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Show Vine.com WORLD Finding the Internet’ s best on-vine information ae By Ted Scheffler Cisine. & natural - Superb Mountain Scenery panied by great wines. Or maybe | should say appropriate wines, since “great” implies expensive or rare. In fact, 99 per- cent of the wines | drink are neither particularly expensive nor rare. But choosing wines can be a daunting task. As much as | and others try to demystify wine and wine drinking, when all is said and done, vino is still a pretty complicated subject. So | recently went looking for help on the Internet. Sure, there are lots of good books about wine on the market. Wine for Dummies and The Windows on the World — Complete Wine Course are two good choices for learning about wine basics. Still, it’s _ often difficult to find the specific information you need in wine books, and even more difficult to locate that information in wine magazines. I have stacks and stacks of Wine Enthusiast and Wine Spectator magazines lying around my house, which | saved so that I could refer back to a particular articles about white Burgundy or Port, buy and how? There’s great information on wine buying strategies at www.winespectator.com, as well as extensive vintage charts you can print out and take to the wine store with you. Add a wine glossary, tips on matching food and wine, suggestions for — best buys and a library of Wine Spectator articles from 1994 to present, and you’ve found one hell of a wine web site. Best of all, it’s free. Also free is my other favorite wine web site: www.wine-lovers-page.com. The Wine Lovers Page is run by a knowledgeable . _wine nut named Robin Garr. His site is especially helpful for selecting wines to buy, particularly bargain wines. He offers, for instance, his list of Top Value wines, all of which are under $15. From Paul ner. There are also lots of useful tools avail- the World Wide Web that contain information about wine. If you don’t believe me, just punch up the word “wine” on your favorite search engine, sit back ... and wait. Now, how do you pare the mountain of wine-based Internet sites to a few good ones? One of the best ways to narrow yout search for wine information is to go to www.vine2wine.com, a sort of clearinghouse for other wine-related sites. There you'll discover a couple thousand web sites organized into categories like wineries, bed & breakfasts (usually associated with wineries), publications, marketing and so on. Click on the publications link for instance, and you'll find sites for everything from Wine Enthusiast magazine to Bung!, the site for a group called Wine Brats. From there you can locate the next San Francisco wine rave or buy a copy of the Wine Brats’ book. But I suspect most wine web surfers may be looking for more basic information about wine. For that purpose, I recommend two particular sites. A very useful site indeed is www.winespectator.com, Wine Spectator magazine’s cyberspace location. Easily the best designed wine site I’ve found, it’s especially good for earning about wine and for help in selecting wines to buy. Click on “Wine Basics” for instance, and you'll be treated to a plethora of helpful info for learning about wine. Think of it as Wine 101. The ABCs of Wine Tasting page, for example, is extremely useful in helping you to think in an orderly and disciplined fashion about wine flavors, aromas, bodies and so on. Likewise, the section on storing and serving wine tells you what to do once you've madea purchase. Want to know wiiat to. ll foods featuring H&aH BAGELS Like no other bagel in the world _ TOP OF MAIN STREET... a Maw Hever: 722 j i a STREET, Ce Krieg Ta ales co TY Trae Microbrew? New this Summer RedRock “Light” Utah’s FIRST Lower-Calorie Microbrew! Cheneau Blanc de Blancs (one of my favorite party bubblies) to Chateau Greysac Cru Bourgeois Medoc, each pick is a win- SALT LAKE CITY + UTAH able at the Wine Lovers’ Page for both current and wannabe wine geeks. I recently or matching food with wine. The problem — _ downloaded Garr's spreadsheet for keeping is, | can never remember which i issue those pieces appeared in. There is an easier way: fhe lnteenict There are literally millions of sites on CD) Located in Alta, ie: eae Canyon Light? BREAKFAST track of the wines in your cellar, as well as his helpful wine-tasting forms which come in both “simple” and “complex” versions. There are also useful tips on how to host a wine party, and a great feature called the 30 Second Wine Advisor, which is weekly wine advice that can be read in 30 seconds _ or less. You can even sign up (for free) to. have the Wine Advisor delivered to your email inbox on a weekly basis. If | were to 254 South 200 West 1lam-Midnight <A 521-7446 4 —~ ot i bookmark only one wine site, it would be The Wine Lovers Page. We know, of course, that wine can’t be shipped directly to consumers in Utah from out-of-state. But let’s say, hypotheti- BOQ A Tuesday, z.0 OFF Sushi Rolls Wednesday & Thursday Lunek, Sushi Bar Seating Only cally, that you have a brother or a vacation home in oh, Sun Valley, Idaho. Peter Granoff’s Virtual Vineyards site at www.virtualvin.com would be a good one to visit to order wines for home delivery. There are Vapanese Restaurant Sushi Bar tons of wines to be had at Virtual Vineyards, as well as extensive and informed tasting notes. And unlike some fly-by-night Internet outfits, the company is reliable. They also run periodic specials. If you’re looking for the rare stuff, check out these wine auction sites: www.winebid.com and www.tcwc.com. The latter is the web site for The Chicago Wine Company, which is currently offering - complete cases of 1900 Chateau Lafite Rothschild or 1900 Chateau Margaux to the highest bidders. Of course, you'll have | to drink these wines in the comfort of your Sun Valley home, since it’s illegal to transport wine purchased elsewhere to Utah. TASTY IDEAS? — Ted welcomes story ideas and comments from readers. E-mail him at - teds@xmission.com or send snail- mail to P.O. ~~ B. 980156, Park C ‘ity, UT &4098. FAX ep 658-29. 308% ee your hotel’s concierge for priority seating in Utah’s hottest restaurants, or call us and we'll do it for you! UTAH GUEST SERVICES ASSOCIATION — See ES Rauiy Gadi (z 10002 ‘vl YIHWAd’S | BS FE: or me, great meals are usually accom- ~ Sip Cs FAMOUS Made to order steamed bagel sandwiches, soups, organic salads Oe |