I Tasted Italy in Eighteen Glasses
Eighteen Italian wine families, four vintages of Sassicaia and one cellar in Cologne. My notes from the Istituto Grandi Marchi masterclass at wineBANK Köln.
19 Free Wine Events in Europe: Open Cellar Days & Festivals (2026–2027)
Open cellar weekends, château open days and wine festivals across France, Germany, Italy, Austria, Switzerland and Spain. Dates, costs and how to plan your visit.
13 Free Online Wine Courses With Certificates (2026)
Wine education has a reputation for being expensive, and a classroom certificate course can easily run into hundreds of pounds, euros or dollars before you have opened a single bottle. What far fewer people realise is that many of the world's best-known wine regions run their own online schools and charge nothing for them.
How Long Does Opened Wine Actually Last?
A practical, wine-type-by-type guide to how long an opened bottle stays good, and how to make it last longer.
Does Wine Glass Shape Actually Matter?
Do fancy wine glasses really change how wine tastes, or is it marketing? A look at what glass shape, thinness, and temperature actually do.
How to Read a French Wine Label (Without Feeling Lost)
French wine labels list region, not grape, and that trips almost everyone up. Here’s the logic behind it, and how to decode one at a glance.
Why Does My Wine Taste Different the Next Day?
Your wine tastes off and you’re not sure if it’s a fault or just the wine breathing. Here’s how to tell corked, oxidized, and simply-opened-up apart.
What Wine Actually Goes With Sushi
Most sushi pairing advice skips one detail: it depends on what you’re eating. Here’s how acidity, not tradition, decides which wine actually works.
How to Write Wine Tasting Notes You’ll Actually Use Later
A tasting note has one job: help future-you make a better decision. Here’s the simple structure that replaces jargon-heavy notes you’ll never understand again.
Pinot Grigio vs. Pinot Gris: What’s Actually Different
They share the same DNA, but Pinot Grigio and Pinot Gris taste almost nothing alike. Here’s what actually separates the two, plus where German Grauburgunder fits in.
How to Taste Wine, Step by Step (Without Overthinking It)
Most people don't actually taste wine, they drink it. Here's the four-step method - look, swirl, taste, finish - that turns tasting into something automatic instead of a performance.
Vineyards Are Being Pulled Out Across Three Continents.
Every few weeks another headline lands. France is paying growers to tear out vines. Australia is talking about tens of thousands of hectares. In California, excavators are working through rows that were still producing fruit two seasons ago.
Beyond Bubbles: Inside the New Sparkling Wine Revolution
The age of predictable Champagne and easygoing Prosecco is over. In this piece, I take you behind the scenes of the new sparkling frontier – from razor‑sharp German Sekt and wild Georgian pét‑nats to radical Spanish experiments – through the bottles I tasted and the conversations I had with the winemakers who are quietly rewriting the rules.
How to Read American Wine Labels: A Complete Beginner’s Guide to Choosing Better Wines Instantly
Imagine you are in a supermarket somewhere in Europe, facing a wall of American bottles with big shoulders and confident fonts. At first, everything looks the same, and the temptation is to grab the prettiest label or the most familiar brand. The good news is that US labels are more structured than they seem, and once we know what matters, we can ignore the noise. The order is everything: first the grape, then the place, then the alcohol, and only after that the names, stories, and design.