The Friday Fermentable
terrasig | November 10, 2006Readers of this near-weekly feature have been the beneficiaries over the last few weeks of the wisdom from my scientific and wine colleague, Erleichda.
Now with the feature back in my hands, I am now realizing that one difficulty in keeping up is finding wines of value that are widely accessible to readers, geographically and financially.
For example, I would love to share with you a glass of what I am enjoying currently this Friday evening: an indulgent glass of 2003 Thorpe Reserve Shiraz from the McLaren Vale of South Australia. Crafted by expert winemaker, Linda Domas, the best way I…
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 | October 19, 2006This is kind of a homer version of The Friday Fermentable, but I think that it has enough international interest that I am putting it here and on the oft-neglected local blog, Bull City Bully Pulpit.
Many themes will come together here that involve science blogging and this will be our first discussion of beer since this feature began. To be honest, when I began making my own wine some 15 years ago, I realized it took so long to enjoy the wine I had made (at least a year or more) that I began brewing beer, a fermentable that can and generally should be enjoyed within three to four weeks.…
terrasig | October 5, 2006This other thing called the day job has interfered with my finishing the last bit of the curcumin series (on the piperine/Bioperine bioavailability enhancer) and a new post for The Friday Fermentable. I've also got some biz travel scheduled today, so I hope that gives me some wine and/or beer fodder for next week.
In the meantime, I urge readers interested in herbal remedies for cancer to revisit this week's posts:
Curcumin for Cancer: Part One
Curcumin for Cancer: Part Two
And, for those inclined toward the fruit of the vine, please be sure to read last week's Friday Fermentable by guest-…
terrasig | September 29, 2006Just clearing out the MSM that finds its way into Chez Pharmboy and was totally taken by a brief gadget alert on wine stuff written by Rebecca Hall in the Enterprise section of the 2 October issue of Newsweek:
Toying With Wine
by Rebecca Hall
If you can't sate your inner oenophile with stylish wine-glasses, there are plenty of cool new accessories on the market.
The Wine Sceptre (who wouldn't want to own a sceptre?) is a metal wand you freeze to keep a prechilled wine bottle at optimal temperature. It's inserted like a stirrer and hollowed out for pouring, and comes with a stopper--in gold,…
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 | September 17, 2006A back alley conversation among several ScienceBloggers is the impetus for this week's post.
A couple of weeks ago, Dave Munger over at Cognitive Daily asked all of us about our favorite cheap wine deals. So, with the permission of my SciBlings, I thought I'd let the readership in on the discussion and suggestions:
From the Mungers:
1. Jaja de Jau (nice Cotes de Roussillon, with great bite)
2. Goats do Roam (Grenache/Syrah from South Africa)
3. Antica Corte Valpolicella
A couple that used to be good but have fallen off in recent years. If you're still drinking these, you can find better:
1…
terrasig | September 1, 2006Another Wine Escapade : The Tuscan Dinner
by Erleichda, special guest correspondent to The Friday Fermentable
(Note to readers: As mentioned in previous editions, guest-blogger Erleichda is a slightly more senior colleague with a much more experienced and seasoned palate. I find Italian wines to be especially vexing, mostly due to their number and use of grape varieties seen rarely outside of Italy, but enjoy them tremendously when educated about them. Erleichda lives in one of those states with odd alcoholic regulatory laws, but I'd welcome the chance to do BYOB with him and his Sweetpea…
terrasig | August 20, 2006Dear Readers,
Due to the combination of hot weather, a paucity of drinking and reading, and the intrusions of the day job and events in the reality-based community, I've decided not to post The Friday Fermentable for this week.
Please be sure to check back next Friday, 25 August, when this feature returns in all of its effervescent, biochemical glory.
In the meantime, I've been planning to update my blogroll to include your own favorite imbibing blogs and web sites. If you have any favorite wine, beer, or spirits blogs or web columns that you'd like to see aggregated here, please use the…
terrasig | August 13, 2006Before we embark on another edition of The Friday Fermentable, the Pharmboy and everyone at Terra Sig sends out their best wishes to actor, Robin Williams, and his family.
Mr Williams' publicist announced earlier this week that the Academy Award-winning actor and brilliant comedian has checked into an alcohol rehabilitation center following a recent lapse in his 20 years of sobriety.
The Friday Fermentable is dedicated to the responsible enjoyment of alcoholic beverages as just one facet of a richly-experienced life journey. However, we recognize that many of us share a genetic…
terrasig | August 6, 2006This week's focus: What to do with all of that extra tequila lying about, especially during a nationwide heat wave.
Well, I've been out of touch with PharmMom and PharmStiefvater as of late, so this edition of The Friday Fermentable is dedicated to them in their new, year-round home in the Land of Enchantment, Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA.
Due to circumstances beyond my control, the posting of The Friday Fermentable is also being posted on New Mexico time, roughly two days late.
Regular readers of Terra Sig know that I am a big fan of The Wall Street Journal because of their tremendous…
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…
terrasig | July 26, 2006This week's 'Ask A ScienceBlogger' focuses on reports such as those in National Geographic and DailyKos that global warming is having, and will progressively have great influence, on wine grape-growing. The idea is that grapes grown for premium wine production are much more sensitive to climate than table grapes or many other agricultural products, making them an excellent living laboratory 'canary in a coalmine." A very appropriate question this week as we launched our feature, The Friday Fermentable, last week.
This issue has been bandied the wine industry over the last several years but…
terrasig | July 21, 2006Welcome to the inaugural edition of The Friday Fermentable, the end-of-week fun feature of Terra Sigillata. As I was on vacation and sick last week, I did not accomplish my goals of wine and beer tasting to share with you specific recommendations this week. So, let us take this week to explain our philosophy:
The mission statement for The Friday Fermentable is:
1. To celebrate the convergence of agriculture, biology, botany, chemistry, biochemistry, microbiology, neuroscience, pharmaceutics, and the pharmacology of natural products and herbal medicines in the production of historically-…
terrasig | July 14, 2006As alluded to on ScienceBlogs.com editors' Page 3.14 blog, many of us are formalizing our more light-hearted posts on Fridays to coincide with the inevitable dropoff in internet traffic and reality-based work.
I had intended to launch today "The Friday Fermentable," my views on the joys of partaking in the diversity of products resulting from biochemical conversion of glucose to ethyl alcohol by Saccharomyces cerevisiae and other yeasts, and the alchemy of other long chain alcohols, organic acids, and esters.
I was particularly excited because I am on vacation and am currently holding court…