your uh, your receptors uh, your nasal receptors get fatigued uh, you know the same way that your um, your eyes do. Um, and uh, you know smelling a shirt, smelling something neutral um is is one Way to reset them so that's something that you actually see a lot of wine uh folk do at, uh, professional uh tasting with Thompson. What do you got? Raspberries, raspberry, that's a good one!

Um, like a raspberry jam thing! Oh wow, this is opened up quite a bit! Um, this is this uh smells uh very different than it did uh when we initially opened it! Yeah, it's like super jammy um in a fun way um uh darker green grape but you know apparently lighter one um uh you know uh do you get anything other than uh jam situation? Oh, those really bright like really nice sweet plums I guess there's a bit of a sour cherry going on yeah I think it's like More, you know, there's definitely something like uh, you know, ripe and developing about it, but you know, it's tart, I think. There's a condition like a connotation of a tart uh fruit um, on this one, so you know, you may be dealing with you know, a a uh, a warmer region, but you know, a warmer region in the context of you know, a set of grapes that still readily retains um acid uh nicely um, and you know, we're not we're not huge fans of clunky red wines, so you're not going to find that for the take for the sake of this blind tasting, but um, you know, we're dealing with one of those kind of uh, middle of the road um, you know, red varietals a grape that's capable of you know berry fruit ripeness but still um you know bright and drinkable um uh any guesses as to what we're dealing with oh i really like that this is kind of fun um you know i think for all the ripeness on the nose um it should be said it's a wine that you know registers you know um you know pretty uh lightly on the palate you know in terms of the alcohol uh at least you know it's relatively high out you know um higher acid um and lower alcohol so uh again that you know kind of points to um you know kind of a cooler climate zone um but you know slightly warmer sub region um this is testable uh for the sake of you um you know home uh you Know, uh, set and uh court nerds this is testable grape but it's a challenging testable grape, um, it's hard because the tears are slightly stained, but I'm not, yeah, so you know that it's any of the grapes that we usually blind, yeah, you're dealing with a grape that you know has some pigment to it, but doesn't necessarily give massive wines, um, and there are a lot of grapes like that, um, that you know counterintuitively, you know, um, carry a lot of color with them, um, color doesn't have a lot necessarily to do, um, with with body, with alcohol, you can, uh, kind of lower alcohol wines that nonetheless are inky in the glass, uh, any Guesses, uh, from the commentaries or from, uh, my two amazing, uh, legendary co-hosts.

I don't even think it's a sarong so what, I don't think I know let's let's go through what we don't think it is yeah what is it? It could be grenache but I don't know I feel like that's kind of a BS answer okay we'll say what what people are saying in the um chats but I also you know this kind of reminds me of the uh sangiovese that's in the the old school chianti yeah chianti yeah yeah all that like sour cherry yeah yeah a little bit lighter in concentration but it all right so So we're taking just a hint. We're taking it back to lesson number 21, lesson number 21. So without further ado, we're dealing with the Pinot Noir of Eastern Europe, which makes it Kobol's Blau Frankisch, Kobol's Blau Frankisch.

So, you know, Slovenia is one of those, you know, kind of country and lessons that, you know, really pleasantly surprised me. I, you know, we didn't have any illustrious guest stars, but I wholeheartedly enjoyed learning about Slovene wine, and, you know, was hugely impressed at the number of people that came out of the woodwork that either like been to Slovenia, wanted to share their, you know, honeymoon pictures, wanted to share their love of the place, the culture, the people and Slovene wine. And, you know, it's one of those, you know, very wistful, you know, Jesus would be really nice to go there kind of moments. But, you know, as such, we had a lot of fun. I live vicariously through the glass.

This one, you know, it comes from a producer in Podravske, but, you know, a vineyard, you know, in this kind of more southerly region of Slovenia, Poldavska, and a grape in Blau Frankisch that, you know, is, you know, very widely grown and, you know, has a lot of the same qualities of Pinot Noir in terms of acidity and fruit. But, you know, for me, it has this more kind of like savage, you know, kind of you know, meaty, you know, fruits of the forest thing going on, which I really dig. Without further ado, moving on to wine number two. Wine number two. Kick it! Chicas, what do you got? Oh, my God. You were warned. Come on. Oh, this is a nice, like. Oh, it's older. Yeah, very. There's some amber.

How do you know it is older? There's some brown. Browning around the rim. Nice. Browning around the rim. That tells you it's an older wine. Or, alternatively, grape that is susceptible to browning. What do you get on the nose? It's all tertiary. The, you know, fancy way of saying it's an old wine. I'm thinking of, like, crunchy autumn leaves. Jumping to a fall-y pile of a wine. Yeah. Mushroomy. Mushroomy. You get a little bit of. Like, John Wayne, you know, comes up to the bar, asks for a glass of wine, kind of thing. You know, grandpa's leather chair, pipe tobacco. Mm-hmm. Definitely dried florals, dried fruit. But pretty, too, in its own way. Mm-hmm. For me, texturally,

this is really dynamic wine, so we're going from a wine in the Bluff-Romfish that had, a lot of, like, no tendency to speak up to wine that, you know, is discernibly tannic. Put it all together, guys. You can do this. I believe in you. What are we drinking? Nebbiolo. Drinking Nebbiolo. Of course we're drinking Nebbiolo. Come on. You can do better than that. Which Nebbiolo are we drinking?

I think it could be the most handsome. What's his name? Leonardo Azzeglia? Francesco Azzeglia. Leonardo. Leonardo. Beautiful man. very enjoy uh look at him yes yes uh that's that's very evocative too i feel like uh he's like reverse you know uh he's like offering you the uh yeah exactly knowledge um yes exactly um uh this is a bro load is from uh brico fiasco um which is my favorite potential uh italian um uh mc name brico fiasco um it is their original vineyard um it is in castiglione uh paletto which is um kind of like sandwiched in in the it's like transitional zone of varroa between the two different major soil types um both kind of old school and new school in the sense that it sees a very extended maceration 60 days uh but uh some newer oak uh over the course of extended elvage uh showing beautifully just like a blockbuster one um number three what do you got thompson come on you can do this we believe in you i know i'm trying remember you're professional whoo okay god that wine is so good uh that is uh 2013 uh which is a hugely uh you know heralded uh vintage uh in in varroa i think the wine's showing beautifully uh but you know it's a really uh it's a really good one that you know has uh you know some additional aging potential uh as well we tried three crews against uh one another uh for the sake of that lesson number 28 um which remains one of my favorite lessons just you know purely uh for the sake of um you know the wines that we had on offer um i feel like we barely explored um the alto p montesi um offerings uh there um nebbiolo is just you know one of life's great joys um rollo is expensive um but uh you know it is a wine you know worth uh you know it's a wine that's going to be a great success and i think it's going to be a good you know, kind of shilling out a little money for it. What do we got here? It smells a little bit like burnt hair. Burnt hair, nice! The salon, that fixer, yeah. What else? I was gonna say it kind of does smell how I think younger Nabiolo smells. I get some really nice like tart berries. I have a woody aspect to it, a little bit like a little wet soil.

So honestly, I wondered for the sake of tasting whether these wines were too like to feature back to back, but I couldn't, given the public response to these particular offerings, not include them in the tasting. So I think it'd be fun to, you know, kind of for our sake, you know, how would you, you know, qualify, so I think in terms of acidity, structure, tannin, etc., um, you know, whatever grape this is, a Nebbiolo share or something in common, um, you know, but you know what are the differences, um, you know, obviously the I think the last one didn't have any of that 'hair fixer' thing uh going on; this is, you know, a more savory uh kind of wine. The chat is going buck wild for Mount Etna, yeah, oh wow!

The chat is going buck wild for Mount Etna um, that is, I'm glad that you know we were able to utter that line in in 2020 um, and uh, you guys are um, passing uh with uh flying uh, fucking colors; it should be said that uh, this was one of my remain, one of my favorite lessons we've ever done. This is uh, Bonanti's uh wine um, Antonio Bonanti here uh, looking like you know an extra from the fucking, you know, um, Godfather or maybe no I mean like uh, Scarface maybe it looks like an extra from Scarface but total badass Antonio, lovely lovely human being, president of the DOC um, this was our first lesson uh, involving uh, anyone from across the pond um, we had uh, three uh, guests uh, illustrious guests um, in the mix Alicia von corsi um antonio and maria paluzzo um from uh e-custody um and you know italians are lovely people but sicilians in particular are really um amazing and i adore this wine um i adore mount etna um and you know i i love the fact that you know it's a wine that you know smells and tastes discernibly volcanic you know it's not a huge uh leap of imagination to go from you know burnt hair to um you know burnt citizens of pompeii hashtag too soon um all right so um moving moving on uh it was not that's vesuvius it's vesuvius i'm sorry burnt citizens of catania uh apologies um uh anyway moving moving on hashtag too soon uh um anyway so uh Wine number four, uh, here wine number four, um, notice a distinct difference in color, um, uh, for the sake of uh wine number four versus the previous two wines, um, and you know it's very instructive, uh, for the sake of this exercise and wine tasting, um, I think also a discernible difference in terms of, um, the play of viscosity, play of tears, uh, around the edge of the room, uh, on this one always points us to something that has a little more alcohol, uh, to it, uh, what do you guys get on the nose, charred bell peppers, charred bell peppers, yeah hashtag absolutely, I know what this is here's in the hizzy, uh, all right, uh, are there some pencil shavings.

