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A chef’s secrets for cooking with wine
Cooking with wine is almost as much fun as drinking it. I hardly ever make a savory dish or sauce without adding a splash of wine to it. I first acquired this delicious habit working the line as a sauté cook. (I cooked professionally for almost a decade.) Now, as a wine student with lots…
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Come for the wine, stay for the salumi: Quartino Wine Bar (The Colony, TX)
Fresh-baked bread, artisan pork products, and Italian wine by the liter! If any of those things are calling your name, head on over to Quartino Ristorante & Wine Bar in the Colony. The Chicago-based Gibsons Restaurant Group opened their first Texas location in 2023. It’s since become a popular spot in the “Grotto District” of…
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Under $12 Review: ALDI’s California Heritage Pinot Grigio
Our wine review of the day is…ta-da! A $5 Pinot Grigio from ALDI. Wait, wait–I can explain: I bought this wine to put in my Italian sausage and kale pasta. But then I remembered that drinking bad wine helps you appreciate the good ones more. So I put on a brave face, twisted that screw…
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Not a bubbly mood: 4 ways Prosecco lovers can cope with tariffs
It has not been a festive year for the wine industry. Climate-related worries, buzz-killing medical research, and an overall decline in drinking among young consumers are just a few of the worries keeping wine people up at night. Now, the wine business is bracing for the possibility of Trumpian tariffs on European imports. Winemakers of…
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75 do’s and don’ts of wine service
Last month, we published an article about how not to look like a dumbass when ordering wine at a restaurant. Today, we’re looking at the other side of the transaction–the server’s side. Dining room and bar service is a complex art. There are countless ways to mess up the deceptively simple act of selling wine.…
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Stop saying “elixir”: 5 cocktail trends we’re so over in 2025
Just another day of typing while the world burns. It’s all too scary out there–so let’s just complain about some drinks, shall we? Recently, The Wine Fairy posted about wine words we think are dumb and wine trends we don’t really understand. But why only pick on wine? Here’s how cocktail bars are getting on…
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Review: Costco’s Marquis de Bern Bordeaux Supérieur (plus my top-secret lamb shank recipe)
Wines with castles and knights on the labels are fancy. That’s a wine fact. And cheap Bordeaux is always preferable to no Bordeaux. That’s a wine fact, too. Both facts were on my mind when I cautiously opened this bottle of Marquis de Bern Bordeaux Supérieur. My cellar (read: lower bar cabinet) records are a…
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Review: CVNE Ribera del Duero Tempranillo (2022)
Cabernet Sauvignon may be my desert-island grape, but lately I’ve been trying to reach beyond the Bordeaux varieties to find the bold, satisfying reds I crave. Especially to drink with dinner. Cabernet and Malbec can be distracting in their bodaciousness: They strut their stuff and suck up all the attention in the room. Wines based…
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Review: Louis Bouillot Perle de Vigne Crémant de Bourgogne
Cleaning out the wine fridge after New Year’s, and I find this bottle shoved all the way in the back. Quel dommage! I forgot to serve it at the party. I opened a bag of leftover cheese cubes, pulsed all the extra charcuterie-board olives into a tapenade, and popped that cork for me and my…
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How to conquer the wine list: 7 tips for ordering like a pro
“Have you had a chance to look over the wine list?” It’s a simple question that strikes panic in the wine beginner’s heart. There’s a double-sided piece of paper (or maybe it’s an entire binder) in your hands and there’s all these foreign words and what seems like random prices. You want to find a…
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Review: Sandeman “Character” Medium-Dry Amontillado Sherry
Guess what? We are Sherry fans on this blog. Get us slightly tipsy at a wine bar, and we will never shut up about how delicious the aged, fortified wines from Jerez are. My readers are lucky that The Sherry Fairy is an even dumber name for a website than The Wine Fairy, or else…
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It’s December, let’s all drink Glühwein.
What do you do when it’s dark at 4:30 PM, and you wish it would maybe snow a little, but it’s Texas so it’s 70 degrees and humid in mid-December? Why, drink some wine, of course! If your holiday spirit is lagging a bit, why not pour yourself a dose of liquid Christmastime with Glühwein.…