Gone with the Wine: Living the Dream in France's Loire Valley


Rosanne Knorr - 2003
    Along with her husband and pate-loving dog, Folly, they gain insights on the history, people, and daily life. Joyful reading for voyagers and armchair travelers alike!

WSET Level 2 Certificate in Wines and Spirits: Study Guide


Wine & Spirit Education Trust - 2008
    

Sinful Dreams


J.K. Hage - 2018
    She imagined spending days at the café while learning about the relaxed southern lifestyle from retirees Ida Belle and Gertie.However, Sinful isn't the sleepy little town she expected. While Pepper is busy trying to educate southern taste buds about the beauty of sweet iced coffee, she also ends up in the middle of murder and kidnapping.And she meets Jaxson, the hottest man south of the Mason-Dixon line. Problem is, Pepper has just decided to get her life together without a man.But this Yankee schoolteacher can't stop herself from dreaming...NOTE: This quick-read novella is licensed fan fiction available as part of Jana DeLeon's Miss Fortune World. It was previously published under the same title through the Kindle Worlds program. Many thanks to Ms. DeLeon for allowing authors to tell new stories and create characters within her world!

Uncorked: The Novice's Guide to Wine


Paul Kreider - 2011
    This entertaining guide is presented in an easy-to-understand format, covering topics on everything from the winemaking process, wine vocabulary, and red wine versus white wine, to tasting and selecting wines for any occasion. With a helpful glossary and brief topic-by-topic chapters, this accessible, snobbery-free guide is the perfect companion for purchasing wines and navigating your way skillfully at parties, dinners, wine tastings, wine shops, and more. Learn how to:Understand the origins of wine and the process of making it Know and speak the language of wine with terms like tannins, oaks, residual sugar, dry, medium- and full-bodied, and more Properly taste and drink wines   Choose wines to complement foods Save money by making choices that suit your palate

The Vineyard at the End of the World: Maverick Winemakers and the Rebirth of Malbec


Ian Mount - 2012
    But then in 2001, a Cabernet Sauvignon / Malbec blend beat all contenders in a blind taste test featuring Napa and Bordeaux’s finest. Today, Argentina and its signature wine are on the tip of every smart traveler’s tongue. How did this happen?The Vineyard at the End of the World tells the fascinating, four-hundred-year history of how a wine mecca arose in the high Andean desert. Profiling the outlandish figures who fueled the Malbec revolution—including celebrity enologist Michel Rolland, acclaimed American winemaker Paul Hobbs, and the Mondavi-esque Catena family—Ian Mount describes in colorful detail the nefarious scams, brilliant business innovations, and backroom politics that put Malbec on the map.

A Very Good Year: The Journey of a California Wine from Vine to Table


Mike Weiss - 2005
     Mike Weiss spent nearly two years with Ferrari-Carano, a California winemaker founded in Sonoma County just over twenty years ago by Don Carano, a casino and hotel mogul from Reno. The narrative in A Very Good Year follows Ferrari-Carano’s Fume Blanc from barren vines in November to its first sampling by a customer at the Four Seasons in New York, and, over the course of the book, Weiss presents his unique insight into the making and marketing of wine today. BACKCOVER: “Superb. . . . Weiss tells a great story.” —THE NEW YORK TIMES “Finally, a wine book that explains all the ingredients. . . . You will marvel at the richness of what Mike Weiss . . . was able to capture and convey within this delicious book.” —LOS ANGELES TIMES “Compelling . . . A Very Good Year is both entertaining and comprehensive.” —THE BOSTON GLOBE “A sweeping book about tourism, globalism, environmental sustainability, immigration, and glamour. . . . The bottle of Fume Blanc . . . is like a Pandora’s box. Open it up and out spill all the vanity, marketing savvy, self-mythologizing, acres of land, buckets of money, precise science, alchemical blending, and feudal working conditions that make up the California dream known as the wine industry.” —SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE

What have we got Toulouse: A family moving to France


Nikki McArthur - 2020
    Nikki McArthur aka ‘A mother in France’ opens up a window to her world and invites you to journey with her through the positive and negative experiences of the process of moving, settling, making a living and raising a family in a new country. Woven within the pages of the family’s experiences are a treasury of facts and information making it not only a fascinating read but a useful guide to living in France.Uncovering the thought processes behind why the family decided to move to France and how they went about it, the book reveals how to prepare for a move abroad, house hunting tips and the buying process. Discover what it was like when they arrived, the main difficulties and challenges they faced with settling in as a family, renovation challenges and experiences of developing a business and making a living. Follow the ups and downs of family life in France from pregnancy and childbirth through to adulthood with fascinating details on education, health, cultural differences and raising bilingual children. An intriguing mixture of facts backed by true life experiences and comparisons and a compelling read for anyone interested in or considering moving abroad.

