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Secrets from the Wine Diva: Tips on Buying, Ordering & Enjoying Wine

by Christine Ansbacher

Book Description
Wine expert Christine Ansbacher has some enviable clients: they include  both corporate icons such as American Express, as well as cultural giants like The New York Philharmonic. Why? Because she’s fun and passionate about wine…and eager to share extensive knowledge so that ordinary wine drinkers (not just elite oenophiles) can get more pleasure from their glass. Here she reveals her smart secrets that everyone who loves wine ought to know—including how to make a $10 Cabernet taste like a $30 bottle; how to determine a fair price for a bottle of wine at a restaurant; and how to avoid the dreaded “red wine headache.” She also answers some common questions, including “What wine do you recommend with Chinese food?” Buying wine, storing wine, going on a “wine vacation”, reading the label, ordering in restaurants: all that, and more, is covered in language as sparkling as fine champagne. This Diva is a delight!

REVIEWS
I'm not an expert, but I have read my five feet of bookshelf devoted to tomes of wisdom, on the mysteries and pleasures in my twenty odd cases of wines. I didn't really expect to learn very much from this diminutive volume, obviously meant to inform beginners. Frankly, the book is a jewel. Witty, extremely readable, concise, packed with common sense and real insider info on enjoying wine. There was barely a page that didn't contain stuff I really want to know. Its like having a world class expert, feeding you tips. The book is over flowing with useful tips. The amazing thing is that this is a book that beginners will find completely accessible, fun to read and filled with useful information, much of which, I hadn't acquired in forty years of aspiring to be worthy of my cellar.
Theodore J. Erikson, (Amazon.com)

I find it very intimating to buy in a high-end wine shop like Sherry-Lehmann because I'm strictly in the under $20-a-bottle category buyer. But the Wine Diva even tells you how you can find excellent $10 bottles of wine without embarrassment. I love her idea of associating names of wines with common words so that you can remember them when you're ordering in a restaurant. Like remembering that Riesling sounds like "wrestling." Many great tips for wine lovers.
J. Antin (Amazon.com)