St. Louis Food Blog

​Too often we forget that wine is fun. Critics are overcritical, writers try to convey too much useful information, normal people get uptight, and wine geeks have been known to manage all three simultaneously. It can be difficult to turn these qualities off, especially after years of conditioning. Sometimes, though, we need to step back, think about what we're doing and attempt to recapture the fun.

I present myself as exhibit number one. A fundamental wine moment for me occurred in the fall of 1995. It was cold and rainy, and I was cutting class because I didn't feel like walking to Wash U. from my apartment. So I popped a bottle of wine in front of the TV to celebrate my sloth: a 1992 Jayer-Gilles Bourgogne Haut Côtes de Nuits.

I pulled the cork, poured a glass and went into the kitchen to fetch a snack. When I returned, I smelled violets. The cool, damp breeze coming in from my cracked window had filled the room with the scent of the wine. Thus began my fascination with red Burgundy. It was a moment of pure joy.

A point comes in many wine lovers' lives when they are unable to find a bottle they really want in their local wine shops. It might be a wine from the birth year of a special person, a bottle enjoyed while traveling or just something about which they've read that simply captivates their imagination.

The simple fact about wine distribution is that far from everything is available in any particular market. While we St. Louisans are relatively well placed in a large metropolitan area spanning two states, there are times when ordering a wine from another state is the only way to get it.

Continuing our exploration of port from last week (read "A Port for Every Storm, Part 1"), we'll cover the other forms of port you're likely to see on the shelves. We'll also spend some time discussing what, if any, food will match well with the port in your glass.

First, to finish up with the red (as opposed to tawny) ports. Let's start at the top of the qualitative ladder with vintage port. For many, vintage port represents the pinnacle of port. In volume terms, vintage port makes up a whopping 1% -- yes, 1% -- of the total production of port.

As cool autumn weather begins to settle in, my thoughts turn to richer wines that can keep the chill away. One wine that fits this bill perfectly is port. Typically, port is imbibed while enjoying a good book at bedtime or while sitting next to the fireplace, but it makes a lovely match with cheese or nuts or even a not-too-sweet chocolate dessert.

This week, I'll cover the history and production methods of port as well as the most common form you'll encounter in the market. Next week, we'll delve into the other varieties of port and discuss some food matches.

Time to decode and deconstruct another term that gets thrown around way too often in the wine world: the "great" year or vintage.

In the early days of my fascination with wine, I marveled at connoisseurs' ability to rattle off all of the "great" years for the world's "great" wine-producing regions. As with points, though, it's very easy to transform "great" to "best" and quickly decide that -- given limited time, budget, liver and brain cells -- "great" should mean "only." This is especially true when vintage rankings are reduced to a handy, wallet-sized chart summarizing some critic's take on all of the world's "important" wine regions.

This path is unfortunate for several reasons.

I find zinfandel an utterly fascinating story. For many years, it has been referred to as American's own grape variety. Not because anyone thought it was native to these shores, but because its story mimics that of so many Americans: It was a humble, unknown import from Europe, adapting to conditions throughout California's wine regions. It has been used to craft wines ranging from classically-styled table wines to rich, ripe blockbusters to port-style dessert wines. It is the grape that came without pedigree or expectations and, with some hard work and luck, succeeded wherever it went.

In 2002, Dr. Carole Meredith of the University of California at Davis finally answered the question of what zinfandel was and where it had originated through her pioneering DNA research. These answers did nothing to change zinfandel's rags-to-riches story as Dr. Meredith determined zinfandel was none other than crljenak kastelanski, an obscure variety even in its homeland of Croatia.

My tastes generally run to the esoteric, the obscure, the endangered and, sometimes, the downright odd. Which isn't to say I can't and don't appreciate more "mainstream" wines, because I can and do, but with so many wines available in the market, I can't resist the urge to explore.

