Tag: Champagne

Tasting

Look I’m just going to post about these 11 Champagnes I tasted in August 2018 and forgot about because life is just going to get worse and the more I wait the more inappropriate it’ll get 

Posted on by Josh

Studying Champagne while your life is going through several circumstances for which Champagne is simply Not Acceptable is a weird moment. Or maybe it is acceptable. I haven’t decided yet. All I know is that it’s been a pendulum of anxiety and excitement, and suddenly every day seems simultaneously too slow and too fast.

Zoom presentations on 21 Champagne producers? Yes! All for it, but presenting Gaston Chiquet and telling a funny story about their blanc de blancs and your last birthday in Vancouver before moving to San Francisco while trying to budget finances at the corner of your eye is real. Falling asleep in a bathroom: real.

…actually, there may be a reason for Champagne, but I don’t wanna say what that is yet.… read more

Quaffing

Demière-Ansiot Champagne Blanc de Blancs Grand Cru Brut

Posted on by Josh

I’m not going to pretend that an ill-planned day involving a rideshare vehicle arriving at the same time as an unexpectedly delayed train deserves a bottle of wine, but I’m going to go ahead and say that it does because my standards are low this week. Maybe they usually are?

Part of me wonders whether watching all three seasons of The Great British Baking Show on Netflix counts as doing something productive on my spare time – though a friend unquestionably defeated me in that domain by finishing up the first season at the gym. I’ve convinced myself that kneading dough burns calories though, or maybe I’m just doing it wrong: one particular odd spark of inspiration on a Monday involved my regular two pans of cauliflower pizza followed by seventeen empanadas and twenty-four pandesal buns.… read more

Tasting

16 sparkling wines to drink alone in your room on New Year’s Eve

Posted on by Josh

Girl, do not limit yourself. You can pick any day! New Year’s Eve, New Year’s Day, or fuck: why not March 6th? I support you.

On that note of celebrations, though, I don’t understand why it’s ridiculously vogue to aggressively bluster about how you’re over partying with large crowds and noisy beats. We get it. Can you stop making me feel bad for not fitting into your definition of introvert, for once? I can be the biggest withdrawn human endlessly swaying to Björk and eating baby carrots, but maybe my version of Saturday night Chopin and Netflix occasionally involves enjoying a Hillary Clinton drag impersonator rip off four layered tearaway pantsuits in a row at a bar where I’ve made just the right amount of mistakes over the past few months.… read more

Quaffing · Tasting

The good, the bad, and the bubbly: 9 bottles to bathe in

Posted on by Josh

Okay – not literally, obviously, but I’m waiting for Gwyneth Paltrow’s new beauty regime that involves using a specific wines as exfoliants and face mask ingredients. Chardonnay from Puligny-Montrachet? Fuck that, she would say, with the flick of a finger. Chassagne-Montrachet is where it’s at. Or blanc de blancs Champagne, only from the 1996 vintage. And, of course, cucumber slices. Maybe an avocado.

Anyways, here’s a random collection of bub. I’ve finally tried a legit sparkling Nebbiolo after having joked about it for so long, and then there’s also a birth year bottle of Dom Pérignon, a stunningly electric sparkling British Columbian Riesling, and a collection of other cool and uncool bottles. It’s become suddenly warm in Vancouver, and I broke the summer hiking seal on the last day of March.… read more

Life · Quaffing

On Dim Sum, Champagne, and not drinking

Posted on by Josh

dimsumchampagne2016

To be more specific, my shitty New Year’s Resolution is to only allow myself to drink in the company of other people, having only broken this rule (before its inception) on January 1st: a seemingly un-celebratory bottle of Trebbiano d’Abruzzo. We’re only a month in, and yes – it’s been difficult. Of course, the temptation drifts in front of me like a horse and a carrot: I work in the industry, I’ve returned to work hours that demand refreshment, and I study wine frequently. But it’s always the third day of no alcohol that’s the worst, where a sour mood brews and where my perception of the quiet becomes even quieter. Ugh. I’m also catching up on the latter half of Breaking Bad; someone just opened a bottle of Pol Roger and I’m dying.… read more

