Weekend Reading for a Monday

Here in the east, it's a rainy, drab Monday--perfect for catching up on any wine reading you missed this weekend. Here, then, are a few articles of note to get you through the day, and perhaps inspire what bottle you pop open this evening after work.

Decanter.com is reporting that Michel Chapoutier, highly regarded Rhone Valley winemaker, "is looking for land to make wine in England." This comes on the heels of a number of awards and accolades that the English wine industry has garnered lately, and seems to be another step along its road to international recognition and respect.

John Mariani, in this week's edition of The Virtual Gourmet, has a fascinating article on the benefits of large-format wine bottles, which are always a treat to open, and make any occasion a bit more remarkable than it otherwise would have been.

Then there are two articles I wrote that ran recently--one on the connection between wine and the people who are responsible for its creation, from Affluent Magazine, and another on a particularly memorable food and wine pairing I recently enjoyed, which ran on FoodRepublic.com.

And, finally, something a bit different than what we normally cover here--a great article on pairing sake with food, in the new issue of Sommelier Journal.