Featured User: Noah Raizman

Noah Raizman is a hand and upper extremity surgeon. Originally from Pittsburgh, he trained in New York City and Cleveland before making his home in Washington, D.C. A father of two beautiful, young and active children, he used to have hobbies and athletic pursuits but now, he just hoards and obsesses over his wine collection like Smaug in his minimal free time. Delectable: What sparked your passion for wine? Noah Raizman: My father, who had a very small cellar in our basement, had a few wine tastings in the house when I was a kid. I am told that I was instructed to tell guests (at age 3) that red wines went best with meat and white wines went best with seafood. It all probably started then. When I was in college, I worked as a cook in a new restaurant in Pittsburgh where I was given the role of “assistant sommelier” and got to taste through hundreds of wines over a summer (I don’t think I was 21 yet, but that didn’t seem to bother anyone). The seeds were sown, and a few visits to friends living in Napa helped me grow. The learning curve was slow and not very steep for several years, but then went nearly vertical once I finished my medical training and could actually afford to begin collecting. D: What wine region are you wild about right now? NR: There’s no single region. I have focused a bit more on Piemonte and Champagne as of late. There’s been a bit of a run on the Northern Rhone, but I spread my love around and love turning new wine drinkers on to the Loire Valley, Riesling in its many variations, Madeira and other, more “niche” regions. I love old California wines and seek them out whenever I can. D: What is the most unusual wine you’ve ever tried? NR: Some “Champagne” I attempted to make in an apartment in Cleveland with a stuck fermentation and some sort of strange bacterial contamination. Let’s let sleeping dogs lie. D: What is your golden rule for wine? NR: Drink what you like, but never stop exploring and expanding your tastes. D: Say you’re not allowed to have wine, what is your second option? NR: Food, I guess. A distant second. D: Choose a movie, book, quote, or song and pair it with a wine NR: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times” – Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities. I think that goes with Burgundy in most vintages, unfortunately. Amazing how some vineyards can be destroyed by hail and neighboring vintages left completely unscathed. D: If you were a wine, what wine would you be? NR: Old Bordeaux – complex, well regarded, a bit stuffy, usually quite enjoyable but occasionally you probably just want to pour me down the drain.