SCHOTT ZWEISEL MAKES THE BEST WINE GLASSES

 From Worldometer (new deaths yesterday):

        DAY  USA  WORLD   Brazil    India    South Africa

June     9     1093     4732       1185        246        82

July    22     1205     7128        1293      1120       572

Aug    12     1504     6556       1242       835       130

Sept     9      1208    6222        1136      1168        82

Oct     21     1225     6849         571       703         85

Nov    11     1479     10178         564       550        60

           25     2304     12025       620       518       118

           30     1238       8291        317       482        58

Dec       1     2611     11891          697      500       109

             2     2833     12356        669      498        65

             3     2918     12660        776       570        94

             4     2718     12142         674       509      160

             8     2913     11714         796       404      183 

             9     3265    12342         848       337      142

           10     3107     12932        769       487       173

            11     3031     12401        652       440      205

Summary:

• The USA remains a basket case.
• Thailand, which was #2 in cases, next to China, when I visited there earlier this year, has dropped to #151 in the world for cases, with 4180.  They have had 60 deaths.
• However, Hawaii, with 1/50th the population of Thailand (1.4 million versus 70 million), has had 18,951 cases and 269 deaths.  And we are doing well, for our deaths/million figure is one-fifth that of our  country (190 versus 916).  Leading the U.S. are New Jersey at 2011 and New York at 1821.  Hawaii is the second lowest to Vermont, at 152 deaths/million.

• 
  Interesting that the cruise ship, the Grand Princess, is listed with the U.S., having had 122 cases and 7 deaths.  If you are a seasoned reader of this blog site, you know that, if this pandemic never happened, in my next around the world trip to take in the World Expo in Dubai (which has been delayed a year, so I'm still planning to possibly leave around a year from now for this final journey) I seriously considered boarding this ship around this time from Vancouver, on a 47-day cruise to Singapore, then using the Star Alliance Global plan to fly the remainder of the adventure.

• 
  Singapore, incidentally, has had only 5 deaths/million, with China at 3 deaths/million.  
• Recall that the U.S. number is 916 deaths/million, and predicted by reliable sources to possibly double when the pandemic ends.  If anyone is to blame, it is President Donald Trump...and his followers.  The last time I checked, just people associated with the White House had 53 cases.  With the vaccine perhaps only a few days away,  no resident of 15 Craigside has so far been so infected.
• I noticed that many islands of the South Pacific, like Vanuatu, Samoa, Marshalls and Solomon, have had very few cases and no deaths.
• Vatican City had 27 cases and no deaths.
• Also, no deaths for Macao, Cambodia, Bhutan and Mongolia.

CAN YOU EAT SUSHI WITHOUT RICE?

This is a two-part posting, for today I show-off my next generation Riedel Chardonnay glasses, which I used for the first time with my experimental meal of sushi without rice.

To the left, one of the Riedel Wine Wings, said to be personally designed by the current president of the company, Georg Riedel.

Note the unusual shape for a chardonnay glass.  Ingredients for sushi:

I had my sushi meal with hot sake, hot green tea, cold beer and cold Chardonnay.  Those two black square containers are flavored Korean nori (seaweed).  The amazing thing is that if you place either a blue-fin tuna piece or avocado, with a spot of wasabi, you almost can't tell the difference.  This combination, with sea asparagus (under the fish), ikura (salmon eggs) and various tsukemono (Japanese pickles) into seaweed sandwiches, result in an almost infinite number of permutations:

The meal was rather high in sodium, but enjoyable even without rice.  I continue to be in a weight-losing mode, for while just a couple of days ago I was down to  a 25-year low of 153 pounds, I ballooned up to 157 just by eating a couple of snacks and a dessert.  Anyway, I found out that I can have sushi without rice.

The bad news is that these brand new Riedel Wine Wings are $35 each and extraordinarily fragile.  First, I washed them, and in the process, broke one just holding it.  I succeeded with the other, but after the meal, attempted to wash the second one.  That too just fell apart.  I was lucky not to cut my fingers.

I still needed a fine Chardonnay glass, so went to Amazon and ordered what that review yesterday recommended, Riedel Vinums, at $29.50 each.

