I am having me a bottle of Shiraz for dinner and after. I asked Google about the difference between that an Syrah. While on one hand, there is no difference because both are made using the same grape, which according to lovely legend was already grown and properly used 7000 years ago in Persia. On the other hand, it is said that after the grape had found its way to the Christian world some 2000 years ago (the timing appears to be logical, because more that 2000 years ago there was no Christian world), it got lodged in the upper valley of the Rhone, where it is named Syrah, or Sirah, once it can be drawn from a barrel into a glass.
By the way, within hailing distance of Switzerland the Rhone leaves the lake of Geneva at Calvin's lodgings in Geneva and on short notice crosses the border to France, where it then irrigates those grapes, and branches out to carry the same blessings to a whole world of even more famous wines - you got the book, look it up. It might be the reason of Calvin's activity against the consumption of wine: it was the French who chased him into virtual exile into the safety of Geneva, while just within the view from his drawing room window he could see the Frenchmen at table enjoying some of the loveliest drops created by the art of French vintners out of the reach of his own domestic staff.
They further say that if you were lucky enough to have a glass of the Syrah next to a glass of Shiraz, you would not - nor could you - support the claim that both are the same. They are not! And the wine maven says further it is because of the climatic difference: moderate in France, and broiling hot in Australia. I would also like to throw the difference of soil into the equation, but of course I cannot know anything about that.
So, there is a mission: find a good bottle of French Syrah, and a good bottle of Australian Shiraz and set them up side by side with glasses ready. Got it? I'm coming.
9:31 p.m.
Please do remind me of this when next we meet again near a Total Wine. The more I cruise the shelves other than supermarkets, the more I am convinced that the former are not super at all when it comes to wine selections. Now TW and Trade Joe's have the courage to lay up wines different from what us mortals found to exist from our reviews of the supermarket shelves. And since trader Joe bought Aldi's, there' something surprising to be found there, too.
And let us not forget dear ole Co-op in B'boro, where they also keep men and women who did not take their wine merchandizing apprenticeship at Shaws or Big Y or Hannaford. I now have a pretty good view and taste and smell of the Lil' Koala Shiraz and am ready to face the French original, for sometime around the 1800's, those grape vines from the valley of the tone were deported to the penal colonies of the British on the other continent (is it the seventh?) Can't wait do do that in congenial company.
Such banter, of course, can come up only in reduced company. Mine, right now is limited to endless time, with Shiraz and Allison Kraus Radio and William de Morgan. 'A Likely Story', indeed!
By the way, within hailing distance of Switzerland the Rhone leaves the lake of Geneva at Calvin's lodgings in Geneva and on short notice crosses the border to France, where it then irrigates those grapes, and branches out to carry the same blessings to a whole world of even more famous wines - you got the book, look it up. It might be the reason of Calvin's activity against the consumption of wine: it was the French who chased him into virtual exile into the safety of Geneva, while just within the view from his drawing room window he could see the Frenchmen at table enjoying some of the loveliest drops created by the art of French vintners out of the reach of his own domestic staff.
They further say that if you were lucky enough to have a glass of the Syrah next to a glass of Shiraz, you would not - nor could you - support the claim that both are the same. They are not! And the wine maven says further it is because of the climatic difference: moderate in France, and broiling hot in Australia. I would also like to throw the difference of soil into the equation, but of course I cannot know anything about that.
So, there is a mission: find a good bottle of French Syrah, and a good bottle of Australian Shiraz and set them up side by side with glasses ready. Got it? I'm coming.
9:31 p.m.
Please do remind me of this when next we meet again near a Total Wine. The more I cruise the shelves other than supermarkets, the more I am convinced that the former are not super at all when it comes to wine selections. Now TW and Trade Joe's have the courage to lay up wines different from what us mortals found to exist from our reviews of the supermarket shelves. And since trader Joe bought Aldi's, there' something surprising to be found there, too.
And let us not forget dear ole Co-op in B'boro, where they also keep men and women who did not take their wine merchandizing apprenticeship at Shaws or Big Y or Hannaford. I now have a pretty good view and taste and smell of the Lil' Koala Shiraz and am ready to face the French original, for sometime around the 1800's, those grape vines from the valley of the tone were deported to the penal colonies of the British on the other continent (is it the seventh?) Can't wait do do that in congenial company.
Such banter, of course, can come up only in reduced company. Mine, right now is limited to endless time, with Shiraz and Allison Kraus Radio and William de Morgan. 'A Likely Story', indeed!
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