Occasionally, however, I want a sure thing. One of the wines that has served steadfastly in this role for me over the past seven vintages or so is the Les Hérétiques bottling from the Iché family at Chateau d'Oupia in Minervois. The Iché family has been one of the leading lights in the region, producing excellent wines from an area that has concentrated far too long on quantity over quality. The patriach of the Iché family passed away almost two years ago, but importer Joe Dressner's remembrance of M. Iché provides a glimpse of the lives behind these wines.

One of the larger areas of misconception surrounding wine is the use of sulfur compounds, most commonly sulfur dioxide (SO2), during the wine-making process. Many consumers seem to misunderstand why most winemakers add SO2 and what ill effects it might cause. Given that all wines containing more than 10 parts per million of sulfites are required by the Food and Drug Administration to sport a deadly-serious-looking official government label that warns of their presence, it isn't surprising that many sinister folk tales surround them.

Before proceeding, it's worth noting that a not-insignificant portion of the population (estimated at about 1%) seems to have an allergic reaction to sulfites. As with most allergy symptoms, these seem to vary greatly from person to person and from exposure to exposure. However, splitting headaches, nausea and vomiting aren't common allergy symptoms. You're going to need to look for another scapegoat for those -- or admit you drank too much.

​From time to time, I dedicate a post to someone doing remarkable work in the St. Louis area. In this edition, it's Paul Hayden, who has the enormous job of managing the Clayton location of the Wine & Cheese Place and buying wine (and other non-Noble Writ beverages) for the store's other locations as well as Provisions market.

Hayden started with the store as a cashier at the age of eighteen and gradually worked his way up the ladder of responsibility as his passion for wine grew. Like me, Hayden had no family tradition of wine drinking but got interested through his work in the store. There were always wines open for the staff (the over-twenty-one portion!) to taste, and Hayden quickly grew fascinated by the diversity and complexity of wine. When the wine buyer position became vacant, Hayden was ready to step in and hasn't looked back.

I graduated from high school in 1989. No, it wasn't in St. Louis, so don't waste time wondering which one. In celebration of blowing off my 20th reunion, and being two decades removed from the trying social experiment called high school, I decided to pull a wine from the 1989 vintage for this week's post.

Now, I didn't purchase this wine when it was originally released back in 1991 or so. Some wineries will cellar bottles at their facility and then release them years or even decades later. To my mind, this is generally a more reliable method of finding well-preserved older bottles than the auction market is -- although in fairness I've yet to experience a problem with poorly-stored bottles that I've purchased at auction.

Today's bottle is the 1989 Chinon Les Picasses from Olga Raffault. I purchased this about five years ago from Chambers St. Wines for around $40. At the time, the current release of Ms. Raffault's Chinon Les Picasses went for around $16, so this was not too steep a premium given that the property had cellared it for more than a decade at the time I bought it.

Matching food and wine is something that has become perilously overwrought -- almost to the point of preciousness. Articles wax poetic over the hint of Dalmatian sage that echoes the slightest grassiness of a sauvignon blanc, or over the wisdom, if not the necessity, of opting for a Cabernet from Rutherford, with its trademark earthiness, to best meld with dry-aged prime beef. The American tendency to seek "the best," has turned the simple synergistic pleasure of food and wine into a ferocious, stress-inducing competition for "the best" match.

So, first, here's your stress-reliever: There is no "best" match. Yes, some matches may work better for some people. And there are certainly some sure-fire losers, such as serving a dessert wine that is less sweet than the dessert itself -- sour city! -- or matching an extremely tannic wine like a young California cabernet sauvignon with a delicate dish lacking the fat or richness to tame the tannin. However, taste is highly subjective and variable and the notion of absolutes needs to be abandoned.

Riesling is my favorite white grape variety, and if pressed, I'd probably choose it as my favorite grape overall (pinot noir being its only real competition). So it pains me that so many folks interested in wine seem to ignore it, if not deride or despise it. There are many misconceptions about riesling, and the German on many riesling labels acts as a further barrier. However, no other grape so clearly articulates where it is grown, which makes the effort not only worthwhile, but obligatory for the someone interested in exploring the concept of terroir.

