Information on the Finest Wines and Accessories

• Finest Wines Home
• Wine Cellars
• Homemade Wines
• Grow Your Own Grapes
• Wine Values
• Wine Store
• Partners

Do Wine Cabinet Provide Safe Wine Storage?

March 20th, 2008    Subscribe To Our Feed

Sometimes people will get it in their heads that the only way that one can store wine is to build an elaborate wine cellar or purchase an expensive wine refrigerator. While both work, they simply are not necessary. If you know the basic principles of wine storage, you can store your wines at practically no cost at all — or at least a very small cost.

My great grandmother (or maybe it was great GREAT grandmother) made wine. She made it from Muscatine grapes that grew wild on the farm where she lived. She stored the wine in what was a rather rustic version of a cellar. It was actually just a deep pit with a wooden door to allow access. She had been dead for many years before we discovered this underground treasure house.

I don’t know whether she really knew what she was doing or why, but she had done everything right. The bottles of wine were tightly sealed. They were all lying on their sides so that the wine was in contact with the cork. The cellar was cool year-round. And yes, the wine was wonderful! It might have been an abomination to polished palates, but the love and care that had gone into the making made it special to us.

The point is this: You probably can’t dig a deep pit in your apartment or in the backyard of your small home, but you can purchase a wine cabinet that will provide safe wine storage for you. Wine cabinets are not all that expensive, and if you will follow the basic principles of wine storage, your wine collection will be safe in a relatively inexpensive wine cabinet.

Wine should be stored horizontally. The wine needs to stay in contact with the cork. The place that your wine is stored needs to be dark or at least not be subject to direct sunlight, and the temperature needs to remain cool.

Milos Pesic is and internationally recognized expert on wine, wine making and wine tasting. He runs a highly popular and comprehensive Red Wine and White Wine web site. For more articles and resources on wine making and tasting, wine recipes, wine reviews, vintage wine and much more visit his site at: wine.need-to-know.net/

San Francisco Wine Tours

March 11th, 2008    Subscribe To Our Feed

San Francisco Wine Tours Offer More Than Grape Vines

There is plenty more to see on San Francisco wine tours than acres of the grape vines and slow operating crushing and bottling facilities. Until the harvest and crushing of the grapes begins, usually in September, most wine making facilities are quiet but once the season begins those taking one of many San Francisco wine tours are treated with a lot of action. However, not every minute of every tour is spent watching grapes get crushed and turned into wine.

Almost all of the California wine industry has roots in the Napa and Sonoma Valleys and whether by bus, train or van San Francisco wine tours will show their participants the acres and acres of grape vines it takes to produce the amount of wine produced in California. Additionally, knowledgeable tour guides can answer many questions about the type of grapes used to make different types of wine.

Once the wineries are in full production, San Francisco wine tours can take on a new dimension are processors can explain how the wines acquire their different colorings and how the aging process works towards the flavor of a specific blend of wine. They can also answer many questions concerning the beverage of choice for a particular type of food.

Not All Tours Concentrate On The Drink

In additional to touring grapevines and a factory, many visitors on San Francisco wine tours have the opportunity to visit areas within Yosemite National Park, which is close to the bay city. Sequoia National Forest, with its giant redwood trees is another popular destination of the many of the San Francisco wine tours. Many of the tours also include trips to the bay under the Golden Gate Bridge and allow tourists to relish in all that the areas has to offer.

Many of the San Francisco wine tours also include wine tastings of the many offering from nearby wineries as they prep their beverages for upcoming distribution. It is through the San Francisco wine tours as well as tours through other wine areas that have introduce California wines to the rest of the country.

California has an ideal growing environment for grapes allowing vineyards to flourish with a new crop of grapes every year. The area is becoming famous for producing some of the best domestic wines and while on San Francisco wine tours a person can taste how many of the wines compare to those of areas of the world.

Understand Wine and Your Health

March 4th, 2008    Subscribe To Our Feed

During the 1990s, a physician voiced on a national TV show that drinking red wine reduces heart disease. It made all the headlines. He cited the relatively lower levels of the disease in France despite their ever so famously high fat diets. Since that program, it seems that red wine health effects have been on the forefront of the wine consumer´s mind.

Good for the Heart

Coronary artery disease is caused by a build up of cholesterol in the arteries that supply the blood to the heart. If the arteries get partially blocked the heart cannot get enough oxygen and the result is pain. Does red wine protect against heart disease?

