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This South African beauty is a steal at just $6! Well, that was the sale price. Regardless, the regular price is more like $10 which is still a good deal for a fruity, elegant, and nicely textured wine.
I could see this pairing well with a variety of dishes, and it also was delicious to drink on its own. I encourage you to seek out South African Chenin Blanc. Some wineries use the grape name Steen, however, it seems more of them are reverting back to the French name for the grape on the label. Either way, it's often great stuff at a modest price. Raise a glass!
2005 Merliance Is New Merlot From Collective By HOWARD G. GOLDBERG Published: May 11, 2008
When the Long Island Merlot Alliance was formed by five producers in 2005, the local wine industry debated its value. Since merlot had become established as the Island?s signature red ? today 38 of 43 producers make it ? an organization to promote it and to define quality standards was unnecessary, dissenting producers said.
Undeterred, the alliance ? Pellegrini, Raphael, Sherwood House, Shinn and Wölffer ? strives to make ?Long Island merlot? an internationally recognized brand. It has just released its second collectively composed merlot, the 2005 Merliance. (Its first venture, vintage-dated 2004, was released in 2006.)
The medium-bodied 2005 red ($35) is soft, richly fruity and reminiscent of macerated black and red berries; six months? further bottle aging will heighten its nuances. It?s a pleasing, but not spectacular, wine.
In producing the blend, each member selected two barrels from its cellars that the winemakers believed best represented its individual style as well as Long Island?s terroir, or grape-growing conditions. Calling 2005 an extraordinary vintage, Richard Olsen-Harbich, Raphael?s winemaker, said it was ?the driest growing season on Long Island in almost 60 years.?
He added, ?We had very mature, intense fruit at harvest, which is evident in the dark fruit flavors and ripe tannins found in the wine.?
Read the rest at: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/11/nyregion/nyregionspecial2/11vinesli.html
Reader Dag from Norway (Oslo rep-re-sents!) poses a question about Eiswein:
"May I raise a question after a discussion we had in Luxembourg recently, about icewein.
Must be picked at minus 7 degrees and pressed while still frozen.
But, I was once told that there is also something else happening to the wine stock at minus 7. That some ?elements? are withdrawn from the grape during this freezing process, which also contributes to the divine taste of eiswein. Therefore, real eiswein should/must be made this way ??
Have you heard about this process and which elements are withdrawn ??
Hope you have the answer.
Eager to hear from you.
Best regards from an eiswein lover in Norway."
Well, Dag. Allow me to first refer you to a fun article I wrote a few years ago called, "Ripeness or Ruin." It is my understanding that the divine taste of Eiswein is derived from the fact that the extract is devoid of most, if not all, water (since it's frozen). Thus the extract is fruit-essence goodness (sugars, -ols, etc.), which apparently ferments slower than typical must. Perhaps the combo of less/no water and slower fermentation adds to the otherworldly flavor of Eiswein.
I'd heard about Bern?s Steakhouse from a few people, so when I was in St. Petersburg last week I made it a point to go across the bridge to Tampa and try the place out. Here's the executive summary: If you're a wine enthusiast, you should definitely give the place a try.
"Over the top" is the phrase that kept coming to mind, from the decor (which I've heard described more than once as "19th century New Orleans brothel"), to the management of their food sources, to the 172-page wine list. Bern's boasts an impressive collection of awards from the Wine Spectator, Wine Enthusiast, and other magazines, and it's easy to see why.
The restaurant started in 1954 in one small space in a strip mall. As the steakhouse became more and more successful it took over all the other spaces in the mall, and the original location is now just one of several dining rooms. A second story was also added, as well as a huge kitchen space.
After dinner (I'll get to that in a moment), diners have the option of touring the kitchen and wine cellar, and if you're a wine or food geek you should definitely do that. If you do, you'll see the computerized command center; the humongous charcoal grill that can accommodate up to 200 steaks at once; the areas where they bake their own bread; their onion ring production system; and where they raise the sprouts that they put on their salads (from seeds imported from England). At the top of the stairs to the wine cellar is the wines by the glass station, where one busy bartender pours from a selection of around 150 different wines.
Then it's down into the cellar, which isn't fancy but is nonetheless impressive. There are about 100,000 bottles down there and 8,600 different selections, ranging in price from about $20 to $10,000 and in age from centuries-old vintages to quite recent. Bern's backup inventory, which totals somewhere around 500,000, is stored in three different nearby warehouses.
