The Best 5 Minute Wine Podcast

Victoria opens with her own name, because hosts tend to tiptoe around it — P-E-L-L-E-T-I-E-R — and from there the story moves fast. She was an only child, gifted, and a bit of a loner who genuinely liked the solitude. Her bike was the vehicle for all of it: new parks, new kids, streetlights as the only curfew, and the habit that never left her — watching people and inventing stories about them. She got her first real job at eleven at a hair salon, running the front desk, the cash, the appointments, the sweeping, the towels. She was already five foot eight and passed easily for older. Babysitti

Karen Green has sat on both sides of the buying desk. She started as a retail buyer at Tesco, moved to Boots buying vitamins and supplements, then crossed the table to sell food and drink herself — before a move to the south of France inspired her to pour all of that knowledge into a consultancy and a book. The book is called Buyerology, and the name arrived, as the best ideas do, unexpectedly: on a bus in Reading, when a furniture store called Sofology rolled past the window and lit the spark. In part one of our conversation, Karen breaks down the nuts and bolts of studying the buyer — why un

Jeanine Lum never planned to invent anything. She'd been a W2 employee her whole career, spent twenty years in law enforcement, flew part time as a flight attendant for a decade, and had no manufacturing background whatsoever. What she had instead was a series of ruined bottles. One was left behind in a dark car in Paso Robles and pushed its own cork out overnight from heat that wasn't even extreme — she notes that wine starts to suffer around seventy-five degrees, a temperature most people would call comfortable. Another was a cardboard box holding about $1,400 worth of wine that tipped over

Forrest closes the series with a true-or-false round, and the fun of it is watching how fast Victoria sorts fact from invention. The executive role at twenty-four is real. The sommelier training in Bordeaux is pure fiction — she went straight into corporate leadership and never detoured. The Turnaround Queen nickname is real too, and when Forrest asks whether that's runway or corporate, she gives the answer nobody expects: corporate, absolutely, though she did walk a runway as a teenager. The turnaround stories are where the episode gets its weight. One came through a consulting engagement wit

Victoria planned the whole Napa and Sonoma trip herself, and she planned it strategically — mostly wineries she and Danny already knew and loved, which she cheerfully admits made the buying decisions easy. It had been fifteen years since her last visit, and it was his first time in wine country at all. The surprises came from the edges of her palate. She's a Sauvignon Blanc and Sancerre person who leans into bold Cabernet, and yet she found herself trying Viognier for the first time and tasting Chardonnays she'd normally skip entirely. Some of it she loved immediately. Some of it she suspects

For the finale, Forrest flips the format and puts four multiple-choice questions to Jeanine about the product she spent years building. She handles the first one easily — heat is the enemy, though she notes for the record that she'd prefer to worry about curious seagulls. The quiz opens into the best running conversation of the series, about zippers. Jeanine has strong feelings here, having wrestled with a two-zip cooler that she says takes an act of God to close, and she wants to know whether there's a balance between waterproof and usable. Her own bag runs tight, she admits, which is why it

This is the practical episode. Jeanine walks through what you'll find at 3rdbottle.com: two bags, a six-pack and a twelve-pack, each with the interlocking modular ice packs that lie flat in a freezer. The six-pack holds six to eight hours depending on how well you keep it sealed. You can also buy the ice packs on their own if you already own a cooler tall enough to take a wine bottle — the measurements are posted on the site — though she's careful to say she can't promise chill times in a cooler she didn't design. Every bag ships with the ice packs and a condensation towel, the latter existing

Victoria wrote a book about building a personal brand, and then people kept asking her the same follow-up question: fine, I built it — now what? That question became the sequel. Influence Unleashed taught the construction. Influence Activated teaches what you do once it's standing. Her diagnosis of where most people go wrong is uncomfortable and probably correct: they lead with credentials and industry and job titles, when the truth is people do business with people. She never takes a meeting cold. Prospective hire, new client, old client — she looks them up first, and she assumes they're doin

