Guest Writers on BKWine

Here you can find some of our friends and colleagues, writing on some of their favourite subjects and giving you their personal recommendations on wine, wine makers, producers districts, and any other wine subject that they want to write about. (Language: = English, = Finnish, = Swedish, = French, = Danish, =Dutch)

Maybe you are interested in contributing to this section? Send me an email if you are.

NB: Any views or opinions expressed in these articles are the views and opinions of the author and not of BKWine.

If you like reading about wine you should take a look at our wine book reviews here!

Virpi Sorvisto

Articles by Virpi

Who is Virpi?

Vistovin, the Finnish company run by Virpi Sorvisto, works closely with BKWine and represents Wine Tours in Finland. Virpi started her own company after a career in the telecommunication and consulting business. She has worked with France and French for 15 years; teaching, translations and business consulting. She is passionate about French culture, wine and gastronomy, also an opportunity to leave computers and office work for a while and share the culinary France with the Finnish wine lovers. She is also a co-owner of a vineyard in Spain.

David Furer

Articles by David

Who is David?

A Californian residing in England with 15 years in the wine trade, David is the author of Wine Places (Mitchell Beazley 2005); a contributor to the annual guides Wine Report (Dorling Kindersley), the Which? Wine Guide (Which? Publications), and Hugh Johnson's Pocket Wine Book (Mitchell Beazley); a contributing editor to Sante magazine (www.santemagazine.com); a freelancer for several magazines worldwide on wine, spirits, food, travel, and cigars; a judge at several international wine competitions; a guest lecturer at the Professional Culinary Institute (www.pcichef.com); a consultant to restaurants in London; a dabbler in wine PR; and a member of the executive committee of the Circle of Wine Writers (www.winewriters.org). His qualifications include Certified Wine Educator, Advanced Sommelier, and Certified Sherry Educator. He may be contacted at dfurer (at) earthlink (dot) net.

Ester Laushway

Articles by Ester

Who is Ester?

Born in Germany, raised in Canada, and living in Provence for the past 12 years, Ester Laushway has been a wine lover ever since she spent a summer as a college exchange student in Germany, and discovered the fruity white wines of the Rheingau. From then on, she has firmly grasped by the stem any opportunity to sniff and sip the wines of the world. Wherever she has lived, in Canada, the United States, England and France, she has belonged to, or directed, a wine tasting club.

Besides giving her tasting skills as much practical training as decently possible, she also studied oenology for two years at the London Wine and Spirit Education Trust, where she obtained a Higher Certificate in 1995, with distinction. In June 2006, she updated her formal wine education with an advanced level tasting course at the Université du Vin in Provence, housed inside the medieval château of Suze-la-Rousse.

As a journalist and lecturer based in southern France, Ester has given conferences and written articles on wine, and conducted wine tours.  She considers wine one of the great sensual pleasures of life, never better than when shared with others.

Ferdinand "Ferry" de Bakker

Articles by Ferry

(NB: The articles are in Dutch)

Who is Ferry?

Ferdinand (‘Ferry’) de Bakker (vintage 1948) lives in the most interesting and attractive town of the Côte d’Azur and is interested in everything life has to offer. He is happily married, with two children and, professionally, has a background in public relations and marketing. Ferry is a shareholder and non-executive chairman of S.A. Lagabare, a most unusual cognac house, specialized in aged vintage cognacs of exceptional quality (www.lagabare.com). Purely as a hobby, he writes about food and wine for two Dutch publications.

Helen Talkin

Articles by Helen

Who is Helen?

Helen lives in Lompoc, California, a small town with a big wine industry surrounded by four newish American Viticultural Areas. (AVA's): Santa Rita Hillls AVA, Santa Maria Valley AVA, Santa Ynez Valley AVA and Los Alamos Valley AVA. Born in England Helen pursued undergraduate studies at the universities of London and Uppsala, Sweden. Upon graduation she worked in the City for several years enjoying frequent business trips to Scandinavia. She has been living in Santa Barbara County, California for the past nine years, where she enjoys teaching art history as well as discovering and sharing new wines.

Per W. Stryger

Articles by Per

Who is Per?

Per Westphal Stryger wine connoisseur, -writer and gastronome. Owns the import company Vinum Bonum (http://www.vinum-bonum.dk/), where he also gives wine tastings. Is employed as airline pilot.

Per (born in 1967) feels lucky, as he is able to live two of his dreams – airline pilot and wine dealer, with Cimber Air and the import company, Vinum Bonum.  At 16 his uncle, who was an expert in French wine, introduced him to the world of wine, and his interest was sparked. He moved from French wine to Italian, Spanish / Portuguese and new wine world, and ended up in Germany. The excitement about German wine was further increased, when he attended a course at the wine-university in Geisenheim.

As the owner of Vinum Bonum, Per is on his way to become Denmark’s leading import company, when it comes to German wine, and his goal is to represent one vineyard from each of the 13 German wine growing regions. Already he has over 100 German wines in his program, and all the vineyards have been “hand picked” through visits and tastings. He wants the customers to feel like he’s shaking hands with the winemaker, where they drink his wine.

Simultaneous with the wine sale to specialized wine stores and restaurants, Per also gives lectures and wine tastings. In his spare time he is engaged in working for his lodge, house building, friends, family, jazz music and he does some sailing in the summer. He has been married to his wife Malene for 7 years now, and she also plays an important part in the company, as she is fluent in German and English. She also works as an airline hostess.