Pencil shadings great, yeah, great. Um, all, all the above, what else we got? Rambly black fruits a little black pepper too, but all of the pyrazines, a little like um, I'd say, like a eucalyptus freshness to it as well as like that ashiness, I think it kind of it plays both of those parts. This is equally showing really, I've been, I've been impressed with all you guys have good taste, I think is the uh, the moral of the story um, you know uh, your wine continues to you know evolve and surprise me pleasantly um, and otherwise, and um, you know it's always nice to take on someone else's taste and revisit the things that your friends love so um, it's Really fun to taste through these wines that were hugely popular, um, over the course of our almost 40 weeks together.

What are we dealing with here? What great I think it is a blend. I think it's a blend... uh, we're going to vote for Cap Frunk. Um, it is in fact related to Cap Frunk; it's sort of a blend... um, well, can you say my thing, but it's mostly sun. Oh, Zoe, what do you think it is? I think it's Aslinas Cabernet Sauvignon, that is a blend, and it does have Petite Barreau in it. It does indeed, Zoe, nicely done. Uh, Cabernet Sauvignon... it felt like a really lovely way to close out, um, you know our exam, um, you know, uh, we are in this, you know. Really, uh, rare moment for the sake of pandemic, uh, that has you know really, you know, stripped away a lot of the, you know, kind of, uh, distractions um, that surround us.

The water uh, that David Foster Wallace you know once talked about in the famous commencement address and you know it's opened our eyes to a lot of the grave inequities that exist um, in all walks of life but particularly in the wine world and um, you know the South African lesson was kind of personally hard because you know I'm me, um, you know I'm a, a goofy white dude, you know, trying to talk about issues of race in a country that's overwhelmingly black, African. um uh but uh makes a shit ton of money from a wine industry that is overwhelmingly um white uh african um and you know how do you enjoy something as trivial wine as as wine you know uh in the midst of all that painful history and i think you know someone like nitsika um points the way forward um you know this is a wine that stands on its own two feet you know uh nitsiki um you know is is you really want not to talk about herself as the first post-apartheid you know black winemaker in south africa and you know just wants to talk about her herself as a winemaker you know she wants the wines to stand you know um you know on their on their own a farm and my favorite thing about her is that, she, you know, the winemaking piece in Stellenbosch, which is a hugely like exclusive bastion of white privilege. The university that she went to was, uh, a black student who did the university, you know, the faculty at Leimeruth, you know, or professors at Leimeruth, which is her first graduate program. She wanted to really, uh, think about her life as an American intellect and also playing in a couple different styles, and so I just wanted to, um, introduce you to y'all.

Unfortunately, she's in the fall. Cheers and that's everything what so I wanted to, um, back her up a little bit. Audit of her story, I don't want to turn out helping you but I really so i i i would love for anyone of y'all to be able to um see if this is uh gotta be pretty obvious and I'm hoping if you want to stay some clients if it's in the midst of a hotel to come see me and you know I hope that's harder than I think Bronx um which is a you know the lucky beneficiaries of it all um so uh brilliant uh all right uh without further ado we have four wines to cover immediately regretting the uh the dishes I hope you it sounds like you all have been you know incredibly impressed with the uh the chat um uh and uh you guys have been you called.

These wines left and right, um, for the sake of the final exam, um, it warms my heart, um, to know that, um, you know, at the very least when tested on South African uh Cabernet Sauvignon and um the uh etna roasters of the world, you're going to rise to the occasion, um, I don't know if you're going to make any money doing that, um, we're certainly not making any money doing it, um, but we're excited to have you all along for the ride, um, all right, so moving on to the, uh, some that will be, um, and again you're indulging my maximalist tendencies, um, and I apologize for the noise length this lesson already, um, uh, and we're gonna you Know, uh, speed through these, um, and you can, you know, enjoy them at home, um, we're gonna go in a weird order, um, and we're gonna honor, um, our good friend, uh, uh, you know, the late Serge Hossein; we're gonna serve his Musar, uh, last so, um, traditionally, this is a Lebanese wine, and Serge Hosseini, um, he served, uh, his uh whites last so whenever he tasted with them, um, I never got the chance to taste it, um, I never got the chance to sadly to taste with Serge, but, um, you would taste, uh, the whites after the reds which sounds odd but, um, uh, Serge, uh, who is the gentleman on the right here, he was fond of saying that his biggest red wines were his whites, uh, Mark.

Uh, the gentleman on the left, um, joined us, um, for our lesson number 24, and, uh, we, uh, raised, um, significant funds, uh, honestly like, um, several thousand dollars, um, through the Flight One USA and Mark was, you know, hugely grateful, um, that, uh, you all, um, contributed, uh, the way you did, um, we're going to start with, uh, a wine that's stunning, um, from, uh, my Wine Crush actually it should be said that, you know, I have a lot of favorite, um, experiences but, um, I have to say that like, um, Melanie Uh Fister, you know, probably one of my favorite, uh, winemakers, full stop, um, the Alsation class, um, you know, for me it's a region that I love, um Obviously, I love Riesling; um, but um, the way she spoke to um her response to the pandemic crisis um, uh, and she did it in French, and it's just, it's an English cognate um, but uh, she spoke to the spirit of resilience um, and this idea that you know you're in a war-torn region in Alsace um, that has endured much over the centuries, but the vine has been you know one of the few constants, and she takes um, you know part um, she finds solace um, in the progression of the seasons uh, and in the work that she does um, and you know I'm ready to give all this up and you know live on the land with it um, uh, but um, at any rate, we're trying a Pinot Gris, Pinot Gris Another one of those ruddy colored grapes, this is aged entirely in stainless.

It is stupidly good. Um, uh, any thoughts uh thompson uh on the Pinot Gris given you never had it before? Sarah Thompson, come on! And I just poured it. Sorry, you're slipping, you're slipping, uh, Joey's typing, you're slipping. Um, it's like crushed flowers and apricots and she's so pretty and it's so delicious and a lot of like apricot and white peach and um, slate and stony steel and resistance. This is Melanie's kind of uh, luscious wine, um, but I love, you know the sense of of focus, purity, in the mix, uh, it's honeyed, um, it's weighty, but it is you. know sublimely balanced and just like um hauntingly long um just just just stupidly good um uh stupidly good um she's a bit of a prodigy she's worked with anybody who's anybody um in alsace um but you would never know she doesn't carry herself that way um and she's kind of off the beaten path she's like at the far northern end of alsace um most of the more lauded vineyards are further to the south um you know uh which is kind of consistent with our program here but she's she's the fucking best um really quickly and and read lisa marie's tasting note because it's so good please kick it honeysuckle winding around ancient rocks In a fairyland orchard, wow! I didn't, uh, I wasn't prepared for Lisa Marie's, uh, fairyland uh reference.

I feel like I should have a graphic for Fairyland, um, you know, imagining myself in Fairyland now, but uh this is definitely the wine I'd want to drink. The second one comes from another uh lovely uh female winemaker, Gavansa, she is uh all the way on the right of your screen, um this is her rosé, um uh and uh we uh had the pleasure of hosting her uh for our Georgia Redux lesson number 27, um uh she makes the wines from red grapes, her sister by makes wine from uh white grapes, um just uh really lovely rosé but one that has Like, bright, brambly, fruited uh component to it, and I think it's a really good wine to drink, um, and I think it's a that, um, you know, is just you know, I think it's super interesting, you know, um, uh, I had, um, actually had a request for a a wine flight based around, um, Harry-style songs, and this one reminds me a little bit of Watermelon, What's the Watermelon Song, Watermelon Something Sugar Watermelon Sugar, um, yeah, yeah, this is like the Watermelon Sugar, uh, of wines, um, and it appeals to me, it's rosé because there's like something gender you know fluid about it, and I think it's about rosé that feels very Harry Styles. So, um, uh, you're drinking a Georgian wine that's like the Harry Styles of wine, which is, you never a bad thing. Um, uh, at any rate, um, uh, I love what she does, as by her sister.

I was on the left of the photo that I unshared, you know this reminds me a little bit of like Chinon uh rosé, so it's a little cat bronchi, um, i think, uh, this is actually not uh raised in Cabernet Sauvignon, so this is uh just pure stainless uh more modern uh winemaking. Capri Sun, uh, which which which Capri Sun packet, Sarah Thompson, that's fair tropical, it was a trap, I thought it was a tropical line, I didn't think there was just a single tropical flavor, it reminds me a little Bit of the party I'm going to Google reminds me a little bit of the um, like Starburst had these rogue flavors that were like the tropical flavors and they had like a strawberry kiwi, um, they were always like lesser than flavors than the original originals, but this is a little bit like the strawberry kiwi.

