This week’s Wine Word of the Week is macroclimate. Official definition from Jancis Robinson’s The Oxford Companion to Wine: Macroclimate, also called regional climate, means a climate broadly representing an area or region on a scale of tens to hundreds of kilometers. Unlike the more precise terms microclimate and mesoclimate, macroclimate approximates to what is […]

This week’s Wine Word of the Week is mesoclimate. Official definition from Jancis Robinson’s The Oxford Companion to Wine: Mesoclimate, a term of climatic scale, is intermediate between regional climate or macroclimate, and the very small scale microclimate. It encompasses the more specific terms topoclimate and site climate, and has largely been replaced both in […]

This week’s Wine Word of the Week is microclimate. Official definition from Jancis Robinson’s The Oxford Companion to Wine: Microclimate is a widely misused term meaning strictly the climate within a defined and usually very restricted space or position. In viticulture, it might be at specified positions between rows of vines, or distances above the […]

This week’s Wine Word of the Week is waiter’s friend. Official definition from Jancis Robinson’s The Oxford Companion to Wine: In 1882, Karl Wienke of Rostock, Mecklenburg [Germany] conceived of using a knife-like handle as a lever [for a corkscrew]. Known affectionately as the waiter’s friend, it is still the essential tool of a sommelier […]

This week’s Wine Word of the Week is solera. Official definition from Jancis Robinson’s The Oxford Companion to Wine: Solera is a system of fractional blending used most commonly in Jerez for maintaining the consistency of a style of sherry, which takes its name from those barrels closest to the suelo, or floor, from which […]

This week’s Wine Word of the Week is flight. Official definition from Jancis Robinson’s The Oxford Companion to Wine: Flight is the name for a series of different but related servings of wine, served in a bar or restaurant by the glass or as part of a tasting. Layman’s terms from Kori: Flight is a […]

This week’s Wine Word of the Week is blend. Official definition from Jancis Robinson’s The Oxford Companion to Wine: Blend is any product of blending but specifically a wine deliberately made from more than one grape variety rather than a single varietal (which may contain only a small proportion of other varieties). Layman’s terms from […]

This week’s Wine Word of the Week is enoteca. Official definition from Jancis Robinson’s The Oxford Companion to Wine: Enoteca is a term used frequently in Italy for a wine shop with a significant range of high-quality wines, as opposed to a bottiglieria, a shop with a more pedestrian selection, and a vineria, run by […]

This week’s Wine Word of the Week is spittoon. Official definition from Jancis Robinson’s The Oxford Companion to Wine: Whatever tasters spit into is a spittoon. These can vary from specially designed giant metal funnels, through wooden cases filled with sawdust, to ice buckets, jugs, or, particularly convenient at a seated tasting, personal plastic or […]

This week’s Wine Word of the Week is spitting. Official definition from Jancis Robinson’s The Oxford Companion to Wine: Spitting is an essential practice at professional tastings where several dozen, often more than 100, wines are regularly offered at the same time. Members of the wine trade, and wine writers, rapidly lose any inhibitions about […]