Stemware

Does it matter? Really? A glass is just a glass, right? I'm here to tell you it does matter. The market being what it is there are now countless options in stem/glass-ware to pick from. So how does one pick, and whats the difference? Its really the shape more than anything that will either best trap the wines aromas at the tip of the glass where you can smell them best to let them fly away.. I do not subscribe to Riedel's theory that you need a different shaped glass for every type of wine, its just a silly. What you need is a glass (yes, made of glass, or crystal, not plastic or metal) with a stem (holding the glass by the stem keeps the wine from getting warm while holding it) that gets significantly narrower around the rim. My personal choice are:

I prefer white wine (smaller sized) glasses for all wine except the seriously overripe (15% alcohol and above), just avoid glasses with thick glass and bulges around the rim, stemless glasses, those new silly cylindrical "edge" glasses, overly expensive glasses, glasses with frilly designs, and of course any wine glass that gets wide around the rim.
There are of course exceptions. Champagne glasses follow the same rules but should be very narrow, and a all black glass is a good investment for very serious wine tasters who do blind wine tastings. Expect to spend about $10-$15 each, any more would be ridiculous.

Vindication

As a small side note, not that long ago I wrote about liking fuller bodied red wines with dessert. In the latest issue of Wine Spectator theres an article about a super fancy dessert bar that focuses on pairing dry table wines with dessert, most notably Zin. Score a point for me!

Embrace the Pink

I love rose, rosado, pink and "gris" wines, and you should to. While they are rarely profound, they're almost always relatively inexpensive (exclude Champagne, Bandol. 1er Cru Tavel, and a handful of Cotes de Provence, etc...), come in styles from bone dry (my prefernce) to sickeningly sweet, and pair really well with a wide variety of dishes.
Rose is traditionally made by taking red grapes and leaving the juice with the skins for a short period of time giving the a delightful pink hue and and different flavor profile but not extracting the tannins. While in this country the reputation of rose or "blush" wines has be thuroughly sullied by Arbor Mist and Beringer (both of whom add water, high fructose corn syrup and potassium sorbate -a preservative- to their wines), roses in Europe are often well respected and even highly priced, particularly in Champagne and the south of France.

South Africa, A Mission

I firmly believe that good quality wine can be and is being made in virtually every major wine growing region in the world, from France, to California, to Chile, to Australia. Of course some newer, or more newly popular wine regions excite me more than others (Portugal, New Zealand, Brazil, Eastern Europe and North Africa), but they all I'm sure have the potential to make really great wine. And then there is South Africa.
Its not that I don't think they can make good wine, I'm a man of great faith, it's that I really, really, really haven't seen it. Forget that I've never had anything from South Africa that really excited me, I've never had anything from South Africa that I could stomach. I know its out there, and I've tried, believe me, but even their much applauded Chenin Blancs have left me consistently underwhelmed.
Maybe its me, hell, I'm the guy who didn't like Chicago when I saw it on Broadway. I didn't care for Nirvana or Led Zeppelin, tomato sauce, sports, or beer. My whole life I've marched to the beat of a different drummer, and maybe I just won't like South African wine no matter how loud James Molesworth screams. But then again, when I listen to NIrvana now it does give me a warm if not totally plesent reminder of my youth. I've learned to occasionally that innocuous red slop at least when I make it, I'm a dedicated World Cup Soccer fan these days (GO PORTUGAL!), and I've been even known to (very slowly) drink a beer. So maybe theres hope yet. So I'm going to put on my game face and go for it. Mission: to find a South African wine I like. Any and all suggestions are welcome.