However, I feel that my February selection warrants more than just a paragraph and a picture. In doing some research on the brand, I found out some pretty cool stuff about them. Tussock Jumper is a relatively new wine company founded here in the US that produces wine varietals with grapes grown from their native locations. Like Sauvignon Blanc? Theirs is bottled in New Zealand. Riesling? Germany. Pinot Noir? France. In fact, the only two wines made and bottled in the US are the Zinfandel and the Merlot, both likely from California’s central coast and made by a local winemaker named Richard Castle. According to LinkedIn, he’s known for his work at the Sonoma Wine Co., Benzinger Family Winery and Guenoc Winery. Despite the fact that Tussock Jumper Wines are fairly new, they’ve been tasted and tested. In fact, the Barossa Shiraz (Australia) scored 87 points from Wine Spectator this past year.

I picked up the Chardonnay, not because it was produced in the Languedoc region of France… but because of the tasting notes on the label: “..lovely aromas of apricots, pears and green apples. The palate shows hits of walnuts and well integrated notes of vanilla oak, which leads to a slight buttery finish.” Sold, sold, sold, and sold.

What did I notice (disclaimer: I am not a trained sommelier … I just know what I like): Fragrant bouquet, sharp start with a buttery linger. I LOVE chardonnays aged in French Oak, but 2/3 of this wine is fermented in steel before blending. That’s what gives it the “bite.” This is certainly a wine that has the best of both worlds. This is definitely a wine for dessert because I think it may be a bit too complex to enjoy with dinner (unless you have a really boring seafood dish that needs some help).

Unfortunately, some people will buy it because it’s inexpensive and there’s a pig in a red sweater on the label. The company seems to think that cute animals are marketable. I, too, sometimes make a final decision on a wine because of the label… but I know never to judge a book by its cover.

I’ve only come to re-appreciate Chardonnay. I’d buy this again.

And at around $12.99 a bottle, you can’t go wrong!

We know it’s early, but we can’t wait for it this year!! The Bottle of White office will be closed through December 25th for the Christmas season. Don’t worry, though…we’ll be back open on the 26th for our winter wine-tasters! Here’s to a happy and healthy December to all of our clients and friends!

~Mary, Reggie, Colleen, Justin & the whole Bottle of White gang!

I bet many people have their Sandy stories. I have a few, but the one that is probably most etched in my memory is this one.

On Wednesday, a full day after Hurricane Sandy left thousands of exhausted, powerless Long Islanders in her wake, I pulled on my rubber rain boots and hit the streets of my own hometown to see what she had done. It was Halloween, and until this day, the streets of Babylon south of Montauk Highway were impassable due to flooding.

As I walked south, crossing Montauk Highway onto Willow Street to make my way down Shore Road, it didn’t take long to see the first signs of her wrath. Several boaters stood nervously around a crane at the Suffolk Marine that was attempting to right a wayward boat that had fallen from her scaffolding. In the background, the bow of a half-sunken boat peered out of the canal. As curious onlookers snapped photos with their iPhones and muttered sounds of disbelief to one another, a man looked back at those that had gathered and said, “Yep – that’s my boat. And I just got it, too.”

Wandering further along Shore Road and eventually making that left onto Fire Island Avenue, I observed trash piles slowly growing on a number of curbs…and not just water-logged furniture and rolled up carpet, but also big black garbage bags that had probably been filled with numerous possessions and personal effects that had floated up inside along with the marauding tide. People often say that objects can be replaced, but is that always true?

My objective in this trip was not to sight-see in a time when so many people were cleaning up what had remained. I wasn’t there to gawk at those that had lost so much. Instead, I wanted to visit the streets where I used to ride my bike as a little kid. Babylon is my home, too… and it has been for a long time. As I approached the corner of Merman Place, near the last bit of Fire Island Avenue that heads down to the village pool, I noticed a crude handmade sign posted on a telephone pole outside someone’s flooded-out home. Slow, no wake: an odd sign to see in the street.

I made a left here and stopped at the edge of the driveway of what was once 4 Merman Place. As I became more stationary and my heels sunk into the mud, I recalled standing there twenty years earlier in front of a bungalow that once belonged to my parents. A tenant had permanently (and unexpectedly) evacuated just prior to Hurricane Gloria, and the venerable shack was not able to keep the water out. Although I was young, I recall almost everything about that house, including the 16 foot Renken bowrider we kept in the canal behind it. The house was uninhabitable after the storm; it sat dormant, waiting for repair. Years later, a fire had taken all that was left: the hardwood floors, the wooden planks that made up the front walk, and the tiny oar that adorned the front door as if to let visitors know, “Hey, we live in a mariner’s town.”