My two dinner companions had mostly gone along to humor me, so I ended up ordering a Martini (regular Bombay Gin, straight up with olives and three drops of vermouth from the eyedropper our waiter carried) and two reds from the by-the-glass list. I chose a Père Anselme Crozes-Hermitage 1978 ($6.50) and a l?Aventure Optimus 2005 ($16.50) to accompany my aged, one-inch-thick Porterhouse, and both wines, while very different, were quite good. The ?78 was medium-bodied and had plenty of fruit still, but paled in comparison to the Optimus, which was huge, rich and satisfying, and an excellent match for the steak. I spent a good, long time with my nose in the glass, inhaling its wonderful bouquet.
I wish I could say that I was as blown away by the food as I was by the Optimus, but it was just a steak. There wasn't anything wrong with it, but it wasn't exceptional, either; I can make a better one at home. Still, it was a very nice meal, and not outrageously priced ? my steak was $52.48, and came with French onion soup, a salad, baked potato, onion rings and a medley of vegetables raised at Bern's own organic farm. We didn't have dessert, but if we had we would have gone upstairs to the Harry Waugh Room to select from 39 different desserts and who knows how many dessert wines and after-dinner drinks.
Would I go again? You bet I would, and I'd recommend the experience to any wine lover. Just go with the expectation that wine is the star and food is the accompaniment, rather than the other way around.
Small Plates, Perfect Wines, a new cookbook from Andrews McMeel Publishing, featuring mouthwatering recipes and wine pairing tips, is now on bookstore shelves and available to order online.
Meze, tapas, antipasti, antojitos–no matter what you call them, small plates offer big flavor, and this is a style of dining and entertaining that has taken the country by storm.
Searching out those small dishes with big flavors, Wine Country cookbook author Lori Lyn Narlock presents more than 50 recipes by Kendall-Jackson Executive Chef Justin Wangler and the Culinary Team, with assistance from Lou Rex, Jackson Family Wines Director of Special Events. Wine tips are provided by Kendall-Jackson Winemaster Randy Ullom.
The book is divided into chapters on salads, vegetables, meat, seafood, and desserts, with each delicious recipe paired with one or two wines. The wine information is presented in a conversational fashion, and includes the basics of pairing wine with food.
Each recipe has been beautifully captured by photographer Dan Mills, with pages exquisitely produced by graphic designer Jennifer Barry. Small Plates, Perfect Wines is colorful, festive and informational, making it the perfect gift for wine and food lovers, and anyone who loves to entertain.
Marking the first anniversary of the 24 hour drinking licence laws, a 'rescue remedy' called Dink has been released.
It is supposed to mitigate the ill-effects of binge-drinking with ingredients that mop up free radicals produced by the liver when it is processing alcohol. It is also cheap and readily available.
It is being marketed to "people who like to get merry". Presumably because they feel it is unwise to market it to people who like to get smashed out of their skulls every Friday night and throw up partially digested burgers on street corners. I think we know who it is actually aimed at.
I must admit that my first thought was "great idea", sounds so useful. But while I'm no Catholic I do think the pain of hang-overs is justly deserved and should reflect any excess. The sparkle generated by a few drinks with friends too easily degenerates into boorishness and incapacity beyond a certain point. There are very few elegant drunks.
And aren't we supposed to be cutting down binge drinking, as a society? We need a cultural shift that comes collectively - social evolution if you like, of the kind we've seen with smoking, drink driving and wearing seat belts.
Most Friday-nighters, though by no means all, are young people with their whole lives ahead of them and of course there is a natural protective urge to want them to stay healthy. The price that many of them pay for their excesses can be heart-breaking. Blaming them as being responsible for their own actions is ridiculous if the message they absorb is that getting really drunk and doing stupid things is clever and/or funny.
And now we are giving them the tools to avoid hangovers. I like drinking and sometimes I drink more than I should, but I also know that my body hates it when I do. It's a natural defense mechanism to show us our limits and should not be overlooked as a preventative.
If we no longer have any medical consequences we will push our bodies over the limit as a matter of course. But often the real trauma of binge drinking is the wider physical and emotional damage caused by violence, bravado, promiscuity or recklessness . Can we develop a pill for that too?
by Martin Field Pickled eggs ?n Scrumpy I was telling Beery Mag about getting legless on scrumpy (a strongly alcoholic rustic cider) on the morning of a mate?s wedding many years ago. We rode borrowed motor bikes down narrow hedgerowed lanes near Rockwell Green in Taunton, Somerset, and stopped for morning tea at a quaint little tavern that sold cider.