WHAT YOU'LL LEARN: - The inspiration behind the name CLINQ ZERO - Anto's previous corporate experience - How CLINQ ZERO differs from traditional wines - The business model of non-alcoholic wine - Future plans for CLINQ ZERO varieties TIMESTAMPS: [00:00] Welcome and Introduction [00:06] Overview of CLINQ ZERO and Anto's Background [00:30] Round 1: The Making of CLINQ ZERO Begins [04:00] Round 2: The Business of CLINQ ZERO Starts [06:12] Closing Remarks and Where to Find CLINQ ZERO @thebestwinepod Discover More from The Best 5 Minute Podcast Network: Wine Podcast Music Podcast Travel Podcast H

India, twenty-some years ago: the site manager who addressed her male employee instead of her Aggressive versus assertive — and the word that gets used on women Guilt aimed at driven mothers; Canada's six-month, now one-year, maternity leave Working the day she gave birth to her second child; back at the desk after two weeks "Well, ask a man" Being the only woman in the room, routinely Forrest on golf, the email he never got, and what exclusion feels like from the inside "I drive a mean golf cart and I buy drinks incredibly well" Finding other avenues to build relationships Hiring for real-lif

This part is where the numbers come out. Jeanine wanted twelve to fifteen hours of chill, driven by a specific need: she and her husband keep a second home in Albuquerque, the drive runs through desert heat, and she favors black vehicles, which is one more thing working against the wine in the back. What the finished product actually delivers exceeded her target — the twelve-pack holds for twenty-four hours and beyond, and she's tested it under a truck cover, deliberately engineering a heat trap, across the full twelve-hour run from Orange County to Albuquerque. The six-pack is the short-trip

The Canadian tell — "out and about" Growing up in Calgary; talked into the University of Calgary at sixteen despite offers elsewhere Scholarship in hand, room and board free, and moving out anyway that first semester Relocated to Toronto straight out of university, later to the US One, two, sometimes three jobs at a time through school: banking, a doctor's office, acting and commercial work Four or five hours of sleep at twenty — and what sleep looks like now Her son's objection: "but then you have no social life" The tuition bargain — maintain the GPA or repay the semester C-suite, decoded: c

Every product story has a stretch in the middle that nobody puts in the marketing copy, and this is Jeanine Lum's. Her first project manager had never had a drink in his life, which made explaining the value of what she was trying to protect a losing battle from the start. He took her concept, produced designs that failed, then redesigned and remolded without consulting her — and charged her for a new mold every single time. A year and several molds later, she was ready to quit. What she says next is the part that stops you. Twenty years in law enforcement, and she had never cried as much as s

Getting the name right, first thing — P-E-L-L-E-T-I-E-R  Only child, gifted kid, self-described loner: the bike as an instrument of exploration  Streetlights as the only curfew, and what kids lose without that  People-watching from a bicycle seat, and inventing stories about strangers — a habit that never left her  First job at eleven: booking appointments, running cash, sweeping floors, laundering towels  Babysitting at $2 an hour  Assistant manager at fourteen, coaching adults decades older  "Turtle shell outside, marshmallow inside — somewhere between don't mess with me and do you want a hu

Jeanine Lum never set out to become an inventor. A W2 employee with no manufacturing background, she stumbled into her business idea the hard way, through a series of wine mishaps that most collectors will wince at. A bottle left in a car in Paso Robles pushed its own cork out from heat. A year later, a cardboard box holding roughly $1,400 worth of wine tipped over on a winding road trip. Those two moments sent her looking for a real solution, and she quickly discovered that nothing on the market actually protected the wine itself, only the bottle. What follows is a candid look at the long roa

Justin Ennis, Senior Director of Winemaking for Joseph Phelps Vineyards in Sonoma County, responsible for the Sonoma Coast wines under the Freestone brand — a role he's held for 20 years. Justin shares how he grew up surrounded by vineyards, with a wine-loving grandfather on one side and a family vineyard in Healdsburg's Russian River on the other, yet never considered wine a career until his stepfather (then at Kendall-Jackson's Hartford Court) suggested harvest intern work. His first vintage was 1995 under winemaker Dan Goldfield, doing the unglamorous cellar-rat work: power washing, punch d

From a family bakery in Sicily to founding a non-alcoholic wine brand in Dallas, Anto's path to CLINQ ZERO runs through aerospace engineering, Fiat, agriculture, Tetra Pak, and five years selling winery equipment across North America. In this full conversation with Forrest, Anto shares the story behind the CLINQ ZERO name, the mixed reaction from friends and family back in Italy where wine tradition runs deep, and the process that sets the brand apart: starting from premium wine, dealcoholizing at ambient temperature, and skipping the sugar and artificial flavoring most competitors rely on to