But that’s all gone now. While I knew that the property couldn’t have sustained any real damage (it’s hard to destroy a home that has already burned down and left a tuft of seagrass growing from its ashes), I was curious to see how everything looked. Aside from the neighbor’s back porch detaching and floating over to the back of our driveway where a garage once stood, everything was OK.

The same can’t be said for Yacht Club Road, though. As I made my way back north, my boots clomped through the tacky muck that covered the streets. I didn’t want to gawk, I swear I didn’t… but I couldn’t help but stare in awe at what was happening before me. As men and women in rain gear and work boots carried what was left of their homes to the street, scrap metal scavengers in pickup trucks went curb-to-curb, only asking for permission to pick through the rubble if the homeowner appeared to be nearby. Cars with shattered windows lined up along the side of the road and waited for tow trucks to carry them away. The smell of oil and rotten shellfish stunk up the air.

The Babylon Beach House, a family-run senior home facing a part of the Great South Bay known as Babylon Cove, stands near the edge of Yacht Club Road. That was my “out-of-bounds” on the bike; I couldn’t go past that point because the busy intersection into the mouth of the Babylon Marina was too dangerous for a little kid. In the present day, my turnaround spot was blocked by piles of its former interior. A sad note on the facility’s Facebook page sadly states, “the…future is unknown at this time.”

While my power was out on Monday night, I took to checking social media sites to see what was going on in my neighborhood. Living half a mile north of the bay means that I’m usually far enough away from powerful storm surges, but after seeing whitecaps on the corner of Montauk Highway and Route 231 on television before the power failed, I didn’t want to take any chances. Among other somber updates I saw about my community, I read that the Venetian Yacht Club may have collapsed, or had a fire, or both.

So I approached that corner like I watch the scary parts of horror movies, with my hands covering my eyes with just the tiniest space between my fingers to see merely a shred of what’s actually happening. Through the cracks, everything seemed to look OK from the front, but I wanted to get around to the back to see if there was anything I had missed. I felt compelled to either confirm or deny this rumor, but getting to the back, the bayfront side of the large catering hall, involved negotiating the biggest puddle I had encountered at this point in my journey. Once I safely made it into the marina and took the pictures I wanted to take, I sat on the pier and wept.

When I was finally ready to head back home, I walked through a community that alternated with the sounds of buzzing chainsaws and silence, a cacophony of the macabre. Here and there trick-or-treaters walked up to homes where work-weary adults put down what they were doing for a few minutes to fetch bowls of candy and offer reluctantly relieved smiles. Police officers stood at the corners of busy intersections with dark traffic signals and somberly directed traffic. Shopkeepers on Deer Park Avenue washed their storefront windows with paper towels and Windex and chatted with one another about when the power might return.

I haven’t been that far down since.

So this is Babylon. It’s not Lindenhurst, It’s not Mastic Beach, It’s not Long Beach, Staten Island, or Breezy Point. But it is my hometown. I’m one of the lucky ones that does not have to go back to reclaim anything. I am one of the lucky ones that does not have to rebuild. Instead, I satiate my guilt by spending my free time working with an organization called Babylon Helps, but that’s another post for another day.

Fall is our favorite time to visit the North Fork!

Bottle of White Harvest Tour

$120 per person (group of 8, based on availability)

• A late model luxury limousine will pick you and your guests up from home and present you with two delicious bottles of Long Island wine to enjoy on your ride out to the North Fork.

• Stop at one of our favorite North Fork vineyards for a complimentary tasting and a delicious catered lunch from Aveline.

• After you’ve had some time to relax, proceed to one of many farms in the area for apple and/or pumpkin picking! There are several farms for you to choose from, including Harbes Family Farm & Vineyard and Davis Peach Farm.

• Stop by the one-and-only Briermere Farms on the way home for some delicious baked goods.

This unique tour opportunity is, of course, fully-customizable for your optimal enjoyment! We have many more vehicles available for larger parties and we can certainly accommodate smaller parties. Availability is VERY LIMITED, so call us at 631-539-2091 or e-mail bottleofwhite@optimum.net to start planning your tour today!

Terroir (French pronunciation: [tɛʁwaʁ] from terre, “land”) is the special characteristics that the geography, geology and climate of a certain place, interacting with the plant’s genetics, expressed in agricultural products such as wine, coffee, tomatoes, heritagewheat and tea. The concept has also crossed to other Protected Appellations of Origin (PDOs a form of Geographical Indication), products such as cheeses.