The biggest issue with riesling is sweetness. Most rieslings have a not-insignificant amount of sugar in them, and this gets into the craw of people who have learned that only "dry" wines are "serious" and worthy of their attention. I've noticed that there is a large overlap between folks holding these beliefs and those who enjoy " dry" red wines that actually have a large amount of residual sugar in them as well. Try to keep an open mind, and I think you will be rewarded with a wonderful wine experience.

On the relatively few occasions when I dine at a nice restaurant, I'm usually seen carrying my "geek bag." (I have used the 820 model for almost ten years.) Inside will be three or four wines from my cellar that I am willing to pay to open pursuant to the restaurant's corkage policy.

A restaurant that allows corkage permits you to bring in a bottle of your own wine and drink it on its premises for a set fee. In St. Louis, this fee usually ranges from $10 to $25, and many finer dining restaurants have a corkage policy, though it may not be well-advertised.

Paying corkage is an attractive alternative for me because -- with a few notable exceptions -- restaurant wine lists tend to be filled with recent vintages of boring wines offered at extraordinarily high prices.

Wait, it's pizza and beer, right? Not in my book. As someone who loves beer, pizza and wine to degrees that would probably embarrass most folks, I'm mystified how this generic "match" has become a ubiquitous populist myth.

What kind of beer? What kind of pizza? What kind of wine? These are areas rife with variations and passionately-held pedantic points of honor.

The most critical pizza component when deciding which beverage to pair is the sauce. Basically, any pie with a tomato-based sauce is going to work better with wine than beer. (Ditto for pesto sauces, too.) Thick crust, thin crust, double-crust, fresh mozzarella, whole-milk or part-skim mozzarella, Parmagiano-Reggiano or Provel: All are relatively irrelevant. The tomato sauce can be spicy, a bit sweet or as traditional as can be, but it's the key -- and it's a nightmare match for beer. Thankfully, the tomato is a great friend to fruity, acidic red wines.

This week we're going to delve into yet another virtually extinct grape variety that, in the right hands, makes absolutely delicious wine: romorantin. First, though, a bit of a rant. There are more worthy grapes out there than just cab, merlot, pinot noir and chardonnay. And, for the really adventurous drinkers out there, more than zinfandel, syrah, sauvignon blanc and riesling too!

Limiting your wine experience to these superstars is like having the Crayola 64 pack, using the red, blue, green and yellow crayons and pitching the rest in the trash.

There is a great, wonderful diverse world of grape varieties out in the world! For now. There are literally hundreds, if not thousands of grapes, made into wine. For now. In previous posts, I've tried to highlight "alternative" grape varieties and hint that stepping out beyond the usual suspects is a worthy pursuit. Well, I'm saying it expressly now: If we don't buy these wines and support these producers, growers and importers, they will disappear, and we will be worse off as wine lovers for it.

Too many people take the easy route with wine, sticking with the well-known, safe, and "prestigious." And I'm not referring to the casual wine drinker here. As my choices of wardrobe and car attest, I well understand that we can't all geek out on everything, though I certainly encourage you to broaden your scope as well. I'm primarily talking to those who claim that wine is their passion -- yet they have cellars full of nothing but Bordeaux or cabernet sauvignon from California or something else equally limited in scope.

To them I ask, why?

Like many sectors of the economy, the wine industry isn't doing well. You might suppose that alcohol sales would be more resilient than most things, and to some extent that's true -- sales of inexpensive wines remain relatively robust. However, high-end wines are being hit hard.

My first clue that something was amiss? The numerous e-mails and mailings that I began receiving from wineries from which I hadn't purchased wine directly in many years, if ever.

Many small domestic producers have mailing lists through which they sell their wine. If you're not on the list, you can't buy the producer's product (unless you stumble upon the wine at a restaurant or at auction). From the late 1990s to the early part of this decade, plenty of wineries had waiting lists just to get on the mailing lists, and a select few had closed their waiting lists as there was no hope that anyone would ever get moved to the mailing list.

