The TRINK Talks Podcast is part of TRINK Magazine (launched in 2020), an independent quarterly digital publication exploring the “German-speaking wines” of Austria, Germany, Italy, and Switzerland.
Founders Paula Redes Sidore, based in Germany, and Valerie Kathawala, in New York, were brought together by their shared love for these wines and the conviction that a deep understanding of the cultural contexts in which they are embedded is essential to appreciating them fully.
#Wine #Food #Education #Entertainment #PersonalStories
The podcast TRINKTalks is created by TRINK Magazine. The podcast and the artwork on this page are embedded on this page using the public podcast feed (RSS).
Welcome to Episode 5 of TRINKTalks. In today’s episode Paula and Valerie talk to three guests, Mason Washington, Founder of LELIYG, along with Carolin and Erik Riffel of Weingut Riffel located in Bingen am Rhein, in the Mainz-Bingen district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. Today’s conversation introduces the Riffel winery and its wines as well as the heartwarming story of Mason’s collaboration with the Riffels', in their journey to create LELIYG Binger Kirchberg Riesling Kabinett. Now available in several States in the US, find out more about this team effort that cemented a true friendship.
Consider joining theTRINK community. Read up on oursubscriptions and unlock exclusive wine content, benefits, and experiences.
Mason Washington, CSW is a sommelier & the proprietor of LELIYG (Live Everyday Like It's Your Glass). Born and raised in Fayetteville NC, Mason gravitated toward the wine industry by working in various country clubs and hotels. As his interest grew in wine, his passion for Germany grew. He set his sites on crafting wine that was not just delicious but also biodynamic, certified organic, and vegan. The 2022 Kirchberg Kabinett vintage is a wine that Mason personally helped bottle and harvest and it went on to be rated 94 points by James Suckling!
In 2005Erik & Carolin Riffel took overRiffel winery, creating the highest quality wines letting the terroir speak for itself. These wines are biodynamic, certified organic & vegan.
To read more about the wines of Alto Adige, don’t miss Ian D’Agata’s (one of TRINK Magazine’s contributors) article titled:Understanding Alto Adige-Südtirol
ABOUT TRINK
TRINKTalks has been brought to you byTRINK Magazine, an independent quarterly digital publication exploring the “German-speaking wines” of Austria, Germany, Italy, and Switzerland.
Founders Paula Redes Sidore, based in Germany, and Valerie Kathawala, in New York, were brought together by their shared love for these wines and the conviction that a deep understanding of the cultural contexts in which they are embedded is essential to appreciating them fully.
TRINK launched in 2020. From the outset, their mission has been to deepen the understanding of how wine intersects with and impacts the narrative, culture, history, and geography of the European spaces where German is common cultural currency.
LEARN MORE:
https://www.facebook.com/trinkmag
https://www.instagram.com/trink_magazine/
https://x.com/magazinetrink?lang=en
https://www.linkedin.com/company/trink-magazine/
ABOUT THE HOSTS OF TRINK TALKS
Valerie Kathawala specializes in the wine cultures, traditions, and innovations of Germany, Austria, South Tyrol, and Switzerland, as well as those closer to her home in New York City. Her work appears in the pages of Noble Rot, The Art of Eating, SevenFifty Daily, Meininger’s Wine Business International, Pipette, Glug, Pellicle and a number of other publications. She is the co-founder and co-editor of the wine magazine TRINK. She is currently at work researching and writing a new course (2025) on German wines for the Wine Scholar Guild.
Paula Redes Sidore moves smoothly between the worlds of wine and words. She is a double-certified sommelier, through the Court of Master Sommeliers and the Chamber of Commerce. In 2012, she foundedWeinstory, a creative content and translation agency dedicated to transposing the world of German-speaking wine into English. TRINK is the natural extension of that pursuit. She is the German and Austrian regional specialist for jancisrobinson.com and a member of the Circle of Wine Writers. Paula has a Masters degree in fiction writing, and her work has been featured in jr.com, Sevenfifty Daily, Feinschmecker, and Heated. She lives on the northern wall of wine growing with her family in Bonn, Germany.
