A few ideas for wine lovers on your Christmas gift list

Fine reading resources, vineyard tours and nifty gadgets for the vinophile

A standard parental response to inquiries is “look it up on the web.” Those of us seeking something beyond a 15-word answer however are stuck with the ancient Roman technique of reading books, nasty dusty things three inches thick and full of facts. If you know anybody who wants more information than a Bud Light commercial provides, you need to give them a couple of books. Here are a few I’ve found invaluable.

Without a doubt the most informed wine writing today is by Jancis Robinson, a diminutive powerhouse of a wine writer from the U.K. Her bibliography is longer than she is tall and I think all of it worth reading. In particular though, every smart wino should have a copy of Wine Grapes by Robinson, Julia Harding and Jose Vouillamoz. When it came out three years ago it instantly made most wine books obsolete.

Wine Grapes contains a guide to 1,368 different wine varietals currently in commercial production, includes several illustrations, and a few wine family trees. If you haven’t already got the desire to branch out beyond your favourite grapes, the mere knowledge of another 1,363 to go before you’re done should encourage you to branch out. My goal is 1,000 varietals. You too can do this. To drink what no one has drunk before! This is your mission.

Another perennial favourite on the Prairies is touring the Okanagan. If you aren’t just buying a ticket on a day tour, you may want to pick up John Schreiner’s Okanagan Wine Tour Guide, 5th Ed. (He tells me his Wineries of B.C. is about 100 wineries out of date.) John knows the Okanagan as few ever will and is always a reliable guide on where to go.

I have a shelf full of cookbooks, and I am also a huge fan of slow cooking which massively widens the crucial time periods while making a dish. With regular high heat quick restaurant cooking, you often have only seconds of opportunity to add the herb or ingredient for the correct outcome. This just isn’t a problem with slow cooking. (A plus for the cancer-paranoid, the lower heat adds fewer, and possibly no carcinogens.)

Judith Finlayson, a constant writer on the technique, brought out 175 Essential Slow Cooker Classics this year. It includes a wide variety of cuisine styles from New Mexican to Indian curries. She even bakes bread in a slow cooker. If you’re coming home to a hungry household, or if you think you don’t know how to cook, this is a cookbook you need to invest in. Any number of the dishes can be done in the early morning and left to simmer slowly all day. My only complaint is there is no attempt to turn a slow cooker into a sous vide device.

Finally, sundry decanting devices are on the market these days from the old fashioned decanter — which I can’t recommend strongly enough; buy one with the widest possible bottom — to various aerators and strainers. Opti-wine showed up on the market here this summer. I have some trouble believing that it works. However, I have tried it with various people and at least a few say they notice a difference.

Essentially it is an acrylic stopper that fits in the bottle. You invert the wine one or two times slowly and the magic of “nano-aeration” tales place, releasing “gustatory molecules” that would otherwise be unexploited. It’s an entertaining device if only as something to get dinner parties talking. Consider it an interesting gift for gadget hounds with a sense of humour.