No Capri Sun had a Tropical Punch, but there is a Strawberry Kiwi Tropical or oh yeah, Kiwi Capri Sun okay okay, well I mean that's the one I'm going all in on, but uh, Tropical Punch, uh, we'll go with it nicely done um, uh, any other thoughts uh about this, why not? I also love um how uh, kind of astute and uh innovative um, the sisters are. uh they're very much rooted um in the traditions of their country georgia is the most in the world but um really like on point their branding their marketing i can love the label of this wine um this actually is a new label um and you see it's actually cabeverie uh there she's kind of like uh draped on the side of um and you know they use social media you know uh i was like talk talk to melanie about this like you know being a winemaker these days you know you're not just a winemaker you know you're a brand ambassador um in a particular way and and you know i think like fluid and you know kind of elegant uh way that i that i think um any Other thoughts about this wine from the commentariat, uh Sarah are you just continuing to research Capri Sun flavors? I really like Heidi's um comment that it has that like white pepper kick to it um as well it definitely has that pizzazz and then the acidity that just um shines right through and carries the palette all the way to the finish is just gorgeous.

I love everything, I'm grateful, I'm grateful that Heidi has recovered from uh her uh Thursday night cocktail tasting, welcome back Heidi, uh we love you. Alright uh moving on, um so I get to try out my Spanish accent so um you know uh this is a bit of a mea culpa. um so i regret that um uh you know uh we did a first uh live event to benefit mama toto and it was fucking awesome you know we're in my first live event and we're in my first live event and we're in my favorite memories of the year um and and thank you to everyone who came out for it um but uh i i gave up a topic that i i thought only worked in person because the wines are relatively arcane but it's something that um now you all have come to embrace and i should have you know shared with the broader audience canary islands um so uh this is a wine from tenerife from pico de paide um it's actually from the val de orta pavo um kind of north and East of uh, the Pico, it's one of the largest mountains actually in the world, from the sea, Florida, up top of it. Um, this is basically like the Beaujolais Nouveau of Canary Island wine; it's a new wine uh for all of you at home, um, and uh, it's like crunchy and you know, savory, and has a little bit of that, like, you know, Etna volcanic um, you know burn vacuum cleaner belt charm, but in this delightfully juicy way that I, I'm, you know, absolutely adoring.

From 100 plus euro vines, nobody makes you know nouveau uh equivalents from 100 plus euro wines. Um, I've been, I've been really impressed with, uh, any, any thoughts from the folks. At home, so I, uh, no everybody wants just to do a um like an after-party class. Everybody wants to have a post-vaccination post-covid in-person party. I'm all for that. We had a lot of wine around, so if you guys just want to hang on then, um, I have nowhere to be, um, uh, I think it's great that Ed and Heather are they thought you were going to troll them with Seth at home and I was like, 'Yeah, I agree.' Oh, in the in this context of wine tasting, yeah, I'm sorry, I didn't think of that guys, uh, that would have been amazing.

Um, it should be said I've done that to staff before, um, I have done that staff before, um, and actually done that various different ways for Staff, so I've thrown in setter home into rosé tasting, I've thrown in yellowtail Chardonnay and a Chardonnay tasting. I've made them taste uh-uh flight of wines, red and rosés, uh, with the color altered um, and uh, what else? I've done is torturous um, uh, if I'm forgetting the biggest thing that you do, which is for every single um foh staff member who comes on you get all of these amazing one-on-one classes with Bill, and uh, tasting them. He will render um alcohol into um all the different structures of wine, which means that he will um, chocolate something and he'll give you some vodka sugar in it, but that also means that you're going To drink some vodka with all of the acid in it and then you're putting what, how much citric acid in per bottle?

It's a lot, I think. The worst, the worst. I did, I forget, was maybe it was Ally actually next door so someone said a wine smelled like witch hazel um so or Ally did Hazel in a wine didn't you all right moving on, moving on, moving on uh this is like me as the uh older brother that I am for her remember that one time that you free-formed and like threw a bunch of vodka in we're moving on, we're moving on um uh final wine here uh 2013 Obi-Day Merwak land Obi-Day Merwak are supposedly um indigenous uh native varietals to Lebanon um. living on the ancient world so it's hard to dispute that claim uh but there are you know uh individuals who say that they are very related to chardonnay and semillon um at any rate um this is a nerdy wine uh hugely oxidative in terms of the the style um at elevation um in uh the becca valley of lebanon um it is you know something to chew over uh it is a wine you know that you know again maybe not your first love um but you know maybe something uh to grow with and and you know i hope too that you know for the sake of these lessons um that you know you have spent enough time with wine that you know it has ceased to be purely um you know a subjective phenomenon and become something that you know evaluate a little more analytically and you know i find often you know the things that you spend time with you know your first love is not your last um you know uh you know you don't uh you know always listen to your first love and you know you don't always listen to k-pop eventually you graduate to bach or something or um maybe it's a terrible analogy but you know uh you move on and i remember my first wine in in wine love was like california meritage blend fucking like turley's in um and you know now i drink you know moussar blanc so um you know what you love at first isn't always You know, uh, what you spend your your life with um, and that's okay case of all um, and I think that says something profound about, you know, the wines or the people um, that you ultimately choose um to make a bigger part of your life as you as you grow older so uh, I'm gonna open up to all the questions but um uh we've taken a long ass time uh and I have one more bonus poem uh for you all here to close things out um, this is a poem that I shared ball drop of uh 2019 into uh 2020 uh it is from uh WS Merwin who actually passed away in 2019 uh and it seemed very fitting uh to uh close out uh this year with it uh so with what stillness at last you peer into the Valley your first sunlight reaching down to touch the tips of a few high leaves that do not stir as though they had not noticed and do not know you at all.

Then, the voice of a dove calls from far away in itself to the hush of the morning so this is the sound of you here and now, whether or not anyone hears it. This is where we have come with our age, our knowledge such as it is, and our hopes such as they are invisible before us, untouched and still possible. And you know my hope for this year is that, in spite of the pain, um, you know that uh it has forced upon us all; in spite of the dislocation it has enforced upon us all, that you know not unlike You know a magical realist novel it hasn't opened up a world of possibilities for us all, and uh, this being uh, you know, first and foremost among them, and uh, I thank you uh for this um, and I thank you for uh continuing uh to join us uh so many weeks on, and uh, I'm gonna toast you all as I customarily do, but there's only one way I could do it: getting very meta; drinking from the motherfucking bottle cheers to you all at home alone together,

oh yeah, I'll wake you up in the morning uh, delightful um, what's the alcohol content um, that is actually so um, I should say that I think that is actually the watermelon, watermelon sugar wines. uh i i i feel like harry styles needs a setter home endorsement deal um so it's a um it should be said that uh sutter home actually initially resulted from a stuck ferment um so it was a happy accident it was like the penicillin of wines it was like you know this mold growing in a wine vat you know could cure someone um i don't know what sutter home cures people up but at any rate um uh so stuck ferment is when uh the uh sugar is not fully fermented in a wine and it stays sweet um so this is a bit like cabinet riesling though um so it's only uh nine and a half percent alcohol um that said so which is to say that you know you should be able to Drink a decent amount of it and not get totally like hungover in the morning, um I have no idea what else is in this wine, um you know it is uh a mass produced um you know kind of uh alcoholic soda, um so you know that you know those adulterants could definitely you know um contribute to one's uh hangover uh you know after the fact, but it does make a delightful Coke event.

