Daddy Winebucks

As the saying goes, “Records were made to be broken.”  Yet after almost 70 years (70!) one baseball record has stood alone as perhaps unbreakable.  That of course is Joe DiMaggio’s streak of getting a hit in 56 consecutive games.

I’d put this in some better metaphorical perspective, something that would blow your mind like, “laid end to end, these hits would reach to the moon and back” but truth be told I’m not much of a baseball fan and am only using DiMaggio’s record as a cheap way to introduce a wine tasting stunt I have percolating in my brain.

And what does Trader Joe’s have to do with all this?

Well, is there a funner place to buy wine if you’re lucky enough to live within traveling distance of one?  I say no.  Where else can you browse wines you’ve never heard off, with prices also unheard of, to serve later that day with your daily food choice?  They’ve certainly changed the landscape of wine buying in LA for me, best evident by the way places like Whole Foods and Ralphs now approach wine sales.  Choices abound in the under $10.00 range everywhere you shop.

Yes, this speaks of a better emphasis around the world (and here at home) for high quality, low cost wines, but in my mind you have “The Joe” to thank for that.  Someone has to find all these wines to set up for our pleasure.

So this brings me back to Joe DiMaggio’s streak.  Here’s what I propose to do.  Each night, I will open a bottle of wine I bought at Trader Joe’s and report back on what I think of it.  Using a familiar system: single, double, triple, home run (damn, I’m clever!) I will try to break Joltin’ Joe’s streak of 56.

I intend to do this honestly, meaning if I try a wine that is a true clunker, the streak is over.  At worst, this experiment will be done tonight when I step up to the plate to try a wine called, “Slow Paseo”, an Organic Spanish red distributed by Latitude Wines in Danville, CA.  At best though, we’ll have at least 57 new wines we can add to our collective rotation.  Hopefully more!

Now batting (batting, batting), from Encino, California (California, California), Eric (Eric) Cohen (Cohen)…