Er… say what? Exactly.

While flipping channels earlier today, I happened to catch the last few minutes of The Breakfast Club. One of my favorite parts of the film is at the very end when the nerdy character Brian (played by Anthony Michael Hall) reads aloud from the essay that Mr. Vernon asked them to write. “You see us as you want to see us,” he says. “…in the simplest of terms, in the most convenient definitions…”  Anyone who knows this film does not need me to explain the point of the narration, but in case the 80s is a gigantic blur to you, it’s about stereotypes. So let’s experiment with this concept a little, shall we? I’m going to list some regions around the world, and I’d like you to classify them in “the simplest of terms.” Are you ready? New York. Italy. California. Chile. France. Can you do it?

Ok, let me slow down a little.

Have you ever been to Montauk? When I think of Montauk in the “simplest of terms,” I think of a quiet nautical paradise that is too cool for the glitz and glamour of the Hamptons, a place a girl can go to with beach hair and a linen dress and not feel like she’s slumming. Montauk has also been typecast as a place where middle class Long Islanders escape to vacation and where the wealthy hang out when they don’t want to be bothered. A friend posted a recently published Times article on his Facebook page about how Montauk has recently been “infested” with a breed of 20-and-30-somethings known as “hipsters.” The complaint of the old-time locals? The fedora-wearing blokes kill the “vibe.”

Ok, “vibe.” In a roundabout way, this is what I wanted you to think of.

Now, isolating a vibe for New York is tricky. Did I mean New York City? Long Island? The Finger Lakes region? I could name every New York hamlet from Montauk to Niagra and each would have a different vibe to it. To give you an analogy, vibe is to city as terroir is to wine-producing region. Since I started taking wine-tasting classes, I’ve learned that a major difference between higher-end French wines and American wines is how they are named. You won’t run to your liquor store and pick up a bottle of “North Fork.” But, you would be able to find a bottle of Bordeaux with no problem. Why is that? Well, here in the US, we name wines based on the grape (i.e. Sauvignon Blanc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, etc.) In France, the notion of terroir is important in linking the style of wine to the region in which it was produced.

I’m willing to admit that I sometimes judge an unfamiliar wine by its label. No, I’m not looking for a catchy name like, “Mommy’s Time Out,” but instead I’m looking for the region from which the wine is produced. I learned in my visit to the Mondavi Winery in Napa last year that a wine can only say “Napa”  on the label if it was really produced in Napa. If it says “California,” it’s likely from the central California coast. The climate is different, and therefore, the wine will taste differently than its northern cousin. Terroir has everything to do with the soil and the climate, and in California, the soil is as diverse as the growing regions.

Regarding the definition and broader “concept” of terroir, sommelier and food/wine blogger Liz Caskey says:

Terroir is a group of vineyards, or vines, from the same region, which belong to a specific appellation sharing the same type of soil, weather conditions, grapes varieties, and wine making savoir-faire. These factors all contribute to giving a specific, unique personality to the wine, much as if it were a person.

Therefore, I often find myself wandering around the Cabernet Sauvignon rack in my local wine store looking for “Napa Valley” on the label. The true north coast wines from Napa and Sonoma are grown in California’s coolest climate. The bay area acts almost as an air conditioner for the whole region, which lends itself to excellent growing conditions. This is precisely why many of California’s “premium” wines are from the Napa Valley.  For similar reasons, I like my Sauvignon Blanc from Central America and my Merlots from Long Island. Those grapes grow particularly well in those regions, producing tasty palate-pleasing wines.

More locally, it’s important to understand that a wine produced from grapes in the Finger Lakes region of New York is not going to taste the same as a wine from the North Fork. Once upon a time I went on a Long Island wine tour where the guide gave us some vague reason why North Fork wines are as delicious as French wines. The statement usually says something about soil characteristics and geography and how they provide the ideal conditions for producing award-winning wines. Well, how? And what region of France? That, my friends, is a conversation for the learned professionals, not for me. I’ve never actually been to France, and I can’t tell you a thing about the climates of the various wine-producing regions.

But, if you’re REALLY interested about the wines you’re drinking close to home, any tasting room employee worth her salt should be able to tell you about the wines you’re sampling and answer any questions you may have. So go and ask away!

