June is National Dairy Month. It started as National Milk Month and was intended to promote drinking cold glasses of milk in the warm summer months. These days, Americans eat more dairy than they drink. Cheese consumption is at an all time high according to the International Dairy Foods Association, with Americans eating more than 40 pounds of the stuff annually.
There s even a National Cheese Day, which is Friday.
The origins of cheese go back some 4,000 years. The food is thought to have been an accident, born from an Arabian merchant traveling through the dessert with milk stored in a pouch made from a sheep s stomach. When he opened the pouch, the milk had separated into curd and whey.
It was love at first sight for Florence Cathiard when she saw the property at Flora Springs.
Florence, along with her husband, Daniel, owns Château Smith-Haut-Lafitte in Bordeaux. That original foray into the wine business was in 1984 and Smith-Haut-Lafitte was a run-down mess, with a hole in the winery roof. Today it has been rejuvenated into one of Bordeaux’s elite properties, and its neighboring Sources de Caudalie is one of the world’s top eno-tourism spots.
The couple has since gone on to purchase châteaus Le Thil, Cantelys, Beauregard, Bastor-Lamontagne and St.-Robert in Bordeaux, as well as develop additional luxury hotels, spas and a ski chalet. The Flora Springs purchase is their first foray outside of France.
New Names, New Wines from Napa
As some readers know, I’ve only recently been able to dedicate more time to writing here on Vinography after a number of years being an entrepreneur and small business owner trying to squeeze in some wine writing around the edges. By virtue of that struggle for time, I have not exactly kept up with new developments in California wine at the level to which I aspite. There was a time that thanks to an endless parade of large public tastings, I was almost sure to hear about new wine projects soon after they popped up.
Posh French Winemakers Pounce on Big American Vineyard Selloff msn.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from msn.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.