Thanks for joining us today and remember toKeep Trinking!!
Welcome toEpisode 4 of TRINKTalks. Listen in as Paula and Valerie talk with Dorli Muhr ofWeingut Dorli Muhr about her wine making journey and her ongoing love affair with the Blaufrankisch grape variety of the Spitzberg in the Carinthian region of upper Austria. The vineyards are cultivated organically, and obtaining the characteristic freshness and finesse in the wine is not always easy, but Dorli’s commitment and passion to her wines becomes clear when you hear her story.
Consider joining theTRINK community. Read up on oursubscriptions and unlock exclusive wine content, benefits, and experiences.
ABOUT GUEST DORLI MUHR
Dorli Muhr discovered her passion for wine during her interpreting studies (French/Spanish). She founded a marketing and public relations agency called Wine&Partners in 1991 and thus developed a highly specialized company for communication around wine, luxury products and culinary arts.
As a farmer's daughter's longing for her own production, she ultimately replanted a fallow plot on Spitzerberg in 1995. Together with her then husband Dirk van der Niepoort, Dorli Muhr began producing wine in 2002. In search of perfection and maximum finesse, Dorli Muhr strove to acquire other plots in addition to the family vineyard, and the winery grew continuously, improving both quantitatively and qualitatively every year.
To read more aboutWeingut Dorli Muhr of the Spitzberg in Austria, don’t miss our TRINK articleWhy Dorli Muhr Bet It All on Blaufrankisch - and remember, you can read many more articles by becoming a subscriber to TRINK Magazine
ABOUT TRINK
TRINKTalks has been brought to you byTRINK Magazine, an independent quarterly digital publication exploring the “German-speaking wines” of Austria, Germany, Italy, and Switzerland.
Founders Paula Redes Sidore, based in Germany, and Valerie Kathawala, in New York, were brought together by their shared love for these wines and the conviction that a deep understanding of the cultural contexts in which they are embedded is essential to appreciating them fully.
TRINK launched in 2020. From the outset, their mission has been to deepen the understanding of how wine intersects with and impacts the narrative, culture, history, and geography of the European spaces where German is common cultural currency.
LEARN MORE:
https://www.facebook.com/trinkmag
https://www.instagram.com/trink_magazine/
https://x.com/magazinetrink?lang=en
https://www.linkedin.com/company/trink-magazine/
ABOUT THE HOSTS OF TRINK TALKS
Valerie Kathawala specializes in the wine cultures, traditions, and innovations of Germany, Austria, South Tyrol, and Switzerland, as well as those closer to her home in New York City. Her work appears in the pages of Noble Rot, The Art of Eating, SevenFifty Daily, Meininger’s Wine Business International, Pipette, Glug, Pellicle and a number of other publications. She is the co-founder and co-editor of the wine magazine TRINK. She is currently at work researching and writing a new course (2025) on German wines for the Wine Scholar Guild.
Paula Redes Sidore moves smoothly between the worlds of wine and words. She is a double-certified sommelier, through the Court of Master Sommeliers and the Chamber of Commerce. In 2012, she foundedWeinstory, a creative content and translation agency dedicated to transposing the world of German-speaking wine into English. TRINK is the natural extension of that pursuit. She is the German and Austrian regional specialist for jancisrobinson.com and a member of the Circle of Wine Writers. Paula has a Masters degree in fiction writing, and her work has been featured in jr.com, Sevenfifty Daily, Feinschmecker, and Heated. She lives on the northern wall of wine growing with her family in Bonn, Germany.
Thanks for joining us today and remember toKeep Trinking!!
Welcome to Episode 3 of TRINKTalks. Today’s conversation is with Jancis Robinson, an absolute power house within the wine world. Listen in as she discusses Riesling (one of her favorite wines!), as well as the German market and what it might do to help exports to countries like England where there is a need for more German wines and German wine education.
Consider joining the TRINK community. Read up on our subscriptions and unlock exclusive wine content, benefits, and experiences.
