7 Ways To “Get Into Wine”

I’ve recently become re-acquainted with many of my old high school friends via Facebook.  It’s amazing how many people come out of the woodwork via the social networking sites.  Some of these folks are people I haven’t seen in many, many years.  So all of a sudden, I’m talking to all my school buddies, and they’re reading my daily status updates, which usually make reference to the wine that I’m drinking, going to drink or drank yesterday.  It’s hard to deny my passion for wine.

So one of the old friends recently sent me a message:  “Wow!  It looks like you’re really into wine!  I want to get into wine too.  What can I do to get more, you know, into wine?”

…It made me stop and think.  Get more into wine?  Hmmm.  Two thoughts that quickly came to mind were “Go to UC Davis” and “Move to France”.  Probably not the answers he was looking for.  So after much thought, here are some more practically  ways to “get more into wine”.

1.  GET THE TEXTBOOK:  There have been plenty of books written on the topic of wine.  One that I think is worth owning is Kevin Zraly’s Windows on the World Complete Wine Course. This guy is ‘the guy’ and this book is chock full of information and a very easy read.  A great way to get a solid foundation of wine knowledge.

2.  READ THE RAGS TOO:  Wine Spectator, Wine & Spirits, Wine Enthusiast and The Wine Advocate are all great magazines written by folks that know their wine.  They’re great tools for learning about new releases, new and interesting recipies and food parings and keeping track of wine scores.  This is all info that will help inform wine purchasing decisions.

3.  GET A LITTLE WINE FRIDGE: (or at least a little rack or shelf).  Sure it’s important to keep wine stored sideways, and even better if you can store them in optimal temperature and away from direct light.  But honestly, the most important factor here is it makes wine more important in your life.  It’s one thing to have a couple of books laying around your apartment.  But once you get a bookshelf, all of a sudden there’s purpose;  you organize and alphabetize your books,  you proudly display them.  It’s the same with wine.  Once you create a spot in your house where you display and organize your wine, it will fuel your enthusiasm and passion for wine.  And wine fridges are not expensive.  Sure there are custom fridges that hold 500 bottle with multiple temperature zones and built-in laser beams, but you can get a little 6-9 bottle deal at Target or Home Depot; and of course there’s always Craigslist.

4.  STEMWARE:  Your wine tasting experience will be greatly enhanced if you have good glasses.  I’m not saying you have to have 5 different types of glasses, but get some that have stems and a nice tulip shape.  If you don’t want to spend an arm and a leg (especially in this economy) try Ikea.  They’ve got decent ones for dirt cheap.

5.  DECANTER:  I’ve talked about this before.  You’ll enjoy wine tasting more (especially for older and more intersting wines) if you serve them properly aerated by a decanter.  Like the glasses above, you can get really cheap ones online or at Ikea.  See my previous rant on decanters here.

6.  CORKSCREW:  Trust me on this, at least get one of the immitation rabbit corkscrews. (That link is for the original, which is SOLID, but you can spend a lot less on an imitation that will still be better than the old-fashioned ‘your grandfather’s corkscrew.”)  It’s nice to not have to worry about breaking a cork or makign a mess.

And lastly, but most importantly.

7.  TASTE, TASTE, TASTE:  and to be more precise:  EXPLORE, TRY, DISCOVER.  There are gazillions of different wines from dozens of different grape types from countries, regions and locales all over the world.  And you don’t have to break the bank to try a whole lot of ‘em!  So many people I talk to are way too concerned about, “Am I gonna pick the right wine?”  “What if I look like I don’t know what I’m doing?”  “Is this wine going to be good?”  WHO CARES!!!!   It’s fun to try different wine and it becomes an adventurous trial and error.  Take a chance, roll up your sleeves, give it a try and most importantly, have fun!!