And one more thought from Liz Caskey really sums it up for me: “After all is said and done, we have to keep in mind is that the pleasure in any wine is subjective. We each bring something to what is in the glass and interpret that result differently. So try to feel the wine as a person, understand where it’s coming from. Let it speak to you, feel its presence, and let it tell you who it really is. That, for me, is terroir.”

Friday Happy Hour

It’s supposed to be rainy and generally yucky today. I know… bummer. For that reason, I’d like to send you to the city to try something a little different: a salsa-dancing-wine-tasting-class (er, of sorts) at Zack’s Dance Loft. I have to admit that the schedule on the website was a little perplexing so I’ll let you figure out when to go on your own, but it does sound like fun! According to the write-up, this is some sort of non-traditional wine tasting that includes a dance class (swing, salsa, tango, or dance on a pole) prefaced by an opportunity to swirl, sniff and sip your way through 10-12 wines accompanied by cheeses and fresh bread. Apparently there is an open wine bar throughout the evening, perhaps to masque the fact that everyone in a beginner class dances like drowning robots. Please take lots of pictures. Tickets start at $30 and classes are ongoing, so if you can’t make it into the city tonight, try again next time!

If you’re staying on Long Island, keep in mind that Alive After Five is happening in Patchogue Village (rain be damned!) Stick around the Brickhouse Brewery and see  The Rock Stars from Mars play at 9:30. Make sure to shout really loud for my friend Rob on drums!

Saturday

I love heading out to the vineyards on weekends, but it can get a little crowded in the summer months. One of my favorite “low-key” wineries to visit, regardless of season, is Shinn Estate Vineyards in Mattituck. If you have the slightest interest in horticulture or the winemaking process, join Barbara Shinn as she opens the vineyard for a walking tour and wine tasting every Saturday and Sunday afternoon at 1:30 PM. The walk highlights the growing cycle of the vines and educates guests about the sustainable farming practices of the estate. The tour is $20.00 and includes a wine tasting.

Not into watching the clock? Visit Shinn when it is convenient for you and take a self-guided tour instead.  Check in at the tasting room, pick up your tour booklet, and stroll through the vineyard, stopping at markers that explain the growing cycle of the vine, sustainable, organic and Biodynamic winegrowing, the natural habitat of wildlife and beneficial insects, and “our living soil.”  The tour is complimentary with a purchase. Check the website for more details about the tours or to download your tour booklet in advance.

To top off your day of wine tasting, why not “stand up for stand-up?” That is, attend the seventh annual Long Island Comedy Festival at Martha Clara Vineyards ($30 at the door, $25 in advance) and enjoy the art of live (and local) stand-up comedy by supporting talented comics, like Paul Bond and Michael Somerville, that call Long Island their home. The show starts at 8:30pm.

Sunday

Ok so I’ve heard about wine and cheese pairing events, and I’ve also heard about wine and chocolate pairing events… but I have never found out about BEER and CHOCOLATE pairing, which is just enough to pique my interest for THIS really cool event: South Bay Paddlewheel Cruises has teamed up with the Fire Island Beer Company and Exotic Chocolate Tasting to host a Beer & Chocolate Pairing Cruise aboard the Lauren Kristy, a 65 foot turn-of-the-century style riverboat that sails from the Bay Shore Marina located at the end of Clinton Ave. in Bay Shore. The 3-hour tour begins with a buffet dinner, then guests will enjoy local summer ales paired with handcrafted chocolates from Costa Rica, Grenada, Bolivia and the Philippines. This guided journey will be hosted by New York’s only “Chocolate Sommelier”, Roxanne Browning, and a representative from the Fire Island Beer Company. The event is $75 a person and reservations are required, so check the website or call 631-750-5359.

Friday Happy Hour

In my efforts to suggest something different for happy hour tonight, may I suggest the following:

Looking for a family-friendly event for a change? Grab a blanket, pack a picnic basket, and head out to East Setauket for the 2012 Backporch Concert Series at Benner’s Farm (5-9pm) to see Nigel’s Acoustic Bridge. Admission is only $7 for adults and $6 for children and seniors.

