Have you ever read a book about wine? Yawn…I’m sorry, were you say­ing some­thing? Yes, I agree, in gen­eral read­ing about wine often leaves you feel­ing over­whelmed & under-educated, until you read Leslie Sbrocco’s,  Wine for Women: A Guide to Buy­ing, Pair­ing, and Shar­ing Wine. The title sounds like a sex­ist ploy to get women to fall into a trap that some­how this book is writ­ten in a lan­guage just for women..and it is. Not the sex­ist ploy part! No, no, no, cara mia, this is not a ploy at all. It is indeed writ­ten for women– or at least those that like to shop, love clothes and appre­ci­ate rel­e­vant descrip­tions in reg­u­lar words peo­ple use every­day instead of sound­ing like an episode of Frasier.

With chap­ter names like, Chardonnay~The “Basic Black” of White Wine, Merlot~The “Wrap Me In Cash­mere” Red, Dessert Wines~The “Paja­mas of Vino”, this book reads more like a fun con­ver­sa­tion with girl­friends where you all are able to fin­ish each oth­ers sentences.

Each chap­ter is orga­nized into 3 sec­tions, Buy­ing, Pair­ing and Sharing.

The Buy­ing sec­tion of each chap­ter gives a mood set­ting descrip­tion of the type of wine, which is related back to our clos­ets and directly to our hearts. Then Sbrocco goes on to explain the story of the grape, wine and region. The mean­ing of the labels or Label Links, “con­nect­ing taste to place makes wine buy­ing easy”.

The Pair­ing sec­tion offers advice on the pair­ing of food and wine. This is more com­pli­cated than it may seem, but it can make the dif­fer­ence between a mediocre meal and a fab­u­lous feast! Sbrocco guides you through this with full-bodied descrip­tions on the types, tex­tures and taste of the food to con­sider when pair­ing. There are even Design-a-Dinner menus and wine shop­ping guides.

Lastly, the Shar­ing sec­tion answers FAQ’s, about stor­ing, serv­ing and thought­ful gift-giving for many occasions.

This Diva’s favorite chap­ter is Chi­anti– The Sleek Ital­ian Heels. Here is an excerpt:

“While some say clothes can make the per­son, I say, what about the shoes? Many of us con­sider footwear the ulti­mate fash­ion neces­sity, espe­cially when it car­ries the dis­creet badge of honor “Made in Italy.“
I grav­i­tate toward styl­ish Ital­ian heels that mirac­u­lously seem to make any out­fit look ele­gant. Granted, it may take time to break them in, but it is a small price to pay for beauty. That’s the same way I feel about San­giovese, the grape respon­si­ble for pro­duc­ing Italy’s clas­sic Tus­can reds. These tightly wound wines often need time in the glass to soften up but show their true beauty when paired with food.
Unlike other reds that pum­mel you with power, Sangiovese-based wines seduce with style. Just like a pair of Ital­ian heels.”

Wine for Women is a won­der­ful book about wine, but after read­ing each chap­ter or even a page, Sbrocco writes with such a pas­sion and flair that you feel as if you have taken a mini-vacation to California’s Cen­tral Coast; Haut-Médoc, France; Brunello di Mon­tal­cino, Italy or Coon­awarra, Australia.

To quote Tony Coltrin of Seña win­ery, “Good wine tastes like a grape, but great wine tastes like a place.”

This Diva couldn’t have said it better.

Do you have a book about wine you would like to rec­om­mend? Leave a comment!