The Ürziger Würzgarten vineyard, with construction cranes in the background. (Uploaded to Flickr by Vincisive)

Amazon.com isn’t the only large online retailer planning to allow wineries to sell directly to consumers. As CNBC reports, Wine.com is setting up a marketplace to make it easy for small wineries to sell through its website.

In the Washington Post, Dave McIntyre profiles Lawrence Meinert, “a wine-loving geologist who has made a career out of analyzing and defining the most indefinable concept of wine: terroir.” 

Chicago chef Charlie Trotter is auctioning off his million-dollar wine collection. Count me in for the Nebuchadnezzar of Trockenbeerenauslese. I only wish there was more than one!

The San Francisco Chronicle provides a guide to Sonoma tasting rooms. I can vouch for Iron Horse, and fellow Terroirist Robby Schrum has enjoyed visits with Porter Creek and Joseph Swan.

In a piece that praises California vintners like Steve Matthiasson and Steve Lagier for making wine from “oddball” grapes, Elin McCoy reviews Jancis Robinson’s just released book, Wine Grapes: A Complete Guide to 1,368 Vine Varieties, Including Their Origins and Flavours.

Lily-Elaine Hawk Wakawaka tastes through a range of Chardonnays from Oregon and California. Make sure you click on the comic!

Ever wonder where NYC bartenders go to drink on their time off?  Serious eats reveals that Terroir Wine Bar, among others, is a popular choice.

The Los Angeles Times reviews the latest English-language volume of the Japanese manga, “Drops of God.” Terroirist Sarah Hexter reviewed the first volume last year. Like many others who have been following the series from the start, I am extremely disappointed at the publisher’s puzzling decision to skip ahead in the story with the “New World” episode.

Talia Baiocchi’s latest post for Wine Spectator asks why people end up falling for wine. Her journey began in college: “[T]iring of the endless stream of Bud Light forties and vodka sodas, I started stocking up on cheap wine at a shop on Broadway in New York City that was, and still is, a sort of Filene’s Basement of wine retail.”

Finally, Decanter reports that “Work on the hugely controversial Mosel bridge has re-started, to the dismay of a vocal band of dedicated protesters” like Katharina Prüm, with whom I had the pleasure of visiting in August. It will be a shame if any of the legendary vineyards in the bridge’s path are harmed in any way.