​Hey, fashion-savvy friends. Your new must-have label for spring is . . . a wine label. More >>

​
I recently had the opportunity to sit down with wine country chef Michael Chiarello at his Orange County branch of NapaStyle, inside South Coast Plaza. A storyteller by nature, he charmed his way through a condensed version of our On The Line series before conducting a demonstration of fresh burrata caprese from his Bottega cookbook. For a little insight on the gentleman behind Easy Entertaining and Chiarello Family Vineyards, uncork the vino and take a seat.

Tell us about NapaStyle's wine bar and your happy hour?
I'm a firm believer of "like what you drink and drink what you like." You don't just get a tasting, you get a 'tastication'. I love to shop and drink, and drink and shop. James, our store manager, selects all the wines for happy hour.
More >>

Anne Marie Panoringan

​

The Place: NapaStyle, South Coast Plaza, 3333 Bear Street, #202, Costa Mesa, (714) 825-0445; www.napastyle.com.

The Hours: 3 p.m. - closing every day. Normal operating hours mean that on weeknights, they close at 9 p.m.; Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sundays are 6:30 p.m.
More >>

​Michael Jordan, member of the Court of Master Sommeliers, former president of the Beachcomber restaurant in Crystal Cove and the former wine director at Napa Rose at Disney's Grand Californian Hotel, has signed on as the sommelier at the Ranch, a steakhouse and live country music venue opening this November in the new Extron Electronics building at the corner of Ball Rd. and East St. in Anaheim, according to owner Andrew Edwards.

More >>

A Ladin-speaking après-ski booth selling waffles and hot wine in northeastern Italy

​Think of Italy, and you think of steaming-hot cups of coffee and glasses of good wine, but do you think of steaming-hot cups of wine?

Yet mulled wine, called vin brulè in Italy (literally "burned wine"), is commonplace in the winter, particularly in the northern mountains, where skiers go to try out the meters and meters of fresh powder. It's rarely advertised, but nearly any bar will have it in season, and it runs cheap, just a euro or two per cup.

Given that the weather here this weekend portends chilly, raw and rainy, it seems like a good time to discuss how to make mulled wine at home.
More >>

thinkgeek.com

​

Last month, I wrote a prison winemaking how-to for a certain ex-Orange-County-sheriff-turned-convicted-felon headed to the slammer. In case you wanted to make your own pruno but were skeeved out by the idea of fermenting Kool-Aid and tomato juice in a garbage bag inside a prison cell, here's the whole kit and kaboodle to make pruno under less, ah, furtive conditions.

ThinkGeek.com sells this DIY Juice into Alcohol Kit. It's an air lock, bottle stopper and yeast. All you do is provide a 64-ounce bottle of juice of your choice.

Is mail-ordering the whole kit too easy for your DIY tendencies? Then make your own. A stopper, airlock and a variety of brewing yeasts appropriate for fermenting high-sugar juices are available at these local homebrew stores . . . after the jump, of course!
More >>

​The first time I tried SanTásti was at the San Francisco Vintners Market back in November. It was introduced to me as a palate-cleansing water--the ideal companion for a wine-tasting event. Though I was initially skeptical of the powers of SanTásti, the beverage definitely did its job between pours, while also being a refreshing drink on its own.

SanTásti works as a sparkling water made with natural ingredients that has just the right amount of carbonation to enhance, rather than disrupt, whatever you taste or eat afterward.

More >>

​

Hi-Time Wine Cellars hosted "A Very Special Bordeaux Tasting" Sunday afternoon, and it's unclear which of those words caused it, but the downstairs wine bar was packed.

In fact, my four-person party had to wait until other tasters left, opening up seats for us--truly SRO (Staggering Room Only). No worries. At least once, I filled my wine-bar stool after being tracked down hugging packs of Guinness Foreign Extra Stout in Hi-Time's walk-in beer frig.
More >>

Flickr user quevedoports

​

This week's recipe goes out to disgraced ex-Orange County Sheriff Mike Carona, who began serving a five-and-half-year prison sentence yesterday in the minimum-security federal pen in Littleton, Colorado. Since prison will present Carona so much time and so few outlets for cooking, here's something to try once he unpacks the bags and sorts out the sock drawer.

Sure, it's illegal to brew alcohol in prison. But when has "illegal" stopped Carona before?
More >>

Flickr user wmliu

​Many are the stories about wines being laid away for decades, maturing into profound statements of the œnologist's art. Many are the legends of some bottle of hundred-year-old Château Machin-Chouette being discovered in a dank corner of an old wine cellar, with wine snobs gathered around to taste just a half sip of the 19th century.

More >>