Blogs of Note: One Oldish, One Newish, Both Vital

Taking a day off from writing yesterday enabled me to catch up on reading 'round the web, in the course of which I was reminded of two things I've been meaning to (re)share: the greatness of Wine Terroirs and the astounding launch of So You Want to be a Sommelier.

Bert Celce has been traveling the world, capturing his experiences with a camera and illuminating those travels and photgraphs with remarkable detail (and remarkably good English for a non-native speaker) at his blog, Wine Terroirs, since January 2004.  That makes him, undeniably, one of the senior statesmen of the wine blogging world, and he still does it with a level of enthusiasm—not to mention great content—that always keeps me coming back for more.  I've already given Bert a "Blogs of Note" shout-out here, way back in May 2008, but yesterday's visit—and his most recent post chronicling the disgorgement of the first sparkling wine produced by Touraine vigneronne Noëlla Morantin—reminded me of why I not only need to read his site more often but also really needed to re-share it with my own readers.  So here you go.... It's worth a look for the quality of the photos alone (that's one of Bert's shots above) but don't skip the every bit as worthy read.  Of course, it doesn't hurt that I also have a serious wine crush on Noëlla....

My own shot of Ms. Morantin in NYC, October 2009.

So You Want to be a Sommelier? is the recently launched brainchild of the ever erudite*, occasionally ascerbic of wit, and always all around good guy Levi Dalton.

The beverage director at Alto in New York City, Levi is indeed a sommelier, one of the city's best in my experience.  He's also a friend (that's my pic of him at right, snapped during a vertical tasting of Torbido! at Alto last month).  But this is no shill; it's an honest, forthright, and, yes, friendly endorsement of what I fully expect to be a damn good blog.

Levi has only been at it since the beginning of December but he's off to a running start.  An active patient participant in the discussion chambers at Wine Disorder (formerly Wine Therapy) for many a year, Levi's first several posts were "reprints" of detailed posts originally shared only at Disorder.  He's since made a quick transition into original posts.  Between the quality of his writing, a welcome thread of humor, and the sheer quantity of sick vino that passes his way (in terms of depth and diversity that is, not volume), it's a new blog that I very much look forward to reading as it grows.

(*Alice's word, not mine, but it was too apropos not to run with it.)