Posts Written OnMarch 25, 2008

Wine Spectator Likes Finger Lakes Riesling — But is There a Glass Ceiling?

By Lenn Thompson, Founder and Publisher If the Napa Valley is cabernet sauvignon country and Long Island is the land of merlot (and cabernet franc), the Finger Lakes region is definitely the U.S. region where riesling shines brightest. The deep, narrow lakes that give the region its name gather and hold a significant amount of heat in the warm summer season, extending the grape-growing season just long enough to ripen grapes as well as protect vineyards against potentially catastrophic early frosts.       Recently, James Molesworth, on WineSpectator.com rated several Finger Lakes Rieslings well — in the high 80s —…

Cask Night at Deks: March 28th

By Donavan Hall, Beer Columnist It’s happening again: DEKS American Restaurant in Rocky Point is having another cask night. This time there will be an entire firkin (that’s a little more than 10 gallons) of a special edition from the York Brewery in England. York Brewery has been experimenting with different varieties of hops and has been releasing ales that use only a single variety. The advantage of this for the person interested in developing their beer tasting skills is that single hop beers make it possible to focus on the flavor coming from only that one hop. The hop…

WTN: Corey Creek 2006 Chardonnay (North Fork of Long Island)

I have a lot of blogging to do to catch up on everything that we ate and drank last week. But first, we’ll start with one of the recent Bedell Cellars/Corey Creek wines I tasted. We all know that the ‘reserve’ designation doesn’t have any official meaning, but most of the time, on Long Island anyway, it means barrel fermentation and aging. The ‘regular’ bottlings usually mean more steel fermentation and more use of neutral oak. Tasted blindly, I thought that Corey Creek Vineyards’ 2006 Chardonnay ($25) was Corey Creek’s ‘reserve’-style wine (which I’ll be writing about later this week).…