A good friend who called me last night to ask me how I make a Negroni. So please consider this as a public service announcement. Let me start by telling you that I have never been a bartender. have no piercings, I am not now, nor have I ever worn a bowler hat. Same goes for arm gators - never. The point here is that I make it the way I enjoy it.

Have you ever lifted a bottle of champagne and thought, “Wow, that’s heavy!&# Well, the bottles are heavy partly with good reason: to contain all the sparkly goodness, which can be six times the atmospheric pressure. And, of course, there’s a little bling factor to the bulk.)

Open less than 2 weeks ago and ready to do business, Vin Et Fleurs is on my list of new wine bars to visit in the near future. passed by yesterday to peek in and it looks like a cozy spot for a bite and a glass of wine. Will be posting soon

Who is man enough for an impossible food-wine pairing? Well, for those with a set of steel, head on over to the seventh (!) annual World Testicle Cooking Championship in Serbia. There, the AP reports that chefs prepare bull, boar, camel, ostrich and kangaroo testicles in such dishes as testicle pizza and testicles in bechamel sauce. Outback oysters!

I was in New Orleans recently and I had the opportunity to try out some of your recommendations from a while back. Very impressive in general, the eating and drinking in the Crescent City, but you already know that. Just a couple of things to share, almost all of them great: So many of the houses are stately and beautiful. No, I am not kidding.

A couple of years ago, I had an op-ed in the NYT arguing for wine in a box. Since then, box wine sales have skyrocketed and many more selections, both foreign and domestic, have come on the market. But one category that seems woefully underrepresented stateside is rosé. Last week I was on vacation and wished I had a box of rosé in the fridge.

It is commonly said that 2004 is the worst recent vintage for red wine in Burgundy. The weather was not good - lots of rain and a lot of rot. But that in itself is probably not the biggest problem with the 2004's. As Bill Nanson of Burgundy Report first wrote about , ladybugs were all over the vineyards in 2004. bought some 2004 wines. Vivant.