An Eminent Voice Joins the Wine Blogging World
Tuesday, April 14th, 2009
After 35 years in the Spanish wine trade, 25 of which were spent at various capacities in the upper echelons of the Rioja wine world — including 14 years as managing director (and most public face) of the Rioja Wine Exporters Association–Midwestern native Tom Perry recently took an early retirement from the upper Ebro valley’s daily grind to ply his trade in a more freelancerly fashion as a marketing consultant, wine educator, and itinerant lecturer.
Rioja’s loss is our gain, since part of the package of his new pursuits includes the launching this month of a new wine blog called Inside Rioja.
Anyone within the realm of Rioja wine scholarship, journalism, travel writing, etc. who’s been inspired to elucidate what they’ve found in Rioja over the last two decades–myself included– owes a huge debt to Mr. Perry and his tireless enthusiasm for the food, wine, history, and culture of the region that’s been his home for over a quarter century.
It’s hardly surprising that, after only 14 days in the blogging universe, his posts have already covered: orange-yolked farm fresh eggs; rustic ‘almuerzos’ enjoyed under the bleachers of the Logroño bullring during harvest festivals; the provenance of old vines Garnacha in Rioja; the little-known, innovative exploits of a certain overlooked priest named Manuel Quintana in the early 19th century; and the mechanics of whole berry fermentation.
The Spanish wine blogging world has just been racheted up by several notches.