Whilst in Bordeaux I took the time to speak to Thierry Manoncourt at Chateau Figeac to ask him about his life and how things have changed during his stewardship of the estate since the 1940s - he will be ninety in September this year. The interview will be podcast in the near future (in [...]
Ever get one of those annoying scam emails asking you to accept stolen credit card numbers and send your product overseas? Who are these scam artists? Who are their victims? Can they be stopped? Dover Canyon Winery has just published a five-part series of articles called Inside a Wine Scam. The series has resulted in FBI subpoenas for the operators accepting money transfers at a remote location in Oklahoma. In a surprising twist, the 'front man' for the scam may herself be a victim of 'work from home' fraud. Part I: How the Wine Scam Works Part II: The 'John...
Little kids go through a phase where they need to put everything in their mouth. I wonder what it says about me that I'm pretty much stuck there? I really enjoy trying out new wines and sakes, especially those that are well off the beaten path.
So when Beau Timkin, the owner of True Sake in San Francisco handed me this bottle and said "check this out" I couldn't resist. After all, it was the sake equivalent of....well.....(if you'll excuse what may be a somewhat obscure (to you) Japanese animation reference) Howl's Moving Castle.
This sake is:
1. Nigori - an unfiltered sake
2. Junmai Daiginjo -- the highest grade of sake, where the rice kernels have been polished to less than 55% of their original volume.
3. Nama sake -- unpastuerized, designed to be drunk very soon after production, much like Beaujolais
Can you understand my fascination? Even if you've never seen the phantasmagorical animation movie referenced above perhaps you can understand what a strange beast this sake would be.
Many people who enjoy sake even occasionally are familiar with the cloudy nigori sakes, as they are somewhat trendy and likely to be offered in most sushi restaurants that aspire to have anything more than just the standard hot sake on the menu. Nigori sakes are cloudy because minute rice particles (think flour particles) that are normally filtered out of the sake are left in. These bits of starch both make the sake milky white, as well as add a slight sweetness to the liquid because they contain sugars.
Most nigori sakes are considered to be somewhat rustic, harkening back to the beginnings of sake when, in fact, all sake was nigori sake, since no one bothered to (or had the technology to) filter it in the early days of sake brewing. Consequently nigori sakes do not tend to be premium sakes, which is to say that they are most often made from rice that has not been polished to the level required for premium sake.
So to see a Junmai Daiginjo nigori sake is quite unusual, both because it means that the brewer has gone to quite an expense to deliberately produce such a sake, and that the brewer is confident that such a sake merits such treatment, as the rice sediments that are left in nigori sake tend, on the whole, to mask some of the more delicate flavors and aromas that a junmai daiginjo sake has been made to possess.
Nama sake or namazake is the sake world's equivalent of Beaujolais Nouveau, or perhaps more accurately, fresh raw milk, which is unfortunately illegal in the US. Unpastuerized by heat, namazake has a different character that is cherished by die-hard sake fans as more rustic and "authentic" than commercial releases that go through the pasteurization and stabilization process.
And sparkling sake? Well, what can I say. Sparkling sake is just a oddball phenomenon. It has been made here and there by various producers over the last decade, but not with any regularity, nor with any real commercial strategy. It is perhaps best characterized as one big experiment.
If there is any brewery that isn't afraid of experimenting, it's the Tsuki no Katsura brewery in the Fushimi district of Kyoto in western Japan. One of the oldest and most regal of breweries in the area, it is single-handedly responsible for the fact that nigori sake even exists today as a commercial product.
As I mentioned, originally all sake was effectively nigori, as it went unfiltered. But sometime before the 19th century, many makers began to press their sake through mesh bags to filter out the sediment. When the "rules" for how to make sake were written in the 1800's and it became regulated by the government, filtering (or more accurately, pressing, as there is most often a final filtration after pressing) became part of the required regimen, and nigori sake effectively became illegal. One of the primary reasons for this was that the filtering process was when the government levied its taxes on sake makers. For perhaps understandable reasons, the government wasn't too keen on the idea of skipping that step for aesthetic reasons.