Phil Leventhal

Articles by Phil

Who is Phil?

Phil Leventhal is a scientific writer specializing in the biological sciences. Phil holds a Ph.D. in biochemistry and has worked in academic research as well as in biotechnology and pharmaceutics. He now works full-time as a freelance writer and editor, most of which is for medical and scientific journals. Phil has had a life-long love of food and cooking, which is why he recently moved from the United States to Paris. He says, “I am pleased to be invited to write for BKWine, where I can help other wine lovers understand the science behind the magic of wine and winemaking”. Phil would enjoy hearing from you by mail at pleven2 at yahoo dot com

Richard James

Articles by Richard

Who is Richard?

Richard James is a freelance journalist, writer and translator who lives in the south of France not far from the Spanish border. He has passed the MW exams and recently submitted the dissertation. His website www.winewriting.com is about to be re-hosted and redesigned, and he will shortly be launching a wine travel company called French Catalonia Wine Adventures. Email Richard richardjames at wanadoo dot fr

Johanna Mikkelä

Articles by Johanna

Who is Johanna?

Johanna Mikkelä is a media student with a background mainly in journalism and language studies. Although being a relatively new member to the wine world she has developed an interest for wine and wine journalism since working as a bartender and also especially since living in Santa Barbara, California. In California she was introduced to wine tasting experiences and also took University wine classes that addressed wine culture and wine production. She has plans to return to California but is currently back in Sweden writing her bachelor thesis focusing on the relationship between wine critics and the wine industry.

Grahame R. Martin AIWS

Articles by Grahame

Who is Grahame?

It was not until I started work in the Bahamas in 1990 that I had any thoughts or ideas of writing for part of my living. True, I was a trained lecturer, thanks to the Royal Air Force, and had produced over the years my own lecture and teaching notes. Entering into the wine trade in 1969, as soon as I had completed my wine studies, I was offered and accepted the job of Wine Educator for the Company.

But it was only in 1991 that writing became part of my job and I started to write regularly and even made a TV series on wine that ran for over 200 programs. Retiring to France in 1999, I continued teaching on wine and working as an examiner with the London based Wine and Spirit Education Trust. In 2002, I was fortunate to be accepted as Wine, Cheese and Burgundy correspondent with French News – the monthly English language newspaper published in France that has a 30,000 copy circulation nationwide.

With so many writers covering the major Appellations, I started to research and write on the lesser known French wine areas and also on ‘unfamiliar or unfashionable’ grape varieties. This has become a passion for me. How many people know Cerdon, the Jura, the grape varieties Tibouren and Chasan, or other than for Beaujolais and perhaps the Loire, the dear old Gamay.

I thoroughly enjoyed my research into the Coteaux du Lyonnais and writing this article (published on the BKWine Guest Writer section), and hope to continue to write on lesser areas for a long time. One of my current projects is on the wines of the Vins de Pays de Haut Alpes, another group of wines of acceptable ‘everyday’ quality, and value for money, seldom seen out of their region of origin. I am now learning about them, I live there.

K. Bengtsson

Artiklar av K. Bengtsson

Vem är K. Bengtsson?

K. Bengtsson är journalist och skriver om vin varje månad i Svenskt Näringslivs tidning Entreprenör, och till och från i andra tidningar. Han ger också ut nyhetsbrevet BraVin.se som tipsar om tre bra viner varannan torsdag - läs mer och prenumerera gratis på www.bravin.se.

"Jag blev såld på vin när jag reste i Australien i början på 90-talet och provade vinerna på plats i Barossa Valley, McLaren Vale och Yarra Valley. Fortfarande kan en topp-Shiraz från Barossa göra mig djupt lycklig men annars är det nog de klassiska vinerna från Frankrike jag rankar högst: Champagne, Bourgogne och Bordeaux. Samt förstås toppvinerna från Österrike. Och de moderna spanska, kaliforniska, sydafrikanska och italienska höjdarna. Och en hel del annat."

Wine World Tour (Delphine Moussay Derouet & Christophe Derouet)

Articles by the Wine World Tour (Delphine & Christophe)

Who is Wine World Tour?

Passionate about both travelling and wine, Delphine and Christophe conceived, planned and undertook a Wine World Tour - a world-wide journey of wine producers and wine related consumer markets outside of Europe. This epic journey, undertaken between January and December 2005, enabled them to travel through 17 different countries and almost 200 vineyards. Like wine specialists who develop their savoir-faire from vineyards from both hemispheres, our two 30+ year olds, adapted the same process to their own jobs in sales and marketing. Both have previously worked in marketing and business development roles in other industries.

Through WineWorldTour, there aim is to bring their unique experience and innovative concepts to the French wine industry. To discover more about their educational journey and to follow their extraordinary adventures at their side, visit their webpage www.homepage.mac.com/wineworldtour

Stefan Thorpenberg 

Artiklar av Stefan Thorpenberg 

Vem är Stefan Thorpenberg?

Stefan Thorpenberg är fil dr i vetenskapsteori. Sedan 1989 har han den högsta kunskapsgraderingen, 3 betyg, hos Munskänkarna. Stefan har undervisat i vinkunskap på Medborgarskolan, TBV, och vid Göteborgs Universitet. Under senare delen av 1990-talet var han vinskribent på Göteborgs-Posten. Stefan och Astrid Thorpenberg driver idag Thorpenbergvin (www.thorpenbergvin.com) som organiserar vinprovningar, kurser och catering, och även samarbetar med BKWine för vissa arrangemang.

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