Calorie Counter Information Blog

7:16 PM

June - Wine Manners-

A Featured Wine Manners Article

Wine and Cheese: Make the Perfect Combination


Ordering wine in a restaurant is not much different than buying it in a wine store. The main difference is that you have an audience. Yet ordering wine in a restaurant can be intimidating especially if the wine list is extensive.





Wine and cheese parties, which were popular in the 70s, are gaining back their popularity in recent times. The ability of the two to bring out each other?s best is simply indescribable. Another good thing about cheese and wine parties is that they're appropriate for any season or any reason.





Unfortunately many people get confused with the wide array of cheese and wines available. Many are confused about which kind of cheese to serve with which type of wine. Luckily, wine and cheese matching is simple, and in no time, you can host a very enjoyable wine and cheese party.





When it comes to cheese and wine parties, the first rule is simple and direct to the point: never used those cheap boxed wines. Wines that come in boxes are definitely convenient to open, but that?s about it. In order to bring out good combinations of flavors in cheese, or any food for that matter, you should pair it with the real deal.





The basic rule about pairing food with wine is that you shouldn't overpower the other. This is especially true with cheese. The flavors of cheese shouldn't dominate the taste of wine and vise versa. The pleasures of each bite of food should replace the delights of each sip of wine and conversely the bliss of every sip of wine should replace the delights of every bite of food. Simply put, strong cheeses should pair well with strong wines, while mild cheeses would go well with mild wines.

Join Wine Tasting Party.





Acidic wines go perfectly well with pungent cheeses. Brie goes well with sparkling wine or Chardonnay while goat cheese matches well with Sauvignon Blanc.





Sweetish wines go perfectly with soft cheeses. A slice of Camembert goes well with Chenin Blanc or Vouvray.





Full bodied red wines pair perfectly with hard cheeses. Red Bordeaux, Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, and Red Zinfandel, could do wonders with a sliver of Parmegiano Regiano or Romana cheese.





Even the humble common cheese like cheddar could be paired well with sweet wines such as Port, Vermouth, and Sherry. Aged cheddar, with its sharpness, could go well with a glass of Shiraz Cabernet, which is equally tangy.





When it comes to cheese and wine pairing, the best guide is one?s taste. If it seems good, then it must be a good much. Of course it takes time to discover the good matches, so one should not despair with a few errors in matching.





Corkage



Many restaurants will open and serve a bottle of wine brought by the patron. A quick call to the restaurant will confirm if this is possible, and if so, they will charge a corkage fee. They usually charge between $5 and $15 per bottle, although some restaurants will charge a lower fee if the wine brought is not on their wine list.





In a matter of time, you can be an expert cheese and wine matchmaker.







Join Wine Tasting Party.







Art of Wine Tasting.

A synopsis on Wine Manners.

Wine and Cheese: Make the Perfect Combination


Ordering wine in a restaurant is not much different than buying it in a wine store. The main difference is that you have an audience. Yet ordering win...


Click Here to Read More About Wine ...

Featured Wine Manners Items

Paul Hobbs Hyde Vineyard Pinot Noir


"The 2003 Pinot Noir Hyde Vineyard offers more currants, with a higher acid profile than the 2002, a lower level of concentration, but impressive currant notes intermixed with jammy cherries, some dried herbs, leather, and wood. Drink it over the next 2-3 years; I don't think this will turn out to be as impressive as the 2002. " RP - 91 (Subject to Availability) PHHP03 PHHP03


Price: 173.99 USD



Current Wine Manners News

How to clean red wine off a carpet or clothing

Thu, 22 May 2008 15:16:51 PDT
How to remove a red wine stain from clothing, rugs, carpet and fabric. Quick tips and tricks.

Fixit: Red wine stains are difficult to remove (Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune)

Fri, 23 May 2008 14:36:16 PDT
QHow do I get a red wine stain out of a cream-colored tablecloth? AForget the popular home remedies of throwing salt or white wine on the stain; they don't work, according to a University of California-Davis study.

Look around the home for natural cleaning products (South Bend Tribune)

Fri, 30 May 2008 04:05:25 PDT
The next time you need to clean your kitchen countertops, don't rush to grab the disinfectant spray you usually use. Instead, dig around in your cabinets -- you might already have natural items that can be used to tackle many cleaning projects around your home.

Packing carry-on suitcases the right way (TCPalm.com)

Fri, 30 May 2008 12:55:12 PDT
The carry-on bag could be the solution to some of the summer travel season's likely woes - including checked baggage fees on American Airlines and possibly other carriers - but it also has the potential to cause headaches. You don't want to find a rumpled mess when you arrive at your destination or spend your vacation shivering or sweating because you weren't ready for the weather. It is ...

