Erleichda
terrasig | April 17, 2009Our dear colleague, Erleichda, is back with another wine dinner experience. For those new to the blog, Erleichda is my slightly-senior colleague from whom I have learned a great deal about life and science. Recently retired from the discovery and development of life-saving anticancer drugs, he posts routinely on the escapades of his travels and wine dinners with his friends, known by the name "Jim's Disciples" to acknowledge their recently departed founder. This is an older column that I missed posting awhile back so here it is for your enjoyment.
Another Wine Experience: Dinner Paired…
terrasig | November 21, 2008Recent Wine Experiences - Mediterranean (and nearby) Island Wines
by Erleichda
Sweetpea and I enjoy (gentle) hiking vacations, and we share this fondness with a small group of other likeminded hiker friends. I attempt to steer our selected destinations to places where grapes grow, and this has brought us, so far, to Sicily and the Greek islands. So when the theme for the latest gathering of Jim's Disciples were wines of the Mediterranean and nearby islands, I was excited by the opportunity to explore some wines not heretofore tasted, and whose origins might provide the basis for future…
terrasig | October 10, 2008Another Wine Experience- A romp thru northern Italy: the Piemonte
by Erleichda
Following a week of hiking around lakes Orta, Maggiore and Como, the eight of us piled into a rented van with all our luggage and headed for the Piedmont (or Piemonte) region, home of dolcetto, barbera, barbaresco and barolo wines. Lucky us (or was it good planning?), we arrived in Alba just in time for lunch and a few hours before the beginning of the annual wine festival. More than 100 wine producers, and a thousand different wines, awaited our tasting glasses (10 euros for a wine glass as an admission price,…
terrasig | August 1, 2008This morning our dear friend and colleague whose wine escapades often fill this spot awoke to the rewards of retirement. My senior cancer research colleague, Erleichda, has just closed the book on 30 years with a single pharmaceutical company, unheard of in today's climate of layoffs and jumping from one company to the next.
My friend began in this industry when it was still considered a noble pursuit and continued to be an ambassador for all that is good about pharmaceutical research & development, with his primary concern the welfare of those stricken with cancer and the cultivation…
terrasig | July 11, 2008Another Wine Experience: A Romp thru Northern Italy's Lake Country
By Erleichda (about the author)
We touched down very early in Milan on what, for all eight of us, would mark the beginning of our hiking week in the Lake Country of northern Italy, a destination we had chosen after last year's successful Lot Valley (France) hiking experience. Sweetpea had to crash as she is circadian rhythm-challenged (easily jet lagged) while the rest of us got our leg muscles warmed up by walking to the Duomo and then climbing up to its roof for a great view of the city. By the time we walked to La Scala…
terrasig | May 23, 2008Another Wine Experience - Syrahs from Europe and the US
By Erleichda
We've been having so many of our wine dinners the past two years that the group has had to return to its favorite haunts. Such was the case one Friday evening as we set about to taste Syrahs from the US and Europe. I have generally preferred my Syrahs blended, which is to say accompanied by other grape varieties such as one finds in the Rhone wines from the south of France. But tonight it was to be a tasting of just Syrah.
Getting a head start before any appetizers arrived, we passed around the first bottle of the evening…
terrasig | April 11, 2008Another Wine Experience: North American Meritage
by Erleichda
The wine-dinner group met recently at a local unpretentious BYOB restaurant. We are surely fortunate to have so many of these restaurants in the vicinity for they curtail greatly our costs for dining out.
The theme for this evening's wine tasting was the blend of Bordeaux grapes known hereabouts as "Meritage." The term Meritage is a registered trademark, and red wines bearing this description must contain at least two of the grapes used in the mix found in the red wines from Bordeaux, i.e., cabernet sauvignon, merlot, cabernet…
terrasig | March 7, 2008[Back by popular demand is my Friday Fermentable co-blogger, Erleichda - to read all of the offerings from my silver-tongued and golden-palated friend, see this compilation. For new readers, here is The Friday Fermentable mission statement.]
Another Wine Experience : 2002 White & Red Burgundies
By Erleichda
It was Mort's fault. As alluded to obliquely a few columns ago, it was he who introduced me to "fine wines.". So many years ago, the story has improved with each telling, I was invited to participate in my first trout fishing adventure. After hours of practice casting, I was ready…
terrasig | February 8, 2008Another Wine Experience - Spanish wines from Ribera del Duero and Rioja
By Erleichda
The gathering of Jim's Disciples met at a nearby BYOB restaurant that we had used before for the monthly wine dinner. Most of the diners were outside on the patio enjoying a marvelous summer evening, while the ten of us gathered indoors (in what had been an 18th century stone barn) so as not to disturb the more genteel crowd. I would have preferred dining under the stars, but I understood the difficulty in attempting to accommodate us in the midst of romantic twosomes. Instead, we had to content ourselves…
terrasig | January 18, 2008Erleichda is the nom de plume of a guest blogger who contributes regularly to The Friday Fermentable columns. The act of contributing a column periodically on the topic of wine is consistent with the philosophy embodied in his pseudonym, i.e., to "lighten up" (from 'Jitterbug Perfume' by Tom Robbins).
