If you weren’t already in the know, TAPAS are more than delicious little treats you savor with a glass of Iberian wine.  TAPAS is also the name of the Tempranillo, Advocates, Producers and Amigos Society, co-founded in 2006 by no one other than Jeff Stai, owner of Twisted Oak Winery, author of El Bloggo Torcido, [...]

Our Chinese correspondent, Edward Ragg, recently sat down with Honorio Noya Dominguez, a native of Barrantes in the heart of the Salnes Valley, part of the Rias Baixas DO, to explore the future of Albarino wines in China. Honorio is the export manager for the producer Veiga Serantes, although, as part of a small family [...]

Gabriella fondly remembers when she was a child, sitting in front of the TV listening to Cookie Monster teach the alphabet, and on this particular day, words that started with the letter “S”. This episode is firmly ingrained in her head, because unfortunately, she couldn’t pronounce the letter “s” as a child, handicapped with a [...]

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 [...]

Every morning, I generally do one of two things, immediately brew my coffee and flip on the computer, or I take a little stroll over to our local bread store to pick up a steamy, freshly baked baguette, and maybe, a gooey chocolate croissant. Today, as our bread stash showed only a few crumbs remaining, [...]

Editor’s Note:As many of you are well aware, Robert Mondavi died last week. Robert Mondavi was fundamental in helping to promote and define what California wine is today. Having read a dozens of wine tributes dedicated to his memory, Ryan and I equally wanted to share our thoughts too, but we didn’t feel as if [...]

I can’t even start this post without smiling, because the experience was so odd and enjoyable, the mere thought of it brings a big broad toothy grin to my face. My cat is even looking at me odd as I giggle alone, thoroughly enjoying the moment.
I’ll let you in on my little secret, I [...]

Seriously, we promise that this will be our LAST interview from the II International Conference on Climate and Wine. We realize that we may have exhausted your attention span with this, but we had to at least give you the opportunity to hear our recently edited video clip with Miguel Torres chatting about what Bodegas [...]

Recently, there has been a fair amount of buzz surrounding music’s influence on the way you perceive wine.
Rocket science? Maybe not, but I love the idea of pairing wine with music and was ecstatic when Robert McIntosh tagged me to participate in a lighthearted music meme. Originally, based on a creation by Andrew at 7 [...]

Big news in the steep Douro Valley! Symington Family Estates, owners of internationally renowned Port brands Dow’s, Graham’s, and Warre’s is converting their three Vilariça valley vineyards entirely to organic farming. Quinta do Atayde, Quinta de Assares and Quinta da Canada, consisting in total of 146 hectares, or 361 acres, will gain their official “organic” [...]

Last January, the UK based wine writer and Committee Member of the Circle of Wine Writers, Christine Austin, suggested that we apply to the organization housed in England. Having had several people offer a similar suggestion for over a year, it seemed ridiculous for us not to get off our hides and do something about [...]

In January, for those of you who weren’t following our play by play of the II International Conference on Climate and Wine, Catavino spent three days cornering wine celebrities, in order to get a better sense as to how wine is being affected both now and in the future by the fluctuating climate conditions. Stubborn [...]

Image by jezkerwin via FlickrSorry to our readers of Iberian wine news, because today, is a blogger show. I listen to TWIT religiously. If you are even tangentially interested in the online tech world, I highly suggest it. Each week, they talk about gadgets, websites and online issues, and occasionally, it directly applies to my [...]

This is just a just a quick collection of newsworthy facts and figures to send you into the weekend feeling full of fortuitous factoids.
Catavino’s La Rioja Newsletter
After two quasi full months of tasting only La Rioja wine, while conveniently forgetting that one week dedicated to Portuguese wine, we will be finished by the end [...]

We know that we’ve bitched and complained since the start about our distaste for the now ubiquitous 100pt scale popularized by Robert Parker. We’ve whined about how it was not fair, nor possible to give wines a rating where we had to choose between 90pts and 89pts. Can a wine be one point better than [...]