If you pack light, watch for stains with this kit (The Morning News)

Sat, 31 May 2008 00:41:48 PDT
NEW YORK (AP) - You packed light, figuring a couple of outfits could get you through. That was before the coffee landed on your lap.

Fond farewell (The Cincinnati Enquirer)

Sat, 31 May 2008 02:38:22 PDT
Ever found parking on Mount Adams? Been called "Hon" at Frisch's? We're 100 percent sure that you'll know what our 14-year reporter is talking about, as he does one final "Chuck's List" for the Enquirer.

The luggage squeeze (The Fayetteville Observer)

Sun, 01 Jun 2008 21:06:26 PDT
NEW YORK — It’s time to think of the inside of your carry-on suitcase as real estate: Make the most of what you’ve got, keep it functional and make neatness count.


Sweet Sherries
Wine Club
Tags: |

Labels:

BlinkBitsBlinkList Add To BlogmarksCiteULike
diigo furl Google  LinkaGoGo
HOLM ma.gnolianetvouzrawsugar
reddit Mojo this page at Rojo Scuttle Smarking
spurl Squidoo StumbleUpon Tailrank
TechnoratiAddThis Social Bookmark Button
&type=page">Add to any serviceSocial Bookmark
onlywire Socializersocialize it
12:12 AM

June - Wine Market

A Featured Wine Market Article

I Love Italian Wine and Food - Tasting A Noble Sicilian Wine


Once again, we are breaking into the series tasting wines from each of Italy?s twenty wine regions. This article examines a noble red wine from the island of Sicily in southern Italy. It is very far from a bargain wine. We were about a dozen to taste it. I?ll be presenting my opinions and those of others.

So far, the wines that I purchased for this series have cost a maximum of about $20. I thought that I should try one at about double the price. I felt that by going to a relatively unknown region such as Sicily I might get a bargain. A lot of wines from the Tuscany or Piedmont regions of Italy cost $40 or much, much more. Such is not the case for Sicily.

Italy?s top of the line wine designation is DOCG, which stands for Denominazione di Origine Controllata Garantita (Denomination of Controlled, Guaranteed Origin.) There are no DOCG wines in Sicily. But the formal designation is not very important, many Super Tuscans costing at least twice my budget carry ?inferior? designations. The wine I chose carries the Contea di Sclafania DOC designation, having been promoted from the Sicilia IGT designation. The wine reviewed here is produced by the same company as the white Sicilian wine reviewed in my article I Love Italian Wine and Food ? The Sicily Region. This was no accident. First I bought the relatively expensive red. Then I bought the white wine for about one third the price. This white wine carries the Sicilia IGT designation, but I found it to be pretty good. Let?s take a look at its much more expensive red cousin.

Wine Reviewed
Tasca d?Almerita Regaleali ?Rosso del Conte? Contea di Sclafania DOC 2002 15% alcohol about $38

About 35 years ago, Count Tasca d?Almerita decided to make a flagship Sicilian red wine from two local grapes, Nero d?avola and Perricone. Nero d?avola is a thin-skinned grape that ripens extremely late, perhaps three weeks after Cabernet Sauvignon. Consequently this variety is virtually limited to Sicily. Some think that it is a relative of Syrah. Nero d?avola wines are usually dark and tarry, with lots of black fruit aroma and taste. They are rich and well structured, with firm and silky tannins. Many of the grapes in this bottle came from vines over forty years old. The plants are grown as shrubs, a somewhat unusual practice. This wine was aged for twelve months in French oak barrels, about 60% of which are new. It can be cellared for years. I only wish that I could taste a ten or twenty year old Rosso del Conte.

I?ll spare you the marketing materials and reviews that tend to be very laudatory. Here are the comments from my tasting group.

A bit of black fruit. Highly oaked. Toasted grains, toast, grilled barley. Nervous and wild. Garriga (a mixture of spices found in areas near the Mediterranean Sea). Leather, dried meat, musk, and underbrush. A strong presence. Acidic and tannic, but not very long. Moderately long, fairly tannic. Round. More fruit than oak.

When asked to guess the price, the general consensus was considerably lower than what I actually paid. It?s fair to assume that most of these people would not purchase this wine, even if they do buy wines in this price range. On the other hand, it?s not hard to find reviews on the Internet that draw the opposite conclusion. In fact, every review that I read was more laudatory than my tasting group was. And my thoughts?

