If you've ever thought about making your own zinfandel, pinot noir, or chenin blanc this book can get you started. Organized into chapters that discuss ingredients and practices that make a good table wine, you'll learn how to bring those elements together in a home winery. Also covers quality, spoilage and stability, juice and wine analysis.

This book covers the basics of making wine and how and what various types differ. The author shows you how to train your palate so that you are able judge the relative qualities of the wine you produce. It includes 55 recipes as well as instructions for racking, processing and maturing.

Geared to everyday wine lovers who want to drink well, save money, and impress their friends, this book reveals everything needed to make delicious wines-both reds and whites-from start to finish. A new preface on the new trend and options in home winemaking update this edition.

Not so long ago, Italian food was regarded as a poor man's gruel-little more than pizza, macaroni with sauce, and red wines in a box. Here, John Mariani shows how the Italian immigrants to America created, through perseverance and sheer necessity, an Italian-American food culture, and how it became a global obsession. The book begins with the Greek, Roman, and Middle Eastern culinary traditions before the boot-shaped peninsula was even called "Italy," then takes readers on a journey through Europe and across the ocean to America alongside the poor but hopeful Italian immigrants who slowly but surely won over the hearts and minds of Americans by way of their stomachs. Featuring evil villains such as the Atkins diet and French chefs, this is a rollicking tale of how Italian cuisine rose to its place as the most beloved fare in the world, through the lives of the people who led the charge. With savory anecdotes from these top chefs and restaurateurs: - Mario Batali - Danny Meyer - Tony Mantuano - Michael Chiarello - Giada de Laurentiis - Giuseppe Cipriani - Nigella Lawson And the trials and triumphs of these restaurants: - Da Silvano - Spiaggia - Bottega - Union Square Cafe - Maialino - Rao's - Babbo - Il Cantinori

This new and completely updated edition, by one of the wine world’s greatest authorities, sets out to teach you that wine, like anything else that gives us pleasure, can be enjoyed more fully by those who have taken the trouble to learn something about it, and who have tried to develop their individual sensory systems. The human sensory system, which includes sight, smell, touch, taste and hearing, can be trained, just as our minds or muscles can be trained. In fact, a high level of assessment skill is within reach of the average wine lover. With the tools given in this book, wine’s myriad sensory cues of quality become discernible, and the distinct and deep pleasure of wine accessible.

Explores the controversy about corking and wine-bottle sealing that has spawned a heated debate throughout the oenological community, tracing the history of the cork while evaluating the merits and shortcomings of other seal contenders.