The rapid-fire rundown: Joe Phelps began his search for the perfect cool-climate site in the 90s. The two estate vineyards behind the vineyard-designate wines are Quarter Moon and Pastorale. Before this year's national release, the wines were only available winery direct or through the Phelps Preferred membership. The 2024 Pastorale Chardonnay carries an oceanic signature — Forrest's notes say saline breezes, Justin says salt air, and they call it close enough. That leads to the best moment of the episode: Justin admits even winemakers struggle with wine adjectives. His advice? If something cr

What does success actually look like five years into building a non-alcoholic wine brand? For Anto, founder of CLINQ ZERO, it's simple: becoming the bottle people keep in the fridge for weddings, baby showers, and pizza nights — and converting soda and beer drinkers to sparkling red along the way. In this final installment, Anto talks candidly about life after two decades in the corporate world, why he genuinely enjoys talking to strangers about the brand, and what separates CLINQ ZERO's ingredient list from competitors that compensate for lost flavor with sugar. He also shares the practical d

Why Pinot Noir? For Justin, it's the flavor and the challenge — a difficult grape to grow and a difficult wine to make, which makes a phenomenal vintage from Quarter Moon or Pastorale that much sweeter. He believes with every fiber of his body that Pinot Noir is one of the most food-friendly wines on the planet: it ages beautifully, but you can drink it young and still sense the quality. Having your cake and eating it too. Justin's advice for anyone just getting into wine: starting with a price point is fine, but don't stop there. Get out of your comfort zone and be willing to spend a little m

Did you know San Pellegrino comes out of the ground already sparkling? Anto shares that detail in this CLINQ ZERO conversation, right before walking through the brand's full product lineup: Sparkling Blanc, Sparkling Rosé, and Sparkling Red, each offered in a traditional 750ml glass bottle and a 12-ounce can. The two also dig into why cans resonate with consumers who want portion control — no recorking, no spilling, just a controlled pour, hot or cold. Anto explains his bigger vision for the sparkling red as a potential alternative to soda or sparkling water, and reflects on what's been most s

Forrest asks the question wine lovers wonder in the store aisle: what's the story behind the price? Justin lays it out plainly. Freestone employs its own in-house vineyard staff of 12 to 15 people — with benefits, 401k match, retirement, vacation, and paid holidays. That's high-touch, high-detail farming, and it's part of every bottle's price. Lower-priced wines often farm vastly differently: farming for quantity, machine harvesting, contracted labor instead of in-house crews. Location matters too. The Sonoma Coast's proximity to the ocean means protecting the fruit can take dramatically more

What actually gets removed when you dealcoholize wine — and what gets left behind? In Part 3 of this CLINQ ZERO conversation, founder Anto explains how the distillation-based process specifically targets alcohol molecules, leaving natural compounds like resveratrol intact, without leaning on artificial wine flavoring to fake what's lost. He also covers the regulatory upside of going alcohol-free: no distributor required, no age-21 disclaimer, and a direct-to-consumer model that's opened the door for CLINQ ZERO to sell straight to customers in the U.S. Anto gets candid about the bigger picture

Forrest asks the question on everyone's mind: is AI finding its way into the vineyard? Justin embraces technology on the business side — presentations, emails, efficiency — and sees real potential in equipment applications like smarter sorting and earlier detection in the vineyard. But when it comes to handcrafting wine, he's protective. To Justin, AI is a recipe: put in the parameters, get a result. Wine's beauty lives in vintage variation, challenging seasons, and a little chaos. Strip out the creativity and you're making formulaic, boring wines. Then the conversation turns to Justin's minim

Why does a wine with no alcohol cost more to make, not less? In Part 2 of this CLINQ ZERO conversation, founder Anto walks Forrest through the real economics and technology behind the brand. The name itself carries meaning — "clink" for the universal, joyful sound of a toast, "zero" borrowed from the soda world's shorthand for "without." Anto shares how the idea landed with friends and family in Italy, where tradition runs deep and non-alcoholic wine was a hard sell, even to his own mother. He also details the process that separates CLINQ ZERO from other dealcoholized wines on the market: star