Many studies suggested that moderate amount of red wine (one to two glasses a day) lowers the risk of heart attack for middle aged people by 30 to 50 percent. It was also concluded that red wine may prevent additional heart attacks if you have already suffered from one.

The cholesterol that blocks these arteries is called low density lipo-protein or referred to as the bad cholesterol. This is cleared from the blood by high density lipo-proteins or the good cholesterol.

Moderate wine consumption produces a better balance of these two. Additionally, wine has an anti coagulation effect which makes the blood less likely to clot.

Red Wines

Chemical and food experts have known for years that wine contains rich deposits of vitamins, minerals, and natural sugars that are often beneficial to good health. Wine is also rich in potassium and low in sodium. Red wines have more of these elements due to the juices longer contact with the grape skins. Red wines are also rich in Vitamin B which comes from the grape skins as well.

Wine and Digestion

Wine aids in the production and flow of gastric juices. This facilitates digestion by breaking down the food in the stomach quickly and effectively. For many, after the age of 50 our bodies do not produce enough hydrochloric acid that are needed for digestion. So many doctors, including my own, have suggested a glass or two of wine with a meal. Who am I to complain?

Wine also has a tranquil effect on the body and helps people who have trouble sleeping. And it does not stop there as it may help lower the risk of developing dementia and Alzheimer´s disease.

Wine and Calories

As of now, there is no such thing as a diet wine. Unfortunately, there is no getting away from the fact that wine contains calories and calories make you fat if you do not burn them up. A glass of white or red wine contains around 100 calories. Sweeter wines that contain residual sugar as well as alcohol have more calories.

Final Thoughts

When you put everything together you may decide that a little bit of wine does you some good. Wine certainly has its place in a healthy lifestyle. That is my conclusion, and I am sticking with it!

About the Author

Contributor: Stuart Glasure [A wine enthusiast and publishing member of the wine source: http://www.WineDefinitions.com]

How to Make Gluhwein Wine

February 26th, 2008    Subscribe To Our Feed

There might be a thousand gluhwein recipes floating around in the world - from simple ones with only a few ingredients to secret family recipes with numerous tasty additives. In my experience, it’s all delicious and I have yet to drink a mug of gluhwein I didn’t like. So, here are two ways to make gluhwein - the old-fashioned way and the easy way.

How to Make Gluhwein the Old-Fashioned Way

Here’s a simple recipe with no special flavors added. Some gluhwein recipes have more citrus while others have a nutty flavor and still others lean towards woody aromas. This recipe is a simple blend of basic spices and makes enough to generously serve ten or twelve people:

Gluhwein Recipe

Ingredients 2 bottles red wine
1 cup sugar
2 cups water
1/2 lemon, sliced
20 whole cloves
1 teaspoon nutmeg
6 to 8 cinnamon sticks

Mix water, lemon and spices and simmer for an hour. Strain. Heat but do not boil the red wine. Add wine to hot water mixture. Ladle gluhwein into cups and serve with half a slice of orange for garnish.

You will find it’s easier and less messy to make gluhwein if you have a tea ball or cheese cloth for the cloves and cinnamon.

How to Make Gluhwein the Easy Way

The easiest way to make gluhwein is to use Jodlers gluhwein mix which you can purchase online.

To make it using gluhwein mix you simply:

1. Heat Your Wine
2. Pour in a dash of gluhwein mix
3. Stir & serve

Gluhwein is exceptionally popular in European countries, especially during the Christmas holidays, and goes by many names (depending upon what language). Here are some other names, by country, for gluhwein:

English = Mulled Wine, Spiced Wine, or Gluehwein

German = Gluhwein (glow wine) or Gluehwein (sort of the English version)

French = vin chaud

Italian = vin brule

Romanian = vin fiert

Swedish = Glogg (pronounced gloog)

Hungarian = Forralt bor (hot wine)

If you want to know more about making gluhwein from scratch or with a mix, visit Gluhwein.Net where you will find descriptions and even a video about making gluhwein.

Chris Denny and his wife, Ela, are huge fans of gluhwein and mulled wine and run Gluhwein.Net to share the fabulous drink with Americans.

— Next Page »

Copyright © 2008 Information on the Finest Wines and Accessories

Credits: Make Money Online | Matteo Turchetto | Andreas Viklund