Reading between the Wines


Terry Theise - 2010
    What constitutes beauty in wine, and how do we appreciate it? What role does wine play in a soulful, sensual life? Can wines of place survive in a world of globalized styles and 100-point scoring systems? In his highly approachable style, Theise describes how wine can be a portal to aesthetic, emotional, even mystical experience—and he frankly asserts that these experiences are most likely to be inspired by wines from artisan producers. Along the way, Theise tells us a little about how he got where he is today, explores the meaning of wine in the lives of vintners he has known, and praises particular grape varieties. Reading between the Wines is a passionate tribute to wine—and to what it can say to us once we learn to listen.

The Road to Burgundy: The Unlikely Story of an American Making Wine and a New Life in France


Ray Walker - 2013
    Ray neglected his work, spending hours poring over ancient French winemaking texts, learning the techniques and the language, and daydreaming about vineyards. After Ray experienced his first taste of wine from Burgundy, he could wait no longer. He quit his job and went to France to start a winery—with little money, a limited command of French, and virtually no winemaking experience. Fueled by determination and joie de vivre, he immersed himself in the extraordinary history of Burgundy’s vineyards and began honing his skills. Ray became a pioneer in his use of ancient techniques in modern times and founded Maison Ilan. In 2009, Ray became the first non-French winemaker to purchase grapes and produce a wine from Le Chambertin, long considered to be one of the most revered and singular vineyards in the world. Along with his struggle to capture his wine’s distinct terroir, Ray shares enthralling stories of late-night tastings, flying down the Route National on a vintage Peugeot bicycle with no brakes, and his journey to secure both the trust of his insular Burgundian neighbors and the region’s most coveted grapes. Capturing the sunlight, the smell of the damp soil, and the taste of superlative wine, The Road to Burgundy is a glorious celebration of finding one’s true path in life, and taking a chance—whatever the odds.

Reflections of a Wine Merchant


Neal I. Rosenthal - 2008
    Rosenthal set out to learn everything he could about wine. Today, he is one of the most successful importers of traditionally made wines produced by small family-owned estates in France and Italy. Rosenthal has immersed himself in the culture of Old World wine production, working closely with his growers for two and sometimes three generations. He is one of the leading exponents of the concept of “terroir”—the notion that a particular vineyard site imparts distinct qualities of bouquet, flavor, and color to a wine. In Reflections of a Wine Merchant, Rosenthal brings us into the cellars, vineyards, and homes of these vignerons, and his delightful stories about his encounters, relationships, and explorations—and what he has learned along the way—give us an unequaled perspective on winemaking tradition and what threatens it today. Rosenthal was featured in the documentary film Mondovino and is one of the more outspoken figures against globalization, homogenization, and the “critic-ization” of the wine business. He was also a major subject in Lawrence Osborne’s The Accidental Connoisseur. His is an important voice in defense of the individual and the artisanal, and their contribution to our quality of life.

He Said Beer She Said Wine


Marnie Old - 2008
    Marnie Old and Sam Calagione divulge the secrets of their trades (sommelier and brewmaster, respectively) in this fully illustrated instruction book on how to successfully pair both beer and wine with a wide variety of foods.

Rick Stein’s Secret France


Rick Stein - 2019
    Now, he returns to the food and cooking he loves the most … and makes us fall in love with French food all over again. Rick’s meandering quest through the byways and back roads of rural France sees him pick up inspiration from Normandy to Provence. With characteristic passion and joie de vivre, Rick serves up incredible recipes: chicken stuffed with mushrooms and Comté, grilled bream with aioli from the Languedoc coast, a duck liver parfait bursting with flavour, and a recipe for the most perfect raspberry tart plus much, much more. Simple fare, wonderful ingredients, all perfectly assembled; Rick finds the true essence of a food so universally loved, and far easier to recreate than you think.

The History of Wine in 100 Bottles: From Bacchus to Bordeaux and Beyond


Oz Clarke - 2015
    Moving from the first cork tops to screw caps, renowned wine writer Oz Clarke presents such landmarks as the introduction of the cylindrical wine bottle in the 1780s; the first estate to bottle and label its own wine (formerly sold in casks to merchants only); the most expensive bottle sold at auction and the oldest unopened bottle; the change in classifications; and the creation of numerous famous vintages. Fully illustrated with photographs of bottles, labels, and other images, this is a beautiful tribute to the "bottled poetry" that is wine.

Into Wine: An Invitation to Pleasure


Olivier Magny - 2013
    He's passionate about making wine more fun and its culture more accessible.Reading this book, you will certainly learn profusely about wine, but you will also learn about all sorts of things far beyond wine that you never knew were connected. You will discover that wine is an eye opening window into our world.INTO WINE is a journey - one that will appeal to anyone with an interest in wine - from the complete novice to the most seasoned drinker. Santé! (Amazon Description)

Making Sense of Wine


Matt Kramer - 1989
    Kramer explores connoisseurship through the practical devices of “thinking wine” and “drinking wine,” making for an engrossing journey through one of life’s great pleasures. Wine’s complexities are often glossed over in favor of sound bites tailored to the novice. Kramer embraces and celebrates these complexities. The superbly written text covers the basics, from food and wine pairings to setting up a wine cellar.