Erleichda holds a PhD in microbiology following a baccalaureate in the same discipline. Post-doctoral training was received in tumor immunology and virology. While initial employment involved transplantation immunology research for a few years, a subsequent job at a research institute focused…
terrasig | November 30, 2007My colleague and guest wine blogger, Erleichda, wrote previously on his birthday trip to New Zealand's wine destinations. I accidentally posted his writings in reverse, with his description of wines of the Marlborough district here. Below was intended to be the first of the two columns.
Another Wine Escapade: New Zealand's Central Otago Region
by Erleichda
Having reached another even decade of aging, I decided to celebrate by visiting a destination I had wanted to experience, New Zealand (NZ). (I could have chosen Tahiti, but I'm saving that one for when the prospect of climbing onto…
terrasig | November 2, 2007For new readers, The Friday Fermentable is our fun end-of-week feature devoted to the fruits of biochemical processes: wine and beer. I am fortunate to have a senior and more well-traveled colleague, Erleichda, who shares with us his wine escapades as accompanied by his beloved Sweetpea. Everytime Erleichda posts, I put another pin on my world map of places I need to visit. The New Zealand Marlborough Valley is no exception. In fact, annotating his post with the winery websites showed me the incredibly beautiful country in which these wines were tasted. Enjoy!
Another Wine Experience:…
terrasig | August 31, 2007Another Wine Experience: Châteauneuf du Pape Tastings
By Erleichda
Another twosome of Jim's Disciples, not to mention their also being members of the "Hiking Group", celebrated one of those even decade important birthdays. Well, important enough to justify spending a little extra celebrating the milestone. Those of us attending the party, dedicated to toasting the couple with Châteauneuf du Pape (CdP) wines, were appreciative of the opportunity to help usher in their next 50 years. [Wikipedia has a brief but informative history of the Châteauneuf du Pape, literally, "New House of the Pope…
terrasig | August 24, 2007Another Wine Experience: Little Known or Under Publicized Grape Varieties
by Erleichda
It was my turn again to name a theme for the almost monthly get together of our wine dinner group, "Jim's Disciples". I thought to push the envelope a bit by asking everyone to bring a wine that used a grape variety they hadn't heard of before, and which represented at least 70% of the wine in the bottle. There were no other restrictions or guidelines. Unfortunately, only about half my tasting notes survived the evening, and so I can only relate a portion of what occurred.
I also chose a BYO Italian…
terrasig | June 7, 2007Another Wine Escapade - "Some Old World vs. New"
by Erleichda
Our wine and dinner group known as Jim's Disciples met recently at a BYOB neighborhood Italian-American restaurant. It wasn't my neighborhood, as there is nothing close by to the woods where we reside, but the sort of place a neighborhood would be proud to call its own, a gem of a place, tucked away on a darkened side street. The organizer for this evening's entertainment thought we might scrutinize old world versus new, of whatever grape varieties we felt like comparing. And, to make it interesting, each pair of wines brought…
terrasig | March 23, 2007I must extend hearty apologies to my colleague, wine and research mentor, and guest blogger Erleichda for overlooking a great wine column he wrote for Terra Sig back in November. November! How could I overlook a post whose third paragraph begins, "The evening began with three different champagnes..."?!? As The Friday Fermentable has been running on-and-off, I should be more grateful to him for keeping this Friday fun feature alive. So, here ya go - cheers!
Recent Wine Experiences : A Pinot Noir Revelation
By Erleichda
I grew up with limited exposure to wine, primarily my father's…
terrasig | November 8, 2006Natural products is an interesting field of science since various parts of it appeal greatly to different segments of the general public.
Hence, we are very excited and honored to be recognized by the culinary functional foods and nutraceuticals blog, Eating Fabulous, written by Ruth Schaffer at b5media.
Interestingly, we were recognized for our general content on dietary supplements. I must certainly make Ms. Schaffer aware of the intermittent weekly installments of The Friday Fermentable, especially with the more culinary contributions of my more learned oenology and cancer research…
terrasig | November 3, 2006Another Wine Escapade: Valle du Lot
by Erleichda
Sweetpea and I enjoy hiking as a platform for vacationing (when we're not partaking of some beach spot). We've managed to attract a few likeminded fellow hikers, and are now able to customize our adventurers to suit our collective preferences. One of my only preferences has been that we visit a place that is known for their wines. In early May, we and three other couples set forth for the Lot Valley of SW France.
Not as well known as nearby Bordeaux, or Provence, at least not by Americans, the Valle du Lot has been a thriving…
terrasig | September 29, 2006In late August, our colleague and correspondent Erleichda conducted a winetasting of some offerings from Virginia, picked up on a tour with his beloved Sweetpea. The tasting fell on PharmPreKer's birthday, so we were unable to make it, but here is Erleichda's missive.
Two things strike me: first, is a whole new education he is giving us about cheeses, an area of my supreme ignorance. Second, is something many of you have known for years: that lovely wines are being made all over the US outside of California and the Northwest. All I can say is that I have to start plotting out our own tour…
terrasig | July 28, 2006Welcome to our 2nd installment of The Friday Fermentable, Terra Sigillata's Friday fun-blogging feature. You can read our mission statement at the original post last week, but the goal, briefly, is to celebrate the particular class of natural products that result from the yeast-based fermentation of sugars from grapes, malted barley, and any plant-based sugar source. Our target audience is the graduate student or postdoc who, in my day, was usually pretty poor but starving for culture and knowledge (Shelley Batts' $25K graduate stipend at Michigan notwithstanding).
So, I spoke last week of…