Wine Simple

I’ve made wine my life on so many levels. Five days a week, lunch and dinner, I observe how people approach and experience it—for pleasure or adventure, status or connoisseurship. For me personally, though, wine represents joy. Its ultimate gift is how it brings people together.

When I was growing up in Austria, wine was always there. It was on the table at pretty much every meal, and we kids got to have a taste as soon as we’d moved on from milk.

Wine originated in ancient Georgia. The Greeks and Romans later developed it further, sure, but it is the French who honed their growing and winemaking techniques over centuries—make that millennia. That’s why today the French are most associated with the art and craft, not to mention the lifestyle, of wine.

Try a few glasses and you’ll understand the French saying, “With Burgundy, you think stupid things. With Bordeaux, you say stupid things. And with Champagne, you do them.”

Let’s face it: We live in a world where we expect things to taste the same every time…forever!