Um, uh it should be said, um this setter home so uh cheers, cheers to you all uh whatever you're drinking at home. So if you have any questions uh from the commentary I should be said I had a special request um pertaining to a bit of verse um from our uh our front window so um. in addition to uh two front teeth uh three former hosts and 19 bottles of wine consumed over the course of uh the year we are uh plus one on a beautiful mural um outside of our revelers our uh restaurant um and uh local artist elon parker um contributed that that mural um and uh there's a quote um at the top uh that uh reads uh they uh they thought uh they were uh burying us they didn't know they were planning seats um which has uh kind of uh come uh become you know a bit of a motto for a lot of uh social justice and you know um black lives matter concerns uh but certainly not limited to to black lives matter um you know uh it's been adopted by you know a lot of social justice oriented uh movements um over the course of you know the last decade or so um and uh i actually thought it was a an ancient greek saying and it has kind of the wisdom of the ancients uh to it but it's actually a a newer saying and it derives um from a couplet um from a greek poet um uh he initially dropped it in a uh a work called the body and the wormwood um dinos uh christianopoulos um he was gay and uh as such um was shunned by um a lot of his fellows in the greek literary community and um that was kind of the inspiration uh for this particular line but the original line reads uh what didn't you do To bury me, but you forgot that I was a seat um and that was in 1978. Um the first English translation was in 1995 and it's become a bit of a social justice motto, um and you know we're thrilled to have it on our window to this to this very day and uh big ups uh again to uh Lisa Marie for you know um kind of inspiring uh that deeper dive uh for the sake of our artwork uh what do you got so I what is the underrated wine that you think will become like the next 'it girl' for 2021 oh 20 20 21 it girl what is um the Queen's Gambit of the wine world circa 2021 um I had no fucking idea, so yeah uh if I if I knew that I would be way wealthier than I am um uh and I Feel like there's not a lot of money to be made in the wine, um, you know it, girl game, um, you know I feel like White Claw is, you know, cleaning up at the bank, uh, wine isn't um, wine, it's girl, 20/21. Oh, shit, um, I mean, it's hard to like, is like orange wine, it girls', Georgian wine, and it girl, it's Canary Island wine, and it girl, um, you know who's it girl, are we talking about, is it my it girl, or is it like the general public's it girl, um, you know, uh, uh, I think it's general public it girl.

So what was how about this though, what will you, what what, what do people think like the 20/20, uh, it girl was for the sake of, for the sake of wine, I'd like to say say that I have my finger. On the pulse of that, but you know I don't really trade in wine. Eight girls, um, you know? So, what I feel like is that Sabi B was the new Pinot Grigie, um, uh, you know what? Is the new Pinot Grigie like, uh, maybe I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, maybe? Let's how about like Alberino? I could see Alberino taking off again, although I feel like Alberino had a moment and then like lost a moment.

Um, you need to think about like supply-side things though in terms of people being able to turn out a shit ton of wine to save uh public demand in a particular way. It's not gonna basically, like, I'm trying to think in terms of the Things that I don't regularly drink, um, because usually it's like the the stuff that I don't like that becomes uh or not, not that I don't like, or um, I'm trying to think of like negative space um, maybe Verdejo is a good eight girl wine, you know it's kind of like showy um and Spain, you know is always agreeable in terms of vintages um, actually how about this, I, I think I would say here's a favorable, here's a good eight girl, here's a good eight girl uh the good eight girl is uh, uh not me making wine, people that are not me making wine, so non, non white dude making wine, I hope I hope that is the eight girl um, I hope I hope the eight girl is a girl. Um, and preferably, you know, yeah, yeah, a girl that you know, traditionally, you know, wouldn't get into wine, um, and I will say that like, hopefully platforms like this lower the barriers to entry to people, and you know, I think that whole moment of like, walking into a restaurant, walking to a wine store, walking into a winery, and feeling out of place, you know, feeling like, you know, 'I don't belong in this room', you know, I think like virtually those barriers erode uh, a lot more um, in a really awesome way, and I just hope that you know, in the wine community, people will, you know, acknowledge the fact that a taste is hugely deceptive, and you shouldn't you know hate on anyone for liking what they like i mean that's not to say that you know it's not important to make wine in a way that doesn't you know defile uh you know the soil and the environment for future generations but there are a lot of different ways to make socially responsible wine you know to appeal to different tastes and you know we should be leaning into that not you know um you know kind of like you know prescribing a particular you know set of wines for people to drink and then also too i'd love to see um you know i'd love to see like a community of astute you know wine drinkers evolve that doesn't depend on a certifying regime you know like the court or or it depends on a better certifying regime um you know the wc community is actually really lovely um uh you know but uh you know i think you know this this notion of um you know a few um you know kind of guardians of the trade you know needs to die a quick death and it is but you know it always takes longer than it should for the dinosaurs to collapse c 1600 pennsylvania avenue uh what else we got uh what were the tops um sellers in the wine shop and what surprised you as a top seller in the wine shop that you didn't think was going to be so good uh excellent question bingo um so um i should be said that the uh block broncish was a huge seller in a way that i didn't uh expect um actually john house's wines uh did really well um in a way that i didn't expect um he was he's kind of an interesting interesting personality i love him to death but john is like uh like hugely nerdy and kind of a very straight white male kind of way um not that i don't have those tendencies myself but you know just in a you know um expert on all things uh kind of way that turns some people off um but i think the wines are awesome uh and and they're kind of like loud re-slings um and i didn't think everybody would be into that but people were like hugely into it. I continue to be impressed that John is a very interesting person. I think that, you know, people are willing to like follow me on these flights of fancy, so um, the demand for Canary Island wine, you know, continues to um precede pace.

It'd be really amazing; it should be said that, uh, in uh, the mailer, so it's my hope um to uh distribute a mail tomorrow and we'll have a link to all the wines that are in the tasting today, along with the 10% off uh code hashtag excellent questions, uh, for those of you to uh fulfill, uh, and cross off, you know, those last-minute kind of uh questions, uh, for those of you to uh fulfill. Uh, and cross off you know those last-minute you know kind of uh, you know, wine uh gifts um, but I'm hoping also to send out invite uh for our next lesson featuring Felipe Pato, arguably like the most prominent winemaker uh, we featured uh on um, The Tail Up Goat Wine School um, the honestly, the demand for the Georgian stuff has been really there's been really awesome um, I'm trying to think of other Zoe can you think of other uh, having yourself worked at the wine wine shop for, I should pull numbers for sure, absolutely say what oh all of our Canary Islands wine has there been anything that you didn't like that you were you were like I'm I didn't think I would have to reorder this, but I did. No um, I think we neither of us like really buy anything that we don't want to sell or that we're not excited about. Yeah, this is our line that like aren't our favorites, but um, but certainly like not bad. And you think that you and I both come from like Sarah as well? I could point out that there's a lot of wine that we don't want to sell or that we don't want to sell or that we you know if there's a like the Zorzal Malbec for example, like I mean I love that one but like that's an amazing so um and it's been a real gift for me as a wine nerd to have the excuse to take on these kind of different Perspectives, and you know I was a Latin American history major, but um, I just have a really tenuous relationship with Latin American wine, um, and now because it's like really usually fascinating history coming from the old world to the new, um, that involves you know Argentine luminaries like Diego Sabriento that I spent the bulk of my um, uh not degree generating undergraduate days, um, you know learning about, and um, it was super cool to you know discover those new and honestly to like realize that um, there are um, all these uh really amazing you know thoughtful younger producers um, making uh, really you know elegant wine in.

places not commonly associated with it uh thompson uh for you to take there any any wines that you were surprised um you know kind of uh took on a like their own physique sales oh gosh i don't know it's been since what august oh come on i don't know i don't think so but people in the chat are talking about lambrusco a lot oh yeah so uh i had this whole so i had this whole idea of inviting back like uh uh old guest stars for the sake of this lesson and and thankfully i did away with it because um my sense of time is terrible um i'm sure that will come as a surprise to no one um i was building out the the the flights um and our very own ali thorburn who's the uh wine guru at tailed goat i was talking about bill's plan for something and she said isn't that an oxymoron um uh ali was in a particularly salty mood it should be said and she's going to uh hawaii to uh you know bro to cleanse some of the salt but it has been a long year i'm good on her and we we love we love her for the salt um i didn't like we don't it should be said we don't hire sycophants and uh like one of like i i you know i don't i want to be challenged uh by the people i work with i don't i don't want it to be um you know kind of parroted uh at any rate um uh i don't know where the hell i was going with that sarah uh yeah I'm going to say I hired Zoe, I totally lost that train of thought.

These faulty people who I know I hired you both because I'm a glutton for punishment, clearly. But, that that said, because you've now brought up Ali, people would very much like to see Ali in these chats in the new year. Ali's working guys, at least Ali's Ali's uh making that on Sunday nights. People want to see Ali. I know, I know, I know uh we would we would we would like to see you all uh but uh you know back switching back to uh you know RC Malbec, you know it it's fun to have you know this like bigger universe of wines to play with and you know take on perspectives that you wouldn't. take on otherwise and find a great argentine malbec and it's reinforced my notion that you know there are you know there's no region you can totally write off you know you can't say you know you can't make good wine in insert place heat or you know even if they're not currently doing it you know a lot of places just need time um and you know even if you know there's a lot of shitty wine from a place you know there's always you know some hipster teenager making you know and doing something cool you know there's always an exception to the world and and i think you know it's really important uh to to remember that you know uh when You're drinking wine, uh, do you know, embrace the mystery of it all and prepare to be surprised, uh, and you know, really pleasant, you know, kinds of, kinds of ways. Another thing I mentioned so, uh, uh, I had, multiple requests, um, for, uh, a compilation of poems, uh, from our lessons, uh, and that was actually something I was really excited to do, um, and then, uh, the clock struck, uh, like one o'clock today, and uh, uh, thanks again, time management, um, I realized that I was gonna happen but it will happen uh by tomorrow, um, uh, if you scan the card, and big ups to Matthew Ramsey for designing our special tail-up goat holiday greeting, but if you scan This currently, uh, you'll see a link to the uh a new year poem uh that I read to to close things out today, uh, but if you scan it at some point tomorrow, uh, you'll see a link to all the poems I'm very excited, very exciting and I'll distribute that as a a file through the magic of Dropbox.