Jancis Robinson, is regarded as one of the world’s most influential wine writers. Jancis founded www.jancisRobinson.com in 2000. Since 1990, she has been the wine correspondent for the Financial Times. Robinson is the founder-editor of The Oxford Companion to Wine and co-author of the acclaimed The World Atlas of Wine and Wine Grapes. She is the first non-trade person to pass the Master of Wine exams in 1984, and she was awarded an OBE in 2003. Jancis Robinson has also received numerous international honors, including six James Beard Awards. Her contribution to wine is just too vast to list here! We encourage you to visit her bio to learn more.
If you want to hear more from Jancis on the topic of Riesling, you can by heading over to her website.
ABOUT TRINK TRINKTalks is brought to you by TRINK Magazine, an independent quarterly digital publication exploring the “German-speaking wines” of Austria, Germany, Italy, and Switzerland. Founders Paula Redes Sidore, based in Germany, and Valerie Kathawala, in New York, were brought together by their shared love for these wines and the conviction that a deep understanding of the cultural contexts in which they are embedded is essential to appreciating them fully. TRINK launched in 2020. From the outset, their mission has been to deepen the understanding of how wine intersects with and impacts the narrative, culture, history, and geography of the European spaces where German is common cultural currency.
LEARN MORE:
https://www.facebook.com/trinkmag
https://www.instagram.com/trink_magazine/
https://x.com/magazinetrink?lang=en
https://www.linkedin.com/company/trink-magazine/
ABOUT THE HOSTS OF TRINK TALKS
Valerie Kathawala specializes in the wine cultures, traditions, and innovations of Germany, Austria, South Tyrol, and Switzerland, as well as those closer to her home in New York City. Her work appears in the pages of Noble Rot, The Art of Eating, SevenFifty Daily, Meininger’s Wine Business International, Pipette, Glug, Pellicle and a number of other publications. She is the co-founder and co-editor of the wine magazine TRINK. She is currently at work researching and writing a new course (2025) on German wines for the Wine Scholar Guild.
Paula Redes Sidore moves smoothly between the worlds of wine and words. She is a double-certified sommelier, through the Court of Master Sommeliers and the Chamber of Commerce. In 2012, she founded Weinstory, a creative content and translation agency dedicated to transposing the world of German-speaking wine into English. TRINK is the natural extension of that pursuit. She is the German and Austrian regional specialist for jancisrobinson.com and a member of the Circle of Wine Writers. Paula has a Masters degree in fiction writing, and her work has been featured in jr.com, Sevenfifty Daily, Feinschmecker, and Heated. She lives on the northern wall of wine growing with her family in Bonn, Germany.
Thanks for joining us today and remember to Keep Trinking!!
Welcome to Episode 2 of TRINKTalks. Today’s conversation is with Daniel Pfitscher of Weingut Pfitscher in Bolzano, located in South Tyrol, Northern Italy. Daniel talks to us about the evolution of winemaking at Pfitscher and their role in the development of quality wines in Alto Adige, especially Pinot Noir (aka Blauburgunder). Daniel also proudly discusses their most recent award winning wine Pinot Nero Riserva Vigna das Langefeld as well as the Pfitscher winery’s commitment to sustainability (Weingut Pftischer was the first winery in Italy to be awarded the casaclima certification).
Consider joining the TRINK community. Read up on our subscriptions and unlock exclusive wine content, benefits, and experiences.
Daniel Pfitcher, born 1990, is the junior manager at Weingut Pfitscher (management, sales, marketing). He studied "economics and business management" at the Free University of Bozen and attended a part-time course at the Austrian Wine Academy. He is a member of the board of directors of the South Tyrol wineries and was formerly a pro football player at FC Südtirol and AC Bellaria Igea Marina.
Daniel is a dynamic personality, described as the conductor, sales wizard, and marketing guru at Pfitscher. He has a knack for building contacts and assessing the commercial potential of cooperation with partners. As a consequence, the Pfitscher wines are now available in more than 10 countries, with Japan and Taiwan as the latest additions.
