qotd- Gabriella Sabatini- that is one hot ball whacker

Gary,
Great episode, adding to my long list of varietals I need to taste. The tasting note about a wet Monday evening in Camden was priceless, as my wife is a Camden girl, and I spent many a damp evenings on a back porch in Camden (Fairview Village in sight of those smokestacks) kanoodling my future spouse. So altogether a lovely reminder ;-).

For your trip abroad how about a remote or two? Perhaps several taped sessions at local wine establishments?

QOTD – Bjorn Borg, the most dominating player amongst some great contemporaries.

Peace, NJ brother

I went to the Wachau last year and visited E Berger, Hirsch, Sepp Moser, Jamek (the wrong one)Alzinger, and Nikoliahof. The wines are awesome. Killed me to pay 8 or 10 euro over there only to come back and discover that the wines are $40+ here. Those importers are brutal. That said, Terry Thiese brings in great german and austrian wines. Any lurkers out there looking for a foster person i’m happy to volunteer. I’d say Ivan Lendl cause he was funny looking and great. McEnroe is funny too in his own way.

Salty sour bomb, eh Gary? I really want to try a bottle of it now.

QOTD: Tough question. I played NCAA DIV I tennis (get the name? 10sGuy = Tennis Guy) and I could answer this a bunch of different ways.

Two best women: Navratilova and Graf. Graf was better for a shorter period and Martina’s probably still playing.

Federer is the most talented I’ve ever seen. Johnny Mac had the best touch. Sampras (BORING!) was great but never won the French. Agassi won all the slams but couldn’t beat Sampras consistently. Muster was the hardest worker…the grittiest. Connors spent a long time at #1 but didn’t give a damn about American tennis. Lendl couldn’t win Wimbledon. The 70s/80s guys like Borg and Guillermo Vilas and Vitas Gerulaitis were rock stars.

My favorite was Rafter. He was serve-and-volleyer like me – a lost art – and he won despite being less talented than a lot of the other guys. I also liked Edberg who somehow managed to win with no forehand…another serve-and-volleyer.

Yeah! Austrian Wines – go for it, Gary!

Don’t forget about the Styrian Wines (South-East Austria).
Has nothing to do with Slovenia!

Great episode, Gary.
Everyone, GruVe rocks!

I just had a Gruve last week for the first time. I had read this article from the San Fran Chronicle suggesting a fish soup recipe to pair with gruve. It was delicious and the pairing was great – Nigl GV 2005. The wine had flavors of lemon zest and mineral. Not really anything else that I could taste. Very crisp, high acidity, but did not taste sour, which was good. The mineral (stone) flavors paired well with the earthy flavors of the soup.

Please lose the ear buds. Had been a lurker most of the time and really enjoy the education and entertainment. I go along with most of the fun, the wave from the nice young lady was refreshing, but feel the ear buds were showing some disrespect. While you were gone, maybe mix it up with tasting one of something different each day, like Amontillado. Ports, Sherrys, and the like. Just one each day that you already know about and can educate us.

Interesting topic.
I am sure that many people havenâ??t heard of gruner.
When I was I Austria last fall I had a lot of Gruner, Blaufrankish (sp?) and Zveigelt. I didnâ??t know anything about regions or producers but the ones I bought or had in the restaurants were pretty good.
I like peppery flavor and aroma in gruner.

QOTD:
Maria, of course!

Suggestion:

About you business trip/vacation-Let Tom do the show. He seams to know a lot about terroir! :=))

Also, you can send short clips from London to be included in the show.

My vote for the anniversary is to most definitely do a show from London. Even if that’s the only one you do from there, you have to do one on the anniversary, no? Just do one after the conference ends for the day, you’ll still be 5 hours (6?) ahead of east coast time, so plenty of time to record a show. You can use it as an example for the other folks in the web applications class.

QOTD: Has to be Jimmy Connors, with Johnny Mac a close second.

My vote for the anniversary is to most definitely do a show from London. Even if that’s the only one you do from there, you have to do one on the anniversary, no? Just do one after the conference ends for the day, you’ll still be 5 hours (6?) ahead of east coast time, so plenty of time to record a show. You can use it as an example for the other folks in the web applications class.

QOTD: Has to be Jimmy Connors, with Johnny Mac a close second.

Whooo! More wines to try! Thanks for getting me excited about all the different kinds of interesting white varietals out there. That “shark” bit had me splitting my sides, nice one there.

QOTD: My favorite tennis players have evolved over time, so hear goes:

Mens:
First half of his career: Michael Chang
Second half of his career: Agassi

Women:
Really liked Monica Seles in her prime (Hey, I was young, and I thought she was cute), but now I’d have to go with Steffi Graf.

GruVes are such food-friendly wines, I wonder if the scores of some of the bottles that you sampled might have benefited by pairing them with some fish, especially that salty sour bomb.

Can’t imagine drinking anything but bier in Austria. Good episode.

QOTD: Bobby Riggs

Thanks for doing this episode Gary. I am fortunate enough to have spent some time in Austria and I have been through the Wachau sampling some awesome Gruners that never make it to the US market. At some of the Heurigers, they serve cheeses, sausages, and other appetizers that pair perfectly with GVs. If any of the viewers can find the 2004 Gobelsburger GV, it is a huge bargain at around 10 bones. Parker gave it a 90, but it is a bit better than that. The Prager Hinter Der Burg 2005 that you were (are?) selling is very nice as well. The good thing is that these wines are typically inexpensive, so experimenting with many different makers is affordable and well worth it. I have had some that were trashed by WS or WA, but were actually fine examples of classic GV. Thanks again for the good episode. As an epilogue, you might want to explain some of the designations such as “Smaragd”, as these classifications can help guide the buyer toward a different and perhaps better experience.

qotd: Kournikova’s hot… and she was born like within a week of me!

Quit giving me all these new wines to try Gary… my shelves are going to bust.

I WILL ADOPT A LURKER! Holler!

Your comments and comparisons were so hilarious that I could see Dracula saying”I vant to bite your neck to put some Vertliner in your veins!” (Sorry):)
QOD: Pete Sampras, low-key but great!

anniversary idea – tape in London and post it from there of course, but do it outside or something so it doesn’t look like an OFFICE. And not only have free shipping, but a secret code word or something for those of us that live near WL and actually shop there (since free shipping doesn’t really do anything for us locals!)

Never had a gruner. I will now.
Chrissie and Billy
Jimmy and Nastasi

Anniversary Show from London with Big Ben in the background and the Queen as your guest.

Gary- I only was able to see 1/3 of todays episode, almost to the end of the first wine. I tried reloading it but to no avail. This has never happened before and was quite traumatic. Based on the comments, doesn’t look like anybody else had this problem so it must be an aberancy. Any suggestions?

had a though again – you could do an anniversary edition on the plane – with the wines that they serve in those little single serving size bottles. Then upload it once you get to London! I mean, its a conference on web stuff, so if someone there can[‘t help you figure out how to do it, then, well, it isn’t a very good conference is it?!

Grüner’s are such good food wines they are my go to after Alsace for foods as an alternative to Chardonnay (my wife’s favorites not mine) but there are many white varietals that go great with food including almost any Rhone white. Just lots of choices if you don’t like Chardonnay.
Not much of a tennis fan so can’t say, guess Borg, Conner Johhny Mac Agassi for the men, Williams sisters, Evert, Sabatini, Graf for the women.
Good call on the white pepper in Grüner. Always there with the grapefruit in the ones I like
While in London please review some English wines if you get a chance. With global warming they may be the next big wine region.
Any lurkers who want to be paired step up. I’m happy to add my advice.