Education
He graduated from the French Culinary Institute and the WSET wine program
He graduated from the French Culinary Institute and the WSET wine program
He is known for his books and articles questioning conventional wisdom in the food and wine industries, particularly a widely publicized exposé of Wine Spectator magazine, and for his writing on the Freakonomics blog. He is author of several books, including The Wine Trials (the world"s bestselling guide to cheap wine), The Beer Trials, and an upcoming book tentatively entitled A Defense of Fast Food. Goldstein was also one of the subjects of Think Like a Freak, the 2014 book by Freakonomics authors Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner.
He lives in Oakland, California.
Goldstein received a Bachelor in Neuroscience and Philosophy from Harvard in 1998. He received a Juris Doctor from Yale Law School in 2002.
Goldstein also reviewed restaurants for Fodor"s Travel Guides in Italy, Mexico, Argentina, Thailand, and Hong Kong, and in 2005, founded the Fearless Critic series of restaurant guides, which was later acquired by Workman Publishing in New York and became a Workman imprint. The hoax garnered worldwide press
Wine Spectator Editor-in-Chief Thomas Matthews responded on the magazine"s web site.
In May 2008, Goldstein revealed the results of an experiment that he conducted in which 500 subjects, in a blind taste test, preferred cheaper wine to more expensive wine. The results were published in an academic paper entitled followed by a book entitled The Wine Trials. Some wine critics and aficionados questioned Goldstein"s conclusions, and a staff editorial in the Boston Globe criticized his findings.