Lifestyle

Another New Year's Eve has passed. Some people stay at home, some go out to dinner, others head to parties to toast the new year at midnight. What my friends and I do is what we have been doing since December 31, 2013. For seven years, we head to Big Bar in Los Feliz to celebrate. December 31, 2019 was no exception and that is why New Years at Big Bar is the Please The Palate Pick of the Week. In general, I find New Years Eve to be rather anti-climatic. For some, it is like any other night but for others, there is so much planning and plotting to make the evening different from others because you want to be in the right place at the right time when the clock strikes midnight and the new year starts. But, after all that preparation, it is over in a moment. This is why I love spending New Years Eve at Big Bar. After lunch with friends, we head to Big Bar. Big Bar starts celebrating at 3:00pm and over the next 10 hours, they celebrate for each time zone. That is 10 time zones in 10 hours and each time zone comes with a special cocktail created in honor of the country celebrating. This year's theme had us traveling across time zones and across zones with a Back to the Future theme. The drinks were created by Cari Ha and her team at Big Bar and the menu was designed by Dave Stolte. And of course, the charming Eugene Lee was on hand to take photos.
04 January, 2020
Generational family businesses are common in the wine industry. The passion and love for wine is passed from generation to generation. The younger generations learn from their parents and grandparents and then pass on the same to their children. Yair Margalit started Margalit Winery in Israel with the idea of building a business for future generations in his family. Today his son Asaf is running the winery. I had the pleasure to speak with both Asaf and Yair about their story and what I loved so much was the relationship between father and son. Asaf talked about how he received one of the best educations in wine from his father Yair, the author of two of the most comprehensive wine books and I share their story in the Napa Valley Register which you can read here. ********************************* We look up to our parents. We learn from our parents. They are our role models and our teachers. We then go to school or work and study under experts in our field of choice.
But when your father is the author of "Concepts in Wine Chemistry," as well as thesuccessive, "Concepts in Wine Technology," the most comprehensive education you can get on wine making is from your father.
 Dr. Yair Margalit studied chemistry at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, where he received his master’s degree and a Ph.D in physical chemistry, with a focus on nuclear magnetic resonance. He worked for five years at the Israel Institute of Biological Research where he was the head of the physical chemistry department. When he was a visiting research professor at UC Davis in the chemistry department, he developed an interest in wine.
Ironically, the door of the enology department was literally in front of the physical chemistry room and Yair was drawn to it. While on his first sabbatical, he took some courses and found that his background in chemistry made enology an easy subject for him. By his second and third sabbaticals to the U.S., Yair came to work as a scientist in the Department of Enology, as well as Department of Chemistry. Yair knew at that point that wine would be his second career.
17 December, 2019
We now have four categories of wine - red, white, rosé and orange. Orange wines have a long history of being made and are basically white wines that are made like red wines, meaning the wines spend time on the skins, where they impart color. But many people think of orange wines as those sour beer-like wines that are nothing like what we think of wine. However, not all orange wines are beer-like and many producers are making skin-contact white wines in order to enhance the texture of the wine. I wrote about some of these wines in the Napa Valley Register, which I am sharing here. It used to be an easy choice — do you want red wine or white wine? Then rosé grew in popularity and the choice was between red, white or rosé? But now, more and more, restaurants have a new section on the wine list offering orange wines, also called amber wine.
Orange wines are made like red wines. When we make red wines, the color comes from the skins. For rosé wines, the time the grapes spend on the skin is less than for red wines, resulting in a lighter red shade, or pink, wine. Orange wines are made from white wine grapes where the skins are kept on for hours, days, weeks or months, resulting in wines with orange or amber hues.
10 December, 2019
The Holiday season is here! If you are looking to get into the spirit, head to Severance Wine Bar in West Hollywood for their Office Holiday Party Pop Up, inspired by everything from Planes, Trains, & Automobiles to The Office. Drinking Champagne and Sherry based cocktails, eating some sweets while surrounded by tacky holiday decorations make the Severance Office Holiday Party Pop Up the Please The Palate pick of the week. Owner Evan Charest was laid off from a tech job on Christmas Eve in 2017. In 2018, he opened Severance Wine Bar with the severance money he received. And here we are at Christmas time again, so what is better than drinking cocktails inspired by the one of the worst yet funniest workplaces, Dunder Mifflin. Through the month of December, the space next to Severance Wine Bar on Melrose Avenue has been converted into a tacky office holiday pop-up. Open Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights, for $20++, you will get a complimentary cocktail or a sparkling wine flight. So get into the holiday spirit! The cocktail offerings are all Champagne and Sherry based. Each is named after a Christmas themed movie that will test your trivia knowledge.
07 December, 2019

One thing about wine is that general statements are difficult to make. There is not one definitive way to make wine. There are hundreds of...

03 December, 2019
I love going on food tours when I am traveling in a new city as they are a great way to see a city and learn about the culture. I find nothing more fulfilling than when I can meet with locals and experience their culture through their eyes. And that is why Eatwith, the world's largest community for authentic culinary experiences with locals, is the Please The Palate pick of the week. Eatwith is in more than 130 countries and they are bringing people together through food. Cooking classes, food tours and dining experiences are hosted by home-cooks, food-lovers, MasterChefs and Michelin-starred chefs. My Eatwith experience was with Christina Xenos, a professional chef, cookbook author, recipe developer, and journalist based in Los Angeles. I have known Christina for years as a journalist but had yet to enjoy her cooking. When she announced her dinner, featuring cuisine from Sifnos, the Cycladic island in the Southern Aegean Sea and said the proceeds of the ticket sales would benefit the Union Station Homeless Services in Los Angeles, I bought my ticket. Christina is Greek-American and her family roots are from the islands of Crete and Milos. She travels there annually and this past summer she visited Sifnos, the birthplace of the first Greek cookbook author Nikolaos Tselementes. An island known for baking in clay pots, she worked with farmers and cooks while on her trip to learn these traditional recipes.
30 November, 2019

I love meeting winemakers and learning their stories of how they got to where they are in the wine industry. Everyone has their own path...

26 November, 2019

When I think of caviar, I think of a luxury product that is very expensive. In fact, it is often well beyond my budget. So, when I have the opportunity to eat caviar at an event, I am never one to shy away from it. But, now, thanks to Imperia Caviar, caviar is something to be enjoyed on a daily basis. The quality, the taste and the value make Imperia Caviar the Please The Palate pick of the week.

Caviar is a very good for you. It is a super-food. It is a source of vitamins and minerals, including Omega 3, vitamins A, E and B6, Iron, Magnesium and Selenium. Caviar is good for our minds and it is also an aphrodisiac. With all of these health benefits, we should be eating caviar every day. And Imperia Caviar is making that possible.

Imperia Caviar was founded by Sony Mordechai in 2018 with the goal of making caviar feel less like a splurge and more like an everyday delight. The caviar comes from sustainable, eco-friendly sturgeon farms and it is made by hand to ensure the best quality. The sturgeon are grown in a nearly wild environment and rely on the purity of fresh water. There are no preservatives and no hormones used.

16 November, 2019
Show more
Loading...
Copied!