Excerpt from Dave McIntyre’s column … With the holidays approaching, it’s time to recommend books to give the wine lovers on your list. Here are my top three picks from among wine books released this year. The economic downturn has spawned a genre of wine books designed to reassure us that it’s okay to drink cheap wines, and that any wine is good so long as it’s cheap. Canadian writer Natalie MacLean takes another perspective in her new book, “Unquenchable: A Tipsy Quest for the World’s Best Bargain Wines.” To MacLean, bargain means high value at a reasonable price, not […]
Books: Wine
Her book took me to countries and vineyards that I could only dream of visiting – Chic galleria
Loved reading Natalie’s new book! She had me at the opening chapter with her witty comments about why she enjoys her profession. I’m admittedly a novice when it comes to choosing wines and Natalie’s book helped me realize that it’s OK to leave the decision making to the experts! Her book took me to countries and vineyards that I could only dream of visiting. Unquenchable is not only educational, but extremely entertaining. I highly recommend this book for anyone who loves the study of wine as well as consuming a fine glass. You can read more reviews of my […]
Bright Sense of Humour, Charming Anecdotes and Nose for a Bargain – The Calgary Herald
In the world of wine, Natalie MacLean, with her bright sense of humour and nose for a bargain, is a breath of fresh air. The author of two books — the second, Unquenchable, just out on shelves now — MacLean has travelled the world to visit myriad wineries, sipped a wine that retails for $2,000 a bottle and met the winemakers behind their eponymous labels. But, she is quick to point out, people who feel they need to be experts before they can make a choice on what to order from the wine list just need to take a page […]
Helping Wine Shoppers Buy $15 wines that taste as good as $30 wines – David Schwartz
After reading Unquenchable, I can state three things with confidence about Natalie MacLean: 1) She likes to drink wine 2) She knows a great deal about it 3) She wants to share some of her experiences and perspectives with you to help you find bargain wines that don’t taste like they came out of a box. That makes this book an enjoyable read. It’s joyfully subjective, with MacLean sharing her insights into both her visits to several wine-making regions and the taste of the wines. Her mission, simply put, “is to demystify wine price in relation to quality,” in other […]
The third thing I always like about her books: they always make me laugh – Bella On Line
One of the things I love most about Natalie MacLean’s books is that they’re always about wine. That’s a subject I will never get tired of, be it in the bottle or on the page. Another thing I love is Natalie’s writing. Too many writers and their reading audience seem to think or expect words about wine will be stodgy and snooty but Ms. MacLean completely ignores that rule and I’m so glad she does. Which leads me to the third thing I always like about her books: they always make me laugh. I love laughter. Every one of those […]
A Juicier Take on Wine Writing with a Rare Blend of Wit and Wisdom – Vancouver Sun
Natalie MacLean brings a rare blend of wit and wisdom to the genre Wine writing can some-times be lip-puckeringly dry. Maybe that’s why Natalie MacLean, an irreverent, lively and often self-deprecating wine writer, is so popular. Her first book, Red, White and Drunk All Over, won Best Wine Literature Book at the Gourmand World Cookbook Awards and sold 50,000 copies in Canada alone. MacLean was in Vancouver recently, for Whistler’s Cornucopia wine and food event in Whistler. Her second book, Unquenchable had just hit bookstores. The book is sub-titled A Tipsy Quest for The World’s Best Bargain Wines. Those bargain […]
Okanagan Wines Make the Grade in Wine Writer’s Latest Book – Kelowna Daily Courier
Wine author Natalie MacLean is more than willing to pose for a photo mid-afternoon with a big glass of Okanagan red wine. And then polish off that glass of 2009 Montage from Naramata’s La Frenz Winery afterward. Full disclosure: I joined her and gulped down the same “This Montage is what I love about Okanagan wines,” said the Ottawa-based author of Unquenchable: A Tipsy Quest for the World’s Best Bargain Wines. “It’s packed with flavour, but is balanced with nice acidity.” I met up with MacLean at the Delta Grand hotel before her recent evening Unquenchablesession at the B.C. Wine […]
A personal, engaging trip around the world looking for bargains – Newsday
The bookshelf is heavy this year. Here are some gifts for your imbibing associates, each to be enjoyed with a good drink at hand. Unquenchable by Natalie MacLean is a personal, engaging trip around the world looking for bargains. It includes top values and some suggestions for menus and pairings. You can read more reviews of my new wine book Unquenchable here.
MacLean is a straight-talking wine everywoman who extols the virtues of bargain wines – Oregonwine.com
This may come as something of a shock, but we don’t spend all of our time visiting wineries, collecting wines and swilling them in lonely, dark corners of our palatial McMinnville mansion. We occasionally read about wine, too, and this season brought two new wine books — Unquenchable, by Natalie MacLean, and Naked Wine, by Alice Feiring — across our desk. Both are second books by women who carved out their own unique wine beats in their first, critically received efforts: MacLean as a kind of straight-talking wine everywoman who extols the virtues of bargain wines; and Feiring as a […]
Drinking Tips for the Aspiring Oenophile – Stute Kitchen
Stute Kitchen Recipe adventures of a few fun & food loving foxes Though CK and I throw back our share of the red wines in this world (and have a damned good time doing it too! Not to mention the actual “wine-throwing” incident…), we’ve both always not-so-secretly wished that we knew more about the wines we were buying and drinking. We both love to learn, and wanted to understand what makes a wine tick, and how to get the most out of any delicious experience (and maybe more importantly, how to turn wines that make us screw up our faces […]
