Here are a few late additions to our holiday gift guide!
Wine writer Elaine Chukan Brown, who blogs under the nom de plume Lily-Elaine Hawk Wakawaka, has been putting pen and pencil to paper lately, designing t-shirts and posters. This hand-drawn rendering of the eight central treatments of biodynamic farming—from the horn filled with cow dung (Prep 500) to tea made out of the primordial horsetail plant (Prep 508)—is a helpful and colorful reference to have on hand, especially if your library of biodynamic tomes is a bit thin.
For the spice master:
As executive editor Tara Q. Thomas discovered this past fall, Lior Lev Sercarz takes spice blending as seriously a chef de cave at a Champagne house. His First Step Kit is a terrific introduction to the power of scent and spice.
Jeni Britton Bauer blended perfumes before she devoted herself to making ice cream. Her flavors are complex and bewitching, particularly the Triumph, a holiday-only combination of absinthe ice cream studded with meringue puffs and crushed bitter orange candy.
For the collector:
The Durand combines a corkscrew and an ah-so opener in one tool to take on old, crumbly corks.
Broccoli subs at No. 7 Sub sustain our staff through many a deadline, so we’re predisposed to trust Tyler McCord’s broccoli recipes:
For the Burgundy hound:
La Paulée de New York is one of the hottest tickets in town, a grand evening of rubbing shoulders with Burgundy’s best winemakers and drinking exceptional wines. What’s less known are the satellite tastings that go on around the event, like a Saturday morning tasting focused on Les Petits des Grands—lesser-known domaines making terrific wines, led by sommeliers Eduardo Porto-Carreira of DBGB and Jordan Salcito of Momofuku in NYC, plus Josiah Baldavino and Stevie Stacionis of Bay Grape, a wine store in Oakland, California, with Daniel Johnnes, the founder of the NYC Paulée.
Brooklyn-based Raaka—a company focused on organic, fair trade and unroasted chocolate bars—offers a monthly subscription service which includes limited edition flavors. Check out Assistant Editor Caitlin Griffith’s conversation with Raaka chocolate maker, Nate Hodge.
For the beer nut:
A beer nut.
Simple and delicate in line, these tumblers from Austrian glassmaker Zalto make everything you pour into them look sophisticated. And they feel great to boot.
This story was featured in W&S Winter 2014.
is W&S’s editor at large and covers the wines of the Mediterranean and Central and Eastern Europe for the magazine.
This story appears in the print issue of Winter 2014.
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