Acetic: vinegar-like taste or smell from exposure to air. Vinegar is acetic acid.
Acidity: wines contain acids, which vary in concentration.
Appellation: French system regulating authenticity; applies to region where the grapes were grown.
Astringent: high tannin content produces dry, puckering effect.
Balance: relative degree of fruity quality, acidity, tannins, alcohol and other characteristics.
Bouquet: complex of aromas, usually from [...]

When you’ve prepared your meat and vegetables, it’s time to start cooking. Three simple to carry out steps can give you a great barbeque.
Barbeque, to a purist, means slow cooking. That often involves using a smoker, or at least a large grill with a good lid and areas where you can separate the food from [...]

Planning to entertain this summer? If so, you’ll need some quick and easy recipes sure to wow the crowds? You can’t go wrong by incorporating fruits of the season into your recipes, and you’d better act fast if you want to enjoy one of the most coveted delicacies of the year.
California Bing cherries are plentiful [...]

Brisket is a cut from the breast, usually the lower part. It commonly refers to beef, but can mean chicken, pork or other animal meats. Though a badly made brisket can certainly be tough and unappetizing, if well done they can be highly tasty.
One key to cooking a brisket is the necessity to do so [...]

It’s time to spring into the salad season, and a good way to go is with Mediterranean flavors. They’ve taken root in this country and small wonder — ingredients like olive oil, garlic, grains, seafood and fresh tomatoes just seem to belong together. Marinating and grilling are among the Mediterranean techniques that deliver delightful dishes, [...]

An old English expression, “What’s the rub?” meant ‘what is the trouble’. But in barbeque-speak a rub is the mixture of spices that is slathered over the meat before cooking. And for many backyard chef that’s where the trouble starts. Nothing defines a barbeque aficionado so much as his own unique rub.
There are dozens of [...]

In one form or another wine production has been carried out for thousands of years. Pottery discovered in Persia (present-day Iran), dated at 5,500 BC show evidence of grape use for winemaking. Jars from Jiahu in China containing wine from wild grapes date to between 6000 and 7000 BC.
But whether ancient or modern, many of [...]

Basic grill types range from charcoal to propane to natural gas, and sometimes even electric. The add-on features available with one model may help tip you toward one over the other.
Some propane grill models, for example, offer a side burner. That burner, typically about the size of an ordinary gas stove burner in your kitchen, [...]

Many would argue that a barbeque doesn’t deserve the name unless the meat is slow-cooked in a smoky enclosure. Anything else is ‘just grilling’. But whether purist or pragmatist, everyone can agree that adding wood to a barbeque enhances the flavor wonderfully.
Wood chips are frequently placed in among the charcoals or near a gas flame [...]

Barbeque grills come in three main categories – charcoal, gas and electric – and each type will appeal to a slightly different customer.
For decades the only type available was a charcoal grill, and this style is still very popular. Chunks of black carbon are arrayed in a familiar pyramid and ignited, usually with the help [...]

It should go without saying that barbecuing can be dangerous. It should, but there always seem to be some who haven’t grasped that grills are hot and tools are sharp.
For some, pointing out the obvious will have no effect. But for others, listing some easy-to-implement protocols can save a burned hand or lost eye. If [...]

Cleaning a grill or smoker is no fun. Ok, now that we agree and have gotten that out of the way, let’s see why it’s important to do it anyway. Then we can examine how to do it as painlessly as possible.
Most food will expel grease and carbonize to some degree in a barbeque or [...]

Right: Wine map of Washington
The 1960s saw the flowering of a new winemaking region in a very unexpected locale: Washington State, USA. Though near latitudes (46-47 degrees) that encompass two of the great French wine regions, Bordeaux (44.5 degrees) and Burgundy (47 degrees), Washington’s vineyards also experience cold and sometimes rainy falls and winters. Less [...]

There are pros and cons to buying one type of grill over another. Those often revolve around convenience in use and clean up, cost and other factors. But the more passionate debates circle around the question of which one cooks the best. To that question there may be no correct answer.
Traditional charcoal grills add a [...]

Every backyard chef has had to contend with insects interfering with the pleasure of a barbeque. If they don’t actually get in the food, they can still often annoy the cook. Here are a few effective, food-safe tips for how to deal with creatures who have rightly earned the name ‘pest’.
Depending on species and season [...]

Preparation is nine-tenths of victory it’s often said. Readying your food, tools and the barbeque itself will bring you close to the goal line.
In the days when a charcoal grill was the only option, there were more or less standard methods for deciding when it was time to begin. You looked, and you felt. For [...]

Good preparation techniques will set you on the road to a great barbeque. Meat, fish, vegetables and other aspects of the meal all require special handling.
The optimal barbeque, like any meal, always uses fresh ingredients. Frozen meat can be thawed (in the refrigerator, never by being left out on the counter), but it never fully [...]

Midway between Milan and Rome, Tuscany is bordered on the west by the Tyrrhenian Sea and the Apennines mountain range on the east.
First inhabited by the Etruscans, in the Middle Ages and continuing through the Renaissance, Tuscany developed into a center of the Arts and Learning under the control of the Medici clan. And no [...]

Barbeque sauce had its origin in a very practical goal: to preserve meat. Prior to refrigeration, it was helpful to coat a sliced animal part with vinegar (a natural bactericide) or salt (a natural preservative). But after the turn of the 20th century when refrigeration became more widespread, and particularly after WWII when the US [...]

Purists will argue that it’s only a barbeque if the food is cooked slowly, from indirect heat. Fast cooking, they argue, is ‘just grilling’. While the difference is partly a matter of semantics, there are two different styles and each has its purpose and strengths.
Slow cooking has distinct advantages, indeed it may be mandatory when [...]