Planet Of Beer

Have you ever been to Cincinnati?  If so, hopefully this travelogue brings back a lot of fond memories and tempts you for a return visit.  If not, let’s see if we can entice you!  Nestled along the Ohio River in the southwest corner of Ohio, Cincinnati is a diverse energetic city complete with unique geographical features and a burgeoning wine culture.

But before we help you discover all that’s great about Cincinnati, let’s take a higher level view.  Ohio, the Buckeye State, has long been part of America’s wine culture.  In fact, we were interested to learn that Ohio has numerous micro climates, with grapes grown all over the state.

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As part of a recent eastern state swing, we discovered abundant clusters of wineries and wine trails all along the southern and eastern boundary of Lake Erie, from Ohio to New York. Along the way, a small area of Pennsylvania awaits, offering the wine traveler a chance to visit some of the Keystone State’s most prominent wineries. This area is part of the Chautauqua Lake Erie Wine Trail, one of 11 wine trails encompassing Pennsylvania wineries.

Like most states in this general geographic area, Pennsylvania has a long history of grape growing and wine making. At present, the state ranks fourth nationally in grape growing and eighth for overall wine production. As you might expect, there are plenty of Pennsylvania wineries to explore, with the state’s varied topography offering many distinct types of grapes and wines.

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Alcohol is the result of the fermentation process where a micro- organism (yeast) converts sugar into alcohol and carbon dioxide gas. Yeast is a living organism that is critical to winemaking. Without yeast, there would be no beer, wine or spirits, bread, yoghurt or cheese.

‘God is Good’ was how yeast was referred to prior to 1859 when Louis Pasteur discovered that a single cell organism was responsible for the conversion of sugars into alcohol and carbon dioxide. The Egyptians were the earliest recorded users of yeasts. They brewed wine and they baked bread. Yeasts are around 6-8 microns in size (1 micron is 1 millionth of a millimetre), it takes about 20 billion of them to make up 1 gram of yeast and the chemical reaction that happens is C6H12O6 + yeast = 2C2H5OH + 2CO2.

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If you love to pop open a good bottle of wine with a loved one, or to share in the company of good friends, then you may love the idea of being able to impress them by making that wine yourself.  Imagine the pleasant surprise on their faces when they discover that the tremendous wine they just sampled is your own creation.  In order to get to that point, however, you must first go through the actual process of making these wines – and that can be a tough task unless you have some help.  This is where home wine making kits come into play.  By using one of these kits, you can get the knowledge and practice you need to be better prepared to make a great bottle of wine.

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For some people, it’s always nice to settle in with a bottle of wine - shared with friends, or simply with someone you love, in the comfort of home. When you decide to have a bottle of wine, it is found more fun by people all over if the wine is made by their own hand. Those who do decide to make their own wines may get frustrated with the idea of trying to do something like that from scratch. Fortunately, though, there are ways to achieve what you want through the convenience of home wine making kits. Thanks to these kits, people who want to make wine can do so far more easily - and can add their own special touch to the process of creating wines.

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How exactly does the type of wine glass you use really matter? It is generally accepted as a rule that serving an alcohol is very easy. You can easily pass on the beer in the can or the bottle, with a bottle opener. For hard variety of alcohol, the spirit is added to the mixer and with some decorations like a mini umbrella and a straw; the drink passes off quite well. But wine is one alcohol that refuses to stick to this adage. You need to properly understand why you need a good wine glass to serve your wine. It has been proven scientifically that each wine has an apt glass required for serving it in its best temperatures for a good drink. Even otherwise, it is in the interest of best etiquettes to use proper wine glasses. And what better could you have asked for than the antique wine glasses to suit your special occasion?

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This month, my wine column switches gears from wine to beer. With St. Patrick’s Day right around the corner, many of us become a wee bit Irish and celebrate the occasion with a pint or two.

Beer and wine share many similarities. Both were made and refined by monks. Also, both are influenced by the fermentation process. Wine can be broadly segregated by white and red; beer is divided between ales and lagers.

The type of yeast selected and the temperature of the brewing process determine if the brew will become an ale or a lager.

Ales are brewed with top fermenting yeast (yeast remains at the top of the barrel during fermentation) at approximately 70 degrees, resulting in a more fruity taste. Examples of ales include porters, stouts, wheat beers and pale ales. These are best served at 45 to 50 degrees.

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Many of the wines bearing different names cannot be told apart by experts without seeing their labels. This is one of the things that provide our wine snobs with opportunities to display their knowledge.

It is probably a form of Bacchic blasphemy to treat wine, the most honored of all beverages, as merely another drink. Yet soda pop–in contrast to the blood of the grape–comes in only about twenty most popular flavors. Beer has four, more or less; whiskey, perhaps six; and the dairy industry now offers us, as beverages, homogenized milk, condensed, evaporated, and powdered milks, buttermilk, skim milk, chocolate milk, and for folks with certain allergies, goat’s milk. Why not group wines, too, according to their principal flavors?

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The aging of wine is a long time tradition that dates back centuries. It is not like having a beer; you cannot just throw it in the refrigerator and expect it to come out ready to go. It needs to chill properly and aged to perfection. There is a great importance of proper wine storage.

Suitable Wine Storing at Home

Wine storage is going to depend on whether you have a family including small children. There are precautions you can take to ensure their safety. The overall suitable storage for your wine is very important. The number one function of storing is to control the aging process. After wine is bottled, the maturing process begins. Especially important for wines that are not so much for social settings as an investment, it needs to be aged correctly. This is why so many people now invest in a home wine cellars and storage racks. This makes it easily accessible and some lavish wine racks make a fashion statement that makes a room look very well accessorized.

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Perfect Pairings

November 15, 2007 - as published in the Beacon News and Naperville Sun

Fall food and wine festivals are an affordable way to experience a wide variety of wines. This helps broaden your palate while discovering your wine preferences. In addition, at many festivals, knowledgeable winemakers are on hand to answer questions, helping you learn more about all aspects of wine. Here’s a great example:

Kohler Food and Wine Experience

These programs were conducted by regionally and nationally acclaimed industry leaders. Chicago’s featured chefs included Rick Tramonto of Tru (and several other restaurants co-founded with Gale Gand) and Adam Siegel of Bartolotta’s Lake Park Bistro. On the wine side, Andrea Immer Robinson, the first woman ever chosen best sommelier in the U.S., was a headliner along with wine makers and owners of prestigious wineries from around the world.

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