World-record tasting attempt in Finger Lakes

GENEVA, NY – The 2nd annual Finger Lakes Music & Wine Festival will have a twist this year: Sample for a Cause.

The event, scheduled for Saturday, August 18, in this Seneca Lake city, will be the setting for what organizers hope will go in the record books as the largest wine tasting event in the world.

The current world record for such an event is 5,095 participants who visited the Plaza de Toros in Arando de Duero, Spain, on September 15, 2006.

With more than 100 wineries, the Finger Lakes region will be able to offer many different wines to festival visitors. And, $2 from every wine tasting ticket sold will go directly to Geneva’s Happiness House to help fund local programs.

If you’d like to get a group together to join the record attempt, here are the details. Wine tasting hours: 3 to 8 p.m., admission to the attempt; 7 to 8 p.m., call-up to all participants.

• Participants are to gather in the designated, fenced-in tasting area to count toward the world record attempt A digital counter above the gate will display the number of patrons in the t area at any given time. 

• During the attempt period all entries and exits by patrons are automatically recorded by an electronic counting system. Specific focus will be placed on the 7 to 8 p.m. period, unless the record is broken before that specific time. 

• An official adjudicator will be present and witness the attempt. If the record is broken, the adjudicator will publicly announce the success of the attempt and hand a plaque to the mayor of Geneva on the main festival stage. 

Wine tasting tickets are $15 per person, 21 and over only. They may be purchased online or at the festival gates on the day of the event. No admission to those under 21. Tickets can be purchased online or at the festival gates on the days of the festival. Full details are available online.

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Trumps to ex-winery owner: You're fired

Eric F. Trump

Donald Trump has really completed his takeover of the Kluge Estate Winery.

After purchasing the Charlottesville, VA, winery and renaming it -- what else? Trump Winery -- the mogul has fired its founder and former owner, Patricia Kluge.

 Kluge founded the winery after divorcing her husband, businessman John Kluge, and receiving a $100 million divorce settlement.

Despite all that money, she quickly ran into financial problems and declared bankruptcy in 2011. Shortly afterward, Kluge sold the winery to Trump for $6.2 million.

Trump kept Kluge on to help run the winery while he put his own team in place. His son Eric F. Trump now runs the complex, and he and Papa Trump told Kluge her services no longer were needed.

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Brooklyn wineries offering orange wines

BROOKLYN, NY -- Someone once said Americans will drink or eat anything if it's colored orange. At least two New York wineries are hoping that's true.

Both the Brooklyn Winery and Brooklyn Oenology have produced unusual wines from oranges.

A 2010 Brooklyn Winery Finger Lakes Orange Chardonnay is being offered for $22 for a 375ml "half bottle," or $15 by the glass at its 213 North Eighth Street location (between Driggs Avenue and Roebling Street).

A 2010 Brooklyn Oenology Orange Pinot Gris is being offered at $25 for a 750ml bottle, or $11 by the glass at its 209 Wythe Avenue (at North Third Street) location.

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Drinking scene rejiggered in Kansas

TOPEKA, KS -- The Jayhawk State's drinking scene is in the midst of major changes.

Under a bill signed into law by Governor Sam Brownback, changes effective July 1 include:

• Liquor stores will be allowed to offer free wine, beer and liquor tastings as of Sunday, July 1.

• Dinner railway cars can obtain a liquor license. State Rep. TerriLois Gregory, R-Baldwin City, said the measure was aimed at luring a Nebraska dinner train business to operate between Baldwin City and Ottawa.

• Drinking establishments may offer "happy hour” specials. Previously, could offer special drink prices, but those charges had to last all day.

• Micro-distilleries will be allowed to to sell and serve their products on their premises.

Another provision of the law, that went into effect on May 31, allows visitors at wine tasting festivals to taste samples and buy bottles of those same wines at the event. Previously, wine tasting visitors had to go to the individual wineries to purchase those same wines.

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Shipwrecked Champagne brings hearty bids

A Veuve Clicquot

Champagne is at its best well-chilled, but this is ridiculous.

Eleven bottles of Champagne that had sat on the bottom of the frigid Baltic Sea for 170 years sold at auction Friday for a total of more than $156,000 in Mariehamn, capital of the autonomous Finnish region of Aaland.

They had been part of the cargo of a schooner that sunk in 1842 between Finland and Sweden. By chance, the wine was perfectly "stored" horizontally.

Divers exploring the shipwreck found 162 bottles, 79 of them drinkable. Four were Veuve Clicquot. The highest-priced bottle fetched a winning bid of $18,721.50.

A single bottle of Veuve Clicquot from the same shipwreck was auctioned last year for $37,400. Profits from the auction will go to a variety of charitable causes.

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Canada to allow inter-province wine transport

• From the Edmonton Journal

Raise a glass, wine lovers. Canadians will soon be allowed to transport wines across provincial borders after MPs from all parties voted late Wednesday to support a private member's bill that will free our grapes.

Bill C-311 from British Columbia Tory MP Dan Albas proposes ending a decades-old prohibition on inter-provincial wine shipments. The bill, which passed by a vote of 287-0 during third reading in the House of Commons, would also allow Canadians to shop for wines online and ship them across borders.

"The wine industry has had this thorn in their side for 84 years. It's time to free the grapes," Albas told reporters Wednesday on Parliament Hill before the vote.

Under the circa-1928 Importation of Intoxicating Liquors Act, it is illegal to transport wines across provincial lines. The offence is punishable by a $200 fine or even jail time.  

[Go here for the full story.]

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