Ghost town | The Spectator

A French symposium

Just as night watchmen are constrained by duty to make their rounds, so are writers about wine. Sometimes the rounds are seasonal. Beaujolais Nouveau, for example, is released every year on the third Thursday of November at 12:01 a.m., just a few weeks after the September harvest. Gamay, the grape that makes Beaujolais, can be fresh, floral and ruby-like in this nymphet incarnation. Beaujolais Nouveau lacks the depth, succulence and complexity of more mature instances of Gamay — especially in Morgon and Côte du Py — but it is an agreeable, undemanding picnic wine that goes well with your preferred instantiation of déjeuner sur l’herbe.

Mary Kate Skehan

The new Dada movement

I first came across the food influencer Samah Dada while searching for gluten- and dairy-free dishes. Dada, a twenty-eight-year-old food influencer with regular segments on the Today show, a cookbook, and a 400,000-follower Instagram account, somehow makes being a gluten-free vegan who doesn’t drink look fun. Her skin and hair are positively radiant with nourishment and nontoxicity; she looks very well-hydrated. Hoping to achieve some of this plant-based glow for myself, I headed to the Instagram account DadaEats and tried to eat like Dada. I started with the desserts, simply for the economy of scale: check out of the grocery store with almond butter, dark chocolate chips, rice cakes, maple syrup and dates, and you’ll be able to make almost any of her no-bake desserts.

Calla Jones Corner

Wild boar: a nuisance and a delicacy

"Comment trouvez-vous le sanglier?" Guillaume parent/hunter/head rôtisseur, asked me last spring, in the tiny village of Monthélie, next to Meursault, where my family lives and where I now live. We were there to enjoy a wild boar banquet. Guillaume, who was dressed as Obélix, Astérix’s sidekick, known for his voracious appetite (especially for wild boar), had roasted three sanglier shoulders on spits over coals from old wine vines. Many of the other villagers had also dressed as famous characters from the comic book series, which often depicts les Gaulois feasting on sanglier after defeating the Romans. Never mind that they are subsequently themselves defeated by the Romans at Alise-Sainte-Reine, an hour north in the Auxois region.

Marisela Ramirez

The classic charm of Exiles

On Washington’s U Street, nestled between a dry-cleaners and the city’s most notorious gay gym, lies Exiles, a modest Irish sports bar marked by a warm blue neon sign and a Bills flag. “It’s a Bills bar and they’ll play a Jets game for me,” boasts Carmen, a local sitting at the long wooden bar. Red Liverpool soccer scarves drape over bottles of whiskey. A large Guinness bell hangs in the middle of the bar. “What can I get for you darling? I almost didn’t recognize you with your glasses on,” says a tender voice with an Irish accent. It’s Donagh. Pronounced “DUN-AHH” according to a sign at the bar. He’s a bartender and one of the owners. “Donagh and Paul will make you feel right at home...

Food & Drink