Valentine's day is the perfect time of year to show that special man or women in your life that you really love them and cherish their presence in your world. This year I plan on surprising my wife with a great bottle of Champagne and some beautiful flowers.

For a long time I was apprehensive about buying flowers for my loved one's because I figured that they would just wilt away and die. Perhaps it's because of the many relationships I have had in the past where I can remember buying those beautiful bouquets for girlfriends only to later find out that they didn't mean much to them.

Recently I have changed my mind about flowers and have realized that although they do eventually die, that their presence while alive is what makes them worth ever living moment. In fact, flowers draw beautiful parallels with humans in that we can only enjoy them for a short moment in time and then everything eventually turns to dust. Why not celebrate our living moments with the beautiful and precious things that surround us in this world; things that can make us feel closer to divinity and earth's purity, things that remind us of the fragility of life.

While searching through the many online websites that deal with flowers and delivery, I was really impressed with the beautiful bouquets and arrangements that 1800Flowers has to offer. Their selection is really quite amazing and they have just about everything that one could ask for when picking out the perfect Valentine's gift.

Cheers,

-Thomas

I have often wondered what it would take to become a rock star winemaker like all those Napa Valley celebrity-style winemaker's .... you know the Heidi Barret's and Helen Turley's of the wine world.

Well, when searching out the best viticulture and enology programs in the world, one immediately thinks about the program at the University of California Davis. Many of today's top American winemakers are graduates of the program at UC Davis, and although it's not entirely mandatory to have a degree in order to become the next great thing in the wine world, it's not a bad idea to consider learning from the best.

The following is a link to the general admissions overview page where you can get all the information you need in order to decide if you can and still want to become Napa's next great winemaker!

UC DAVIS ADMISSIONS

It was recently reported that in last weeks state dinner for Chinese President Hu Jintao that they served  2008 DuMol Russian River Valley Chardonnay, 2005 Quilceda Creek Cabernet Sauvignon, and a 2008 Poet’s Leap Botrytis Riesling.

Although some might accuse Pres. Obama with being somewhat elitist with the Quilceda Creek ($200+ a bottle) I find it quite satisfying that he served one of North America's best wines and that instead of opting for one of Bordeaux's First Growth wines that the Chinese are no doubt obsessed with, he showcased the best of what we offer here in the US.

It really interesting for me to taste wines from Australia that are approaching the 8-10 year stage in their maturity. You sometimes wonder if these wines can stand the test of time and age with grace into something more interesting and complex. "The Gate" is made by John Davey who is most famous for his Shingleback wines. He says: "my aim is to use premium fruit from our family vineyard to produce rich complex wines with the ripeness of McLaren Vale wines".

What I was immediately interested in when opening this bottling was the color. Would it be deep and purple or would it have the look of an 8 year old wine? Well, the answer is this wine has a deep ruby red core and is slightly fading towards the edges of the glass into soft pinkish tinged red. It's definitely showing it's age in terms of color but is still holding on to it's deep color in the center of the glass.

On the nose the wine also shows classic aromas of plum, tobacco, stewed cherry, and hints of raisin, marinara, and molasses. It's got an amazing rusticity to the bouquet which is no doubt brought forward by the time it has spent aging in bottle. When the wine opens up a bit in the glass some of the creamy oak aromas start to come to the forefront and without even looking at the winery website I immediately assumed the wine was aged at least partially in American oak. It's just this coconut-vanilla type thing that always tips me off!!

On the palate this wine is rich and opulent and shines with tart black cherry flavors, cranberry, hints of leather, and unsweetened coco powder. The tannins are well integrated as one would expect and the oak spice that I imagine was once very prevalent in the wine is now in harmony with the fruit.

Overall I'm quite impressed with how this wine is performing and seeing that I got a really good deal on it at the market ($20 - normally $40) I'd say it's quite a value. 90+ points


Click here to find out more about this wine

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1. Subscribe to our feed via E-mail (box located on the top right hand corner of the blog)
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At the end of the month we will draw a name of those who participated and the winner will be notified by e-mail to send us their shipping info. in order to receive your prize!!

Fibers.com is an absolutely amazing website! It's so easy to design you own t-shirts that I know I will be back to purchase many more custom T's. They can also do Food T-shirts and Wine T-shirts!!

I recently came across a really neat product that is specifically designed for those who have fine automatic, self-winding watches such as Rolex and Patek Philippe. So what is a watch winder? Well, the orbita watch winder  is handcrafted in both the USA and Europe for fine automatic, self-winding watches such as Rolex and Patek Philippe. Never reset time, day or date again. They hold the most innovated technology mimicking human wrist action to keep your watches fully wound with no possibility of over-winding.

What's even better is that these great watch winders are designed like a watch case, and are perfect displaying your fine piece of jewelry. The website that is linked up throughout this post is really great too because they offer such a wide variety of these beautiful watch cases that wind such as watch boxes, medium sized watch winders, double watch winders, and even single watch cases designed to wind you special custom watches.

Anyone can purchase a regular watch case in order to display and safe keep your watch, however if you want to both protect your watch and display it in a beautiful setting then I highly suggest you check out bestwatchwinder.com or click on the links throughout this post to be directed to their site and check out the great selection of watch winder watch boxes.

While recently contemplating all the expenses and other variables that go into starting a profitable bottle shop or wine bar, I came up with a small list of things one might consider before opening the doors on a wine business.

1. Keeping your overhead as low as possible
I believe that this is the number one concern for a brand new wine shop or wine bar. By "overhead" I'm referring to your overall operating expenses. Monthly rent, payroll, utilities, insurance, revolving inventory, and advertising costs are all things to add up to find out exactly how much it will cost to run your business every month. What you need to ask yourself is "how many bottles of wine or glasses of wine would I need to sell to cover these expenses and still make a decent profit at the end of the month?".

When just starting out I would suggest working in the shop as the owner as much as humanly possible to avoid having to shell out hourly pay to any employees. I would also suggest starting with a modest inventory and to work with wines that have a fast sell through rate that you can turn and burn. Try not to sit on any significant dollars in the form of rare cultish wines that only serve a very small niche market of collectors. (Unless you already have a special order for a customer).

2. Location, Location, Location
The location of you shop will be probably one of the most important decisions you will have to make when deciding on opening your wine business. Ask yourself the following questions:

-What is the overall demographic of the population where I plan to lease my retail space? Age, Religion, Expendable income....ect.

-Are the businesses that surround my shop wine friendly and will they network and send potential customers to my business? Will they be customers themselves?

-What is the traffic like both on foot and vehicle in front of my store? What kind of location would attract wanderers into my business?

-Is my landlord a shrewd business man or one who will want me to succeed and form a long term business relationship?

3. Building your online presence
I cannot stress the importance of building your online presence for you wine shop/bar in the form of an active newsletter, a busy social network, a dynamic industry blog, and a bustling online wine shop. If you can be selling wine out the back door to the UPS or Fedex truck imagine how much this will help you meet the goals mentioned in point number one of keeping you expenses low and making a profit above your business expenses.

4. Passion about the wine business
I suspect many wealthy wine collectors will get involved in this business because they have an extreme passion for wine. Let me just tell you that wine enjoyment and enthusiasm is not the same as the business of selling wine. If you don't have a passion for the industry and the business of selling wine, then I would suggest that you keep out of the game. It could be a very costly mistake and one that would all but destroy your love and enchantment with the beverage.