It’s almost 2010 wine lovers! As you get ready to toast the New Year, I have some last minute sparkling suggestions to help you celebrate the end of the first decade of the new millennium in style.

Sparkling wine and Champagne are delicious and appropriate wines to sip as you bring in the New Year and today I’ll share with you some of my favorite bubbly picks. While many sparkling wines are made in the Champagne method, none can be called by that famous moniker unless they are produced from grapes grown in region of Champagne in northern France.

If you recall, the Champagne method (or methode champenoise) is a process where still wines (traditionally pinot noir, chardonnay and pinot meunier) are blended and then put in a bottle to which yeast and a small amount of sugar are added. This causes the wine to go through a secondary fermentation and the result  is a bubbly wine like Champagne.While Champagne is regarded as the gold standard, many other countries produce excellent sparkling wine using this method.

So here are a few of my favorites you might consider sipping New Year’s Eve and any time you get a hankering for a little bubbly:

Champagne under $40:  Perrier Jouet Grand Brut; Moet & Chandon Imperial; Veuve Clicquot Brut; and Michel Arnould Grand Cru Brut.

Sparkling wines under $25: 2005 Domaine Carneros Brut; Vigna Dogarina Prosecco; Roderer Anderson Valley Brut; 2005 Vilarnau Brut Nature (Spain); Parxet Cuvee 21; Domaine Chandon Brut Rose; and Gloria Ferrer Brut.

Happy New Year!!

Well, here we are again faced with that most enjoyable of all dilemmas: what wine to get for that loved one, friend or you this holiday season.

Normally, the pressures of holiday shopping are both frustrating and exceedingly difficult for me, but not when it comes to wine gifting!  Why?  Well, for me, securing a quality selection of top wines for the holidays is a labor of love and today I’ll share my top picks that should meet just about every budget.  

Let’s start, though, with some non-vinous gift recommendations for those in need of wine accoutrements (that’s French for “stuff”), or other goodies that are not liquid.   

I just finished reading and really enjoyed ”The Billionaire’s Vinegar: The Mystery of the World’s Most Expensive Bottle of Wine” by Benjamin Wallace.  This real life mystery story  (which is still raging) recounts the alleged fraudulent sale of several bottles of 200- year old Chateau Lafite Rothschild to a billionaire who is bent on exacting pain from those he feels are responsible for the sham.  

The other book I suggest for your reading pleasure is “Wine and War:  The French, the Nazi’s and the Battle for France’s Greatest Treasure” by Donald and Petie Kladstrump.  This book recounts numerous stories of how individual French wine makers and their families fought to save their vineyards and wines from the invading Nazi’s. 

Both books are available in paperback and hard cover and can be found at local bookstores or ordered online.

There is nothing more pleasurable than sipping good wine from crystal stemware. You can spend a lot of money on wine glasses from renowned companies such as Riedel, or you can get similar quality by purchasing your wine glasses and crystal decanters right here in West Virginia. 

Masterpiece Crystal in Jane Lew  (96 Trolley St.) produces magnificent handmade lead-free crystal wine glasses and carafes.  Buy right from the showroom or go to masterpiececrystal.com and get them online. You may also place your order by phone (800-624-3114).   

Now to the good stuff.  The following wines are among my favorites and should be available in wine shops around the state.

White Wine  (under $20 a bottle):  07 d’Arenberg The Hermit Crab; 07 Pertinace Roreo Arneis; 06 Domaine Patient Cotat Sauvignon Blanc; 2008 Alexander Valley Chardonnay; Montinore Estate Almost Dry Riesling; 07 L’Ecole 41 Semillon; 07 Cakebread Chardonnay ($50); 07 Beringer Private Reserve Chardonnay ($35); and 07 Talley Arroyo Grande Vineyard Chardonnay ($30);

Red Wine (under $20 a bottle) 07 Martin Codax Rioja; 06 Las Rocas Vinas Viejas Garnacha; 07 Ancient Peaks Zinfandel; 07 d”Arenberg The Stump Jump; 08 Castle Rock Pinot Noir (Mendocino); 07 Guenoc Petite Sirah; 07 Falesco Vitiano Rosso; 06 Monte Antico Rosso; Delas St. Esprit Cotes Du Rhone; 05 Geyser Peak Cabernet Sauvignon; 06 Domaine Serene Yamhill Cuvee ($45); 05 Falcor Sangiovese ($35); 05 Silver Oak Alexander Valley Cabernet Sauvignon ($65) and 01 Banfi Brunello Di Montalcino ($67).