Um, it's crazy to me that I'm as fluent with all these um cloud sharing platforms as I am uh Zoey. What else you got? What are you going to be drinking for New Year's Eve? I haven't thought, Zoey. I haven't taught that far; we're taking it day by day, um, at the Jensen broadbac, uh, Jensen Cybert, um, Tyler, uh, households, um, so, um, New Year's Eve, uh, I don't. I'll say that my favorite New Year's Eve was so, you know, as someone in the service industry I don't expect to like really have any years, you know, you just work on New Year's, it's fine, but it's not something that you like to deify. Um, my favorite New Year's Eve was uh, my wife and I before the restaurant opened, uh, I actually had the night off and cooked this like lamb ragu in the slow cooker, it was awesome, drank uh, I think like Prosecco or something um, uh, but you know, fell asleep watching Pitbull's Rocking New Year, um, and then woke up just in time to see Pitbull drop the ball, and nobody drops a ball like Pitbull, um, uh, but yeah it's like one Of my favorite New Year's memories, like, uh, you know, falling asleep looking up, um, but this New Year's, I don't know, I've been leaning to champagne lately, uh, since we did, uh, the champagne class, it's an expensive habit, but you know, it's nice to be able to buy things at, um, wholesale, and I, you know, I'm still in this like, um, kind of post-apocalyptic Mad Max what does it all mean?

I might as well drink my feelings, uh, place, um, so, um, I feel like Mad Max would like champagne if he had access to it, um, so, uh, I'll probably drink champagne, it's cliché, but it's a worthwhile one, um, and you know, additionally is one of my favorite lessons, uh, only because Of all the um, you know, circumstances surrounding it and because I was hugely worried that I like totally fucked things up for the world, uh, by calling shots before, uh, the election for the sake of for the lesson, not that you know um my nearest proclaiming of champagne is a lesson, can you know influence electoral outcomes? But you know there's just like quantum physics, you know, butterfly wing flapping thing that happens occasionally and you know you try not to tempt fate especially when it comes to orange clowns in the White House.

So uh, what else you got? What was your most excellent, excellent question you've received? oh oh um that's actually i do know i do know um so we got a question about um the finger lakes lesson um and we got a question about um the um life cycle of particular grape varieties and uh the sexing of particular grapes so um there's there's some some grape varietals um uh depend um for um they're flowering um on they're they're they're not self-flowering they you know they're like male and female you can get a question about that and and it was like very deep it was like if it was a again just to mention like it was walls it would be like you know the infinite just like footnotes like buried in the footnotes um but it was a great Like, I was thinking, dear God, um, you know, uh, you know this community has grown around me that is asking about, you know, the reproductive lives of great vines, you know, I can hang it up now, I've done, you know, I've done my presentations, I've done my radio trams, um, so um I'm channeling just like at my meet my found this beautiful excellent having like I feel good in this world, um, so that I think that was like the most excellent question, um, but you know they're I think they're they're all they're all excellent questions and and again like when it comes to anything in life like approaching it with the you know joy of a child asking all the questions.

Is what makes life worth living um, what will you be drinking on Inauguration Day? And will turn it on tomorrow, 3 days later. The % transform later this afternoon, my life will be good; is the best I wish to live. I'm sorry. mom and dad actually like uh were were wondering um and you never want to keep mom and dad wondering uh but there will be wine school in the new world so um it should be said um uh there's going to be a wine school winter break um uh sadly there's no j term unless sarah do you want to do a j term for no no sarah will do her own j term with the cats as pupils um but the the uh 2021 uh we're all we're all going to give our livers the stance to recover um although the livers the liver is evil and must be destroyed but um uh at any rate uh uh we're going to take we're going to take a little time off uh after lesson 40 uh but we're going to come back strong on the weekend of inauguration um and uh we're going to go from there honestly i don't know um uh you know what uh shape or form this is is going to take going forward i'm hugely grateful we've been able to do this um and i'm going to take a little time off after lesson 40 and i'm to um you know propagate this whole thing as long as we have i never imagined that uh it would endure as long as it had uh has um um and and you know something that you know can't stop won't stop um but it'll be a little different in 2021 um uh but um you know uh hopefully it'll be different in like a a new and unexpected and embrace the possibilities kind of way uh but yes we'll definitely do something for the biden inauguration um it's going to revolve i can already tell you around his vice president uh biden uh i love him to death um amtrak joe for life um is a teetotaler um and we're going to honor his vice president who is uh not a teetotaler uh she gets her drink on and we love her uh so um yeah we're going to do a california lesson in honor of our girl uh what is the most unusual object that you've used to savor a bottle of wine i none none uh mostly shitty knives from the kitchen i've never gotten broke with it um i i know people do and i was actually contemplating um uh i've actually contemplated uh uh like savoring uh magnum for the sake of this lesson but uh sutter home just felt like the right way to go out um and you can put that on my tombstone sutter home just felt like the right way to go out um but uh um uh i i i i've never i've never explored the space it you guys both raised your hand have you explored the space for the sake of savoring one thousand percent yes what have you what is the Most interesting object to you, I keep it PG.

So, I passed my certified exam and was living in North Carolina working on that vineyard, and I had all of two friends and we went into the basement of this wine shop of a friend who was opening a wine shop there in the middle of nowhere North Carolina. But we didn't have a knife, um, and so there was a very flimsy metal ruler, oh nice, um. It took me about 15 times; oh, you took 15 times, yeah! It took about 15 times; it wasn't working, it wasn't working, and then it finally worked, fascinating! Um, what I was like, I swear this never happens to me; I did it, no, I mean, I did it. Never, never there's Never, never, there's never just give me a couple moments uh yeah I'm really distracted I have a lot of stress uh what else Zoe?

What is the most uh um uh dear friend of mine, she finally got a new phone this year, she was rocking her iPhone 4 until 2020 and so I taught her how to savor a bottle of champagne with her old iPhone 4. Whoa, that's awesome! Did it did it uh injure the i the old iPhone 4 or was iPhone 4 like no um phone totally intact? Uh, R.I.P Steve Jobs would have been so proud of that craftsmanship um and the clean break; it was like one of the best sabrings I've ever seen. From wow, savoring for their first time, that was wow wow someone. paying the ghost of steve jobs if she's like can i just say that wendy wendy is saying that she savored a bottle with a car key on a hike oh that's gangster i i can't even imagine that that's so yeah yeah well yeah good good on you guys uh just you know just keep it safe when you're savoring at home keep it keep it keep it keep it safe keep it safe uh what else you guys are um would you consider doing a class about mead fascinating me i actually find me hugely fascinating it should be said um my dog walker makes me that's a really weird my dog walker makes me this is a weird sentence um it feels like a like a death cab song or something um but uh um mead is mead's fascinating like honey is fascinating mead is ancient i feel like i like uh should like i mean i definitely know that like when i do the mead lesson we're doing a reading from beowulf that just feels right um in the original old english um but uh yeah great you know like they're all all these like like mead sub variants um uh you actually like mead doesn't ferment obviously you have to add like water to mead like uh mead mead scares me like i i feel like i i don't understand you know after all these years of you know drinking wine i i still i'm trying to wrap my head around it i don't want to take on another fermentable um you know and and i feel that way about sake in particular you know and then sake is this weird like double stage fermentation process mead mead's kind of the same way but like mead is is as ain't like even more ancient in its own way than than wine um you know so i think mead could be fun i actually thought about the the one class that i really wanted to do i've done it is cider um fucking love cider um and would love to do a cider class um and you probably will at some point um uh you know just like uh i'm i'm excited to find new and different ways to do all this shit um you know i absolutely adore it um you know it's been Um, you know it's been a grind for the sake of um the the every Sunday scheduling so you know I'd love to find a way that um, you know gives me an occasional uh, you know Sunday at home as much as I love you all um, and you know just make it make it like you know workable for the life of business as opposed to something that you know is more of an emergency uh response but you know um to sustain you know the same community and and you know uh give people a way to um, you know access not only the I mean at the end of the day the the mead the cider the wine is is you know important but you know the the coming together piece is is is more important awesome. Um, I have a really good question that I think should be the last question so any other questions in between can anybody uh dm me right now or put it in the chat we'll just buy time for a few seconds Sarah Thompson do you have any questions we just hang out can you just like unmute everyone if you want to chime in and uh you know and actually I think we're sufficiently deep in that uh you know and actually this is the we are at the latest uh we're going on an hour and 40 on this so if you want to chime in and uh you know and actually I think we're sufficiently deep in.

