How to Make Mulled Wine

It's Christmas! Which means it's time to break out the mulled wine. Here the Food Network's Alton brown shows you a nice and simple method for making your own wine, involving a coffee percolator. Just the thought of all those spices is getting us excited about trying his recipe out.
.

Chardonnay

Do you love drinking Chardonnay? Do you automatically assume that because of the name the wine you're drinking must be French? The truth is that Chardonnay is not only hugely popular, but also hugely ubiquitous in vineyards the world over.

Traditional Chardonnay stems from the region of Burgundy in France. Here it has a steely and fresh taste that can be substantially different when compared to other wines made from this grape. For instance, if you travel further to the south of France, that steeliness gives way to a much more mellow flavour. Some would even describe the taste as buttery, or oaky.

That oakiness is perhaps most prevalent in the Chardonnay grown all over California. In fact, not only is the wine made in such great quantities (with many examples being over-oaked and of generally inferior quality) that there is even a group known as the ABC Movement - standing for "Anything But Chardonnay". Nevertheless, we mustn't give the impression that all Californian Chardonnay is bad. On the contrary, both the Napa and Sonoma Valley produce highly sought-after examples of the wine.

For instance, the 2009 Ryo-Fu has been noted as having "lemon, light floral honey, French oak and spices." You can buy wine online such as this example and many other quality chardonnay and have it shipped direct to your door.

Bordeaux Wine

If you enjoy quaffing the odd glass or two of shiraz and know your Chardonnays from your Cabernet Sauvignons then you’re probably well on your way to being a wine connoisseur. However, there is more to wine than simply tasting it. Although we do admit that this part is probably the most fun!

Growing wine and the act of wine-making does not boil down to expertise alone. There are often a thousand different varieties of grape, but there are also rules and regulations about how these grapes most be grown. These are particularly complex with regards to old world wine. By old world wine we are referring to wine from countries such as France, Germany, Spain, Italy and Romania.

The laws that govern how these wines are produced come under the European framework of the Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) and the Protected Geographical Indication (PGI). These systems have individual enforcement bodies from country to country.

Let us examine, France, which is by far the largest old world country for wine.  The system by which grapes can be grown in France is controlled by the Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée (AOC) and Vin de Pays.

Bordeaux is the largest and most prominent wine-producing region in France. The region covers the city of Bordeaux and the Gironde. This totals 120,00 hectares of wine-producing land. Of the wine produced in Bordeaux, a large majority of it is red – or Claret as it is often referred to. Overall, there can be up to 700 million bottles of wine produced in Bordeaux in any given vintage. This staggering number comes courtesy of over 8,500 châteaux.

While red wine accounts for roughly 89 per cent of Bordeaux’s wine output, the remainder is comprised of sweet white wines and dry white wines. Both rosé and sparkling wine are produced in much smaller quantities here.