When you’re the “wine guy,” the one that everyone kind of expects to hit it out of the park when you bring wine to a party, what’s the vinous game plan when you’re invited to holiday dinner parties to ring in the new year?

In a word, ringers.

You grab items from the sample pool that you know (or, at least, are reasonably certain) are going to be high quality, and likely will go over well with everyone.

You bring the good juice.

Which is, unsurprisingly, precisely what I did.

There’s more to this little story than gee-whiz-the-wines-were-pricey-but-really-great, however. The reason I picked these – and in one case, it was an inaugural release – is that the brands themselves are proven quantities. So, get your saliva glands geared up, and let’s dive into the high-end of the sample pool, shall we?…

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image: fix.com

There are, in fact, only two styles of Port.

Yeah, I know, that goes against everything that your senses tell you, especially when you see thirty different types of Port for sale on a wine store shelf. But quantum physics defies much of the common sense that you develop to survive at the macro-physical level, and it happens to be true, too. It just won’t give you as bad of a hangover.

Anyway, I’ve been singing this dois estilos de porto song for several years now, and I’m not backing down now. There are only two styles of Port wine, and the rest of it is detail. Granted, there are a lot of details, And the devil is, absolutely, in those details, and he will give you a brain-meltingly awful hangover (ask me how I know), but that doesn’t stop the differences in Port types – small and large – from all being details.

If you’re looking for a reminder – along with some super-nifty visual representations of the flavors, aromas, and nuances offered by most of the different types of Port expressions out there – check out my latest for Fix.com, titled A Port Wine Primer.

As always, the Fix.com way-cool infographic is embedded below after the jump, and I always get a kick out of seeing how they pictorially represent my wordiness. For the impatient among you, skip directly to the bottom to see what they did with the food pairings, it’s pretty bad-ass.

Cheers!

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Yeah, it’s that time of year. Again.

I know that plenty of people hate Thanksgiving wine pairing articles (because many of you contact me to complain when I write them). The trouble is, just as many of you seem to love the things and ask about them every year.

I almost never give specific wine recommendations for Turkey Day, because there are just too many culinary options on the table for any one wine to handle. It’s best to stick with general guidelines, which happen not to change year-on-year, so from the 1WD perspective, what’s needed to be said on these things has already been said. Which is why I am at the point of recursively recycling the said items that have already been said.

In that spirit, here are two previous articles on the T-Day wine pairing topic, which happen to link to other articles with information that the perennially buzzed among you may find useful (including a recent guide on what and how to gift booze, which many of you may almost certainly find yourself doing on Turkey Day):

Ye Olde Dreaded Thanksgiving Day Wine Article (And Other November Tidbits, Including The Most Talked About Wines Online In 2013)

Gifts For Another Horse’s Mouth (Gifting Alcohol 101 For Fix.com)

Back to more regularly-scheduled programming next week.

Cheers!

image: fix.com

My latest piece for Fix.com was published this week, and it’s geared towards the When, How, and What of gifting booze.

And not a moment too soon, I think, considering that the holidays are nigh upon us, and that you might have many, many friends who are desperately in need of a stiff drink (for example, the majority of the U.S. electorate after last week’s presidential election).

After being asked by Fix.com to write this piece, I was amazed in my research at how little information is readily available when it comes to gifting alcohol.And that’s likely because it’s fraught with opportunities to drop the ornament ball. As I mentioned in the article, “..why all the gift-giving drama when it comes to booze? After all, isn’t this stuff supposed to be fun? The trickiness comes from a combination of history, culture, and subjective personal preference.”

I’m hoping that this little article contribution helps a few of us to brave the puritanical taboos that might otherwise prevent the booze from flowing generously (but responsibly!) this holiday season. Because, you know, I really don’t want people thinking that they can’t gift booze to me.

Anyway, head on over to Fix.com to read Gifting Alcohol 101 and let me know what you think. Crazy-cool Fix.com infographic awesomeness for this installment is, of course, included below after the jump.

Cheers!

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