Bourgie Wine TV

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Ep 013 Become a Wine Expert in 5 Minutes!

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On Location: In-store Wine Tasting

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Bourgie Wine TV - Ep 013 Learn to Taste Wine in 5 Minutes

I'm going to show you how to become a wine expert in less than 5 minutes...at the house! Plus I'll explain the meaning of the #boomfiyah twitter hashtag.

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Ep 012 Amber Crest Mojo Red Shiraz

Checking out a wine from North Carolina called "Mojo Red" Shiraz. Also trying out a new set, let me know in the comments how you like it!

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Ep 011 The Four Enemies of Wine

4 quick tips to keep that great bottle of wine you just bought from going bad before you get to enjoy it.

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Ep 010 Wine at a Tweetup

Sampling a shiraz and chardonnay from Yellow Tail of Australia. "Live" from the Headshot Tweetup at Mindworks Multimedia in Durham NC.

Big thanks to Damond Nollan for being my videographer on the fly.

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Ep 009 Part 2 Pinot Tasting Notes

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Ep 009 What Chile Wants - Pinot Noir

For the second bottle in the Perfect Bougie Case of Wine series, I review a light-styled red called a Pinot Noir by Cono Sur Winery in Chile.

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Wine BAP is Corked; No BWTV Today

Hi Bougies! I was hit with a stomach virus about 4am, so there will be no Bougie Wine TV episode today. Nothing sounds appetizing but tea and toast right now.

BTW "corked" is a term referring to a wine that has gone bad due to the cork drying out and letting air in the bottle. It tastes and smells like old collard greens left out in the sun for 2 days.

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Ep 008 Palette Tune Up - Pinot Gris

As a follow-on to Monday's King Estate Pinot Gris review, I break down the tasting elements one by one for the Pinot Gris varietal, then retaste to see if my pickups were valid.

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Ep 007 King Estate Pinot Gris

To kick off my Perfect Bougie Case of Wine series, I review a fantastic Pinot Gris, light styled white wine, by King Estate in Eugene Oregon. And, BoHo's take note, its 100% organic.

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Ep 006 Screw Cap Saturday Wine - Alsace One Pierre Sparr

Tonight I review a table wine from the Alsace region in France. With a screw cap. From France! And I didn't buy it at the Dollar Store either!

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My Cameo Appearance on Freezer Burns!

No, Greg Ng hasn't pulled a Conan O'Brien and jacked my show.

Call this my 15 seconds of fame. My friend Greg, the Frozen Food Master of Freezer Burns shot this montage at Raleigh Media Leaders this Tuesday. I'm in here briefly towards the end.

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Ep 005:Deinhard Riesling Review On Location at Raleigh Media Leaders

A "guerilla"style review (shot on my Blackberry) of one of the best summer whites I've had in a long time - Deinhard Piesporter Riesling at this month's Raleigh Media Leaders meetup. Location is Isaac Hunter's Oak City Tavern in downtown Raleigh.  Many thanks to the incomparable Gregory Ng of Freezer Burns for being my "camera man" on the fly.

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Wine for Easter Dinner: What to Take To Big Mama's

Easter dinner divides the bougie nation into two camps: the lamb camp and the Easter ham camp.  While ham is usually the default, if you're bouRgie lamb will also be a part of the spread.  Here are some suggestions on wines that will go well with what Big Mama serves up Sunday afternoon.

My motto on pairing wine with food is to match the intensity of the food flavor with the intensity of the wine. Red wine with this or white wine with that is just too difficult to remember, and you miss out on a lot of great pairings.  So, whether your family typically serves Virginia ham(the salty kind) or glazed and pinappled within an inch of its life ham, I'd suggest a  Pinot Gris, also known as Pinot Grigio in the Italian variety.

Pinot Gris is a nice, lightly-styled white wine that won't compete with the flavoring of the ham, deviled eggs, green beans, etc. Oregon state has made a tremendous name for itself as a mecca for Pinot Gris wine.  One brand that's a tremendous value and very consistent in quality is King Estate Oregon Pinot Gris. You should be able to find it for around $14-15 a bottle. Pinot will have a straw-like color, and is very easy to drink. No one will be coughing or complaining its just too strong or gave them a headache. It will have a crisp,fresh nose and flavor, like fresh green apples, but not sweet.