To read more about the wines of Alto Adige, don’t miss Ian D’Agata’s (one of TRINK Magazine’s contributors) article titled: Understanding Alto Adige-Südtirol
ABOUT TRINK TRINKTalks has been brought to you by TRINK Magazine, an independent quarterly digital publication exploring the “German-speaking wines” of Austria, Germany, Italy, and Switzerland. Founders Paula Redes Sidore, based in Germany, and Valerie Kathawala, in New York, were brought together by their shared love for these wines and the conviction that a deep understanding of the cultural contexts in which they are embedded is essential to appreciating them fully. TRINK launched in 2020. From the outset, their mission has been to deepen the understanding of how wine intersects with and impacts the narrative, culture, history, and geography of the European spaces where German is common cultural currency.
LEARN MORE:
https://www.facebook.com/trinkmag
https://www.instagram.com/trink_magazine/
https://x.com/magazinetrink?lang=en
https://www.linkedin.com/company/trink-magazine/
ABOUT THE HOSTS OF TRINK TALKS
Valerie Kathawala specializes in the wine cultures, traditions, and innovations of Germany, Austria, South Tyrol, and Switzerland, as well as those closer to her home in New York City. Her work appears in the pages of Noble Rot, The Art of Eating, SevenFifty Daily, Meininger’s Wine Business International, Pipette, Glug, Pellicle and a number of other publications. She is the co-founder and co-editor of the wine magazine TRINK. She is currently at work researching and writing a new course (2025) on German wines for the Wine Scholar Guild.
Paula Redes Sidore moves smoothly between the worlds of wine and words. She is a double-certified sommelier, through the Court of Master Sommeliers and the Chamber of Commerce. In 2012, she founded Weinstory, a creative content and translation agency dedicated to transposing the world of German-speaking wine into English. TRINK is the natural extension of that pursuit. She is the German and Austrian regional specialist for jancisrobinson.com and a member of the Circle of Wine Writers. Paula has a Masters degree in fiction writing, and her work has been featured in jr.com, Sevenfifty Daily, Feinschmecker, and Heated. She lives on the northern wall of wine growing with her family in Bonn, Germany.
Thanks for joining us today and remember to Keep Trinking!!
Welcome to Episode 1 of TRINKTalks. Today’s conversation is with Moritz Haidle of Weingut Karl Haidle. Moritz discusses the Remstal wine region, and gives his assessment of climate change as well as his opinions on organic winemaking. Moritz also shares his reasoning and passion for producing Riesling and Lemberger wines!
Consider joining the TRINK community. Read up on our subscriptions and unlock exclusive wine content, benefits, and experiences.
Moritz Haidle, is the head winemaker at Weingut Karl Haidle, one of the oldest wine estates in the Remstal region of Germany. Initially disinterested in the family business, Moritz pursued his passions for drawing, painting, and hip-hop. However, a pivotal internship at the Rudolf Fürst winery in Franconia sparked his interest in winemaking, leading him to further internships in Germany and Australia, and eventually to Geisenheim University, where he honed his skills.
Upon completing his studies, Moritz returned to take over winemaking at his family's estate in 2014. Since then, he has focused on elevating the estate's quality, emphasizing organic practices, and modernizing its portfolio while preserving traditional values. Moritz is known for his innovative approach, combining a respect for the family's winemaking heritage with a commitment to producing high-quality, terroir-driven wines that appeal to both local and global markets.
Read an in depth article on “Ritz” by host Valerie Kathawala.
ABOUT TRINK
TRINKTalks is brought to you by TRINK Magazine, an independent quarterly digital publication exploring the “German-speaking wines” of Austria, Germany, Italy, and Switzerland. Founders Paula Redes Sidore, based in Germany, and Valerie Kathawala, in New York, were brought together by their shared love for these wines and the conviction that a deep understanding of the cultural contexts in which they are embedded is essential to appreciating them fully. TRINK launched in 2020. From the outset, their mission has been to deepen the understanding of how wine intersects with and impacts the narrative, culture, history, and geography of the European spaces where German is common cultural currency.