Here’s wishing you the happiest of holiday seasons, Cheers!

After rummaging around my very disorganized cellar for a suitably mature wine to pair with a celebratory meal, I came upon a bottle  which had obviously been lying in repose for quite some time. After blowing the dust off the label, I was incredulous to discover that the wine was a 1947 Borgono Barolo!

Say what?  That’s older than … Howdy Doody! (By the way, there is no truth to the rumor that Howdy Doody was the illegitimate result of a union between Little Orphan Annie and Pinocchio).

Anyway, it turns out my brother, who had prompted me to look in that particular area of the cellar and with whom I share a passion for the fruit of the vine, had years before slipped the Barolo into a nook instead of a cranny, and I was unaware I possessed this museum piece.   

I had actually consumed one other wine from that ancient vintage and, according to the  wine cognoscenti, it is perhaps the greatest Bordeaux ever produced. The 1947 Chateau Cheval Blanc was undoubtedly the best wine I had ever consumed, but I wasn’t expecting this wine (from the Piedmont region of Italy) to be anywhere near the quality of that legendary Bordeaux.

However, my recollection of Borgono Barolo is that I had uncorked a 1978 version of the wine a couple of years ago and had been surprised by its youthful flavors and amazing aging potential. But this wine was more than 30 years older than that wine. 

Since the wine actually belonged to my brother, I magnanimously sought his advice about when we should open it, knowing full well that we would need to stand the wine in an upright position for several days to assure that decades of sediment would settle to the bottom of the bottle. 

In its youth, Barolo is a purple monster with huge dollops of mouth-puckering tannin and searing acidity which can completely mask the earthy, rich flavors hidden underneath. There are some Barolo producers who are now making wines which are more approachable in their youth, but wines produced in the old-world style like the Borgono can improve for decades.  And so I had some hope that there would be something more than vinegar left in the bottle.

On the appointed day, I began to gingerly open the bottle with a traditional waiter’s corkscrew.  Mistake! Unfortunately, but not unexpectedly, the cork began to disintegrate as I attempted to pull it from the bottle. In fact, I was forced to push a hole through the cork so I could get to the wine. 

I should have used an “Ah-So” which is also known as a  “Butler’s Friend” to remove the cork.   The Ah-So is a twin-pronged device that is placed on either side of the cork and then rocked back and forth until the prongs grip the cork along the sides of the bottle. Once inserted, you pull and twist the Ah-So until the cork is removed.

Pouring the 1947 Barolo through a coffee filter!

 My unsatisfactory solution to the cork debris problem was to insert a coffee filter into the decanter and then pour the wine through it.  The problem here is the filter just might also strip out any flavors left in the wine. Also, as I poured the wine ever so slowly through the filter into the decanter, I was immediately concerned by the brownish-orange liquid that came out of the bottle.

I quickly poured myself a few ounces of the wine and put it to my nose.  At first, the Barolo had a pungent, almost unpleasant raisin/beet nose that slowly- over 15 minutes – morphed into an aroma redolent of earth, mint and prunes.  In the mouth, this amazing wine still had life with layered flavors of cola, caramel and spice with a solid acid backbone.  It was also silky smooth and continued to develop over the next hour that it took us to savor and consume the wine.

What a remarkable experience and one that I’ll always remember. It also reminded me of the reason we age wines from great regions in exceptionally good vintages.  In the meantime, you can enjoy that glass of ready-to-drink wine while both you and your special bottles mature.