Tasting

16 Wines to Pair with your Disappointing New Year’s Resolutions of 2016

Posted on by Josh

Rarely do I scroll through my phone in the morning (still in bed, furthermore) and decide to go to an event on a whim especially after a slightly pixilated night involving absinthe and a plethora of Real Housewives taglines, but making quick decisions was one of my resolutions for the year – malformed somewhere in the summer – prompting a quick change and a leap out of the door. Were we supposed to RSVP? Yes, says my phone. Whatever.

I remember attending the Annual Champagne and Sparkling Wine Tasting at Marquis Wine Cellars last year: it was a last-minute invite by text after the first Guild of Sommeliers blind tasting seminar held in Vancouver. I remember forgetting my wallet, so I had to borrow money from a friend to donate to the Big Sisters of BC Lower Mainland, the charity who the event supports. … read more

Life · Quaffing · Tasting · Travel

Pain in Champagne

Posted on by Josh

When your only clean shirt is that floral one you bought in Paris, but everyone in this city dresses in understated colours, and then for some reason your ankle is busted in the morning so your swag level dips into the negative as you hobble past some college students who stare at you. I suppose life was finally punishing me for being so seemingly masturbatory on social media despite my lack of #blessed, and I thought sucking it up and drinking a couple of pints of beer in quick succession would numb the pain. But after dinner, we had to cab home not without me drawing more attention by hopping on one foot out of the fucking restaurant, though luckily Theran ran out and bought Champagne, because he is a fucking god.… read more

Life · Quaffing · Travel

Josh Likes Paris

Posted on by Josh

I’ve unapologetically become my parents when it comes to travelling, which primarily means that I like to arrive at airports hours and hours before I realistically need to. Combine that with what Erin and I decided to drink the night prior, which was all of Cava, fresh hop beer, and bourbon. Why?! But the morning turned out fine, and we had shitty mimosas and beer at the airport to satisfy the unending ghosts of the night prior. The short layover in Montreal slowly eased us into our French-speaking modes, followed by a decent 7-hour flight to Paris. I sheepishly told the flight attendant that I would like the chicken option for dinner, which really just means I muttered “poulet”.

I don’t remember what in-flight movie I saw, but after watching the trailer, I realized this might not be the time to finally watch Taken.… read more

Tasting

Josh tastes 118 wines at Top Drop

Posted on by Josh

If there was one unforgettable takeaway uttered by a wine god during this year’s Wine Bloggers Conference, it was the keynote speaker Karen MacNeil (author of the Wine Bible) who opined – and I’m paraphrasing, here – that people should pay more attention to tasting the wines during such events. Of course, I was thrilled, because that gave me even more validation to ignore people. Ha! Key advice when the militant goal is to taste every wine during a well-curated tasting, but it’s harder than it sounds because I guess I like to wave and flail at people.

A regretful ode to the few tables I did not get to visit: Anthonij Rupert, Badia a Coltibuono, Elio Altare, Giusti, Latta, Montenidoli, Orofino, Scribe, Spottswoode Estate, and that miscellaneous Australia Table.… read more

Life · Travel

JOSH IS ALONE IN NEW YORK CITY: Day 1

Posted on by Josh

So this year, the Wine Bloggers Conference is held in New York, and a small group of us decide to spend some time in NYC as a pre-pre-conference excursion before heading to the Finger Lakes. But it was only literally just a couple of days before our flight to New York that I found out my airplane buddy Donita could no longer go due to a health issue, so besides the couple of Vancouver friends I would meet up with later, I came to the realization that I was going to be mostly alone in a city I recently denounced as being crowded and scary. THIS IS IT, YOU GUYS. GOD IS TESTING ME.

I was late to the interview to my current job because I couldn’t figure out how our own buses work and I’ve lived in Vancouver since I was born.… read more