cover image The Right Wine

The Right Wine

Tom Maresca. Grove/Atlantic, $19.95 (357pp) ISBN 978-0-8021-1270-5

Unsurprisingly, award-winning wine commentator Maresca ( Mastering Wine ) is also a university professor--his spirited yet conscientious approach announces basic principles, then moves the pupil invincibly toward the upper echelons of expertise. He begins at the beginning, helping us to identify our wine preferences; we graduate to dinner parties and restaurant dinners for two; and finally forge ahead to the ultimate: wine for a party of four dining on different main courses. Anyone who has pondered wine descriptions that vault into the abstract will find reason to relax in the hands of an aficionado who describes a Chardonnay as buxom compared to a Twiggy-like Sauvignon Blanc. Maresca admirably simplifies the tricky business of matching food with wine, and despite his avowed prejudice in favor of dry reds, unsnobbishly demystifies how to select the right vintage to go with ribs . He is an expert who neither intimidates nor patronizes, but demonstrates, in a well-organized fashion, his belief that knowing what you are doing can only lead to greater drinking pleasure. (Dec.)