LEARN MORE:
https://www.facebook.com/trinkmag
https://www.instagram.com/trink_magazine/
https://x.com/magazinetrink?lang=en
https://www.linkedin.com/company/trink-magazine/
ABOUT THE HOSTS OF TRINK TALKS
Valerie Kathawala specializes in the wine cultures, traditions, and innovations of Germany, Austria, South Tyrol, and Switzerland, as well as those closer to her home in New York City. Her work appears in the pages of Noble Rot, The Art of Eating, SevenFifty Daily, Meininger’s Wine Business International, Pipette, Glug, Pellicle and a number of other publications. She is the co-founder and co-editor of the wine magazine TRINK. She is currently at work researching and writing a new course (2025) on German wines for the Wine Scholar Guild.
Paula Redes Sidore moves smoothly between the worlds of wine and words. She is a double-certified sommelier, through the Court of Master Sommeliers and the Chamber of Commerce. In 2012, she founded Weinstory, a creative content and translation agency dedicated to transposing the world of German-speaking wine into English. TRINK is the natural extension of that pursuit. She is the German and Austrian regional specialist for jancisrobinson.com and a member of the Circle of Wine Writers. Paula has a Masters degree in fiction writing, and her work has been featured in jr.com, Sevenfifty Daily, Feinschmecker, and Heated. She lives on the northern wall of wine growing with her family in Bonn, Germany.
Thanks for joining us today and remember to Keep Trinking!!
SAVE THE DATE! Episode 1 of TRINKTalks airs January 7th!
Join us in welcoming TRINKTalks to the air waves! In the coming weeks TRINK Talks will begin releasing episodes.
Hosts Paula Redes Sidore and Valerie Kathawala, co-founders of TRINK Magazine introduce TRINKTalks, a podcast that will be available on Spotify, Apple, or wherever you listen to your podcasts!
The upcoming episodes will showcase their passion for German-speaking wines from Austria, Germany, Italy, and Switzerland, through interviews with some of the most compelling wine personalities in this space.
TRINKTalks is a part of TRINK Magazine, an independent quarterly digital publication that explores the bridge between cultural and language barriers, spotlighting emerging talents and providing fresh insights through interviews, essays, and more. Join Paula and Valerie as they reflect on their journey, and their commitment to changing the conversation around wine. Join them as they reignite their mission of storytelling and exploration through monthly audio episodes. Join us each month, more info in our bio!
Note: Episode 1 of TRINKTalks will be Moritz Haidle of Weingut Haidle.
If you want to interact with guests as interviews are happening, ask questions and gain access to interviews before everyone else, join the TRINK community. Read up on our subscriptions and unlock exclusive wine content, benefits, and experiences.
LEARN MORE:
https://www.facebook.com/trinkmag
https://www.instagram.com/trink_magazine/
https://x.com/magazinetrink?lang=en
https://www.linkedin.com/company/trink-magazine/
ABOUT THE HOSTS OF TRINK TALKS
Paula Redes Sidore moves smoothly between the worlds of wine and words. She is a double-certified sommelier, through the Court of Master Sommeliers and the Chamber of Commerce. In 2012, she founded Weinstory, a creative content and translation agency dedicated to transposing the world of German-speaking wine into English. TRINK is the natural extension of that pursuit. She is the German and Austrian regional specialist for jancisrobinson.com and a member of the Circle of Wine Writers. Paula has a Masters degree in fiction writing, and her work has been featured in jr.com, Sevenfifty Daily, Feinschmecker, and Heated. She lives on the northern wall of wine growing with her family in Bonn, Germany.
Valerie Kathawala specializes in the wine cultures, traditions, and innovations of Germany, Austria, South Tyrol, and Switzerland, as well as those closer to her home in New York City. Her work appears in the pages of Noble Rot, The Art of Eating, SevenFifty Daily, Meininger’s Wine Business International, Pipette, Glug, Pellicle and a number of other publications. She is the co-founder and co-editor of the wine magazine TRINK. She is currently at work researching and writing a new course (2025) on German wines for the Wine Scholar Guild.
Thanks for joining us today and remember to Keep Trinking!!
En liten tjänst av I'm With Friends. Finns även på engelska.