 Saturday

Grab your best cocktail dress and horse-racing hat, and get to the North Shore to enjoy an old fashioned Clam Bake at the Vanderbilt Estate on Northport Bay. Enjoy an evening of food, music and dancing under the stars at this benefit event to support museum education programs. Come hungry: the event features a menu of seafood-lovers’ favorites — from whole steamed lobsters, clams, mussels and clam chowder to barbecued chicken, burgers, hot dogs and corn-on-the-cob — plus wine and beer. It will take place in the Vanderbilt’s celebration tent on the west lawn of the mansion. Tickets: $100 per person (includes beer, wine and soda). Purchase tickets online at the Vanderbilt Museum website, or call the Vanderbilt at 631-854-5579 (Monday-Friday, 10:00am-4:00pm)

Sunday

I have to say that I regret not being around for this really cool seminar at Castillo di Borghese Vineyard in Cutchogue: Getting Published with Tom Clavin and Phil Keith ($50 from 2-5pm). Granted this is more for aspiring authors than for wine drinkers, but I couldn’t resist posting information about it here (for those of you who don’t know, I’m also a high school English teacher here on Long Island). Light refreshments will be served, and each attendee gets to leave with  free autographed copy of one of the hosts’ books. Register on the website linked above.

Here’s your chance to stuff your face for a good cause!

If you’re not writing a book, channel your inner chubby-kid and head over to West Islip for the 2nd Annual Villa Monaco “Thrilla at the Villa” and help support the West Islip Breast Cancer Coalition. Food, drinks, raffles, live music, and a ravioli eating contest! Admission is free; visit this website for details and directions.

*Keep in mind that events may be changed or cancelled without notice. Bottle of White does not accept any responsibility for any such changes that are made after this post was written. Always check website or call ahead to confirm. Enjoy and drive safely! 

• 

  A bottle of wine is always a thoughtful hostess gift!

  A gift is a gift is a gift, unless it is something you were asked to contribute. Keep this in mind and you’ll avoid a potential faux pas. If you’re told that it’s not necessary to bring anything to a party, do not assume that the wine you are bringing is going to be opened. It’s actually up to the hostess as to whether or not she will open the wine you brought or provide other options for her guests. Frankly, if someone comes to my house with a delicious bottle of Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon, I may choose to hold onto that one for later instead of opening it so someone can dump it into the sangria pitcher. And please, please, please for the love of all that is holy, NEVER do this at someone’s party!

• Don’t look for bargains to give as gifts. If you don’t know wine, ask for some help from a friend or from the liquor store. The friendly folks behind the counter are usually always happy to answer questions. Say, “I’m going to a party and I’d like to give the hostess a bottle of wine. I know she likes Chardonnay. Do you have any suggestions?” They are not likely to sell you a $6 bottle of crappy wine that will embarrass you. That being said, never bring a $6 bottle of wine to a party as a gift. You should always plan to spend anywhere from $12 to $20 at minimum.
• Make sure your gift has been properly cared for. Let’s say that you know you’re going to a party on Saturday, July 14th but you only have time to go to the liquor store after work on Wednesday, July 11th. You might be tempted to leave the bottle of wine you purchased in the trunk of your car so you don’t forget it for the party. Don’t do it! Heat damages wine and can spoil it. The proper temperature for storing wine is ideally 55 degrees, but room temperature is quite OK in the short term as long as you keep the wine out of direct sunlight. That being said…
• If you’re going to stock up on wine, store it properly. This is an important rule whether you are giving wine as a gift of keeping it around the house for special occasions. While liquor stores often stock their bottles of wine vertically, it’s not the proper way to keep your wine at home. It all has to do with how wine reacts to oxygen, and storing a bottle of wine on its side is one way to prevent a cork from drying out and letting oxygen sneak into the wine and change the taste. This discussion thread actually offers some more detail about wine storage, if you’re interested.
• Get creative. I recently saw a creative gift wrapping idea for wine on Pinterest that came from Real Simple. I also really loved this idea for a “graffiti” bottle. Your hostess is sure to appreciate the effort. While you’re at it, be sure to follow me on Pinterest for a hodgepodge of cool ideas!

Running a little short on cash this week? Why not check out one of the many FREE Summer Concert Events available all over Long Island (like this one:)

Saturday

Yet another weekend comes to Long Island hand-in-hand with a heat advisory. There’s a high of 93 degrees expected tomorrow with super-mega humidity to boot, leaving us in that 100-104 degree “real feel” zone. If heading to the beach or lounging on a pool raft is what you’re planning for the heat of the day, enjoy! After you’ve had enough, come to Tasting Under the Stars from 6-10pm at One Woman Wines in Southold. Are you a white wine fan? I hear the Grüner is awesome.

