Many people live by the rule “always refrigerate white wines, never refrigerate reds.”  However, for true wine lovers that rule is overly simplistic.

Most people keep their refrigerators around 40 degrees F.  That is too cold to serve whites; at that temperature they lose some of their flavor.  This Ventura County Star article addresses proper wine temperatures.  Lighter whites, the article says, such as pinot grigios, are best at 45 to 50 degrees F.  Fuller-bodied whites, like chardonnays, require temps closer to 55F for optimal taste.

Serving reds at room temperature is not optimal either.  Reds generally are best at temps of upper 50s to about 68F, depending on the type of wine.  That’s cooler than most people keep their houses.

How can you adjust for this?  Well, you can take whites out of the fridge a little while before serving and let them warm up, and you can put reds in the fridge for a few minutes to lower their temperature.  However, this is an inexact science at best.

For the best possible taste, consider investing in a wine refrigerator to store your whites and reds at the proper temp.  Mid-South Alcoholic Supply has plenty to choose from, at a wide range of storage capacities and price points.

Singer/songwriter Sting is venturing into a new business enterprise this year.  He’s launching his own red wine, made with grapes grown on his estate in Tuscany.  He bought the estate in 1997 because he wanted to grow food to feed his family.  Now, he’s going to share a product of the estate - great red wine - with his fans.  About 30,000 bottles of Sting’s wine will go on sale in September.  More info here.

Be sure to enjoy Sting’s wine in one of our many fine wine glasses.

Two wine links for you today.

First of all, Forbes.com recently had a good article about horizontal wine tastings.  These are tastings where all the wines are from the same year.  You may want to narrow it even further, the article suggests, sampling wines that are all from the same region and year, to sample variance in taste.  For example, the article suggests that you could do a sampling of 2005 Napa cabernets.

A vertical tasting, on the other hand, is one in which you sample different vintages (different years) of the same wine.

Once you taste that wine, you’re going to need to describe it.  This article on SouthCoastToday.com suggests that you avoid using standard wine description terms if they don’t have meaning to you - a lot of people can’t relate to words like “tannic,” for example.  One taster couldn’t relate to “cherry” tastes in wine, but she did think it “tasted like Luden’s cherry cough drops,” so that’s how she described it.  You’ll get more out of your wine tastings if you use your own descriptions, rather than conforming to other people’s standard descriptions.

You’ll also get more out of tastings when you use Mid-South Alcoholic Supply’s wine glasses - thousands to choose from.

Ben Carter, author of the Benito’s Wine Reviews blog, is holding an online wine tasting Thursday, March 12 at 7 PM Central time (8 Eastern, 6 Mountain, 5 Pacific).  If you want to participate, he requests that you buy a bottle of 2006 Redheads “Yard Dog” wine from Australia, and join him online for the tasting.  More details will be posted on his blog as the date approaches.

If you need glasses for the tasting, Mid-South Alcoholic Supply has a huge selection.

The 2009 NASCAR season has started.  For years NASCAR was associated with moonshine and low-brow beers like Busch, Pabst Blue Ribbon, and Miller High Life.  However, the sport has gained sophistication in recent years, and it’s gained appreciation among wine drinkers.

This Long Beach Post sports article discusses six drivers wine drinkers may want to follow.  Among the drivers are Tony Stewart, Joey Logano, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Kyle Edwards, Carl Busch, and Jimmie Johnson.  The article explains why each driver pairs well with a particular wine.

We’ve had food-and-wine pairings on this blog before, and we’ve had food-and-beer pairings.  But NASCAR driver-and-wine pairings?  That’s a first.  Be sure to enjoy your wine while watching the NASCAR race in one of our wine glasses.

You’ve probably heard that it’s best to let red wine “breathe” for a while before you serve it.  Letting it mix with air brings out more of the wine’s bouquet and lets you enjoy the taste that the winemaker intended.

Sometimes, however, you don’t have time to let wine breathe.  Maybe guests show up unexpectedly.  Maybe you have to pop open a new bottle in the middle of a party and have thirsty guests.  Maybe you want to enjoy a glass after work, and simply don’t want to wait.

A new product called Vinturi Essential Wine Aerator can help.  You pour the wine through Vinturi into the glass, and Vinturi’s hourglass-shaped cylinder aerates the wine in seconds.  I had the opportunity to taste wine aerated by Vinturi on a recent trip to Nashville, and it did seem to make a difference.  It’s a small investment (currently selling for slightly north of $30 on Amazon) that can make your wines taste much better.

Does it seem snobby to you when people swish and swirl their wine at tastings?  “Why don’t they just drink the stuff like normal people?” you may think.  However, according to this Creative Loafing Tampa article, there are good reasons for all the swishing and swirling.

Swishing, the article says, exposes wine to oxygen more quickly, opening up the wine more, getting rid of rough flavors and providing a taste that is more faithful to the winemaker’s intentions.  The article also notes that swishing is mainly for red wines and doesn’t have much effect on whites.

Swirling in your mouth moves the wine across all your taste buds, giving your brain a complete picture of the wine’s taste.  Different taste buds pick up different sensations - sweet, sour, salty, bitter.

You can find plenty of large wine glasses in our store that are perfect for swishing wine at your next tasting, or just to appreciate a fine bottle by yourself at home.

The Wall Street Journal recently posted a great article on how to read wine labels.  Some of the items they talk about are pretty standard - vintage, alcohol content, geography - but they also have some unexpected hints.  For example, they believe a phone number on the wine label is a very good sign.  When they see a number, it’s a sign that the wine is produced by a highly personal winery, and if you call there’s a good chance you may find yourself talking to the winemaker or owner.  They don’t like critters on the label (although they admit there are exceptions).  They like to see “estate-bottled,” because it’s a sign that the people who bottled the wine also had a hand in growing the grapes.

Mid-South Alcoholic Supply’s bookstore has plenty of books that can teach you even more about wine.

The Houston Chronicle recently ran a good review of five top wine books.  Here’s a look at what they reviewed:

• The Battle for Wine And Love: or How I Saved the World from Parkerization by Alice Fiering.  A one-woman crusade against wine consultants and the 100-point wine scoring system, and a search for authenticity in wine appreciation.
• Gary Vaynerchuk’s 101 Wines.  A look at the 101 most tantalizing wines the author has discovered while traveling the world.
• Taste: A Life in Wine by Anthony Terlato.  Read the words of the CEO who enjoyed great success bringing Pinot Grigio to the United States.
• The Wine Trials by Robin Goldstein.  This author has been mentioned here before, as the one who created a fake restaurant and exposed Wine Spectator by winning their Award of Excellence.  Here she uses brown-bag tests to find $15 wines that stand up against $50 to $150 wines.

Find many more great books about wine in Mid-South Alcoholic Supply’s bookstore.

I came across an article a couple of days ago listing the best box wines of 2008, and thought that would be a useful topic to post about.  However, upon further examination, I discovered that the article was part of a very good blog about wine, written by a guy who calls himself “Dr. Vino.”  Nice name!

Dr. Vino is a real Ph.D. who teaches wine classes at NYU and the University of Chicago.  He’s written two books about wine and has wine maps for major cities on his site.  Besides the look at box wines, other recent posts include whether screwcaps diminish a wine’s value, an interview with a wine collector, and a recommendation for a good port.  If you’re into wine, this is a blog you will want to bookmark.