Then, all of a sudden, wineries that had dropped me from their lists were offering to sell me wine -- and lots of it.

Dave Nelson is the author of the blog Beer, Wine and Whisky. He writes about wine for Gut Check every Tuesday.

While Gut Check is on vacation this week, check out some of Dave's best work:

Chardonnay for the Chardonnay Hater (March 3, 2009):

The world produces an ocean of chardonnay. In California alone, almost 100,000 acres of this incredibly popular grape variety are planted. That's enough chardonnay to make -- using modest crop and efficiency estimates -- over 250,000,000 bottles. Add the chardonnay acreage in France and Australia, and the worldwide total pushes 400,000 acres.

Given chardonnay's ubiquity, it's not surprising that most chardonnay is garbage. However, despite the current hipster aversion to anything and everything chardonnay, there are some really nice wines made from this over-exposed -- and frequently over-manipulated -- over-ripe grape.

The Pointlessness of Points (March 24, 2009):

What's most important is how you -- yes, you! -- perceive the combinations of aromas and flavors in a particular wine on a particular day, and whether, ultimately, you enjoy them. This will be a function of your body, the environment in which you're consuming the wine, its temperature, your health, what food, if any, you're consuming with the wine, what you had to eat earlier in the day and countless other factors. The absurdity of assigning a number to such a fleeting personal experience is surpassed only by the idea of placing significant weight on a number assigned to such an experience of another person!

Spanish Spring (May 5, 2009):

lbariño makes its home in the Rías Baixas -- the grand estuaries that are the Spanish equivalent to the fjords, though made by rivers, not glaciers. This area is relatively cool and wet, at least in comparison to the rest of Spain.

My ideal albariño is ripe, but not too much so. Some folks let the grapes get really ripe, and others even ferment and age in new oak, but this destroys albariño's charms for me. At its best, albariño is like biting into a not quite ripe peach: The stone fruit aromas are there, but acidity is still prevalent and keeps things zippy.

Want to read more of Dave's take on wine? Visit the complete archive.

From time to time I feel obligated to investigate new products I see on the market. Were I "just" a consumer, I might well pass them by, not willing to risk my hard-earned money -- but since I can at least write about such things here, I'm a bit more adventurous. A recent pre-camping trip wine run led to me to purchase several new offerings that are not packaged in glass bottles.

Glass certainly has its advantages: It is inert and does not allow oxygen into the wine, which would spoil it. However, glass is breakable, making it an explicit no-no in many locations, and it is heavy, which raises concerns when you're the one responsible for schlepping the alcoholic beverages in your backpack. Until purchasing the wines for this post, I hadn't realized how heavy a glass bottle was. While both of the alternatives packages weighed in at about two ounces, an empty glass bottle is fourteen.

For many years, if you weren't buying wine in a bottle, you were buying it in a box. In the wine trade, this packaging is known as "bag in box" as it's actually an oxygen-impermeable (well, they try) bag that holds the wine. There are several quality wines now being packaged in this manner, but here we'll explore two alternatives that were new to me: the Tetra Pak and the plastic bottle.

Remember chugging Lancer's, Mateus, Black Tower or Blue Nun in the parking lot before the Three Dog Night concert?

Me neither.

But I certainly hear plenty of quasi-wistful reminiscences about them. I was relatively surprised to learn that many people lumped one of my favorite white wines, Soave, in with these pop-culture laughingstocks.

It seems that in a decade not too long ago Soave was the Italian white wine -- the pinot grigio of its day. As with so many things, popularity bred mediocrity as plantings increased and as vines were pushed to produce as much as possible. As a result, quality fell, and sales tapered off. I'm sure there were producers carrying the flag for quality back then, but this predates my exposure to high school, let alone Soave.

The wine world has seen few success stories like New Zealand sauvignon blanc. In the past decade, the country's production of sauvignon blanc has increased by 800%, and the value of all wine exported from New Zealand is set to top NZ$1 billion next year. Sauvignon blanc put New Zealand on the wine map and continues to dominate the nation's output.

