Stupid but fun... Take the Alcohol Knowledge Test to find how how hardcore a drinker you are, and to test how well you know beer, wine and liquor. I'm "134 proof" -- 60th percentile for guys my age. I also scored at the 88th percentile on beer, 98th percentile on wine and 94th percentile on liquor. Time to call AA?
 :: posted by Dante Ramos at 9:04 PM
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Cemetery savior. Last week Steph and I went to a fund-raiser for Save Our Cemeteries. It was billed as "a tasting of Napa Valley wines," and it had the potential to be lame or terrific. Turned out to be the latter. There were so many great wineries there that there wasn't time to check out a fraction of them.
     The highlights for me were the 2001 Robert Keenan Winery "Mernet" (a Merlot/Cabernet Sauvignon blend), 1987 Spring Mountain Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon and especially the 2001 Spring Mountain Vineyard Elivette Reserve. This last wine was shockingly good, though the $90 price tag tends to cool one's ardor a bit.
 :: posted by Dante Ramos at 9:35 PM
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"Fahrenheit 9/11" for the "Sideways" set. I'm not much on demagogic documentaries, but "Mondovino" might be worth seeing, if it ever opens in New Orleans. Slate's wine guy takes out after it:

When Guibert first appears on the screen, he is seen walking through a vineyard, glumly declaring, "Wine is dead." De Montille is also a fount of pessimism. In one of the film's loopier moments, he even tells Nossiter that the French wine industry's woes are the result of an American plot.

The movie's official Web site is here but appears to be French-only.
 :: posted by Dante Ramos at 7:47 AM
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Restaurant rave. Gary and I went to Bank Café on Burgundy Street in the Marigny last night because some friends of ours had liked it -- so much so that they were arriving at the restaurant just as we were. So we all had a drink at the bar. Promising sign #1: The bartender, fresh from New York, was using a pestle to grind actual blackberries into his blackberry martinis.
     Sign #2: If I see homemade ravioli on a menu, I almost always order it. Ditto for seviche. Bank has both on the appetizer list -- a mushroom-and-goat-cheese ravioli and a redfish seviche with homemade tortilla chips. I ordered the former; friend Randy ordered the latter. Both were terrific. So was my entree, two huge hunks of tuna served on top of tomatoes, fresh lima beans and gnocchi.
     I never looked at the wine list, but friend Don ordered a bottle of 2002 Verget Pouilly-Fuisse. It's a pleasant and vaguely herbal white wine from Burgundy ($25-ish retail, $50-ish at the restaurant), and it proves that when it's not drowning in oak and butter Chardonnay can be a great accompaniment for fish and spring vegetables.
     The chef at Bank Café is Dan Esses, who taught a couple of the Savvy Gourmet classes I took a while back; in fact, the panna cotta he made during one session was on the menu last night. Brett's review of the place a couple of months back suggested that it was promising but had some problems to iron out. By and large, they're ironed.
 :: posted by Dante Ramos at 8:31 AM
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