Personally, I would rather drink wine with food than without food. There were only a few sips left in the bottle but I was able to squeeze out two pairings. First I tried slow-cooked beef ribs with potatoes and a side of green beans in tomato sauce. This wine was the essence of mouth-filling, a tiny sip enveloped my mouth with pleasure. The wine?s acidity and tannins handled the meat?s fat. If only I had more.

Isola is a Sicilian fresh cheese made from sheep?s milk. The Isola cheese was powerful, strong smelling and strong tasting, especially when you crunched into a peppercorn. The Rosso del Conte?s richness and complexity was quite noticeable in the presence of this cheese. I am glad that I didn?t waste the last precious sips of this wine on a weak cheese.

Final verdict. It?ll probably be quite some time before I buy another bottle of Rosso del Conte. I do think that it?s worth the price, but I can?t say that I got a $100 wine for less than $40. Have you ever done so?

Levi Reiss has authored or co-authored ten books on computers and the Internet, but to be honest, he would rather just drink fine Italian or other wine, accompanied by the right foods. He teaches classes in computers at an Ontario French-language community college. His wine website is http://www.theworldwidewine.com



Short Review on Wine Market

I Love Italian Wine and Food - Tasting A Noble Sicilian Wine


Once again, we are breaking into the series tasting wines from each of Italy?s twenty wine regions. This article examines a noble red wine from the is...


Click Here to Read More About Wine ...

Featured Wine Market Items

Hauterive Dufouleur


This delicios red Vin De Pays goes well with anything that you normally would have a red wine with. it has a beautiful deep velvet color, a fresh fruity bouquet with a nice full body. A wine for everyone, even the folks who are not to much into the red dry wines. Have this wine with steaks, pasta dishes, pizza, lasagna, cheese and by itself. You might want to enjoy this red ever so slightly chilled 55-60 F. WM439 WM439


Price: 22.95 USD



Headlines on Wine Market

High on wine, pathos and Tchaikovsky - Livemint


High on wine, pathos and Tchaikovsky
Livemint, India - May 22, 2008
When I looked up the meaning of pathos in the dictionary, I discovered that pathos (appealing to emotions) was one of the three “modes of persuasion” ...


ABOUT A COMMITMENT TO TERROIR - Yahoo! News


ABOUT A COMMITMENT TO TERROIR
Yahoo! News - May 25, 2008
The noun does appear in the two-volume Oxford English Dictionary. Yardley had used it precisely. Rooted in medieval Latin, terroir blossomed in 15th-century ...


Ex-Philadelphia magazine editor Benjamin Wallace writes saga of ... - Philadelphia Daily News


Ex-Philadelphia magazine editor Benjamin Wallace writes saga of ...
Philadelphia Daily News, PA - May 27, 2008
Those books included Simon Winchester's "The Professor and the Madman," which described lexicography and the history of the Oxford English Dictionary by ...


Gadget of the Week: Whisks - National Post


Gadget of the Week: Whisks
National Post, Canada - May 28, 2008
Though the Oxford English Dictionary defines “gadget” broadly as “a small device, mechanism or fitting in a piece of machinery, etc. ...


Welcome to your own backyard - Globe and Mail


Welcome to your own backyard
Globe and Mail, Canada - May 31, 2008
Margaret Webb reports on the boom in gourmet travel in Southern Ontario and explores the hinterland's next foodie frontier In 2007, the Oxford Dictionary ...


The Goat and Compasses (God encompasseth us)* - clusterflock


The Goat and Compasses (God encompasseth us)*
clusterflock, TX - Jun 1, 2008
See The Goat and Compasses under the heading Goat, Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (Centenary Edition). Harper & Row: 1970. Page 469. ...


Enlexica Announces "Explore" - A One Million Word On-Line Dictionary

Mon, 15 Nov 2004 00:00:01 PST
SANTA BARBARA, CA (PRWEB) November 15, 2004 -- Enlexica today announced the publication on the web of its Explore™ series of dictionaries. "Explore – Dictionary and...


Wine Manners
Wine Vintages
|

Labels:

BlinkBitsBlinkList Add To BlogmarksCiteULike
diigo furl Google  LinkaGoGo
HOLM ma.gnolianetvouzrawsugar
reddit Mojo this page at Rojo Scuttle Smarking
spurl Squidoo StumbleUpon Tailrank
TechnoratiAddThis Social Bookmark Button
&type=page">Add to any serviceSocial Bookmark
onlywire Socializersocialize it