Sunday

There might be some isolated thunderstorms on Sunday, but the weather IS supposed to be a little cooler. Instead of braving the bay to head to Fire Island, consider checking out one of my favorite events on the North Fork: The Wine, Beer, and Oyster Festival with Blue Point Brewery at Jamesport Vineyards. 11am Saturday begins the second of three such events this summer. Lawn chairs and blankets are welcome, and there is plenty of room on the sprawling vineyard to catch some vitamin D and listen to the band play. Admission is free (EDIT: I’m actually not so sure about this because of what I’m seeing here), but keep in mind that no outside food or drink is permitted, so bring plenty of cash for lunch and beverages. I attended with my boyfriend last year; he’s not much of a wine drinker, so he enjoyed the Blue Point tent (as did I – Blue Point Toasted Lager is one of my favorite draft beers).  After we had our fill of the festival, we stopped at the Lobster Roll Northside on the way home and shared one of the biggest lobsters I have ever seen. That’s what I call a Sunday Funday!

I didn’t eat the whole thing (though I would have liked to try!)

If you like the Jamesport East End Series of wines (the ones with the shellfish on the labels), you should know that 10% of sales are donated to S.P.A.T., the Southold Project for Aquaculture Research to promote local shellfish restoration.

Flash forward to last summer: I was hanging out at a barbecue in Rockaway Beach when the hostess told me all about a wine club she was a member of. The concept was simple: the group is small. They meet once a month at the home of one hostess. The hostess chooses a theme and buys the wine. She then gives out “assignments” to the guests to pair courses of a meal with one of each of the wines while she prepares the main course. Everyone then gathers for a potluck meal with courses that pair perfectly with each of the wines that the hostess has chosen. Sounds great, right? I couldn’t wait to try it myself!

I gathered the important players: six good friends who like to eat and LOVE to drink! I chose a Friday evening in early September and decided to start with an easy theme, A Taste of Italy. Using my notes from the Bacchus classes I took last year, I set out to purchase a solid collection of wines. Now, a good rule of wine tasting is to follow a specific order since heavier and sweeter wines can overpower lighter wines and influence the taster’s experience. Start with sparkling whites, move to heavier, more complex whites (think oak-y Chardonnays here), then roses, light reds (Pinot Noir) heavy reds (Cabernet or Zinfendel) and finish with sweet or dessert wines. Since we were messing with food, we broke the rules when we felt it necessary. I gave Chef Reggie a Pinot Grigio to research and create an appetizer for. Jackie prepared a meat and cheese plate that went well with Brunello di Montalcino. I, myself made a saucy pasta dish to pair with a Sangiovese. My friend Jenn made a delicious berry custard dessert to pair with a Moscato. With each pour, I read the tasting notes of the wines and we talked about the best foods to pair it with. I also spent a little bit of time talking about the Italian labeling laws in an attempt to provide a brief overview for my friends in case they wanted to impress their own dinner guests with a good quality Italian wine. Each guest spent a few moments talking about the dishes they created, and in many instances, shared the recipes. It was a delicious first attempt! The concept stuck, and we’re now working on a solid bi-monthly meeting pattern. We’ve explored a whole bunch of themes: French wines, Fall favorites, South America and Spain, Cheap Wine and Comfort Food (one of my favorites), and this coming Sunday we will be drinking North Fork wines and eating local food!

It’s not that hard to get started! All you need to host your own wine club event is an idea for a theme and a small group of friends to invite (keep it small – no more than 4 couples or 5-6 people, as too much food and too much wine just kills the experience).  Assemble a tasting kit: corkscrew, one glass per person for each wine, a small notepad for each guest with a pen or pencil for impressions, a small bottle of water for each person, and a “dump tank” receptacle for collecting waste wine.

If you’re running low on glasses, you can reuse them; just be sure to rinse them out with a small dash of wine, not water, especially when moving from whites to reds! Rinsing with water will actually dilute the wine and skew the tasting experience.

I really love my own wine tasting group! In almost a year we have tasted a wide variety of wines from all around the world and have eaten some awesome homemade dishes. Of course having a chef in the group is motivation to make the very best effort in the kitchen as not to look like slackers! My job for this coming Sunday’s “club meeting” is to prepare a first course to pair with Raphael’s 2011 Rose of Merlot. In the spirit of “keeping it local,” I’m planning to make a foccacia pizza exclusively from ingredients I pick up at the Babylon Farmers Market in the morning! Keep an eye out for that Test Kitchen post!

My wine club effort for Wines of Spain and South America: an array of Spanish cheeses with mild and spicy chorizo, fig bread, almonds and fresh honey. Homemade “flags” name the cheese and provide brief information about the region on the back.