But nigori sake wasn't forgotten, and after decades of tireless lobbying, Tsuki no Katsura managed to convince the government to allow them to make nigori sake. How did they manage to get around at least two hundred years of precedent for pressing sake through a filter to remove solids? Well, in the end they didn't. They were still forced to filter their sake, but they convinced the government to let them use a filter that had holes in it about the size of golf balls. Apparently it took a couple of years of changing their production process so the government ministry that oversees sake brewing would approve, but eventually they did, paving the way for all modern nigori sake.
Today, Tsuki no Katsura is one of the largest producers of nigori sake in Japan, and is apparently breaking new ground by moving into the sparkling sake world as well. They also produce a range of standard sakes which are rumored to be decent as well.
Full disclosure: I received this sake as a press sample.
Tasting Notes: Cloudy white to the point of being chunky, with a medium-strong effervescence, this sake has a yeasty nose with scents of bubblegum and malted milk. In the mouth it has a thick presence on the palate and about as much carbonation as some soft drinks. The flavors are cool and rainy, with a distinct flavor of wet paper, a light floral element, and a finish that is beer like with hints of yeast. I'm not sure if my sense of the beer-like flavor was influenced by the carbonation or not. Overall this is not a sake that does a lot for me, but it was a fascinating drinking experience and one worth trying just on principle, especially for those who are interested in sake.
Food Pairing: Nigori sakes normally reward pairings with slightly more substantial foods than their lighter, more delicate filtered brethren. I'm not confident about it, but I might try pairing this sake with tonkatsu, the traditional breaded and fried Japanese pork cutlet.
Overall Score: 8/8.5
How Much?: $20 for 300ml bottle
This sake is not available for sale on the internet. You can give Beau a call if you're interested: 415.355.9555
Tasted by TashNYC. Jen had this and reported it was ok but would benefit from a year of bottle age, to put on some weight. I didn't have the wine. Other year's vintages have been very good. At Bob Tarjan's 60th birthday party in Princeton, NJ (88 pts.) - Tasted 5/9/2008. [FIND IT!]
Latest specials at 1stChoice and Dan Murphy, initial prices on Penfolds St henri 2004 and more prices on Petaluma Coonawarra 2005.
[07/23/2006, 05:23]
An Argentine glacier moves back There is in danger the productive region that Argentina and Chile share
A glacier of Argentina, the Upsala, in the southern province of Santa Cruz, moved back almost 13,5 kilometres between 1928 and last year, according to analysis of organizations that study the environment. In 20 years there would be serious problems for the production.
For graficar the process of deterioration of the mass of ice, a photo took from the same place of the one that was taken an image of the glacier in 1928. To simple sight is observed that most of the ice already is not.
The scientists who study the phenomenon of the melting it attribute to the increase of the temperature average of the planet, due to the use of fossil fuels as the petrol and other derivatives of the petrol.
The organizations environmentalists claim Argentina and Chile that political decisions take, since the melting does not affect only the Upsala, but all the big glaciers of the south of the continent.
Also they demand that countries like The United States and Russia, they sign and put into practice Kyoto's Protocol, which almost 120 countries resolved in 1997 to reduce the emission of the gases that raise the temperature of the planet.
These organizations that study the environment demonstrated besides the fact that in some zones of the mountain chain of the Andes, in the frontier zone between Chile and Argentina, also the volume of the glaciers is diminishing. According to experts of the United Nations, if measurements are not taken to reduce the global warming, the glaciers will disappear in 20 years, which will provoke big problems for the productive activities.
Source: Simbolo. Net (# 52) Buenos Aires - Argentina
It's official. Millennials are a major force in wine. Why we needed a study to tell us this, I'm not sure. We millennials are hip, sophisticated and reliably swayed by marketing. Sigh. At least we have the good sense to like wine.
Quotable: "Connoisseur, n. A specialist who knows everything about something and nothing about anything else." - Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary
Caberiffic: Delectus 2001 Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon Stanton Vineyard Oakville ($50). Tobacco, mushroom, black cherry, plum. Decant, my friends, decant.
Splurge worthy: Philip Togni Vineyard 2003 Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon (online prices vary widely, between $80 and $150). Blackberry, dusty chocolate, plum, great acid on the back end.
The Trimbach Cuvee Frederic Emile is one of the world’s great white wines. And at $35, it’s also one of the world’s great white wine bargains.
