Wine Violence-A Poem by Ben Sherwin

Should a wine jump from the glass
as I've seen in people's notes?
Should it punch you in the nose
or grab you by the throat?

Is it safe to drink a wine
that makes you shake and stammer?
Will it leap out from your Riedel
and hit you like a hammer?

Don't get me wrong dear reader,
I don't want a wine that's silent.
I just wonder why so many notes
are so unbelievably violent!

Truth in Labeling

In one of the most bizarre wine-related publicity stunts I have seen, the BBC reported that winemakers of the Languedoc have called their wine Vin de Merde (loosely translated, crap wine). Remarkably, whereas most wines from that region languish on shelves, apparently, VdM has sold out its initial run. One further irony is that a French magazine once had to defend itself from a libel suit for calling Beaujolais vin de merde.

The Languedoc itself is an interesting region. Created in 1985, one would think that it could have created its own image of itself rather than be forced into the tiered systems of other regions. The niche they seemed to carve out though was largely for crap wines. The quality has increased with some small serious producers, but the region goes underappreciated because of the difficulty of sorting the wheat from the chaff. Further, the best producers don't represent much in the way of value vis-a-vis other up-and-coming regions, such as the Loire. As concisely put by Jamie Goode, "The Languedoc seems to have come of age. No longer is it a sea of cheap wine with just a handful of quality producers. It’s now a slightly smaller sea of cheap wine but with dozens of serious, ambitious producers." Not bad wines, just not that compelling. Anything I'm missing?

First Customer at UWS Shake Shack? Me!

I was dropping my girls off for a playdate at their friends' house, when I noticed an unusual amount of activity at the new Shake Shack on W77th St. It wasn't supposed to open until tomorrow, but I figured I'd check the door. A tall, young man in a black Shake Shack T-shirt and a green apron came to the door and told me they would, in fact, be opening today at 11:00. I checked my watch. I had 15 minutes to drop the kids off and get back to be the first on line. "Let's pick it up, girls!" I said, hustling them across the street against the light. Multi-tasking, I left a message at home for my wife to meet me at the corner of 77th and Columbus. After ditching the kids, I sped back to the shop, hoping that no one had taken my place at the head of the line. I turned the corner with some trepidation and was relieved to find a door without customers in front of it. I was to be the first. For those of you not from NY or following the NY food scene, the opening of Danny Meyer's new burger joint on the Upper West Side was as greatly anticipated as anything I've seen in my dozen or so years living up here. There are few things for which New Yorkers will wait on line. We NYers are always looking for efficiency, shaving valuable seconds off what could be sucks on our time in a finite life. If you want to see frustration to the point of murderous rage, drop a New Yorker in the Heartland and put him behind an old lady writing a check at the local grocery. So, when you see a hundred yard line of people snaking around Gramercy Park, you know it must be somewhere special.

The burger and fries were perfect. The shake was thick and sweet. Here was comfort food at its finest. David Swinghamer, the President of Danny Meyer's Union Sq. Hospitality Group, which included some of our favorite restaurants, came over and congratulated me as I savored a double cheeseburger. I gave him my chit, the first of its kind at the restaurant. I hope that it is one of many. As we left, I wished them luck. The Upper West Side, for so long a foodie pariah, is getting into the game.