Wine Blog

Tarted-up wine labels a disservice to female drinkers? – Calgary Herald
But with more than a million wine producers worldwide she adds, “I understand a winery’s need to stand out on crowded liquor-store shelves.” MacLean says the job of a wine label — be it a fluffy squirrel or a castle in the middle distance — is to get us

Maryland Wine Week highlights state’s growing wine market – HometownAnnapolis.com
The association partnered with restaurants and wine stores across the state to coordinate wine tastings, wine maker dinners and other themed events. In Annapolis, participating businesses include: Annebeth’s, Bay Ridge Wine and Spirits and The Wild Orchid.

Sotheby’s Wine Encyclopedia: Fourth Edition, Revised (Sotheby’s Wine Encyclopedia)
If you want to learn about wines of the world and advance your comprehension of wine production, grape varieties, appellations, and individual wineries, understand the factors (such as location, soil, climate, and methods of viticulture) that affect the taste and nose, and visit your wine shop with a list of quality wines to explore, Tom Stevenson is the man to read. Author of 12 books (including Champagne and The Millennium Champagne & Sparkling Wine Guide), three-time winner of the Wine Writer of the Year award, and columnist for Wine magazine, Stevenson has the gift of taking vast quantities of knowledge and experience and translating them into lucid, sparkling prose, easily graspable by the novice, yet still interesting and instructive to the connoisseur.

Arranged geographically, with nearly 100 maps, profiles on top producers, and valuable Author’s Choice charts for each region, the Wine Encyclopedia covers the wines of Europe (from Great Britain and Switzerland to Southeast Europe, Greece, and the Levant), as well as wines from North and South Africa, North and South America, Australia, New Zealand, and Asia. In addition, there’s a guide to wine and food (pairing fois gras with a Champagne or Sauterne, for example, and claret or Cabernet Sauvignon with beef), a guide to wine flavors (making sense of descriptors such as fig, gooseberry, violet, and hay), a list of good vintages, and a glossary of tasting and technical terms, distinguishing “cheesy” and “chewy” from “creamy” and “corked.” Enhanced by beautiful pictures of vineyards, wine labels, and Stevenson himself demonstrating the art of wine tasting, from examining and nosing the wine to spitting it out, this a visually beautiful as well as an informative volume. As sumptuous as an elegant Tuscan Barolo, as rewarding as a Sarget de Gruaud-Larose from Bordeaux, as pleasing as a Ferreira port, the Sotheby Wine Encyclopedia is a remarkable tome of oenological erudition. –Stephanie Gold

Customer Review: Best Appellation book around
This is the third edition of this book I have purchased. It only gets better and better.

For information regarding appellations, grapes, and wine in general, I prefer this as my number one book.

Customer Review: Great reference tool
I am a gigantic nerd, so this book is great, but for normal people that just want the information…it might have too much minutia.

The Way to Make Wine: How to Craft Superb Table Wines at Home
Written by a vintner and science editor with twenty-five years experience, The Way to Make Wine is the most readable and reliable handbook among the many winemaking guides. In engaging conversational prose, Sheridan Warrick shows that making your own wine is not only easy, but also fun. Geared to everyday wine lovers who want to drink well, save money, and impress their friends, this book reveals everything needed to make delicious wines–both reds and whites–from start to finish.
Warrick demystifies winemaking by explaining the nuts and bolts and demonstrating that if readers can replace a faucet washer or cook a pasta sauce, they can make food-friendly wines that cost less than the bottles they’re now opening. He enables amateur vintners to equip a home winery, procure top-quality grapes, run a flawless fermentation, and enjoy their wine–its nose, its body, and finish–with renewed awareness and appreciation. At the same time, the author points experienced home vintners to new skills, describing top wineries’ techniques. Rich with insiders’ know-how, this book also divulges the many advances that have been made in the past few decades and makes clear that, with enologists’ innovations, home winemaking is easier than ever. With straightforward illustrations of key steps, this book offers one-stop shopping for anyone who’s ever dreamed of making table wines at home.
* two step-by-step sections: one for beginners, one for experienced home vintners
* sidebars offer quick tips and key elements of winemaking lore
* includes the only clear and comprehensive guide to minimizing the use of sulfites in wine
* section on suppliers and labs provides a wealth of information on sources of fine wine grapes

Customer Review: Great Book!!
This is a great book for wine makers, gives tons of suggestions! Love it!

Customer Review: Very informative and well written
This book is great for anyone wanting to home brew wine. I find myself referring to it over and over during the process. If i had one tiny gripe it would be that the book is heavily geared toward someone who is pressing their own grapes for juice. If you’re (not as ambitious)like me you will opt for already pressed juice to avoid the hassel of a press and you may find yourself having to interpret and adjust given methods accordingly. Other than that i would highly recommend this book to all would be vinters it is a great resource.

The House of Mondavi: The Rise and Fall of an American Wine Dynasty
The New York Times bestseller, now in paperback: a scandal-plagued story of the immigrant family that built—and then lost—a global wine empire Set in California’s lush Napa Valley and spanning four generations of a talented and visionary family, The House of Mondavi is a tale of genius, sibling rivalry, and betrayal. From 1906, when Italian immigrant Cesare Mondavi passed through Ellis Island, to the Robert Mondavi Corp.’s twenty-first-century battle over a billion-dollar fortune, award-winning journalist Julia Flynn Siler brings to life both the place and the people in this riveting family drama. A meticulously reported narrative based on more than five hundred hours of interviews, The House of Mondavi is a modern classic.

Customer Review: tess’s review of House of Mondavi
Anyone that is big into Wine and has been to Napa knows Mondavi Winery is one of the biggest player in the Valley. It was very interesting to read how the winery came about and the split up of the family….Charles Krug winery.

Customer Review: Family dynamics for all to see
An interesting in-depth review of a famous family, from success to downfall. This book navigates the ascendacy of this dynasty to the top of the California wine industry, hindered by the breakdown of personal relations and the final fiasco of the business. Sad, but fascinating.