"news" news and stories

Southern wine. Photo: Amy C. Evans, flickr

Even in Louisville, Ky., a betting town where success is measured in wins, places and shows, few gamblers would have bet that master sommelier study partners Brett Davis and Scott Harper would pass their diploma exam on the same day.

The local boys defied the odds by becoming the only two test-takers out of 38 to pass the prestigious test last month, making them the first master sommeliers in the state of Kentucky. Harper's workplace, the Bristol Bar and Grille, will fete their achievement at a wine dinner next week.

With fewer than 200 wine professionals worldwide having earned the master sommelier title since it was established 30 years ago, two friends holding matching diplomas counts as a curiosity. Earning those diplomas at the same time is considered extraordinary.

"It's very unusual, very rare," confirms Davis, who's in the wine import business.

Hawk on chicken, New York City. Photo: D.Billy of I Am Not Lying

New Yorkers tend to throw fits about wildlife showing up in odd parts of their city. So we're unsurprised to hear that a local man was flustered when a large hawk flew into the restaurant where he was eating last week and perched on his lunch.

It'd be cruel to steal the story away from its hilarious original teller, whose best line was "I turned around to see it standing on my two-piece-with-side-and-soda combo, just chilling and looking out the window wistfully, as though a Sarah McLachlan song were playing in its head."

A phone call to the restaurant confirmed the tale, including the tidbit that a cook, Manoli (in the style of a true superhero, no one at the eatery knew his last name), whom a waitress describes as "pretty fearless," caught the thing in his bare hands when it flew into the kitchen. Said hawk was sent to the vet, who reportedly turned him over to a wildlife refuge.

The name of the eatery? Birdie's.

• Our pockets empty while our bellies fill with booze: "Canadians boosted alcohol sales by 4.3 percent [this year], funnelling more than $18.8 billion into the economy."
• SeaChoice now offers a downloadable sushi guide about locating sustainably sourced fish, but brace yourself -- the beloved unagi and hamachi are on the list.
• Laiterie Charlevoix's Le 1608 cheese -- the "pleasant tang of the long finish clinches this cheese's spot as a new Canadian favourite."
• Miga restaurant in Mississauga, Ontario, a favorite due to "wannabe luxe comforts."
• A guide to that Twitter cooking shorthand we've seen so much.
• Wine on a budget -- a general rule for which wines to grab and which to avoid.
  
• Au Petit Chavignol in Vancouver -- serious cheese, an amazing wine list and full meals.
• Next time you spy bubbles, it might not be club soda -- Ontario's about to get Camitz Sparkling Vodka.
• A talk with Kevin Kent, "possibly Canada's great prophet of Japanese knives."

Rishi is putting Milwaukee on the world tea map

Rishi took home seven first place awards at the recent World Tea Expo. They are definitely doing something right, and I personally recommend their Jade Cloud tea.

Cup of tea may ease memory problems

It turns out that the flavinoids in tea may actually help ease symptoms of neurodegenerative diseases, and there seems to the possibility that flavinoids in tea may help repair the damage, not just stop it.

A test in the art of gimhae style tea bowls

Teaware geeks will enjoy this write up by MattCha about Korean style gimhae tea bowls, complete with a brief history of this teaware style and several pictures of some very nice bowls.

32 Gongfu Tea Tables

This is a great article on gongfu tea tables, with in-depth comparisons that you really won't find anywhere else. It's very cool of the author to share all the info collected while on his own quest for hte perfect gongfu tea table. Bookmark this one if you ever want to get into gongfu tea preparation!

Last week CNN reported (and we posted about it) that food vendors in Bejing, China were selling steamed buns filled with a combination of "chopped cardboard, softened with an industrial chemical and flavored with fatty pork and powdered seasoning."

On the heels of reports of contaminated toothpaste, dog food and frozen fish from China, news agencies from around the world were willing to believe these reports of tainted street food. However, it seems now that the story was fabricated by an employee at Bejing TV in order to get a ratings boost. I've heard of folks in the TV world taking extreme measures for ratings, but this seems to be a bit much.