* DRINK BOOK OF THE MONTH! *
1.IMPERIAL WINE; how the British Empire made wine's new world (University of California Press, 323 pages, $43.85 CAD hardbound) is by Jennifer Regan-Lefebvre, an historian at Trinity College in Connecticut. It's full of good material, concentrating on the development of the wine industries in South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand. She argues that today's global wine industry exists as a result of settler colonialism and that imperialism was central, not incidental, to viticulture in the British colonies. For the large part, the wines were ignored by the landed gentry in the UK. They failed to match up with wines from France, Spain, Portugal, Germany and Italy. Plus they had a long transport from their origins. Canadian wineries are not covered or even mentioned, which is just as well – because the only wines available from Canada were made from labrusca or hybrids. It was only after World War I that "colonial" wines became popular, and that was mainly because they were "patriotic" wines and plentiful if not cheap because of preferential import tariffs. An excellent read, well-researched. Quality/Price Rating: 91.
Chimo! www.deantudor.com
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