Mute yourself, I give you that you've been there, yeah I I give you the blessing. yeah yeah um bill what was uh lessons learned in 2020 whether in wine class or not or this would be a popcorn to sarah as well lessons learned jesus um where to start um i i? don't know i um like a it made it. i'm sure it's been surreal for everyone um personally um you know i i felt a huge responsibility to um you know the the staff of our restaurants and um you know the community of people that um we you know provide food and drink and you know a sense of shared ownership over something with you know but that's all balanced with you know all sorts of stuff that happens you're on a personal level so you know how do you balance a business that's all consuming with a life at home and you know how you do that in the best of times and you know how you do that in the midst of this and um you know i i think that for for me like uh hopefully it's it's it's been a lesson learned in terms of writing your own story and you know um embracing unexpected um you know opportunities as they arise and not being afraid to you know lean into the things um you know that that you love in unexpected ways and um you know to to run with it all and you know to to declare that and um you know i i hope that um you know something that i'm able to continue to do and honestly like um i'm you know at this point in my like restaurant life you know as much as i love service you know i'm kind of um you know at a point where i'd rather do this and um you know appear on the floor a couple couple nights a week and um you know make that my my work a day and um i think uh i would hope that you know for for people at home you know the pandemic has a way of stripping things away and um you know making you reconsider you know what is truly important to you you know what you truly love about what you do and you know how do you want to apply that going forward in the best possible way and and you know um you know i i hope to live with that going forward that was that was that was tough that was tough was that my mom or my wife and did the dog did the did bd did the dog invade the chat uh she definitely she definitely wants so actually we joke that the dog is living her best life and she's living her best life and she's living her best life um the dog definitely like wants 2020 to continue um dog is like the 2020 like contrarian um uh in our midst but um no i i do i equally hope too that like um you know the you know i've read as much i'm not it's not an original thought but you know pandemic has accelerated a lot of technological and societal changes that were already in their midst so you know what We're doing now was something that was available to people, but people weren't readily taking advantage of, and, you know, obviously you know we're not going to do it as much because you know virtual happy hours, you know they're I'd rather I'd rather actually be I’d rather be at a fucking bar, you know, but uh, but you know by the same token I I hope that you know we don't you know totally um abandon this and you know I hope you know we are more comfortable you know with engaging one another this way because you know that equally there's magic in it and like I I just i think about like you know the gavances of the world, you know the The 'the' marks the world, the Antonia's the world you know, being able to connect with someone like eight times on this way and having them talk about their wine like you know.

I think about that a lot in the context of um, you know, so we, we live in this, you know, political social environmental moment where things can feel really compromised and fucked up, but by the same token, we have access to this god-like technology that um, you know, allows us to live our lives in ways that you know, we're not going to be able to live our lives in ways that you know, previously unimagined. So um, you know, if we have to deal with the pain of all other shit. we might as well embrace the joy of this amen well said well said um wait what would you be um that's a great question actually uh you should so we we've it should be said we we've used this

icebreaker before so um as a former political organizer uh community organizer i'm a huge believer in the icebreaker love a good icebreaker um love making people feel awkward about it a good icebreaker um one of my favorite holiday icebreakers like favorite holiday movie uh favorite holiday album uh you name it because obviously i have many um but um if i was a grape i mean i'd be riesling um uh you know it's just it's it's just where i land Um, you know it's versatile, it's very white, um, uh, you know it is, uh, a wine that's, you know, not usually alcoholic but, you know, can be, you know, tremendously durable and, you know, even eternal; well, not eternal, nobody's eternal, but, you know, lived for a long time, and, um, it is, it's just kind of multifaceted and expressive of place, and, um, it's also like I like that recently, like, it's really fun, so you can have, like, flirty, you know, um, you have Rieslings that drink like, you know, set her home, um, and then, and, then, you have Rieslings that are just like as every bit as serious and complex as you could want a wine to be and and I love what's not to love about a grape that embraces that duality, Sarah. What was um, what's your varietal? Oh man, I think when we did I was like I felt like I was Shannon Blanc, but that's just because that's my favorite grape varietal. Um, oh so is this like the uh what grape would you want to be versus what you know I can be sweet but I can also be you're beautiful just the way you are, Sarah Thompson.

I can take on age gracefully, yeah or it can taste really, I'm a little woolly come on, so Shannon, Shannon's your answer, yeah I just gave you all my reasons why I thought you were going to follow up with the grapes, you actually are like you, like. I actually i i wanted to be Shannon Blanc, but I'm actually like quite long, I feel like that's true about my personality - I can be sweet and also very dry. I'm not sure if I age gracefully, but like you know, I think Shannon's great, I feel good about Shannon Thompson; I think uh Joey um I think it's like Sarah uh like Sarah, can I feel like I thought you should be Italian though, I don't know, I feel like you should be Italian yeah yeah I mean sure, following you now definitely no no I don't know, I feel like I feel like Zoe's Nebbiolo or something.

Yeah, I feel like you've given Nebbiolo your answer previously for this. She's got structure and power, you know, and very dynamic. Yeah, she's like, you're like the Barbaresco, she's the Barolo. You're like the Gaia. Yeah, definitely. Definitely. Absolutely. 1997 Gaia. What was it? What was it? I'm forgetting. The quote was 'A grown, grown and sexy, grown and grown, grown and sexy.' There you go. I'm learning. Bill. Yes. It's Jill over here. Yes. Just thought you should know. I don't, I don't really think. Zoe is much of a Nebbiolo. She seems much more like an Ionico, kind of Taurasi, kind of big, powerful, juicy, you know. James, thank you for chiming in. I feel like we're entering Sex in the City territory where, I'm more of a Samantha, you know, whatever hybrid.

And so it's like the Nebbiolo Ionico hybrid. Yeah, there's a lot of power there in Zoe. So, you know, no withering violet. James, James. Late of a star turn, there's a cocktail show. James, what grape are you? Welcome back. What grape are you? What grape do you think I am, Bill? No, no, no. Jill Tyler also. What grape are you? Come on. Jill is Vitis vinifera. She is lover of all things. Jill is godlike with body. Yeah. Omnipresent. Omnipotent. Deathly potent. All right. James, you can have a think about that one. And what other questions do we have, Zoe? Oh, man. I'm sorry. I was writing things down. I had a list and I stopped having a list. This is the I stopped having a list bit of the chat. It happens.

Tell us a little bit more about you. A lot of questions of the best ways that we can support tail up goat and revellers our. I feel like there's enough of that branding and. Emails about that. We've read enough missions about that. you guys are You guys are too much. So, I want to say first and foremost 1st I'd like. like um you know i i you know it's important to count your blessings and uh we you know both at revelers and atilco are going to be you know as businesses um are going to be fine you know we have enough you know runway to survive this and um you know remain intact and um you know remain um you know open uh throughout uh this um you know winter into um spring and summer hopefully eventually uh without pandemic um you know i i i don't know i mean i obviously you know you buy shit from us um that's that's the that's the easiest way i um you know that feels you know relatively minor though because um you know you have a whole industry of people that are affected and and we are hugely privileged in terms of the position we occupy um for the sake of the press uh and attention that we have uh received Um, and you know the resources that are available to us as such, um, you know, and ultimately it's it's the um, you know, restaurants that don't have you know the kind of um, you know, spotlight uh, that that that do suffer so honestly I just find myself wanting to support local things in the midst of all this, so you know, go out of your way to shop in an independent bookstore, to you know, support a coffee shop that's not, you know, Starbucks, to you know, buy whatever it is you're buying on a smaller scale um, you know, I I think that's that's really important and and you know, think about you know the um uh, the supply chain, that you know, Brings something to your table, I hope that's another lesson uh for the sake of of you know what we've done.

I think people you know get really worked up about putting food in their body when it comes to you know organic um you know forms of alcohol like agriculture and that's like I feel like like wine gets treated as something they don't consider, you know. I mean I love all these imports but like they cost a lot to get here especially in fucking glass, you know, and and you know drink local. Like, I'm not gonna say that you know um there is a moussar of Maryland, you know. I wish there was that'd be really cool, but um you know we haven't. been making wine for a thousand years in maryland um but you know uh you know find find an underdog to root for locally um and and you know make it make it your own um you know you're not going to necessarily taste wine on the same level uh but you're going to experience something much more profound which is like a wine culture you know that is nascent and becoming and that's always the most interesting you know period of time something that's kind of like stagnant and codified is is harder to break into but you know if you get in the ground on you know anorundal wine um you know you're you're gonna you know you're not gonna be Set for life, um, but, but you're not gonna have access to you're gonna have access to you're gonna have access to you're gonna have access to you're gonna have access to it in a way that you wouldn't if you were just like another, you know, person that wanted to drink Margot, um, so, um, yeah.

