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SAN ANTONIO -- We always like to delve into the wine list at restaurants we review. It’s a pleasure, but we are also firm believers that wine and food go with each other because nature planned it that way. Sure, some wine and food matches can be truly awful. As I write this, a decidedly unpleasant memory arises that involved a glass of cabernet sauvignon served with a smoked salmon salad. It lived up to the “awful” description exactly. If you haven’t honed the art of wine-food pairing, however, don’t worry overly much about it. If you love the wine you’ve ordered and the food is well prepared, chances By Bonnie Walker are you’ll enjoy the meal. San Antonio Lately, we’ve been asked Express-News questions having to do with ordering wine at restaurants. Here are some thoughts about one we were asked recently. Why does a wine served at a restaurant taste better than the same wine you serve at home? While this is probably not always true, I can think of a couple of simple reasons it might happen enough that someone would ask us about it. First, restaurants that care about wine store and serve them professionally. Not all of us, including myself, are able to do that at home. We’ll start with storage. Do you have a wine cellar or wine cave with temperature and humidity controls? Or, is your wine rack in a cool, dim or dark place (especially with no fluorescent lighting). Is it an untrafficked area so the wine isn’t sloshed around in its bottle every time someone walks past the rack? Restaurants that are serious about their wines will store them in one of the ways described above. If they’ve purchased wines that have been handled competently along the way, from the winemaker to your wine waiter, you should get that wine just as it was meant to be tasted. Does this always happen? No. Even in the best of circumstances there might be a chemical mishap, from a flawed cork to unwelcome bacteria that ruins the flavor of the wine. Another simple answer is vintage. Even in mass-marketed wines that aim for consistency every year, we can sometimes notice a difference from one year to the next. Check to be sure the wine you have at home was produced in the same year as the one you loved at the restaurant. Do you keep your wine glasses scrupulously washed and polished? True, not all restaurants do this. But, when wines are being tasted at a competition, cloudy glassware or any hint of a soapy taste will result in a loud hue and cry from the judging rooms. Soap in wine, just like in food, will really throw off the taste. Are you serving the wine at the proper temperature? Most restaurants pay attention to the fact that a red wine needs to be cooled to cellar temperature, not served at the temperature of the average home living room in July. Put it in the fridge 15 minutes before you serve it. For white wines, chill them in the refrigerator but take them out 15 minutes before you serve them. This might not be the perfect rule of thumb, but it works well enough and is easy to remember. I’ll take this opportunity to complain about something I see too often. When I walk into a restaurant and pass the bar, my heart sinks when I see a slew of wines to be served by the glass opened, partially used and stoppered, sitting on the shelf behind the bar. Not all of these wines will be pleasant to drink when served. Most of these wines, even reds, would be better kept in a cool place. This has happened to me enough that I now ask the wine server if the red wine by the glass has been stored in a cooler or not. If not, I ask them to cool it down for a few minutes. (We assume that whites, already opened or not, will be kept chilled.) Finally, we get to what is a subjective reason that wine served at a restaurant might taste better than the same wine served at home. That might be simply because we’re out, relaxed, not working to put a meal on the table or distracted by television. If the wine is being shared by friends, so much the better. Even if it’s just a relative perception that the wine is better, that’s always something to count as pleasure added.
July 17 - 23, 2008
Television forever changed the game of poker and is solely responsible for the resurgence of no limit Texas Hold’em. Before that, limit hold’em was the name of the game. I started my poker career grinding it out in limit games just like many other of today’s big name professional players. Few of us had any experience playing in no limit games. These days, however, most people learn to play hold’em by starting with no limit. Now, don’t get me wrong, that’s not necessarily bad. But I do believe it’s better for beginners to learn the game by playing limit poker, or at least by playing both variations of the game. One reason is that limit hold’em is a much faster game. In limit hold’em, you’ll rarely see a five minute delay before a player decides to make a big call on the river. In that respect, beginners will play a lot more hands, thereby gaining valuable experience much faster. Here are a few other reasons why I think it’s so important to learn how to play limit hold’em. You’ll learn to play with more aggression, both before and after the flop. In limit hold’em, acting aggressively in marginal situations isn’t nearly as dangerous as it is in no limit where you can risk all of your chips on any given hand. All great poker players understand the importance of playing aggressively. Limit hold’em teaches you to do just that. At the same time, the game’s structured betting protects your bankroll from monster swings. You’ll also get to play more flops in limit hold’em. In no limit hold’em, when another player makes a pre-flop raise, it will often be so large that it will force you to fold your hand. That doesn’t happen in the limit game, so you’ll see more flops and gain more valuable experience. You’ll learn how to play a variety of hands based on position, flop texture, and your ability to get reads on your opponents. Most importantly, you’ll learn to read your opponents’ betting patterns by playing limit hold’em. In the no limit game, creative betting is often rewarded. That’s not always the case in limit hold’em where a skilled player’s bets generally have a clear purpose. Focusing on your opponent’s betting pattern can often reveal
critical information about their hand. Here’s an example. You’re playing $10-$20 limit hold’em and raise in early position with AJ. The player on your immediate left reraises to $30 and you call. The flop comes As-9c-2h. You check to the raiser. He bets, you check-raise, and he calls. The turn card is the 7d. Now, let’s assume that you know your opponent is a tight player. His initial reraise from early position suggests he probably has a pocket pair, or a hand like A-K or A-Q. Go ahead and bet the turn hoping that your opponent has a hand like pocket kings. Warning: If he raises, be prepared to fold! Despite the fact that you have a powerful hand, when this type of player raises on the turn, he’s probably holding pocket
aces, A-K or A-Q. If so, you’ll need to catch a miracle jack on the river to win the pot. Well, that’s a pretty simplistic example of how to read an opponent’s hand. But the key point is that you’ll have plenty of opportunity to practice this skill in limit hold’em. And when you do master that skill, you’ll be a much stronger player in no limit hold’em, seven card stud, Omaha, or whatever game you choose to play. Visit www.cardsharkmedia. com/book.html for information about Daniel Negreanu’s new book, Hold’em Wisdom for All Players. © 2008 Card Shark Media. All rights reserved.
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