A&E

It's time for wine, not whining, as the New Year draws near

Right about this time every year, people start making lists and checking them twice. I'm not talking about Christmas shopping lists. No, these are the resolutionaries who start each year vowing to make new habits or break old ones.

Sure it's good to lose weight, stop smoking and start adhering to a budget, but how many years have you made those promises and promptly broken them? Rather than set yourself up for failure, consider some fun and rewarding wine-related resolutions you are more likely to keep.

Here for your consideration are a few I'm adopting this year:

  • Try new wines. Most wine drinkers get into a rut, rotating among two or three they like. With the vast number of varieties and their growing availability, it's a pity to limit yourself. Resolve to pick a wine sometime next year just because you have no idea what it is.

  • Hold a wine tasting party with friends. Keep it simple. Select four or five wines, or invite everyone to bring one. Assign a country (or wine variety) to each guest and let them make the selections. As the host, provide plenty of wine-friendly snacks, such as bread and cheese, crackers and fruit to refresh the palate between samples and allow people to taste the wines with and without food.

  • Go global. Switzerland, South Africa, Argentina and New Zealand make some great wines, but they haven't always been as available in the United States as they are now.

  • Visit a winery and buy a bottle or two to bring home. Buy the ones you can't get at retail stores. Register for the mailing list so you can keep up with new releases. And remember that it's now legal to order wines directly from their makers.

  • I recommend this next one without blushing: sample a rose and discover there is more than just cloying white zinfandel in this color range. An Anjou Rose or dry Tavel from France is light and fruity as well as off the beaten path. These wines are best consumed when young so don't stash them away for the future.

  • Drink champagne more often. Sparkling wine turns an ordinary day into an occasion.

  • Start a wine cellar. It need not be fancy, extensive or expensive. Buy a few favorite wines and put them in an attractive rack. Plan to rotate new ones in as you go. Don't leave a better wine on the shelf until just the perfect occasion arises. There's nothing more disappointing than opening an expensive 20-year-old bottle only to discover that it's become vinegar. Open one bottle a month that has been saved for that special moment, add friends and enjoy. What if you died tomorrow and never had a chance to try that Romanee-Conti that cost you a month's salary?

  • Invest in a good corkscrew. The angel-wing type is not great because of its tendency to pull out the center of a cork. Buy a lever type or a "rabbit" style, and avoid those cork fragments floating in the glass.

  • Start a wine diary. How many times do you say to yourself "I just don't remember that wine we loved at the restaurant last week"? Keep it handy - in a bedside dresser perhaps - and jot down the name and a few notes about a wine you enjoyed that day. To help remember, either bring home the cork (if there is one) or write it on a piece of paper at the restaurant. Some wines now come with tear-off reminder tabs on the labels.

  • Never cook with wine you wouldn't drink. When a recipe calls for wine, it's meant to enhance the flavor. You wouldn't use an under ripe tomato or brown, withered herbs. The same rule should apply to wine. Use some when cooking, then serve the rest during the meal.

  • At restaurants, send the last glass or two of wine in the bottle back to the kitchen for the chef. Sure there's that merlot-to-go law that allows customers to take an unfinished bottle home, but it's a pain to get it sealed up, then it has to be stashed in the trunk where it might get forgotten or broken. Better to share it with the chef and his/her staff, who might appreciate it at the end of a hard night's work.

  • The one resolution everyone should make this and every year: Don't drink to excess and then get behind the wheel. Wine should be a source of joy, not tragedy.

    Happy New Year to one and all. Cheers!


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