Whisky refers to a broad category of alcoholic beverages that are distilled from fermented grain mash and aged in wooden casks. Different grains are used for different varieties, including barley, malted barley, rye, malted rye, wheat, and maize. Whisky or whisky-like products are produced in most grain-growing areas. They differ in base product, alcoholic content, and quality.

Eric takes a moment to explain the different spelling views of the word whisky/whiskey in his post Whiskey versus Whisky.

Whiskey is a word with an alternative spelling, whisky. Or maybe it’s the other way around. Dictionary.com  seems to prefer whiskey. But clearly, definitively, and somewhat aggressively, people from Scotland and many fans of Scotch have informed me of their preference for whisky over whiskey, judging by the flood of comments and emails I received yesterday.

John from the anything wine-blog met his wife six year ago and since than i guess you can say fell in love with her and her family tradition of making mulled wine. Mulled wine, variations of which are popular around the world, is wine, usually red, combined with spices and typically served warm. In the old times, wine often went bad. By adding spices and honey, it could be made drinkable again. Nowadays, it is a traditional drink during winter, especially around Christmas.

Mulled wine can be maid in a variety of ways, in fact every country has its own mulled wine, Germans have the Glögg {you can see a recipe for it in tow posts back},French people have the vin chaud and Italians have the vin brulé just choose the one you think will excite your palate.

The Donati estate is a family estate started in 1930 which is now run by the third generation of Donati — Camillo Donati, his wife and their children. They cultivate 11 ha of vines using organic and biodynamic practices They are about 20 km away from Parma in the hillside at an altitude of around 250 m with an eastern exposition.

The Donati Malvasia Candia is historically from Crete, arriving in this part of Italy many centuries ago, and it is also one of the oldest known grapes. Up until 30-50 years ago it was only vinified in sweet and demi-sec style, but Donati now makes both a dry and sweet Malvasia.

Lyle from the Rockss and Fruit-blog wrote his wonderful review on the Donati Malvasia Candia in his lovely post The Phoenix Garden Tasting Group Converges.

X Winery specializes in Cabernet Sauvignon and Sauvignon Blanc, but also produces small lots of Chardonnay, Petite Sirah, and Zinfandel. The philosophy of the winery is to produce wines that retail in the super-premium price category of $10-$25 per bottle with a quality consistently better than the category’s competition. The brand was created to fill a niche that the winery identified as an underserved market.

The winery utilizes new technologies along with traditional winemaking to produce wines that have the texture and traditional flavor profile of wines that normally cost two to three times the price.

Read Mikes thrilling review on the X Winery 2006 “X3″ Cabernet Sauvignon in his post Green Wine.

I make Glogg every year and bottle it to give out to friends. It’s basically mulled wine with a brandy kick. It’s very good, served hot with a orange peel twist in a mug. High alcohol tho so you have to be careful! The recipe I use is something like this:

3 Liters Red wine (I usually use caburnet because I have a lot)
3 Liters Ruby Port wine
1.5 Liters Brandy
2 Tablespoons Cardomom seeds (fresh from pods is best)
about 20 inches of stick cinnamon
2 Orange peels
40 Cloves
4 cups sugar
1 cup raisins
1 2/3 Cups Blanched Almonds

You mix the wine and port in one big pan, has to be stainless steel so it does not react with it. Make a gigantic tea bag with the raisins at the bottom and the almonds at the top, everything else in the middle. It floats better that way. Warm it up to just steaming but NOT boiling. Let that stay that way while you take 750 ML of brandy in another pan and heat it with the 4 cups of sugar until it is disolved. You need to carmalize the sugar a bit, some people like to light the brandy on fire to do it but the pan is hell to clean then, but it does work. Be careful you get like a 2 foot tall blue flame. Also make sure you have good ventilation in the room! After that cooks down you add it to the wine and put a lid on it, turn off the heat and let it mull for about an hour while you stir it once in a while. Then take out the bag, stir in the other 750 ML Brandy. You serve it that way with an orange peel twisted over the cup when it’s full. The orange peel is important!

And one last word - make sure you take the car keys from everyone… ;-)