Now, for the suburbanites serving lamb tomorrow, you'll need to go to the opposite end of the wine intensity spectrum to get something that will enhance the big lamb flavor. I'd recommend a red wine with lamb, believe it or not. There are many ways you could go, but a good one I just had about two weeks ago is Purple Moon Merlot, sold at Trader Joe's for $3.99. That isn't a typo, it is only $3.99, but it certainly doesn't taste like it. My personal term for Merlot is "liquid velvet" because its just that smooth.  The nice thing Purple Moon Merlot adds to the equation is the fruit component. It has a nice balance of black cherry and a bit of strawberry to it, without being overpowering.  This is also good one to play "guess how much I paid for this" with.  Don't tell anyone what you paid, let them ooh and ah, then tell them you paid less than $5 for it.....or not ;-)

Leave me a comment and let me know what you decided to pick up for Easter dinner, and how you and your family/guests enjoyed it.

Happy Easter.

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Jay-Z and Bougie Wine TV Launch Sididdy de Negro Champagne

BROOKLYN,NY--Building on the success of his Armand de Brignac champagne joint venture with Cattier Champagne, today hip-hop mogul Jay-Z announced a partnership with  Krista, the Black American Wine Princess, and Bougie Wine TV,  to produce a limited-edition vintage champagne called Sididdy de Negro.

"Jack and Jill black folks don't wanna Mo it up with common folks, nah mean? The hood has totally tainted Mo' and Dom P for that target market. By partnering with my girl Krista and the Bougie Wine TV brand,  we are bringing the exclusivity and unpronounceablilty that the Boulee' crowd craves back to the sparkling wine industry.  Furthermore, we will spare  the Jack and Jill segment from having to revert to their old neighborhood accents to buy a bottle of bub' errr I mean, sparkling wine produced in the Methode' de Champenoise."  said Jay-Z at a press conference in Brooklyn this morning.

In addition, Krista the Wine BAP added that part of the proceeds from the sale of Sididdy de Negro will go to the Desiree' Rogers Anti-Defamation League. "We want Desiree' to be able to hold her head up high at Martha's Vinyard this summmer, and we feel good that   Sididdy de Negro to be a part of that." added Krista the Wine BAP.

Sididdy de Negro will be available on BougieWineTV.com, as well as other proper-speaking minority sites including:

The Broke Socialite

Soul Bounce

The Black Snob

Post Bourgie

Jack and Jill Politics

Black Web 2.0

Change Clothes

Freezer Burns

"We don't believe you...you need more people!" --- Happy April Fools Day 2010 Bougies!

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Card Party Wine for Good Friday

[caption id="attachment_153" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="Photo Credit: Murphy's Place, Dallas TX"][/caption]

What?

No I'm not being sacreligious, and yes you know what I'm talking about.

Ever since I first entered bougie-hood several years ago in Chicago, I noticed it is a tradition among bougies to have a bid whist or spades card party on Good Friday evening, after you went to Seven Last Words from the Cross service that afternoon.  The dilemma: what wine to bring?  If you are the go-to wine person in your crew, the party is depending on you. If you aren't usually the wine point guard, you'll shock your peeps to death, and crack them up at the same time.

Now, if you're like a lot of folks, your wine selection strategy involves grabbing whatever's on the end cap at the grocery store.  Nothing wrong with that, especially if its on sale, but you miss out on a lot of good wine that way.  Let me list a few tips below to help you break the white zinfandel habit.

Wine is not Kool-Aid. I know we like sweet stuff. I do to. All wine shouldn't taste like grape Kool-Aid you dumped a pound of sugar in, though.

Always remember, match the intensity of the wine to the intensity of the food. So, if this year's card party is going to be a fish fry, try a Sauvigngon Blanc, which is complex and can handle the hot sauce.  One of my favorites: Marquis de Chasse Bordeaux Blanc, which is a 50/50 blend of bordeaux and sauvignon grapes.  If its warm enough where you are to throw some ribs on the grill, try a Shiraz, which is a red wine with lots of fruitiness laced with a hint of smoke to match up with the smoke from the meat.  My personal favorite is Yellow Tail Shiraz; its one of my personal "house wines" for the summer. Yellow Tail is made in Australia, so given the intense climate, you get a lot of big bold-flavored wine from there without spending a lot of money.

Skip the Wine Bucket, Chill It In the Sink Card parties should be as low-maintenance as possible, even with wine. For white wine, fill the sink with cold water, add a couple of handfuls of ice cubes, put the bottle in for about 20 minutes, and you'll have a perfectly chilled wine.  Red wine is technically not supposed to be chilled for drinking, because it "closes up" the flavor.  However as I'm typing this I know a lot of folks aren't having that, so you can follow the process above for your red wine choice.

Okay well that should be enough to get you through your first card party with wine. Drop me a comment and let me know what you chose, and how the crew liked it. And let me know if you ran a Boston, too.