 

In the same order, I also got two Schott Zweisel glasses, $14 each, and they all came in two days:

Note the difference in size:

CAN YOU HAVE TACOS WITHOUT TORTILLAS?

These wine glasses also came into play during my continued experimentation with taco bowls.  But first, not only did several wine glasses arrive from Amazon, but my Stanford wines came:

Yesterday was an unusual day, for 15 Craigside served me fish tacos for lunch and vegetable tacos for dinner (the second at my request because I wanted to combine them).

 I of course enhanced the above by frying the vegetable tacos mix with Japanese wagyu beef fat:

The fish they served was covered by a thick batter, which I removed.  Instead, I placed the fish in a ziploc bag, cracked an egg into it, some flour, then added corn flakes.  I then fried the concoction in olive oil.  Amazingly enough, the Corn Flakes worked.  The outer coating was crispy:

Placed both the beef/veg mix and fish pieces on to a large salad topped with those additives.  Introduced three kinds of hot sauce here and there.  There was so much volume that I skipped the usual Fritos.  Thus, I had a taco bowl with no tortillas:

Note the wine glasses:  the Stanford red and white into those Schott Zweisel and Riedel Vinum stemware, with beer in a Riedel champagne glass.

Then, to my left I noticed that the Sun was setting:

Not quite a green flash, but a few seconds later, I saw it.

So in summary, Riedel says that their glasses are shaped to enhance taste:

Is this true?  Well, if you consider the psychological value, where perception can make a difference.  Perhaps.

Certainly, SZ over Riedel because of cost.  Anyway, people tout Riedel to improve their wine snobbishness.  However, if you want to join an even higher class, try Lalique crystal.  They start at $140 each from Bloomingdales, and shoot up beyond $300.  You can get a decanter for $2800.

One more reason why Schott Zweisel is preferred over Riedel:  Riedel Sommelier class uses lead oxide to improve reflectivity.  However, their cheaper (but still more than double the cost of SZ glasses) Vinum glasses do not.  Well, that was one article.  Another says all Riedel glasses use lead, except for Ouverture.  I would trust this second one.

Here is the part that is particularly frightening.  Riedel glasses are 24% lead!

SZ Tritan crystal uses titanium and  zirconium, a patented system, which also strengthens the glass.  Can you get lead poisoning using one over the other?  Not really, but read this article, which almost warns you to keep away from wine glasses with lead.

So what is the bottom line?  I send you to this recent (December 2020) article by Wirecutter and The New York Times, which says Libbey Signature Kentfield Estate All-Purpose Wine Glass is the best all-purpose wine glass.  Costs less than $10 each.  But, aha, only for people who drink wine that costs $20 or less/bottle.

For more expensive wines, the stemware of their choice is Gabriel-Glass StandArt at $63 for two from Amazon.  It has a better feel.  They say nice glasses shouldn't be reserved for special occasions.  What they are trying to say is that you won't want to use your $139 Riedel every day, so you can feel more comfortable with the Gabriel.

Schott Zweisel is hardly mentioned.  I particularly loved the following graphics from this article:

Someday, I'll go into the best champagne crystal and the matter of bubbles.

I introduced my song #16 yesterday, It was a Very Good Year, by Frank Sinatra, which starts at the age of 17 and goes on.  Many think this was a very old song made more famous by Sinatra.  Actually, it was written by Ervin Drake in 1961 when I was still in college, and originally recorded by Bob Shane of the Kingston Trio.  This is closer to why I picked this so high in my favorites list. Drake wrote it for a girl he was dating, who he finally married 20 years later.

Frank picked it up in D minor after hearing the Kingston Trio's recording just around the time he turned 50, and in 1966 won a Grammy for Best Vocal Performance by a Male.  The single only peaked at #28.  His very good years were 17, 21 and 35...sort of same for me.  He related girls of those years to wine. How appropriate for the subject theme of this posting.

Maybe you remember William Shatner's version.  He was, of course, making fun of those lyrics, as he also did for Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds and Mr. Tambourine Man.

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