Dorothy J. Gaiter and John Brecher are

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journalist A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalism ...

author An author is the writer of a book, article, play, mostly written work. A broader definition of the word "author" states: "''An author is "the person who originated or gave existence to anything" and whose authorship determines responsibility f ...

s, and

wine critic Wine is an alcoholic drink typically made from fermented grapes. Yeast consumes the sugar in the grapes and converts it to ethanol and carbon dioxide, releasing heat in the process. Different varieties of grapes and strains of yeasts are ma ...

s, wife and husband who jointly wrote the wine column "Tastings" in ''

The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...

'' between 1998 and 2009.Maker, Meg Houston, ''Palate Press'' (February 22, 2010)
Dottie and John Share Their Thoughts About 'Open That Bottle Night'
/ref> They rated wines on a scale that ranged from ''"Yech"'', ''"OK"'', ''"Good"'', ''"Very Good"'', ''"Delicious"'' to ''"Delicious!"''. Their careers began simultaneously and have remained connected since their first meeting in the newsroom of ''

The Miami Herald The ''Miami Herald'' is an American daily newspaper owned by the McClatchy Company and headquartered in Doral, Florida, a city in western Miami-Dade County and the Miami metropolitan area, several miles west of Downtown Miami.Jacksonville, Florida Jacksonville is a city located on the Atlantic coast of northeast Florida, the most populous city proper in the state and is the largest city by area in the contiguous United States as of 2020. It is the seat of Duval County, with which the ...

and graduated from

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

in 1973, where he served as editor-in-chief of the ''

Columbia Daily Spectator The ''Columbia Daily Spectator'' (known colloquially as the ''Spec'') is the student newspaper of Columbia University. Founded in 1877, it is the oldest continuously operating college news daily in the nation after ''The Harvard Crimson'', and has ...

''. Gaiter grew up in an all-black community near

Florida A&M University Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University (FAMU), commonly known as Florida A&M, is a public historically black land-grant university in Tallahassee, Florida. Founded in 1887, It is the third largest historically black university in the U ...

Tallahassee, Florida Tallahassee ( ) is the capital city of the U.S. state of Florida. It is the county seat and only incorporated municipality in Leon County, Florida, Leon County. Tallahassee became the capital of Florida, then the Florida Territory, in 1824. In ...

Open That Bottle of Wine Night

In the late 1990s, Gaiter and Brecher invented the annual "Open That Bottle Night" (OTBN), encouraging their readers to open a symbolically significant bottle, and then share their stories. Since its inauguration in 2000, the event is always scheduled for the last Saturday in February, so the date may range from February 22 to 29.

Books

Among their published titles are ''Love by the Glass: Tasting Notes from a Marriage'' (2003), ''Wine for Every Day and Every Occasion'' (2004) and several editions of ''The Wall Street Journal Guide to Wine''.

Final "Tastings" column

Gaiter and Brecher announced at the end of their December 26, 2009 "Tastings" column in ''The Wall Street Journal'' that it would be their last. No reason was given, and no hint was provided as to what the couple would do in the future. The writers who later succeeded them as ''The Wall Street Journal'' wine columnists were

Jay McInerney John Barrett "Jay" McInerney Jr. (; born January 13, 1955) is an American novelist, screenwriter, editor, and columnist. His novels include '' Bright Lights, Big City'', ''Ransom'', '' Story of My Life'', ''Brightness Falls'', and ''The Last of ...

Lettie Teague Lettie Teague is an American author and currently a wine columnist for ''The Wall Street Journal''. Teague was for several years with ''Food & Wine'', as wine editor of the magazine from 1997 and executive wine editor 2005–2009. Biography ...

, and

Will Lyons Will Lyons is a journalist, newspaper columnist, award-winning wine writer and Television presenter, broadcaster. He is most widely known for his writing in ''The Wall Street Journal'' and ''The Sunday Times''. Education Lyons was educated at ...

. In 2011, in an interview with the Jacksonville Wine Guide, Gaiter and Brecher said that they "took the year off" in 2010—their first significant break from work in 36 years—and were undecided as to their next project.Catching up with Dorothy J. Gaiter and John Brecher (February 17, 2011)
JacksonvilleWineGuide.com
Retrieved October 19, 2012.

Recent accomplishments

In 2010, Gaiter was named Food and Wine Editor for ''France Magazine''. In 2013, she was also named Senior Editor for grapecollective.com. Brecher joined Bloomberg News in 2011 and, in 2012, was named Executive Editor for ''Enterprise''. In May 2014, he was awarded the Lawrence Minard Award, one of two Gerald Loeb career achievement awards.

References

External links