Tonight Paula & I went to a Bourbon and Big Red Wine Dinner. The friends and family we shared it with made for great conversation. I was impressed with the bourbon and the wine. This got me to thinking about the first time I ever had a fine wine. In a previous blog I mentioned that my grandfather and the other men on the block (31st Street in Brooklyn between 3r and 4th Ave) engage in an annual wine making. that wine appeared at every dinner and ever sunday a new gallon was opened. The wine was rough but just knowing it was home made it significant.
However, the first fine wine i consumed was paradoxically drunk in the midst of a war.
It was in Viet Nam, 1971. We had a relatively difficult week. We were given a weekend pass to Saigon! Myself and some comrades were wandering around the Cholon district when we came across a French restaurant( remember Viet Nam was a French colony). The proprietor brought out a bottle of a 1951 Chateau Rothschild. The bottle was dusty, the label was muddled, but the taste was exquisite.
The paradox was that delight was found in the midst of the anguish of war!
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