I think the the locality of things, the scale of things matters more to me now than than it ever has, um, before. Um, this is a great question from Janice: Is it common for or easy for psalms or wine buyers um to know about which wineries are either unionized or paying their field workers? Oh, that's a and that so, that kind of that might. trump the um uh uh kind of uh sexual life of grapes question as the excellent question uh janice is a great question um i'm sorry excellent question i have to stay on brand um uh so um it's fascinating so like obviously wines don't come to uh the glass um you know the glass um you know the glass um you know the glass on their own they depend on a shit ton of migrant labor in this country um and in europe for that matter um in europe um here it's mostly mexicans um in europe it's mostly romanians and uh polish actually the polish are like a little less really the romanians get their drink on um uh although if you're melanie like sometimes it's locals like melanie her whole it's actually like really cool to hear her say that like it was like older citizens of her village that still speak alsatian um network or artists that's hugely rare um that doesn't happen a lot in the old world i mean it does happen at smaller scales but um usually it's migrant labor even there but it's like migrant labor within the european union uh carl marks fascinating enough is from a winemaking region so carl marks um uh was uh born um in uh i'm telling the green card but uh german wine country um uh trier um which is at kind of like the trier is at the intersection of this the the mussel rivers um and a lot of his understanding of the exploitation of labor um and uh you know um you know the the misapplication of capital came from um you know the life of vineyard workers um you know so uh it is really important not only to think about you know environmental concerns when it comes to wine but think about you know the um you know condition for for laborers uh on on the ground um you know there's and and the shitty thing is that there's not a reasonable set of certifications for that some countries are more um forward thinking than others when it comes to um evaluating like a fuller notion of sustainability Which I love about Austria, so um in Austria they think of sustainability not only in terms of environmental conditions but also in terms of um uh labor conditions, but that's true throughout Europe, that's why Swiss wine costs what it does because it's all Swiss citizens mostly you know doing the harvesting um uh and you know there is a social safety net in the European Union in a way that there isn't here and that fucking matters um in terms of you know the kind of you know security that you have um you know so uh all these global economic forces matter um in terms of what ultimately ends up in your glass um but there aren't convenient like certifications when it comes to that and there fucking should be um and it's definitely something as an industry that we need to think more about um uh and work towards because none of this happens in a vacuum none of the wine you know gets through the last time back and it makes it all the more difficult to um embrace you know those people from walks of life you know different walks of life that have risen from you know somebody that harvests grapes in the field like some of my favorite memories of working on a winery are you know i've worked at you know beamer beamer actually in the finger lakes they have A, they’re all their harvesters um work in a nursery so they’re lucky enough to have a nursery so they can consistently employ um uh you know over a dozen um formerly actually H-1 visa folks um or whatever the relevant H visa is migrant laborers who are now full-time because they can you know pay them throughout the year because they have this extra nursery but they also harvest and being in hard like being in the field with them during harvest awesome because they’re all singing like these goofy ranchero songs um at like top blast um but it’s creepy so they’re like you have to imagine yourself you’re harvesting Riesling.

Grapes, um, you have like all of these, you know, uh, you know Mexican harvesters, like singing goofy ranchero songs, and then occasionally there's this, like, bird cannon that goes off. So, bird cannon is like a so, it's there are a lot of different ways so birds eat your grapes, it's bad. Um, you can apply netting but that's expensive or there's a bird cannon which is like a just like this occasional pop. So, have you ever seen that, like, it's like that scene in Boogie Nights where that like uh kid in underwear, like occasionally throws caps, it was like your vineyard and you have to get used to it. Um, it's a really like surreal. environment but if you're in this if you're in the finger lakes and the sun is setting over seneca lake then you know there's magic uh to it as well um you know fucking like puebla that are you know in western new york harvesting grapes to make beautiful wine like like what is this world that we live in you know this is really fucking weird and awesome by the same token and we should live in the wonder of it but you know understand it and try to understand it and uh not live in ignorance um so uh that was a long way to dance with janice but like there aren't a lot of good certifications for that um uh but there there there should be and it should definitely be something that you think about, and it's another argument for buying small because um, you know if you're working small then you're dealing with people that are forced to develop honest-to-god human relationships with their growers uh, and their pickers um, and there are pickers they're actually employing people to pluck grapes as opposed to you know some weird machine that does it.

That was a really long answer. What else you got? Some other questions um, hey Bill, sorry this is Josh I'm I saw somebody ask earlier what your favorite wine movie was and uh I actually I want to favorite wine movie actually I actually I do love sideways, um, uh, like Paul Giamatti is like the worst caricature of a wine drinker, but they also like, I mean, I, I love you know Alexander Payne, winemaker, the filmmaker, but like they get it right on a lot of things about wine, like I don't think the thing they get wrong is there's no way that the uh who's the it's like Virginia Madsen is that the the there's no way that in a real world she ends up with Paul Giamatti there's like no there's no way that happens in a real world but like a lot of the stuff they overstate you know it feels like a wine movie from a wine lover's perspective um in in a really cool way my favorite movie about Like, restaurant culture is like one of my favorite movies, like Ratatouille, I think they get that right, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, like in terms of like the brigade system and like the relationship of the front of the house, the back of the house, and stuff like that, they nailed that. Um, there's a goofy Keanu Reeves movie with uh wine uh that is like strange, I'm forgetting the name of like A Walk to Remember or some shit like that where like the vineyard burns down but Keanu Reeves isn't prominently involved so I'm all in for anything involving Keanu Reeves and grapes um it should be actually that so um i there was like a period of time where so there were like uh the psalm documentary took took took on and i have this fame not famously but i have a historically um uh problematic relationship with the court of master sommeliers and they were the driver behind that movie um and so people would ask me about they said like oh i said some and uh and i would just like you know die inside and you don't have to talk about it it and you know but i i know i know enough of the guys in that movie speaking tells me about it and you know i always i always like reverted to this stock answer of oh it's not for me but i you know i which the stock answer was very true, it should be said like it's not for me but I hugely respect the people that you know have you know kind of uh committed themselves to um you know that program and and you know have um you know undertaken the tremendous amount of you know effort it takes to to pass that exam which you know shouldn't you know be understated, it's ridiculous, it's like samurai um but um you know by the same token there were sequels and actually uh so Dustin Wilson um who was uh in the first movie uh they released a third which is actually really cool um and Chance Robinson is prominently involved as well As Stephen Spurrier, and sadly Fred Dame has since been cancelled justifiably so because he's a doucher, um, but uh, he's involved, uh, but it's actually really cool, like, and it's available on Netflix, and it's worth it, and it's actually worth watching, so is there I feel like you'd be good at this game; is there a wine movie that you like? Oh, she's also with the um, there's a counterfeiting movie about counterfeiting in um, uh, the Rudy, that's really, the documentary, it's really cool, sour grapes, it's so good, that's the rare wine movie that my wife generally enjoyed; and it gets at this whole notion of like um, this like really awesome. Philosophical consideration: if the wine tastes good enough, does it matter that it's counterfeit?

Like, uh, if the blender is gifted enough to make you think Jefferson's vinegar is actually the original wine, then like, who gives a rat's ass? Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's that, that's a great movie; um, that is a really great movie; um, uh, and like, a really well-done documentary; um, which you know is worth its weight in gold and it's a sale of approval; and I don't need to think about it; I feel like I don't feel like anyone is like actually, nailed it for the sake of winemaking; like, you know why making is it's agriculture, it's like drudgery. And I don't think that there are a lot of people that have liked understood that encapsulated it in in wine form, you know, and it's like, but what's cool about it is like, you do a lot of like, really laborious stuff, and then occasionally you taste something or you make what you want to create, Thompson, you've actually worked on a vineyard and paid to do so.

Uh, do you have a favorite wine movie? No, I'm sorry, no, I'll tell you, actually, my least favorite, least favorite wine movie is the what's the one with the dude from um, who's the amazing voice, uh, the uh, do this, uh, it's like, the um, Judgment of Paris movie, yeah, what is it, it's Called Bottle Shock, it has Alabama so bad so bad, yeah yeah, that that one is really bad. Um, you know, like the same one. There was a lot of love for Bottle Shock in the comments, so like, the amount that Sideways is also factually inaccurate. When I was a little baby song, my mentor um told me to go watch Sideways and write ten things that they say about wine that at that level I knew to be untrue.

And I came back with like, a list of like 15 things that they said, not to mention that they're drinking Merlot at the end of the movie, yeah yeah yeah. So that that's so... You just start from the hub, yeah yeah exactly. So um, there are a few. Zoe makes a great point. So, uh, a, um, so that movie is is built around well, it's a good trope, so there's this idea like, he pooh-poohs Merlot and, um, he lauds Pinot, and it should be said, like that sounds facile and it sounds like trivial, but it drove wine sales, it drove like thousands of acres worth of planting in subsequent years in this like insane way for the sake of market forces, um, and everyone is shitting on Merlot and loving Pinot, but the Château Blanc that he was drinking was predominantly Merlot, um, from the right bank of Bordeaux, um, and, um, in as much as Château Blanc is one of life's great pleasures, um, and in as much as I actually like

it, he drank. it with hamburger that sounds like fucking awesome like i would love nothing more to drink cheval with a hamburger like a good burger that sounds great but you would never drink it out of styrofoam like styrofoam in particular is like you know a paper cup would be better like styrofoam is just like so okay like you if you cared that much you know you would at the very least bring one of those like cut off like wine glasses to to drink it in under the table you would not drink it out of styrofoam like i don't care if you were that desperate you would just bring a glass uh even if it was like a plastic you know like wine like the ones We were using at the lot, you would think you would find a way not to drink it out of Styrofoam like that.