In addition to aggressive export, the New Zealand wine community has been at the forefront of two revolutions. First, as an industry, it committed early to employing screwcaps to close wines. Second, it has committed to having all vineyards in the country using certified sustainable practices by 2012.

As commendable as those causes might be, it's what is in the bottle that counts.

We live in a time when well-made wine is readily available to just about everyone. You can walk into most grocery stores -- not to mention wine shops -- and find dozens of wines that are cleanly and soundly made starting at or below $5 a bottle.

But I need a wine to be more than "good." A "good," technically sound wine isn't what feeds my passion. I need a wine to draw me in -- to capture my attention with something distinctive. Sure, there's a base level of quality that needs to be met, but the story is what really makes the experience.

The most fascinating story a wine can tell is the tale of what the French call terroir. This simple word requires paragraphs, if not pages, to articulate decently in English -- and quickly becomes a muddle of uncertainty, myth, tradition and science. (Some would add religion.) My shorthand explanation: A wine that expresses its terroir is able to tell the drinker where it is from through its tastes and aromas.

I'm not so crazy about Champagne. By Champagne, I don't mean sparkling wine in general or a $6 bottle of Cook's from California. I mean proper Champagne, the great sparkling wine from the Champagne region of France.

During production, much Champagne is aged in its bottle with yeast for several years prior to release. This extended interaction with yeast gives Champagne a range of flavors that many people find compelling and record positively as toasty, yeasty, nutty or freshly-baked bread. But these flavors and aromas really hit me the wrong way when they become significant components, so my practical side doesn't see the point in spending a premium for Champagne.

Luckily, there is a great wide world of other sparkling wines well worth your attention. Today, we'll explore one of my favorites: the Spanish sparkling wine, Cava.

Dave Nelson is the author of the blog Beer, Wine and Whisky. He writes about wine for Gut Check every Tuesday.

Wine is a daunting subject: tens of thousands of producers, located in unique microclimates all around the world, each creating between one and dozens of wines, each of which is different to some degree every year due to variation in the weather. How even to begin learning about it?

The breadth and depth of the topic of "wine" make knowing it intimately outside the scope of all but a few obsessed individuals. That's not me, and it's almost certainly not you, either.

Feel better already? Good.

Whether you're just starting to explore wine, or you're a regular wine drinker looking to learn more, there are a few simple steps you can take to increase both your knowledge of wine and the pleasure you derive from drinking it. Learning about wine isn't something that happens overnight but, as the first step below should demonstrate, the journey is a very pleasant one indeed.

Dave Nelson is the author of the blog Beer, Wine and Whisky. He writes about wine for Gut Check every Tuesday.

I love rosés -- perfect for picnics or just for sipping to keep cool on warm summer nights. I always end up going through a case or so each year. The 2008 vintage has begun to arrive on the market, but quantities seem to be quite small, with some wines having already come and gone.

I wanted get on top of what was available to secure my stash, so I invited a group of five friends for a rosé tasting. The wine experience of the panel varied, but all are rosé fans. Thanks to Zac, Carl, Mark, (another) Mark and Jennie for the help.

The plan was simple: Each person brought a 2008 rosé, telling us what it was to avoid duplicates. I then filled out the field with other interesting samples, including one 2007 rosé and a supermarket white zinfandel. Apart from a handful (less than, perhaps), rosés are best enjoyed fresh, and I wanted to see if a 2007 tasted noticeably old. I included the white zinfandel because we tasted the wines blind. What better way to remove any bias against white zin than tasting without seeing the label?

Wikimedia Commons

I tasted all of the wines single-blind, meaning that I knew what wines were to be tasted, but I didn't know the order in which they were presented. My friends tasted five of the wines (the ones they brought) single-blind and four double-blind, meaning they didn't know either the identity of these wines, or the order in which they were tasted. I accomplished this by opening all of the wines, wrapping them in paper bags and placing them in the fridge myself. Another person at the tasting then pulled wines randomly from the fridge and assigned them numbers. We only revealed the identity of the wines once we had completed the tasting.