Justin breaks down what's actually in the glass — Pastorale Pinot Noir is fruit-forward and flashy with red cherry and strawberry notes and a long finish, while Quarter Moon, sitting closer to the ocean and the Petaluma Gap, leans Old World: spicier, darker, with bigger tannins and more structure. Thicker skins and smaller clusters mean a higher skin-to-juice ratio in the fermenter, and deeper color in the bottle. Same farming, same winemaking — the site does the talking. On Chardonnay, Justin makes what he calls "varietally correct" Chardonnay: high-acid, fruit-driven, fermented in large-form

She had good reason to be distracted. Sara arrives listing off everything new in her life — a new album, a new baby, a new house, a new tour, and a new shirt, the last of which turns out to be the only one she's willing to discuss at length. There's a running joke about her age that she refuses to concede, a stretch where she takes over the broadcast entirely to plug her own record, and a genuinely strange detour into reading the temperature, the humidity, and the dew point off the studio screen, at which point she asks the question every radio person has privately wondered about their own wea

Most people who launch a non-alcoholic wine brand come at it from the wellness world, the beverage startup world, or the "I gave up drinking and couldn't find anything good" world. Anto Li Brizzi came at it from none of those places. He came at it from the winery floor. As head of North America for an Italian capital equipment company, Anto spent years selling the machinery that wineries use to make wine. He understood the production process, the industry dynamics, and the category from the inside out. When he saw the opportunity to build a better non-alcoholic sparkling wine — one that starts

Justin Ennis explains that you can't talk about Napa Valley's red table wine history without talking about Joe Phelps, who founded Joseph Phelps Vineyards in 1973 after building a national construction company, Hensel Phelps, with his father's business out of Greeley, Colorado. Phelps released the first vintage of Insignia in 1974, Napa's first Bordeaux-style blend, and was also among the first to varietally label Syrah in California after Prohibition. Working alongside his first winemaker, German immigrant Walter Shug, Phelps experimented widely across varietals including Riesling, Johannesbu

Rusty Cellars is back behind the quiz desk, and this time the subject is the one guest who literally wrote the book on wine talk. Maryse Chevriere — certified sommelier, illustrator, and James Beard Award winner for the gloriously funny @FreshCutGardenHose — gets the full Pop the Quiz treatment as Rusty turns her interview series into two rounds of trivia and translation. Round one tests how closely you listened: her grape-stomping fall in Alsace, the humor award she won as an illustrator among writers, the Ian Cauble "fresh cut garden hose" line that named her brand, learning to drive at fift

Justin Ennis explains that his path into winemaking didn't run through a four-year degree program, but through 32 harvests of hands-on, ground-up learning that started at age 19 with the least glamorous jobs in the building: cleaning tanks, floors, drains, and barrels. From there, progression came step by step, learning to run the crush pad, organize the barrel room, and operate equipment like pumps, forklifts, and cranes before eventually taking on bigger responsibility. He stresses that interns benefit most from working at high-quality, technique-focused wineries rather than high-volume prod

Henry Santos of Premium Blend joins Forrest to talk about Raise a Glass for Colombia, the company's earthquake relief campaign. Premium Blend has deep roots in the Colombian community, and just two months before the earthquake they launched Brisa Ardiente, a wine-based Colombian aguardiente created with the community's support. Now they're giving back in a big way. Henry explains that the campaign has grown beyond its original scope: rather than just Colombian restaurants, Premium Blend is challenging all of its customers to host a one-evening fundraising event and dedicate cocktail proceeds t

Then things get playful: Keith cheerfully ad-libs an Outback Steakhouse tagline ("Crikey, I just threw that one in myself"), before a rapid-fire lightning round turns up Citizen Kane, a love of tattoos, chocolate over vanilla, and his dad as his athletic hero. He signs off by picking Who Wouldn't Wanna Be Me — the same song that opens his show every night — ahead of the Farmhand benefit at the House of Blues in Anaheim. A warm, funny, generous farewell to a genuine star on the rise. Show notes The story behind the forgiveness line, and writing by stream of consciousness Keith riffs a full Outb