I had the 2001 recently with a friend and loved it. I tried the 2002 at a tasting last week and found it higher in acidity and not quite as subtle as the 01, so I went out and bought some more of the 01. I’ve never had the top wine from the Alsatian producer, the $120 Clos Ste. Hune (find this wine), but one of my friends who has had it describes the “Freddy” as “more than half the wine at a quarter the price.”
Although I prefer German Riesling on the whole to the Alsatian versions, this Freddy has a German-like precision, alluring aromas of lime zest, lemon grass, wet rocks and a touch of honey, while the palate has excellent richness while remaining dry and a long finish. I’d like to try a version of this wine with some age on it so I’ve stashed away a few bottles for just that purpose. Next time I’ll try it with pan-seared scallops.
The wine is from grand cru vineyards but still seems to have a production size that means that it actually can be found. Search for it now before it is all gone.
Why write about this wine today? Why, it is for Wine Blogging Wednesday #45, with a theme of Old World Riesling that Tim Elliott selected. Surf on over to Tim’s site to see a roundup of which other Rieslings people chose to explore. And thanks for the one day grace period, Tim!
Yes, that was basically the point of this quick weekend post.Over the past week I made the best attempt I could at finding all six single-variety wines that the South African producers released, and have only achieved partial success (3/6).Though not so entirely happy with one of the whites (sadly the only one I could track down), I return to the reds to find a very interesting Shiraz.
A small clarification about how I view value wines though.Obviously, the MAN Shiraz is no Crozes-Hermitages, but that simply isn?t the objective with a value selection recommendation.It doesn?t make it better than say, a Northern Rhône Syrah that usually sells for more.Value selections like this one are unusually interesting for the price point.That shortsighted all-or-nothing approach people have the tendency to apply to so many things in life seems absurdly inappropriate even with wine.I thought about that today when I read the latest post over at The Pour, which somewhat deals with a new book on wine reminiscent of that 20/20 segment from 2005 which relegates the value of art and art criticism (good parallel with wine) to that of upper-brow contempt for the masses.How many certifiable idiots have you overheard in a hotel lobby asking trite questions that more or less resemble ?which one?s the best, Flemish art or Florentine art?The inanity of an exchange like this swiftly reveals the poverty of knowledge, or perhaps more crucial to the matter, lack of genuine appreciation which the participants must have for art.
As someone who seriously studies literature and has a couple of degrees to back that up, I have always cringed at those book club type questions where two writers from completely different perspectives and time periods are given the old CNN Crossfire treatment, ?George Sand or Danielle Steele??On a whole, more people would likely prefer Steele, who no doubt is an accomplished writer; her work could thus be considered better, right?No, no and no.As with artists or writers, let?s please leave wine out of that sort of thing.
At any rate, this Coastal Region Shiraz is all about straightforward flavors and food-accompanying functionality.I thought it a bit complex for the price point, with nice plum, berry, spice and smoke.Balance wasn?t too far off, with medium acidity, high body, medium-high tannin and solid fruit which stood up to the vegetal and spice flavors for three days after opening.An added bonus, considering most sub-$10 reds, was that the oak presence was never overwhelming.I?ll certainly consider the MAN Syrah and Pinotage again when looking for value-priced accompaniments to grilled meats and those ostrich burgers I have come to enjoy recently.
I have been pointing out for years that the hardest thing about judging wine is remaining objective. I have shared my own techniques for eliminating variables, which include always using the same glass, and tasting in the same order. Now Stanford University has published a report that illustrates exactly what i have been trying to stress. It is easier to fool ourselves than we think.
The report demonstrates that telling someone the cost of a wine influences their perception of it. This is very similar to telling someone to not think about a barrel of monkeys. Plant the perception, put people in a position where they defer their own opinions to an expert or a supposed fact, and you can make them believe almost anything. This is exactly why I keep my eyes open for wine quackery.
I recently gave a series of lectures at the International Restaurant (and Nightclub and Hotel) Show in Las Vegas (a hello and thank you to al that attended). The show floor was awash new and wonderful gadgets, ideas and do-das. Not to mention half naked women pouring every kind of booze imaginable.
Among the eye and literal candy there were several vendors demonstrating their "wine enhancement" products. The ones I am going to harp on here are not those that rely on unknown metaphysical forces, if I haven't convinced you yet to ignore those, then you deserve them. No, this time I am going after the devices that help wine to aerate.
I have already debunked the expensive crystal glasses in an earlier blog, but even then I wondered how well known wine personalities could be so enamored of them as to lend their endorsement to the product packaging.