That did bother me about that movie, um but although I mean yeah, I love all the literary references in that movie and I don't want to poo poo bottle shock too much. Like that original story is cool and I've actually been to Montelena, um this is like before I was you know making a living out of wine as I do now and Montelena is gorgeous, it's fucking beautiful. My wines to this day are really great and uh Giga Rich uh Mike Mike is like a hugely talented, you know, winemaker. He has his own label now. Like that story needs to be. told um the the thing i hate about that well it's kind of like a the thing that's goofy about that movie that like uh i love is there's that scene where they're like blind tasting in the bar and they make it this like fucking goopy like that would never never happen um you know but anyway um i guess like maybe it's like maybe it's like i feel like bottle shucks like wine or it's like some porn it's like this weird alternate universe that you know you know sommeliers are hoping to live in but there's yet i feel like there's a there's an opportunity there to make a truly like poetic great you know wine wine movie you know that encapsulates Something of and there are a lot of great parties out there, so um, a lot of the great mayors of Paris, um, you know. So there are, you know, read the book 'Like Wine, Wine and War', you know. There are these amazing, you know, Gaston, he was a mayor of uh, fucking Bouverie, um, survived you know the war like organized a tasting of French wine in you know a Nazi internment camp, uh, how can you not make a movie that's like, 'The Fucking Constantine', Frank came from Ukraine, was a PhD, worked as a janitor, worked his way up, you know. I want to make that a musical um, I've always said that, like, yes we can grow Vinifera, we are growing anyway, but like That like how is this not uh like it should be a thing already, like Angelina Jolie should have made this movie, um you know but no one has optioned the rights yet, but uh I joke about that with my Finger Lakes friends all the time, uh and I'm, I'm amazed that there are still, you know 60 plus people on this Heidi, You're muted, You gotta plug it in, Heidi come on we believe in you, I am so drunk, okay when this fucking shit is over, I have a song that I have been working on for weeks in my head that I'm singing to you when it's over Bill and we're all together, I'm just saying that I'm just saying that I'm just saying that I'm just saying that I'm just saying that now now nice nice something to look forward to that's both horrifying and amazing mostly horrifying mostly horrifying is it in french please tell me it's in french it's in english it's in english and it's like a takeoff on a song that was super popular when i was five years old and i was born in 1962 so none of you have heard this fucking song ever that means it's good though that means it could be like motown-y bingo i hope it's like baby i need your loving got to have all your heard that song this is one you probably haven't heard but you never know but we're gonna get to this fucking pandemic and then i will Sing for everybody when we are all together at Reveler's Hour and I am soberer than I am now, um. You know, I should, I should, I want to double down on the like, uh. You don't need to worry about this thing though, I, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I, you know there's a lot of uncertainty in this moment, but um, you know, not to, you know, I look like a nice guy, but uh, I am, you know, hugely stubborn and um, you know, I would, you know, have these restaurants fried from my gold like cold dead hands, so um, you could not, you know, um, you know kind of like I, I will, I will be here, um, so whether you want me to or not, um, you know, you'll Be here, um, Thompson, you have anything to add, good uh so you said you said you had a was there uh you said you had a list you said you had a final question I keep thinking like you're on the final question but I feel like there's a final countdown. My final question was what were the lessons that you learned in 2020 because I know you're gonna I already answered that, you did a very, very well done, no, no it was that was that was a hard one I thought I again I thought the dog I thought the dog added that question a lot like I think BD is somewhere on the chat like for the cause like uh stepping away and can I add something in we learned from cocktail. Class last Thursday, all these little wine bottles you have, bring them back to Revelers Hour. We didn't we didn't know that the first few flights we got we came out in cocktail class last Thursday so we sent ours back today and uh, you know, bring them all back. Thank you, David. Like, so we felt I felt like initially weird about soliciting um, you know, requests for just like uh asking people to recycle things in pandemic because people got weird about like you know shared services.

All this stuff like class is inert, um, you know it's an amazing vessel, and honestly the more we're learning about um, the current viruses that like it doesn't Really, spread that way, um, you know me speaking, you know, has, you know, the it's just like yeah, it's the respiratory stuff that's that's a big worry, um, so yeah, uh, we'd love to recycle stuff, um, and, um, the it is, you know, kind of horrifying to see all the, um, disposable containers, you know, going out, uh, for the sake of the takeout ward that we're living in now, and we we certainly love to recycle that stuff, and honestly like keep keep more people, um, at work for sake of, uh, rinsing and recycling, uh, all of it. Bill, can I ask a non-wine question?

Yeah, uh, how do you feel about sour beer, which I feel like is moving more into the types of things that Wine is doing these days, Josh did that surprise you? That I love sour beer. I love, but I want to hear you expound on it, Josh. Oh, it's amazing, so uh, my i have a like a great love affair with sour beer um, my like Mary and I, my wife and I are one of our favorite dates is uh right proper um uh uh the the tasting room which are not the tasting of the the restaurant the original brewery um but um I sours are amazing um and like just the whole as a dimension of taste like I think just sour is like much more interesting than hoppy um which is like the place where you know most brewers, most American-like new brewers we're kind of leaning into and it's very wine like too like sour beers are more wine like um in a way that feels very on brand for me um you know but um uh you know that that'd be fun lesson to do equally um beer beer doesn't like i always say that like making beer is kind of like baking whereas you know making wine is kind of like working with a roast or like savory cooking so you know working with a wine is more like ingredient driven whereas like beer making is more like recipe driven it's more like deterministic um what's cool about sour beers is they kind of like they make that notion like really muddy um and like the canteons of the world so like famously like you know you're you have these like really like fabulous um like i mean the dutch words cool shit but like you open the windows and you um invite these sammy east and they work their magic and you end up with like sourdough bread meets beer and you know it's amazing um but it's an acquired taste and but uh no i i adore it um and if you haven't been already um please go to pen druid uh pen druid um is uh a closely guarded secret um it is a bunch of brothers who um were in this weird like um like indie rock like i don't need i forget the name what was the name of their band thompson what's a what's their band they're still in the band they Still, what's the band though?

Uh, I always want to say like, uh, I wanted to make it German, like Rammstein or Kraftwerk or Audubon. I want like, uh, like the big label-like uh, it's a psychedelic rock band, and then yeah, yeah, anyway they're they're fucking awesome. Bill, they built a new tasting room; I don't know if you've been down there recently, it's like basically down the road from the old one, but it's completely outdoors so there's tons of picnic tables, like it's very safe for all things Covid um, so I recommend going down. This is Sperryville for those of you that don't know; Sperry Blacksmiths, yeah, and then go through, yeah. sperryville is this weird place where they don't get cell phone reception either it's like this like corner of the universe that is like off the map in an awesome way um and pendrew it is stupid good and deserves they may so like i always tell the the brothers who do we usually taste with thompson jennings yeah i would tell jennings that like what you're doing is better than it has any business being like you're doing things at like a preposterously world-class level and no one knows and it's criminal but they're they're waiting they're like wedded to this like punk aesthetic where they just don't give a rat's ass um which Is like, awesome. They have a different water source now, too, that's like completely changed the dynamic of their beers. Really, yeah, it's really cool.

Um, and so they're they're stoked about the new, like, iteration of their beers that has happened since they've moved to the new property just around the corner. Um, by the way, their band's name is Pontiac with a K, I knew that with a K, of course, yes, yeah. I also want to drop a line to the awesome, fucking kick-ass women of Denizens because their South Side Sour IPA is delicious; they're technically from Maryland, but they're one block into Maryland because they're both former. lawyers that became brewers here in dc and they found out like where exactly is the best place to put their brewery to just to maximize their business they're amazing i love them so much women owned and local

oh and it looks like sperryville has gotten their cell reception fixed a little bit really i kind of love that about it um all right without further ado uh it's been emotional guys uh i'm gonna close things out um and uh you know i i feel hugely privileged um to uh you know be a part of this community you feel hugely privileged that as many of you um have been able to come um are uh still still online uh listening to us um you know uh chat on uh as we do and um you know i you know am equally um you know honestly i mean like burning the burning rope at both ends to keep businesses open but also knowing that one day i'm gonna be nostalgic um about all of this so um but actually the the um there's a great word in portuguese they say squadade for that this is like pain twinned with happiness so um here's to that uh i love you all cheers alone together.