In total, we sampled nine rosés. Unfortunately, the one I was most looking forward to ended up having a significant flaw.

(My friend Mark had purchased it from Bon Vivant Wines, and Andrew stepped up immediately to replace it with a new bottle. However, we weren't able to retaste it in time for this post, so I'll add a comment when that happens.)

We initially tasted the wines on their own, and then with a variety of rosé-friendly foods. I served some charcuterie, a nice roasted red pepper chevre spread on crostini, a basic bruschetta and falafel sandwiches.

Below are my tasting notes, with additional comments from the rest of the panel. The wines are listed from the group's favorite to its least favorite, and the first four wines are recommended.

Dave Nelson is the author of the blog Beer, Wine and Whisky. He writes about wine for Gut Check every Tuesday.

As I've researched the many issues surrounding cork and its alternatives, a central theme has emerged: Little solid research has been done into both the chemistry of wine aging and the impact of bottle closures on that process. While new studies seem to be announced almost weekly now, there is a paucity of historical data and controlled long-term studies. Combine this with all of the new products being rolled out by the closure companies, and it's a dizzying issue.

Somewhat understandably, the closure industry and wine producers are quick to tout any aspect of a new study that remotely supports their closure -- or points out a potential problem with a rival. Cork producers do it, as do wineries that have opted to continue using corks. Screwcap producers do it, as do wineries that have switched to screwcaps. It's much like the constant barrage of soon-to-be-contradicted health headlines -- this month's weight-loss savior is next month's scapegoat.

So if you want to explore the topic in depth (and not be sold someone's company line) to whom do you turn? My recommendation is Jamie Goode of the website Wine Anorak. I've followed his blog for many years, and he's particularly gifted at cutting through spin and explaining the science of many wine technology issues in terms I can understand.

Goode has been very active in the closure debate, writing numerous articles and one of the few books on the topic, Wine Bottle Closures (Flavour Press, 2006). I ordered a copy and enjoyed the way it walks through the science of the issues presented by closures as well as all of the research on the performance of corks, screwcaps and artificial corks. I highly recommend it, and this post wouldn't have been possible without it.

Dave Nelson is the author of the blog Beer, Wine and Whisky. He writes about wine for Gut Check every Tuesday.

While Spain doesn't have the staggering diversity of grapes that Italy does, it's still home to some fantastically distinctive white wines. Fewer of these are imported into the United States than their Italian counterparts, but this again works in favor of high quality -- people just aren't going to waste their time bringing in the plonk.

Today, we have samples of two of my favorite Spanish whites, albariño and Txakoli. Both come from the cool northwestern portion of the country, nestled on the Atlantic coast between Portugal and France, but they are very different in style.

User "chicadelatele," Wikimedia Commons

Ría de Vigo, Spain

Albariño makes its home in the Rías Baixas -- the grand estuaries that are the Spanish equivalent to the fjords, though made by rivers, not glaciers. This area is relatively cool and wet, at least in comparison to the rest of Spain.

My ideal albariño is ripe, but not too much so. Some folks let the grapes get really ripe, and others even ferment and age in new oak, but this destroys albariño's charms for me. At its best, albariño is like biting into a not quite ripe peach: The stone fruit aromas are there, but acidity is still prevalent and keeps things zippy.

Dave Nelson is the author of the blog Beer, Wine and Whisky. He writes about wine for Gut Check every Tuesday.

Over the past decade I've consumed more wine from Clos Roche Blanche than from any other producer. In fact, it's not even close. The quality, variety, value and philosophy offered by the estate make it irresistible to me. This post is the first in a series exploring in detail wineries and winemakers that I find particularly compelling.

Clos Roche Blanche is located near the small town of Mareuil-sur-Cher, about 40 miles southeast of Tours in the heart of the Loire Valley in France. It is set upon the river Cher, a major tributary of the Loire. French photographer and wine blogger Bertrand Celce has visited the property and taken beautiful photographs.

