January 24, 2008

Wine Openers

posted by alesha in Wine

You just came home from a long day at work. The kids are fast asleep. Now it’s time for to relax with a nice glass of wine, like Wolf Blass Cabernet Sauvignon Black Label. You go to the kitchen drawer, extract your wine opener and raise it to the bottle. After you attempt to open the wine, the unthinkable happens… the cork breaks!

How many times has this happened to you? Again, you are screaming at the wine opener, as you place it back into the bottle for a second attempt. You are now at a crossroads: pray you can get that sucker out in one piece or start thinking of grand excuses why the wine has cork pieces swimming in it. How embarrassing…

Waiters and waitresses make it seem so easy - it must be since they practice so much. Well, I have been drinking and opening wine for roughly 10 years now, and I still can’t seem to stop breaking a few corks every now and then. Thus, I have decided my troubles are the fault of my wine opener. I have several in my kitchen, but I still haven’t found one that I can truly depend on. I’ve got the $1 liquor store plastic wonder, the cheap wing corkscrew opener ($5-$7), the Waiter’s corkscrew ($5-$10), and the two-prong corkscrew ($10-$12 - though quite helpful in extracting already broken corks but are quite difficult to use). The only one not in my collection is the most expensive opener - the Rabbit ($50+). My fear is that if I spend a lot on an expensive wine opener, it will fail me just the same as the others and I’ll just be out more money. So, what’s the best opener? Do I pay for what I get, or is there a compromise?

I have heard two sides of this story. The first side claims that all wine openers are the same and I need to just slow down and take my time. The second side claims that if you really are a true wine lover, a good opener is imperative no matter what the cost.
So I must know – is The Rabbit the answer to my troubles? What do you fellow Snoothers find works best? If you do have The Rabbit(or openers with similar designs), what are the positives and negatives. I’d love to solve my wine opening dilemma before it’s time to open the next bottle.

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January 9, 2008

Ice Wine Harvest Begins!

posted by alesha in Wine Industry, Wine

While most people were inside staying out of last week’s icy cold weather, winery workers in Niagara, Canada hustled outside to start harvesting grapes for ice wine. According to Carolyn Hammond, from decanter.com, temperatures in Canada dropped below 17°F on January 3, 2008, marking the beginning of the ice wine harvest.

Ice wine (or Eiswein in German) is a dessert wine made from grapes that freeze while still on the vine. Once the air temperature is low enough, the water in the grapes will freeze into solid ice. During the pressing process, only the sweet concentrated juice can be extracted for fermentation and the ice stays behind with the grapes skins. Many producers must harvest the grapes very early in the morning as they need the grapes to come to a hard freeze before they can be processed.

Because the juice is so concentrated, ice wine’s sugar levels are equivalent to a Beerenauslese wine (the 2nd sweetest level of German table wines) and are generally low in alcohol. Ice wines are typically expensive as only an extremely small amount of wine can be extracted from each grape and the harvest season lasts for just a few weeks. Canada and Germany are the most famous producers; however other countries like Austria, Australia, Hungary, and the United States also can make ice wine. Niagara wineries expect a good harvest this year, and anticipate their first release this spring.

Sadly, I’ve never tried ice wine, but I plan on changing that very soon with the 2004 Inniskillin Ice Wine for $41.99. Most ice wine ranges in price from $16 and up for a 375 ml bottle, depending on the producer. Are you excited for this years harvest and which ice wines have you tried?

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January 2, 2008

Alcohol-free Wines

posted by alesha in Wine

The holidays are over….After multiple parties and dinners, perhaps you’ve indulged a bit too much on the food and drinks. Now you’ve made a New Year’s resolution to cut back a bit on the alcohol and get rid of that extra holiday weight. There’s only one problem - you love wine and don’t want to give it up. What’s a wine lover to do with such a dilemma? I’ve got the solution - drink alcohol-free wine!

According to Janet Cromley of winebusiness.com, alcohol-free wines have fewer calories, 15-25 for every 4oz glass, and provide the same health benefits that regular wine offers (like decreasing the risk of cardiovascular diseases). Fergus Clydesdale, head of the Department of Food Science at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, claims that the same antioxidants found in regular wine are also found in alcohol-free wines; “If the same grapes were used, the wine would have the same kind of phenolics,” (that basically that means chemistry). Alcohol-free wines are made by removing the alcohol during the filter or vacuum process, leaving the wine with less than 0.5% alcohol. That’s all well and good, but what wine lovers care most about is the taste factor. So, do alcohol-free wines taste the same as regular wines?

Corie Brown, taste tester and wine writer, compared top alcohol-free wine brands and found that the one thing these wines lacked was ‘mouth-feel.’ Brown says that “alcohol knits a wine together and gives it weight. Without it, wine tastes thin and watery.” There is always a compromise, isn’t there? Luckily, alcohol-free wine is pretty inexpensive, ranging from $4.99 for Sutter Home’s Fre 2005 Premium Red to $8.99 for Ariel 2005 Chardonnay.

If these wines are right up your alley, give some of these a try and let us know what you think!

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