Wine How-Tos

Want to know how to save the wine in a half-filled bottle from spoiling? Open a bottle without a corkscrew? Remove the last half of a broken cork? Serve wine at the proper temperature? Check out those four how-tos here. (And watch a video on How to Retrieve a Broken Cork.)

I’ve added “Wine Pairings and Whys” to many of the recipes on this site. I don’t merely suggest which wines would taste best with a given recipe; I explain why they would. (Reading the reasoning might help you pick your own wines for similar foods.)

Check out the wine pairing postings at these recipes:
·      Fish “en Papillote”
·      David Swanson’s Spicy Eggs, a difficult-to-pair recipe
·      Queen Mary 2’s Prosciutto & Pineapple
·      Braised and Glazed Umami Salmon
·      Roasted Vegetables
·      Creamed Spinach Queen Mary 2
·      Pastel de Choclo, a Chilean beef and corn casserole
·      Roasted Vegetable Ratatouille
·      Alaska Halibut “en Papillote”
·      Sole Meunière

Videos on Wine: In 2011, while I lived and worked in Chicago, a team of us put together a TV series called “Wine at 45.” It didn’t take off, but much of the footage remains, and it’s evergreen with wine appreciation tips and winemaking lore. Here are clips on How to Taste Wine Using Your Senses, Why Cool Climate is Food Climate, How Grapevines Grow in the Vineyard, and Why Roses Grow at the End of Vinerows.

Also, here are some additional new wine vids: On Using Corkscrews, How to Order Wine at a Restaurant, and How to Get Out That Broken Cork from the neck of that bottle of wine you’re struggling to open NOW.