Windows on the World Complete Wine Course, 1994 Edition

Zraly, Kevin

ISBN 10: 0806984929 / ISBN 13: 9780806984926

Published by Sterling Publishing Company, Incorporated, New York, NY, U.S.A., 1993

About this Item

First Edition, First Printing, New York, NY, U.S.A.: Sterling Publishing Company, Incorporated, 1993. Hard Cover,Very Good/Very Good. 4to - over 9¾" - 12" tall. ISBN: 0806984929.

Seller Inventory # 002784

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Windows on the World Complete Wine Course, 1994 Edition
• Publisher: Sterling Publishing Company, Incorporated, New York, NY, U.S.A.
• Publication Date: 1993
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0806984929
• ISBN 13: 9780806984926
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: First Edition
• Condition: Very Good
• Dust Jacket Condition: Very Good
• Seller catalogs:
  • FIRST EDITIONS
  • Large Editions

About this title

Synopsis

An entertaining and comprehensive wine guide which explains the many varieties and demonstrates how to judge them, from the wine director of New York's world-famous Windows on the World restaurant.

Review

Quick, what's the correct way to open a wine bottle? Bonus round: what are the 13 grape types permitted in Chateauneuf-du-Pape?

Whatever your score on the above, you're bound to enjoy the Windows on the World Complete Wine Course. Subtitled Millennium Edition, this 14th annual update is again authored by Kevin Zraly, founder and teacher of the Wine School, begun in 1976 as an offshoot of New York's Windows on the World restaurant. On 200 colorful and clutter-free pages full of maps, wine labels, and sidebars full of facts and anecdotes, Zraly acts as your Sherpa through eight classes. Chapters 1 through 3 circumnavigate the white wines of France, the New World, and Germany; 4 through 8 explore the reds of France, California, Iberia, Australia, and South America, concluding with a section on champagne, port, and sherry.

As wine guru, Kevin Zraly is opinionated, knowledgeable, and patient. His skill at talking novice wine devotees off the ledge is especially evident in the chapters on Burgundy and Germany, with their notoriously confusing wine labels. Study Zraly's careful parsing and annotation of a German label and you'll be able to tell the region from the town from the vineyard the next time someone hands you a Mosel-Saar-Ruwer Ürziger Würzgarten Riesling Spätlese.

But any book that calls itself a "Complete Wine Course" sets the Barbera pretty high--sometimes too high. Oregon and Washington States share one page while New York State rates two and a half. Certainly a millennium edition could scare up another paragraph for the red-hot Pacific Northwest. And two chapters following the classes--"Creating an Exemplary Restaurant Wine List" and "Award-Winning Wine Lists"--seem little more than padding.

But these are small quibbles about a handsome and approachable volume that will take you from Amarone to Zind-Humbrecht with confidence. Whether you're a true cork dork or someone who doesn't know their Alsace from their elbow, you could certainly do worse than pressing your nose up against these windows on the world. --Tony Mason