The estate comprises about 44 acres of vines, equally split among white and red varieties. The expected grapes for the middle Loire are present -- sauvignon blanc and cabernet franc --- but there is also côt (the local name for malbec), pineau d'aunis, gamay, cabernet sauvignon and even a bit of chardonnay.

From these grapes, Clos Roche Blanche produces a broad range of wines. In the U.S., I've seen varietal bottlings of each grape, a combination of côt and cabernet franc called Pif, and a red pineau d'aunis (they make most into a delicious rosé) labeled "l'Arpent Rouge." I've managed to drink plenty of all of them over the years, but the gamay and the cabernet (a blend of franc and sauvignon) are probably my favorites.

Dave Nelson is the author of the blog Beer, Wine and Whisky. He writes about wine for Gut Check every Tuesday.

Pinot grigio is one of the runaway success stories of the wine industry over the past decade. At its best, pinot grigio can be a very nice seafood wine or patio sipper -- crisp, lightly fruity and lip-smackingly acidic. A good pinot grigio begs to be guzzled with platters of fritto misto outside on a warm summer evening.

Unfortunately, pinot grigio's popularity has led to as much of it as possible being imported from Italy. As a result, you're quite likely to run into dilute, insipid versions, rather than the good stuff -- especially if you're shopping at the value end of the spectrum.

Luckily, Italy is an incredibly diverse wine nation, with over 350 varieties of grapes officially approved by the government to be made into wine. Many of these provide the delicious light, crisp whites that make people fall in love with pinot grigio, and some add compelling characteristics of their own to the mix. In fact, if I were to limit myself to white wines from a single country, Italy would likely top the list, which is really saying something considering how much I love German riesling.

Dave Nelson is the author of the blog Beer, Wine and Whisky. He writes about wine for Gut Check every Tuesday.

Aging wine at home is something everyone should attempt. You don't need a cellar. In fact, I hesitate to use the term "cellar" because it carries so many preconceptions. People tend to think of the dusty dungeon-esque catacombs beneath a stately European manse or the large, expensive wine fridges that populate the ads of wine magazines. Both images are misleading. Aging wine doesn't require a large investment, nor is the enjoyment of aged wine limited to the wealthy.

User "Che," Wikimedia Commons

Not Dave Nelson's wine cellar.

Honestly, most people don't keep wine around long. The latest stats show that 98% of all wine purchased in the United States is consumed within two days. I absolutely understand: Wine is a food product, after all, and for many only a occasional purchase. What's more, the bulk of wine in the market is produced to be consumed immediately. Still, a significant number of wines that can improve with age are available.

Of course, improve is a very subjective word in this context. There may be some consensus with regard to the evolution of a particular wine from a particular year, but the only thing an older wine is sure to be is older.

(Well, in most cases.)

As it ages, wine goes under a number of complex -- and not particularly well-understood -- chemical changes. As temperature increases so does the rate at which chemical reactions occur. Thus, the warmer the place you are storing the wine, the quicker it will age in the chemical sense. And since these chemical reactions are what causes the flavors and aromas to change, it's this chemical "age" we are really concerned with.

Which brings us to the single biggest obstacle to aging wine at home.

Dave Nelson is the author of the blog Beer, Wine and Whisky. He writes about wine for Gut Check every Tuesday.

In just about any wine store, and even in many grocery stores, the pinot noir selection seems to keep growing and growing. Frankly, I thought there would be a plateau and then perhaps a fall as we got further removed in time from The Movie, but there are few signs of things slowing down.

I'm actually happy about that: Pinot noir can be an incredibly tasty, food-friendly wine. For many people, though, it has flown under the radar, hampered by myths about it being "difficult" to grow, and, at least with respect to red Burgundy, "difficult" to understand.

If forced to drink pinot noir from only one place, I would choose red Burgundy, but I've had plenty of fine pinot noirs from the United States. Of these, I've had much better luck with wines from Oregon than from California.