About time

I just read on a wine business web site that distributors are slashing prices to unload shelves full of dust collecting trophy bottles of wine. You know the ones, where someone with a straight face says this wine will be released at $150 or $250 or $1200 per bottle. Maybe some of you were actually caught up in this mass ego inflation exercise. Ego Inflation on the part of the winemaker in saying that "I am SO GOOD that my wine is worth two or three cases of anyone else's wine." Or maybe you were one of the ones duped into buying that marketing line and actually paid one of those ridiculous prices just to have a trophy wine. Why? To brag to your friends? To brag to yourself?

This whole sordid business of horrendously over inflated wine prices is part and parcel of the general ego malaise that gripped the country over the last seven or eight years. Too much money was made for essentially doing nothing so that the value of the money itself could not generate a real sense of achievement or value. The money itself, while plentiful for 1% of the population, became worthless from a standpoint of real value.

This was in part reflected in the wine high as demonstrated by winemakers actually able to charge, and get, such absurd prices for their wines. If these wines were indeed worth these prices, that would reflect an innate value in the wines themselves, whether Napa cabs or Bordeaux classed growths. But the prices have plummeted to the point that some distributors are discounting as much as 60% of what the release price was a year or two ago just to get these financial anchors out of the water.

Bordeaux exports took a nose dive in Britain for the same reason that trendy Napa producers are sitting on inventory.

Maybe now there will be an adjustment of prices to approach some sort of reality. Once the grapes are paid for and the labor and financial carrying charges plus a profit margin are factored in, the rest of an inflated price is ego in action.

Maybe it is time to think rather than boast or brag.

Next exciting chapter

Well, not much has happened since our last action packed installment. The publisher has had the revised manuscript for a little over a week. It goes to "readers" who decide if it is ready to present to the university review board.

Publisher number two was sent two ideas for other books I am working on and also no response from them either.

Even if nothing gets published this has been a great experience. I learned lots about some great people I did not know before and just the discipline of keeping at writing over three hundred pages was a trip.

Hopefully more later on the adventure.

Web site address

For those of you interested in learning more about wine whether personally or for your business, take a look at my web site, http://web.me.com/winewithachef/Site.

Talk soon.

So you want to write a cookbook?

Having recently seen "Julie and Julia," which I thought was a fabulous movie, I got to thinking about the process of writing and publishing a cookbook. Or a book on food or wine. Or maybe on anything.

It was just a year ago that I decided to author my own book, a combination of culinary history and cookbook, focusing on a number of cookbook authors, each of whom had a profound influence on the food we cook and eat today. Authors are from the earliest American cookbook to the first chef for the St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco.

The format was relatively easy: write a biographical section on each author that would also place them in a historical context of the country as a whole. Recipes from their original books would follow with modern adaptions and some updating of syntax where required.

I had a great time writing the book and learned a lot. As a food professional for many years, I was wonderfully surprised to discover all this "new" information. Once the book was about 75% written, I decided that I would find a publisher.

After reading a couple "how to publish your literary masterpiece" books that all said the same thing, one item made sense. Get an agent. Many publishers do not look at manuscripts unless forwarded by a known or established literary agent.

Well. The first three months were something less than a joy. Many no responses. Some "you gotta be kidding, right," responses. Some nicely written that were ultimately, "sorry find somebody else." I did receive a rejection from an agent in Ireland who used wonderful language in his rejection. I actually laughed it was so well written. Yes, this is a "No," but let's not be all too serious about it.

Then started the process of writing directly to publishers. Which is a whole 'nother story.

Tune in for the next exciting chapter.