What to Drink with What You Eat: The Definitive Guide to Pairing Food with Wine, Beer, Spirits, Coffee, Tea — Even Water — Based on Expert Advice from America’s Best Sommeliers
Andrew Dornenburg and Karen Page
Bullfinch Press; $35

www.becomingachef.com

Andrew Dornenburg and Karen Page, authors of the James Beard award-winning Becoming a Chef and Culinary Artistry, have written mostly about and for chefs. This time around they’ve interviewed more than 70 wine experts, including master sommeliers, chefs and others at some of the country’s best restaurants, to assemble a cornucopia of excellent advice about food-and-wine pairing.

They suggest matches for ingredients, cuisines, and dishes, including fast foods like pizza, McDonald’s Big Mac, even a Kit Kat candy bar, for which they suggest a blended African tea. There’s a chapter on the fundamental rules of food-and-wine pairing and lots of other helpful information, like Wines to Have on Hand So You’re Ready for Any Occasion and If You Like This, You Might Also Like That. The guide also works in reverse, allowing readers to search by beverage to find the perfect food match.

Read this book, with its easily accessible matching suggestions, and soon you’ll be thinking like a sommelier. It’s simply a must-have for anyone interested in food-and-wine matching.

Wine Report 2007
Tom Stevenson and a unique team of regional specialist
Published by DK; $15

Here, in one compact, annually updated, award-winning package, is a wealth of information meant to keep wine lovers up-to-date with the always changing and always growing wine world.

British wine expert Tom Stevenson, author of The New Sotheby’s Wine Encyclopedia and more than 20 other wine books, and a contingent of regional contributors evaluate the current state of wine in more than 24 countries. Chapters on each area conclude with informative lists of the Greatest Wine Producers, Fastest-Improving Producers, New Up-and-Coming Producers, Best-Value Producers, Greatest-Quality Wines, Best Bargains and Most Exciting or Unusual Finds.

There are non-regional reports on topics like Organic and Biodynamic Wines, Wine and Health, the 100 Most Exciting Wine Finds and more. Also included is a very good list of recommended wine-related websites.

This book packs a lot of punch in a small package. It’s one I like to get for myself every year.

Top 10 Wines USA; Top 10 Wines France; Top 10 Wines Italy; Top 10 Wines Australia and New Zealand
Vincent Gasnier
Published by DK; $13 each

Everything comes in 10s in this new series of pocket wine guides based on Vincent Gasnier’s 2004 book Wines of the World: 10 Great Red Wines, 10 Wines for Festive Occasions, 10 Best-Kept Secrets, 10 Great Whites, 10 Top Wine Producers, 10 Best Sparkling Wines (or Champagnes), 10 Wines for Everyday Drinking, etc.

At age 22, Gasnier was the youngest person to have achieved Master Sommelier status. He’s put his knowledge to good use in these small (160-page), appealing, if slightly expensive, books that are nicely illustrated with photographs, maps and labels and offer a concise overview of these important wine-producing countries.

A Taste for Wine: 20 Key Tastings to Unlock Your Personal Wine Style
Vincent Gasnier
Published by DK; $20

In A Taste for Wine, Gasnier sorts wines into styles by their flavors, textures and aromas and leads the reader to discover her personal preferences. Categories in the Tasting Tour are Light, Crisp Whites; Juicy, Aromatic Whites; Full, Opulent Whites; Rosé; Fruity, Lively Reds; Ripe, Smooth Reds; Rich, Dense Reds; Sparkling; and Sweet and Fortified. You’ll find old favorites like Chianti and make discoveries like Lago di Caldaro.

This tour will expand your knowledge and your repertoire, like any good voyage should. And you can stay for the whole trip or pick and choose your itinerary. The book is easily navigable, organized in a very appealing way, with many photographs. It’s an excellent value too, very browsable, and I highly recommend it.

Page One of 10 Books That Will Be A Welcome Addition to a Wine Lover’s Library<<

Award-winning author and certified sommelier Sharon Kapnick has written about food and wine for many magazines, including Time, Portfolio, Food & Wine and Hemispheres, and many newspapers, thanks to the New York Times Syndicate. She contributed to several entries in the Oxford Encyclopedia of Food and Drink in America.