Alexis Bespaloff: Witty and Wise Guide to Wine

[Gifted Gourmet]

New York Times obituary

Alexis Bespaloff, wine columnist for New York Magazine, the author of six books on wine and a frequent contributor to food, wine and travel magazines ... Mr. Bespaloff joined the ranks of prominent wine writers with the publication of "The Signet Book of Wine" in 1971. "Alexis Bespaloff's Guide to Inexpensive Wines" appeared in 1973, and a literary anthology, "The Fireside Book of Wine," was published in 1977....with the virtual explosion of winemaking and wine interest around the world, he considered himself fortunate to be involved in what he called the best of times for wine lovers... For oenophiles, this is the golden age, and there is every reason to predict that the next millennium will enable this specialized world to shine even more brightly."

Does anyone, either a wine lover or not, agree with Bespaloff's contention that today is actually "the golden age of wines"?

Bespaloff was apparently a very well known wine author ... is anyone familiar with some of his writing?

[MaxH]

Hi Gifted Gourmet, I just spotted this posting. (I posted recently on this topic elsewhere.) By the way, Bespaloff was cited more than once on this forum, including a little bibliography of classic wine-demystification books in This Thread.

Bespaloff is better known for a couple of other, larger wine books including the Signet Book of Wine, but his Guide to Inexpensive Wines (1973), mentioned in the earlier thread, is useful for historical perspective in incidental remarks (more than for its recommendation specifics).

Narsai David's former restaurant near Berkeley (Narsai's) featured a simple old-fashioned specialty dish, honorifically named Suprêmes de Volaille (i.e., chicken breasts) “Alexis Bespaloff”. It's on a Narsai's menu I have on file from 1978 and I duplicated it at home in those days, more or less (a sauté finished with shallots, Sauternes, and cream). Later, with credit to the restaurant of course, I posted my approximation to the main Internet wines forum at the time (July 1988, in a thread on Sauternes wines), where it proved popular, and surfaced periodically later. (I still have it handy.)

Alexis Bespaloff was one of the US wine writers I found valuable when learning about wine in the middle 1970s. With other journalistic writers (Asher, Blue, Spinazzola, Prial, etc.), and the further group of writers who published independent wine newsletters starting in the 1970s, he contributed to the legacy of independent US popular wine writing and demystification.

-- Max

Edited April 26, 2006 by MaxH (log)

[Craig Camp]

Alexis brought millions into the world of wine. You can find my comments on his passing here