The earlier glasses and the aerating products at the show did indeed make a difference to the wine. A slight difference, and one that is easy duplicated without the cost and mess, by simply swirling the wine in your glass.
So why then do these products continue to sell? Or even more to the point why were the reps at the show so surprised that they couldn't win me over when so many others had been praising their products?
The parable of the Emperor's New Clothes is so important to our society that it has become part of our social consciousness, far outliving Hans Christian Anderson. In the story we are told that only those who are worthy can see the clothes. Since everyone wants to be worthy, they all claim to see the clothes, and even convince themselves of fine details that don't exist.
Tasting wine is an odd pursuit in that each of us to some degree doubts our abilities. We almost always ask others of their impressions, and the response can not help but taint our experience, in the barrel of monkeys tradition.
Hand someone a taste of wine and tell them it is worth a great deal of money, and they will think better of the wine. That is the crux of the Sanford research. Tell them your product has greatly improved the wine and when they do taste that there is a slight difference, they will elevate that difference in their minds in an attempt to be worthy of "seeing the Emperor's clothes."
This is human nature, and it is exactly why people have been selling snake oil since the dawn of time. The moral of my lesson is to trust your own abilities and sense of taste. Stand up for what you taste in wine, and don't worry if no one else ever tastes what you do. It is all subjective, and your opinion is exactly as valuable as mine (I just have a better chance of telling you how it stacks up to other wines of the class or value).
You don't need to run out and buy the latest gizmo to enjoy wine. Just open a few bottles and have fun with the contents therein. Take the money you saved on not buying that gadget and buy a bottle of wine you have never tried before. Good or bad, the education you get from that wine will almost certainly be a better value than the myriad wine enhancers that keep popping up.
The rep who was so dismayed that someone didn't find their product earth shattering left me with this retort: "Why then do so many wineries buy our product? They wouldn't buy something that doesn't work!" It is hard for me, but I will refrain from a lesson in logic and simply point out what my regular readers already know. Not everything that a winery does, or any other human endeavor does, works.
May 31 - June 1, 2008 Stevensville, Maryland Can you think of anything more fun and enjoyable than spending a beautiful sunny day on the sandy shores of the Chesapeake Bay sipping wine? We can't either, so plan to join us at the Inaugural Chesapeake Bay Wine Festival which will be held at Terrapin Nature Park, Stevensville.
This is the weekend following Memorial Day and it should be the perfect weather for enjoing amazing wines from all over the state of Maryland..
The event will feature wines from 14 Maryland Wineries, as well as local cuisine, juried arts & fine crafts and live entertainment.
Tickets $17 per ticket in advance $20 per ticket at the door Must present ID to enter
Designated Drivers and Ages 13-20: $10 per ticket in advance $10 per ticket at the door
Group Rates: $15 per ticket for groups of ten or more (advance only)
OK, I don’t usually answer these things, but since it’s from Uncle Stan (Hieronomous of Appellation Beer), I’ll bite. The premise: Share things about yourself that others may not know by picking four categories and providing four answers per category (the master list). I just took Stan’s categories, because you all probably know way too much [...]
by Martin Field Spirit House A group of us dined at the Spirit House in Yandina, a short drive south of Noosa. A spectacular setting, just like walking into a tropical restaurant in Bali or Thailand; complete with exotic flowers, bamboo, palms, and a central lake dotted with lotus leaves. Standout entrée ($19.50) was the ?Buddha?s Delight? a trio of beautifully presented savoury dishes, described accurately on the menu as ?Potato, pea and spinach samosa with coriander yoghurt; eggplant and banana chili salad with cassava chips; and Son-in-law Egg with sweet, salt and sour sauce. Address: 20 Ninderry Rd, Yandina, Queensland. Phone (07) 5446 8994.
When I read Inertia Beverage’s announcement of a change of CEO it was not only interesting but actually a very wise move by the current CEO and a friend of mine Paul Mabray. I don’t want to get into a long post on my business philosophy but I thought I should post a short commentary as I saw some conversation breaking out that made it seem as if this was a negative thing.
I know many times press releases put alot of spin on a bad situation to make it seem like a good one. I know because part of my role in various marketing jobs had been to do just that and I always put out the story before someone makes a "scoop" and spins it negatively first. Thats just good PR.