Justin Ennis dives into the long tradition of international exchange programs in winemaking, where interns and foreign workers move between wineries to share techniques, equipment innovations, and processes that have developed differently across regions. He recalls starting in the cellar at eighteen years old, working alongside people from completely different countries, languages, and backgrounds, and how that experience opened his eyes to how much more there was to learn beyond what he'd seen at home. Justin challenges the assumption that American winemaking is automatically the best, pointi

What does it take to build a 35-year-old spirits brand from scratch when nobody believes in your product, you have no industry experience, and a liquor license costs seven figures in your market? Ask Gino Santos. Premium Blend Cocktails for one of the most wide-ranging, personal, and genuinely fascinating guest conversations in TB5MWP history. The Business Concept Premium Blend produces wine-based spirits that are legally classified as wine — meaning any venue holding a basic beer and wine license (as low as $400 in Florida) can serve them. No six-figure liquor license required. The products a

Justin Ennis, senior director of winemaking for Joseph Phelps Vineyards and the steward of its Freestone brand along the Sonoma Coast, where he's spent the last twenty years shaping the wines. Justin grew up surrounded by wine without ever planning to make a career of it — his grandfather kept a full table, and his mother's family in Healdsburg tended an old field-planted vineyard in the heart of the Russian River Valley. It wasn't until his stepfather, who worked facilities at what's now Hartford Family Winery, nudged him toward a harvest internship that everything changed. Justin signed on a

Keith talks his TV run on Leno and The View, a fan poll that had him wanting to see him on the big screen (right behind Faith Hill), and previews the next single, Raining on Sunday, written by Radney Foster and Darrell Brown. Keith geeks out over guitar heroes Lindsey Buckingham and Mark Knopfler, his love of Bob Seger, and reveals the surprising story behind But for the Grace of God — co-written with two members of the Go-Go's. A warm, funny, guitar-obsessed snapshot of Keith Urban on the rise. Show notes (timestamped highlights) Rebecca Lynn Howard calls in — Somebody Like You is her favorit

Thirty-five years. Same 800 number. Still picking up. That's Premium Blend in a nutshell — built on relationships, consistency, and a product that just keeps finding new audiences. In this final episode of the series, Gino Santos gives Forrest a full picture of where the brand is headed and what it looks like at home. Highlights include: A new Aguardiente (Colombian-style spirit) launching just ahead of the FIFA World Cup, with Miami games on the schedule and Premium Blend accounts already lining up launch parties The long-term retail vision: getting agave wine and other products onto shelves

Maryse Chevriere's illustrations — a little figure she simply calls "my little dude." He's intentionally universal, someone anyone can see themselves in, though she'll add a ponytail, a bow tie, or a mustache when a drawing calls for it. Forrest zeroes in on a favorite: a "greets you with… but hits you in the face" illustration featuring the character at a microphone under a spotlight, arms up as if shielding himself. Maryse explains the improv-style thinking behind it — "greets you with" is the chill, gentle version of describing a wine's notes, while "hits you in the face" is the version whe

Every great business has a moment when the founder walks into a stranger's establishment and has to sell the dream from scratch. For Gino Santos, that pitch had three parts: increase your margins, keep your customers coming back, and make your wait staff more money — all with just a beer and wine license. In this final installment of the Premium Blend series, Forrest gets the full story: Why Premium Blend launched in plastic bottles — a practical shipping decision when you're self-distributing across Florida with almost no capital Why plastic has actually become a selling point for bars and re

The series wraps by going back to the beginning. Maryse Chevriere opens with the closure debate and dismantles an old-school myth: you absolutely can have great wine under a screwcap — some of the world's best Rieslings are sealed that way. She gets the confusion, since screwcaps are also a cheaper closure found on inexpensive bottles, but her position is simple: if the wine is good, she doesn't care how it's sealed. Corkscrews have more flair, sure, and she offers a pro tip on the trickier wax-topped bottles — drive the corkscrew straight in rather than trying to peel all the wax off first. T

In Part 1, Keith laughs through a surprise call to a bed-and-breakfast in his hometown of Caboolture, Australia (where the locals are more sure about the Crocodile Hunter than the future superstar), talks about flying his mum and dad over for the CMAs, and admits the Aussie beers he still misses back in the States. He opens up about the Farmhand drought-relief broadcast beamed to Australia via satellite, his love of Farm Aid and Willie Nelson, and where his best song ideas tend to strike — the shower. Plus a caller phones in about the Somebody Like You video with Niki Taylor. A warm, funny, ge

