Le Flâneur

If you think you like wine watch this brilliant video blog. It’s hosted by the hugely charismatic Gary Vaynerchuk. Vaynerchuk runs a wine store with his father in New Jersey called Wine library and clearly the man knows what he’s talking about. Winelibrary.tv is on a mission to take the stuffiness out of wine appreciation and cultivate a broad repertoire of wine knowledge in its viewers (sorry ‘Vayniacs’, as they are known). It’s fun, dynamic and informative. Who would have thought that watching a guy, on a static camera, trying and then describing wine for twenty minutes would be good entertainment? But it’s surprisingly compelling. There’s a brilliant episode where Gary takes you through how he developed his palette. This basically involves training yourself by gathering together all the flavors that commonly make up the flavour profiles of wines - including rocks, fruit, dirt, vegetable matter, you name it. I’d really like to try this some time. If you taste all the components individually and in succession, your brain builds up a clearer picture of what they are. How often is it you drink a nice wine and you just can’t quite put your finger on what the flavours are? Well this is how you do it apparently.

I really like Vaynerchuck’s boundless enthusiasm and his larger than life persona. Can you imagine a Brit doing the same thing, and referring to the show as ‘The thunder show’? At first glance he could come across a bit of a frat-boy, but you quickly realise he’s a very sophisticated guy. Be warned, this will make you want to consume a lot of wine. Basically, and this is more than a little sad, I wish I could do what he does everyday but I’ve neither the budget nor the expertise. Frustratingly also, when he does pick out a wine that is cheap but highly rated, I don’t seem to able to find a retailer in the UK that will stock it. This is particularly annoying when it’s a French Wine (Gary is a big fan of ‘old world’ wines by the way, is this an east coast thing?) Maybe the French have given up on the British market now, saturated as it is with New World stuff.

We’re not talking about the football here by the way. I can only hope that they appoint a dispassionate foreigner and one or two candidates spring to mind. Have we got enough time to completely rejuvenate English football in time for the next world cup? I doubt it somehow.

This entry was posted by Chris on Thursday, November 22nd, 2007 at 5:06 pm and is filed under film/ televison/ entertainment.