A Mod without Kitchens....Not Terrible After All!

Hope everyone had a nice break, but now it's back to the ol' grindstone. I had a great spring break, just relaxing at my parents' house with my family and a friend or two. The train rides were fun, nothing like spending about 8 hours on a train with a complete stranger. Lucky for me, I make friends easily, so I met some really fun people.But here I am, back to school again. I was initially afraid that I would suffer this mod because I don't have a kitchens class. My only two classes are Wine and Beverages and Culinary Math, at 9:30am and 11:00am. It strikes me as hilarious that I am taking a class where I have to taste and describe wine and other alcoholic beverages at 9:30 in the morning. The math class, which I'd originally thought would be boring and easy, is only easy. The Dean of Students, who is awesome and really fun, is my math teacher and that has worked out really well.  We just took our first math exam, which is really basic math, but applied to the culinary world, for example, how to cost out a recipe or determine how much you need to order and balance your checkbook. So it's not exactly exciting, but it's definitely useful, and Mr. Moran makes it fun. Wines is really exciting, as I thought it would be, but we don't start actually tasting wines until Monday I think. But for now, here are some little tidbits about wine for you.

• The three things that make wine different are the grapes, the climate it was grown/made in, and the winemaking techniques used.
• There are two kinds of wine: "new-world" and "old-world". Pretty self explanatory, new world is wine from newer regions such as Unites States, Chile, Australia, