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Pairing Cheese and Wine

Cheese and wine generally go together really well, but don’t just pick any old cheese and wine because some combinations are taste disasters. There’s an art to pairing them. Of course the final decisions on taste are going to be down to your own personal choice because taste is subjective, but knowing a few basics will help to get you started. ...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

Pairing Cheese and Wine

Five Classy Ways To Serve Up Some Holiday Cheer

With Christmas hurtling towards us, it’s time to start preparing for the challenge of the season. Whereas October is a month for complaining that Christmas seems to keep coming back earlier and earlier each year, November is a month for a gradually mounting sense of panic. It can be hard enough getting the presents together, especially when there...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

Five Classy Ways To Serve Up Some Holiday Cheer

Creative Wine Gifts For Christmas Connoisseurs

Whether you’re drinking a fruity red, a dry white or a home-made mulled, there’s no doubt that there’s nothing quite like a fine wine at Christmas time. The spirit of Christmas is felt in those very moments when you’re wrapped up in the warm, at home with family and friends sharing great food and drink without a care in the world. For the w...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

Creative Wine Gifts For Christmas Connoisseurs

7 Classic Ways to Display Your Wine Bottles

Whether empty or full, we feel obligated to do something profound with our wine bottles. They just look so classy that we don’t want to throw them away! Plus, they don’t exactly fit well on most shelves or in standard kitchen storage spaces. Here are seven ideas that have achieved some success in dealing with this problem: 1. Counter-Top racks:...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

7 Classic Ways to Display Your Wine Bottles

Hosting A Wine And Cheese Party

Hosting a wine and cheese party is among the most elegant ways to entertain. They can be used as a great way to switch up an old routine, reward employees, connect with new friends, or celebrate as a club or group. Because fine wines and cheeses are generally considered refined and exotic, hosting a party where patrons come to taste different wines...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

Hosting A Wine And Cheese Party

How To: Buy Rose Wine

Last time on our back to basics ‘How to’ series, we considered how to buy White Wine. Buying any variety of wine is as easy as adding it to your shopping cart (virtual or real) these days, but negotiating the intricate world of wine etiquette, tasting and just plain buying the best wines is really not as easy as it sounds. This time, we’re lo...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

How To: Buy Rose Wine

How To: Buy White Wine

Having already revealed our list of buying tips for red wines, we move onto the obvious need for a white wine buying guide. Many treat buying white wine with little thought: It’s relatively hard to find a white wine that you’ll want to tip away the moment you taste, and most are quite pleasant. But White wines have an enormous range of tastes t...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

How To: Buy White Wine

Europe’s Wine Regions: A Guide to Germany

Rounding off a month of easyjetting round Europe’s wine regions, Sam ends up in Germany. The Germany wine history is thought to have begun with the Romans in the 1st century, with the first vineyards being planted in near the Rhins’ left bank. The plants spread to Mosel in about the 3rd century. In the Middle Ages wine production developed ...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

Europe’s Wine Regions: A Guide to Germany

Europe’s Wine Regions: A Guide to Italy

In a series of guest posts, Sam Bird of Easyjet is on a round-trip of Europe’s Wine Region. In this penultimate post, we’re in Italy. Italy has one of the longest histories of wine production in the world. Wine production in the country traces back to the Mesopotamians (in around 4000-3000BC), these people who lived near (present day) I...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

Europe’s Wine Regions: A Guide to Italy

Europe’s Wine Regions: A Guide to Portugal

This week in Sam’s Easyjet tour of Europe’s wine regions, we’re in Portugal! Portugal’s wine production has been in place since before the Portuguese nationality itself. It is thought the first production of Portuguese wine was made in around 2000BC. In the 10th Century BC the Phoenicians took control and introduced many new gra...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

Europe’s Wine Regions: A Guide to Portugal

Europe’s Wine Regions: A Guide to Spain

Continuing this month’s series, Sam Bird, is Easyjetting off to Spain to take a look at their major wine producing regions. Spanish wine production was most greatly introduced by the Romans, however there are some historic signs that wine was in production even further back. In around 218-219B.C vineyards were cultivated in Gadir (now Cadiz) ...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

Europe’s Wine Regions: A Guide to Spain

Europe’s Wine Regions: A Guide to France

In a new series running this month, Sam Bird, a writer for EasyJet, explores the Ins and Outs of the wine regions of Europe. This week, we’re off to France. France has an extensive and interesting history of wine production, for many it is the epitome of a fine wine growing region. It is the Greeks and Romans who were first attributed to plan...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

Europe’s Wine Regions: A Guide to France

Great Wine for Your Wedding Guests

Picking your venue and buying the dress may be top of your wedding to do list, but have you given any thought to which wines to serve? Wine can make or break a meal, so make sure to plan in advance for the perfect wedding feast. Wine and Food Matching Your choice of wines should be influenced by your chosen meals. Consider choosing wines at the sam...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

Great Wine for Your Wedding Guests

A wine cooler for every budget

Many of us wine connoisseurs don’t consider buying a wine cooler. However, if the wine collection is growing our fridges may not have the space we need anymore. Many wine coolers are not as expensive as you might think, in fact, there’s one out there for every budget, from economy machines suitable for small collections, to stylish multi-zone...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

A wine cooler for every budget

A Right Royal Vintage

Now that the royal wedding has been and gone, you’d be forgiven for thinking that the potential for blog-posts on royal related subjects would have to be put on ice until the Diamond Jubilee. So apologies for all those breathing a sigh of relief, because the royals are back in the wine limelight. And this time, they’re playing straight into our...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

A Right Royal Vintage

Choosing Wines for the Barbecue Season

Barbecues are a great opportunity to show off your cooking skills and get a few friends over, and the preparation and cooking can be as social as the meal itself. The question of which drinks to serve is often overlooked, and although it is not usually associated with barbecues, wine can be an excellent choice. Fortunately, the food and wine pairin...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

Choosing Wines for the Barbecue Season

Get Patriotic With English Wines!

Royalists and Republicans alike are doubtlessly out there in the sun (weather permitting!) enjoying and scowling at the bunting and street party antics of the day in equal measure. So whatever you’re up to on this impromptu bank holiday, we hope you’re having a great time celebrating (or avoiding!) the festivities! In the mean time, we’re pon...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

Get Patriotic With English Wines!

Malbec and Argentina Make It Official

What were you lifting a glass to celebrate on the 17th of April? Were you arranging your placemats and tableware Argentina was making official its union to Malbec wine. It’s been a long time coming, but South American wine’s most prolific wine producing country has finally made a commitment to this most unfairly ignored of reds. April 17th was ...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

Malbec and Argentina Make It Official

5 Weird and Wacky Wine Glasses

Wine glasses, an inconspicuous and somewhat unspectacular member of our kitchen cupboards right? Sure, they take pride of place at the centre of the dinning table along with all our fancy wine accessories when we have guests over for a meal but do they ever really stand out and say ‘look at me’? For most people hosting dinner parties, family ga...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

5 Weird and Wacky Wine Glasses

How To: Buy Red Wine

Sometimes it’s necessary to go back to basics. Here, we consider how to go about selecting a red wine that suits your tastes. This isn’t necessarily an easy process: where most of us will finish up a white we don’t particularly enjoy, a fine red wine that doesn’t agree with us will re-gifted at best, and simply tipped away at worst. These a...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

How To: Buy Red Wine

April Alleviation: Wine and Relaxation

As wine lovers, I’m sure we all love a glass of red in front of a roaring fire in winter, and a glass of white with friends in a summer garden. Wine is there to be enjoyed all the year round, and a perfect companion to any relaxation regime you care to devise. Even in the ‘neither here nor there’ British springtime, a glass of the good stuff ...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

April Alleviation: Wine and Relaxation

Biferno Rosso in the Guardian (and Other Great Reds Under £10!)

One of our most consistent performers has to be the Biferno Rosso Riserva, a Smooth and Silky Red Montepulciano Wine from Italy. So we were unsurprised to see this affordable classic featured in the Guardian by resident wine expert David Williams. David accurately describes it as ‘a mature, comfortingly old-fashioned wine [...] this has mellowed ...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

Biferno Rosso in the Guardian (and Other Great Reds Under £10!)

James Halliday Selects Australian Winery Of The Year

Everyone here at Classic Wine Direct always has a lot of enthusiasm for quality world wines and as we move into another decade of wine globalisation, we’re expecting to see a lot of new national wines vying for attention. Not that we’re forgetting the increasingly important profile of the more firmly established nations of ‘new world’ wine....

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

James Halliday Selects Australian Winery Of The Year

To Decant or Not to Decant?

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

To Decant or Not to Decant?

The Decline of Cork (And Why It Still Matters)

Cork, like wine, is associated with many of our most important celebrations. The wonderful moment when the cork pops out of the bottle punctuates everything from 18th Birthday celebrations to Formula One wins. It was Dom Perignon who first used cork to preserve the legendary flavours of his famous sparkling wine back in the 17th century: What many...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

The Decline of Cork (And Why It Still Matters)

The Spiritual Home of the Vineyard

Italy is one of the oldest wine-producing regions in the world. Wine production even predates the Greek colonization that saw wine-making flourish, resulting in a 3000 year heritage that any Italian wine must live up to. Depending on vintage, Italy is either the world’s largest wine producer, or only the second: either way, they are a key player ...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

The Spiritual Home of the Vineyard

The How and Why of Organic and Bio-Dynamic Wines

For many, the reduced environmental impact of choosing organic goods is enough to get them to spend a little more. By excluding chemical fertilizers, pesticides, herbicides and fungicides from the growing process, farmers can (among other benefits) improve soil quality and avoid harmful scenarios where pesticides become re-concentrated in the bodie...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

The How and Why of Organic and Bio-Dynamic Wines

South of the Bordeaux: Wines of the Southern Hemisphere [Part Two]

In the previous part of ‘South of the Bordeaux’, we looked at Chilean wine (with inevitable references to a Chilean mine) South Africa enjoys near exclusivity on African wines, with the majority of wine growing regions in the Western Cape. Despite the relative narrowness of the African wine-growing region, it has a remarkably long histo...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

South of the Bordeaux: Wines of the Southern Hemisphere [Part Two]

Should You Chill Red Wine?

Should you chill red wine? What is best to drink with meat or fish? Actually Most people drink their whites too cold and their reds too warm. Chilling wine reduces the sweetness and increases the tannin and acidity. Drink too cold and you lose too much flavour. Drink too warm and the wine tastes flat and dull. A good rule of thumb is to ta...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

Should You Chill Red Wine?

South of the Bordeaux: Wines from the Southern Hemisphere [Part One]

It’s an oft-quoted statistic that approximately two-thirds of the Earth’s surface is covered by water. However, in the southern hemisphere, water covers one-quarter of the surface, and in the latitudes that make wine making possible (between 35° and 45° south), land is actually somewhat scarcer than north of the equator. Nevertheless, the win...

This is a post from: Classic Wine Direct

South of the Bordeaux: Wines from the Southern Hemisphere [Part One]