What started as a workaround for the cocktail licensing gap has evolved into something much bigger. Premium Blend's Agave Wine Collection isn't just a tequila substitute anymore — California restaurants are doing bottle service with it, customers are taking shots, and people are drinking it straight because at 48 proof, it's smoother with none of the burn. In this episode, Gino Santos walks Forrest through: The philosophy behind product development — Gino won't sell something he doesn't believe in himself The full Agave Wine Collection lineup: Tequesta and Ginete (blanco-style), Guitarron (rep

Maryse Chevriere a five-question, multiple-choice wine quiz, and her answers double as a myth-busting crash course. Why do sommeliers have you taste before pouring the full glass? To check whether the wine is corked or flawed — and, honestly, to catch whether you simply don't like it. Maryse would rather figure that out early, pour the bottle by the glass, and steer you toward something you'll love than watch you pay for a bottle you'll never finish. And that returned bottle needn't go to waste: if it isn't faulty, let the staff taste it so they can sell it by the glass as a special. Everybody

Sandwiches and cold milk. That's what greeted a five-year-old Gino Santos when the U.S. Coast Guard pulled his family off a sinking shrimp boat and brought them ashore in Key West. For a kid who had just spent the crossing crammed into a shrimp hold with his grandmother, it was heaven. That same resilience and hunger would define Gino's path decades later when he and his brother Henry built Premium Blend Cocktails from nothing. In this episode, Gino walks Forrest through: The harrowing details of the family's escape from Cuba — a stolen shrimp boat, Soviet-era communism, a Bay of Pigs connecti

The best way to learn wine, Maryse Chevriere argues, isn't to read about it — it's to pour two glasses and taste the difference. In this episode she walks Forrest through the drinking games tucked into How to Sound Wine Smart, designed to make abstract concepts click through direct comparison. Think a wine you assumed was sweet suddenly revealing itself as dry when set beside an actually sweet one, a shy grape next to an aromatic Gewürztraminer, or one bottle tasted at first sip, again at thirty minutes, and again at two hours to feel what time and air really do. There are no winners, no loser

Ever wonder why your favorite neighborhood restaurant doesn't serve cocktails? Chances are it comes down to one thing: the liquor license. In many states, a full liquor license can run well into six or seven figures on the open market — making it virtually impossible for small and mid-sized venues to offer a full bar program. That's exactly the problem Gino Santos and his brother Henry set out to solve with Premium Blend Cocktails. Their wine-based spirits are legally classified as wine — meaning any venue with a basic beer and wine license (which in Florida costs around $400) can serve them.

Some people are trained into wine. Maryse Chevriere talked her way in on pure enthusiasm — and it turned out to be the perfect qualification. In this episode she tells Forrest Kelly how a manager went to bat for her despite her being "green," echoing the philosophy her chef husband lives by: give him someone hungry to learn over someone he'd have to un-train. From there, Maryse walks through the pivot that shaped her path — leaving New York not because she'd outgrown the wine bar, but because she was ready for a new experience and drawn to the easy access to wine country that San Francisco off

Grab your scorecard, wine lovers — Rusty Cellars is popping the quiz on one of the most fascinating guests in show history. Chef Chuck Hayworth spent 35 years in professional kitchens before a rare stomach cancer diagnosis changed everything, launching a private chef career that began when fellow patients in his therapy group asked him to cook for them. In this two-round, ten-question challenge, Rusty tests your memory on Chuck's go-to Niçoise salad dressed with cold-pressed Georgia olive oil, his resort chef tasting menu based in Boone, North Carolina at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains,

Maryse Chevriere's wine story doesn't follow a straight line — and that's exactly what makes it worth hearing. In this first installment, the author of How to Sound Wine Smart (out now from Simon Element) tells Forrest how a food-website waiter with an affinity for drinks talked her way into the wine world. Maryse opens up about her three months working the harvest at a Domaine in Alsace — no real paycheck, but all the wine she could drink and a hands-on crash course she calls the best "fall camp" of her life. From literally stomping grapes to learning alongside fans, pros, and travelers from