A GOOD NOSE & GREAT LEGS…

WE always digress a little at this time of year to bring you our pick of some Christmas-stocking reading for a special someone into the enjoyment of wine.

And if you’ve family or friends fit that category, don’t look past giving them The Art of Wine from the Vine to the Table – sub-titled “a good nose & great legs.”

Written by wine educator, broadcaster and marketer, Robert Geddes it’s 300+ easy-to-read pages are jam-packed with the story of wine from the importance of where the grapes are grown (“soils ain’t soils,”) to their month-by-month life-cycle, the difference between making table, sparkling and fortified wines, and wine varieties including some we bet you’ve never heard of.

Rob, who was only Australia’s third Master of Wine, also talks about what to look for in terms of bouquet and nuances of flavours on the tongue and through the nose, the importance – with examples – of matching food and wine, “glass rules,” and the difference between “great” and “boring” wine lists.

This is a most enjoyable book for those who already know something about wine, but want to know more: and you’ll enjoy his lively writing style that ranges from the racy to the delightfully droll and quirky.

At $39.95 in time for Christmas, the wine buff will find themselves referring to this gem time and again – and we loved the many quotable quotes scattered liberally through its pages, from W.C. Fields’ “Who took the cork out of my lunch?” to the white-collar crim who told his captors on his way to prison: “I’m not worried about the reds, they’ll keep. But I am worried about the whites.”