But I view Paul’s announcement differently. I’ve been in High-Tech since the 1980’s even before I was in college (when I was working for a software retail company). But more importantly, my view is shaped by something my mentor, Don McKinney, imparted on me when I first moved to Silicon Valley. Basically, if you want your company to really succeed you first have to recognize that the company will require different CEOs and RARELY does the same person have the personality to be all of these.
the "$0 to $10M" CEO - this CEO thrives on the startup situation. Risk taker, entrepreneurial, big-game hunter, and business developer (as well as visionary and marketeer), this CEO is usually one for the founders. The key here is to have a sales person in this role and drive the initial products to be customer-oriented with a saavy product team. This CEO recognizes that getting A+ players on the team is more important then having the right structure or hierarchy.
the "$10M to $100M" CEO - This CEO can take those first few BIG customers and nourish them such that they can be cash cows for the company. At the same time he/she starts to pull in trusted sales and business development folks as well as marketing folks to compliment development and empowers them to do their job. What can happen to a company that may cause it to fail is if CEO #1 thinks he/she is CEO #2 but isn’t really and has trouble either getting help to create new business, create a polished brand, or both because he/she still thinks he/she has all the best ideas and no one else can do it for them. Its the beginning of scaling the company.
the "$100M to $1B" CEO - This CEO recognizes that the company is going to go BIG TIME and needs processes that allow the organization to scale. Oh the dreaded "P" word, but its true. At this point, customer care is still job #1, but setting up the structure to scale operations is becoming more and more important and this CEO needs to allow that to go to a professional A+ COO type. Again, failure can happen here when a CEO doesn’t appreciate what an operationally oriented person’s value is (i.e. can make the organization scale in ways the CEO never dreamed up). This CEO also has to be able to attract the investment levels that typically the founding CEO doesn’t have access to. This is usually when you see a CEO finally step aside but it can be too late.
the "$1B to $10B" CEO - Now your talking about the professional CEO that you see at the top of Cisco, GE, and companies like that. Charismatic and oozing leadership that can rival Bill Clinton in his prime. This CEO still focuses on his top customers but there usually are so many that the top 10 are likely the only he/she gets to visit. This CEO could be very very smart but is really removed from day-to-day so is fed development information and status from a staff of A+ lieutenants but likely has a big company filled almost 50% with B players (inevitable at this size). The hope is that CEO #3 created solid enough processes that the company will thrive and compensate for some incompetence that has inevitably creeped into the the ranks of the company.
Thats the idea in a nutshell. You can move the revenue bands up and down a little but this is generally true. I had this wisdom passed on to me in the early 1990s and I’ve seen it proven out time and time again. What I see in the Inertia announcement is a smart man that wants to see his company do great things. But I say "smart man" because from my conversations with him, he intuitively sensed he wasn’t CEO #2 or #3, checked his ego at the door, and did the right thing. He’s still working in there directing strategy and given his history in the wine business thats probably a good move.
The employees of Inertia should be excited. As a Silicon Valley veteran, I can tell you more often then not that a move like this initiated by the CEO prevented this from happening later in your lives when the Board of Directors forces this decision (and they always do) because the CEO isn’t scaling the company for the big time.
Cycling the Tour de France has been likened to running 20 marathons in 20 days. I?m pretty sure I couldn?t run one marathon in 20 days.
Yet there I was, under the blistering sun of Provence, slowly pedaling my way up one of the most dreaded, soul-crushing climbs of last year?s Tour: Mont Ventoux. What lured me to that beast of a hill was a longing to do more than just watch the Tour de France. I wanted to experience the Tour de France. I yearned to ride the very roads that, just hours later, would be chewed up by Lance Armstrong, Laurent Jalabert and Joseba Beloki. I wanted to white-knuckle it down the same hairpin turns, and be cheered on by the giddy spectators who?d camped out for days, waiting for that colorful tsunami of Spandex to speed by. Basically, I hungered for a taste of what the world?s most grueling sporting event really felt like.
That?s what landed me, my husband and 13 others on a Tour de France cycling trip with Backroads, an adventure travel company. The plan was to follow the la
Tecnorati
I'd heard about 
Small Plates, Perfect Wines, a new cookbook from Andrews McMeel Publishing, featuring mouthwatering recipes and wine pairing tips, is now on bookstore shelves and available to order online.
£5.99 and 
$12.71 
Little kids go through a phase where they need to put everything in their mouth. I wonder what it says about me that I'm pretty much stuck there? I really enjoy trying out new wines and sakes, especially those that are well off the beaten path.
