‘Tis the season for toasts, for good times with friends old and new, and a season to find gifts for your favorite wine-lover. Two suggestions come to mind, in fact they are directly at hand while I plot a project. These are books, of course….since it is a little late to order tools and gadgets (the ultimate streamlined corkscrew that I found in Helsinki answered any such details). The vagabond is inherently a geogrophile (if such an animal exists – I just made it up!) and after over fifteen years of wandering, tasting and taking notes, the connection between terroir and what grows or swims or munches is clear: direct correlation, different taste – a connection between terrain and product long established. So, while browsing in a Sonoma bookstore last April, I was intrigued by a book on The Geography of Wine. When I read on…”Geography is in every drop of wine we drink”…it seemed like an answer to many questions about soils, sun, rain and varieties that built up during many tasings. The author, Brian J. Sommers is as clear and crisp as they go, and wine writers are not always so crisp. He deftly links the distinction between regional cuisines to the identity of the people before tackling the daunting subject of the diverse wines of the Loire. This is a Plume book, published by Penguin group (USA) in 2008, a paperback, 280 pages of fascinating reading.

Another approach to wine takes us to the “roasted slope” of France, the Côte-Rôtie, where the author has agreed to meet two old friends/arch rivals on the same day. To find out what followed, do pick up Jay McInerney’s A Hedonist in the Cellar, Adventures in Wine, published by Vintage Books, New York, 2007. Travel with him through the caves of Cheval Blanc in St-Emilion, into Salon de Champagne and on to Australia, a truly bubbly tour of terroir: cheers…salut…kippes…skol!

Next up: Notes on holiday wine pairing…from soups to sweets.