One of the most popular categories of wines in the last two years is the nearly ubiquitous blended red wine, which is so popular that it has become synonymous with everyday drinking for millions of Americans. A couple of weeks ago, a stranger, hearing I was a wine writer, asked me what I thought of…

You’d think that the 2022 U.S. wine-grape harvest ended months ago, but curiously it’s now harvest time in a small number of northern hemisphere areas with conditions that couldn’t be stranger. That’s the word out in northern Michigan, which a week ago experienced such cold weather (minus 7 degrees F on Jan. 31!) that any…

I renamed it the “unhappy hour,” even though the thought was appreciated. The hotel put out two wines at 4 p.m. in its lobby, a white and a red. A sign invited guests to help themselves. Ignoring that the wine wasn’t exciting, I nonetheless poured two glasses and we sat on a couch. Then I…