How to better enjoy wine at home

Enjoying a delicious bottle of wine at home is one of life’s true pleasures. When you order a bottle in a restaurant, sometimes the mark-up on the cost price is scandalous. It’s fair to say that much of a restaurant’s profits comes from the alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages rather than the food; this may come as a surprise to many people. This isn’t the case when buying privately for home consumption though.

Here are a few quick suggestions about enjoying wine in the comfort of your own home.

Personal wine fridge

Having your own dedicated wine fridge (or wine cooler to use the American vernacular) brings a level of decadence and sophistication to your love of wine. No longer is it a problem to find a place to store more than just a few bottles without taking up half the fridge in the process or needing a separate cold storage area under the stairs, for instance. Using a private cellar to store wine is essential if you have vintage bottles of Château Lafite Rothschild that collectors fawn over. Alternatively, you can invest in your own wine cooler.

The wine fridges from wineandbarrels.co.uk come in a variety of shapes and sizes and are popular amongst many wine lovers. The tall and slender design is the most popular though, so it’s best to find a good position at home that has access to mains power and will fit a new fridge. The fridges from WineandBarrels offer one or two zones that have two separate temperatures for wines with different ambient tolerances. Dehumidifiers in some fridges protect the wine from any damaging humidity too. The back-lighting looks attractive on many models and reading the wine labels is easier with lighting.

Unrushed and nothing important left to do

It’s best to have an unhurried environment when cracking open a savoured bottle that you’ve been waiting to enjoy. A good wine is not something you should be sipping on when you know you have to get something completed right after because your mind will be consumed with other things. Enjoyment of each sip of matured wine is best done while unburdened. It can also help to unwind after a long day.

It’s also sensible to avoid getting behind a wheel after drinking. Wine contains a substantial percentage of alcohol – far more than the average beer – which sometimes catches unsuspecting wine lovers unaware.

Matching wine perfectly with every meal

When entertaining guests or just alone with your thoughts, consider matching your bottle of wine perfectly for each meal. If you’re not sure how to choose the right wine for each meal, then this article from the Wine Spectator is going to be extremely helpful to you.

What’s key is finding a balance between how acidic or sweet the chosen wine is and how it enhances the prepared meal. Complementary flavours will add interest to the taste of the meal.

Enjoying wine at home is much better value than ordering expensive bottles at a pricey restaurant. When you choose well and take the time to sample good vintages, it’ll provide much more pleasure with every glass.

Trinidad ponche de crème

Ponche de crème, sometimes called punch a crema, is an eggnog type drink – like the black cake I posted about recently – enjoyed in Trinidad & Tobago only at Christmas.

It consists primarily of eggs, milk, rum and ground nutmeg. Although the eggs aren’t cooked, don’t worry about food poisoning, the rum content will put paid to any bugs. I would, however, recommend removing the chalazae (the white coily bits that hold the yolk in place) from the eggs. An easy way to do this is to use a jagged edge of broken egg shell.

The proportions of ingredients used is personal preference – some prefer it sweeter, some milkier, others packing more of a punch. The generally accepted quantities are 8 eggs to 3 tins of evaporated milk to 1½ tins of condensed milk and 250ml/9 fl oz of rum. I’ve used dark rum, but it’s often made with super-strong puncheon rum.

Once made, the ponche de crème should be kept in the fridge (in sterilised bottles). If you can, leave it for a few days before drinking – tipping the bottle up & down a few times during that time – so that the flavour can develop.

Serve over ice in a high ball glass – preferably whilst listening to some parang on your music system. It can keep for months in the fridge – but I promise you, it won’t last that long! If you fancy trying ponche de crème this Christmas, save the recipe to Pinterest.

Here’s calypsonian, Lord Kitchener, singing a very famous song celebrating the festive libation.

Bottle of ponche de crème or punch a crema | H is for Home

Trinidad ponche de crème

Print recipe Pin recipe

Prep Time 15

Course Drinks

Cuisine Caribbean

Servings 16

Ingredients

6 eggs chalazae removed (the white stringy bits)
zest of 1 lime peeled thickly
600 g/21oz/1.5 cans condensed milk
820 g /29oz/3 tins evaporated milk
500 ml/17.5 fl oz rum
1 tsp Angostura Bitters
1 tsp ground/grated nutmeg

Instructions

In a large measuring jug (2.5 litre) or mixing bowl with a spout, whisk the eggs with the lime peel (using the peel cuts through the 'eggy' taste) until pale and aerated
Whilst still whisking, pour in the condensed milk
Continuing to whisk, pour in the evaporated milk
Stir in the rum and the bitters
Sprinkle ground/grated nutmeg and stir through
Remove the lime peel and decant the mixture into sterilised bottles and keep refrigerated (it will keep for months)

Serve over ice

Keyword alcohol, Christmas, ponche a crème, ponche de crème, punch a crema

Caprissimo Coffee is full of beans!

What’s the first thing that you do when you wake up in the morning? Check your phone? Turn on the TV? Ours is make two cups of coffee. No, I tell a lie – the dog wouldn’t leave us in peace if we didn’t feed him first!

So, it was a no-brainer saying yes to The Coffee Mate when they offered us the opportunity to review their Caprissimo Fragrante and Caprissimo Belgique coffee beans.

Caprissimo ‘Fragrante’ is a medium-dark roasted blend of two kinds of Brazilian beans. “warm aroma with nutty, buttery and chocolate sweetness”. The Coffee Mate website suggests it has an “aftertaste of slightly bitter walnuts” – we’d agree. When we tried it, it was reminiscent of the hint of oak you can get at the end of a sip of red wine. That will simply be a matter of preference for fellow coffee drinkers out there.

Our agreed favourite of the two Caprissimo Coffee types, ‘Belgique’ is a combination of 80% Arabica & 20% Robusta coffee beans. Also medium-dark roasted, it’s described as having a “syrupy consistency… if made correctly, a hard body & strong aroma – with dark chocolate and sweet caramel finish”. Again, we picked up on these characteristics. In fact we’ve just had a lovely cup served alongside our pancakes with maple syrup!

We prefer to grind our own beans because it makes for a better cup. We use an electric grinder that Justin bought me a few years ago. However, if you like the look of the manual one pictured here, we have vintage examples available in our shop.

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Price Points: Grown-up Advent calendars

There aren’t any children in our household, however that doesn’t stop us getting excited about Christmas. Christmas proper for us generally begins on Advent – this year, the 3rd of December. On that day, the tree gets erected, decorations go up and, if we’ve managed a bit of forward planning, the first door of the Advent calendar gets opened.

There’s a growing number of grown-up Advent calendars on the market – and there’s something for everyone – glamour pusses, real ale drinkers, coffee connoisseurs as well as the sweet-toothed. Here are three of our favourites…

Christmas coffee advent by Perkulatte: £40, Notonthehighstreet
Beer advent calendar: £74.99, The Pip Stop
24-day beauty advent calendar: £120.00, Selfridges

H is for Home Harbinger

Tag: beverage

How to better enjoy wine at home

Personal wine fridge

Unrushed and nothing important left to do

Matching wine perfectly with every meal

Trinidad ponche de crème

Trinidad ponche de crème

Ingredients

Instructions

Caprissimo Coffee is full of beans!

Price Points: Grown-up Advent calendars