There are bars and there are great, secret gems well worth going out of your way to experience. In the city of Valencia, Casa Montaña happens to be one of those incredible finds completely saturated in both history and beauty.
If left to our own devices, however, we would have never have found this bar, as [...]

Today we are proud to announce another winery who will no longer be covered here at Catavino. Back in March, Carrie Jorgensen, one of the owners of Cortes de Cima, approached Catavino to assist them in creating a blog. Naturally, we were interested, as we like to help all wineries enter into this social [...]

I love home cooked meals, especially when I’m in a foreign culture, enjoying their traditional cuisine. I love the anticipation as exotic aromas float in the air, the great conversations that lead up to the first bite and the fervent energy that zips throughout the room as glances are stolen into the kitchen wondering how [...]

If I say “white fish”, what Portuguese wine comes to mind? Possibly a crisp, dry Alvarinho? Maybe you’d even go so far to include an Alentejo white made from Arinto or Antao Vaz? All fair combinations, but I doubt you would ever say, “hey, what about a light, refreshing Port wine!” At least I hope [...]

As wine bloggers, we are dependent on the web to give us vital nutrition that comes in the form of both community and information. This can be seen as both a positive and negative. The positive is that we are able to meet people from around the world who share our passions, vision and dreams. [...]

I’m tired of all the whining about alcohol and extraction, manipulation and critic focused wine making. Wine is meant to be drunk, enjoyed and savored. And if you are not enjoying what is in front of you, pour the bottle down the drain and move on.
My tastes range from ultra-modern to the most classic [...]

At the end of March, we threw a little shindig for Ryan on his birthday consisting of wine, mounds of grilled butifarra and dozen friends. And with the appropriate social graces, many of our friends came bearing gifts, all looking distinctly similar to a bottle of wine. Clearly, they had been well versed in the [...]

For those of you unfamiliar with D.O. Yecla, I can assure you that it’s not something you’d say when tasting a glass of old milk, well past its suggested date of consumption. “D.O Yuck-la?!” Instead, this tiny D.O, with only 4,300 hectares under vine, is increasingly gaining in popularity abroad, as traditional winemaking is crafting [...]

Last night was one of the first evenings, in quite some time, that we took a big break away from drinking La Rioja wines. Sigh…it felt magical to take a massive step to the right and look adoringly at the bottle of 2005 Quinta do Vale Meão sitting regally alongside my red wine braised pork [...]

Today’s my birthday. I’m saying this not as a plea for attention, but rather a chance to reflect on some things. Catavino has grown a lot in the past three years. In a few more months, we can officially call Catavino three years old, an achievement I never expected we’d accomplish. 33 years ago today, [...]

Selling wine is an exercise in repetition. Regardless of the topic, every good salesman has a handful of educational tidbits sitting their back pocket, cataloged and ready for the next customer to ask them what “corked” means, or “do European wines have more sulfites”, or the fact their uncle told them that “white wine starts [...]

“Do you want to try something else really good?” Dirk Niepoort says to me just after pouring a 1977 Garrafeira Port into my wine stained glass. Of course, there is only one answer to such a question, and with port still sitting in my mouth as I restrained from swallowing what is perhaps one of [...]

A few nights ago, Ryan and I opened two Dao wines from two distinctly different producers, the Borges Reserva 2003 and the Quinta da Fata Reserva 2004. Although the Quinta da Fata had a cute little gold star on it boasting of it being the “Best Wine of the Dao” from the DO itself, we [...]

Have you ever been sent back in time after looking at wine label? Personally, I tend to have these experiences most often with aromas, rather than images. Maybe the bouquet of a wine will catapult me back to my aunt’s kitchen helping her make a sweet cranberry strudel, or a vacation I took horseback riding [...]

Editor’s Note: We are currently open to suggestions as to how we may revamp our bodega profiles to be more interesting and practical for you. We ask that you please either leave your comments below or in the “Pimp My Wine Blog” page in Facebook.
Although I haven’t had the privilege of meeting João Portugal Ramos, [...]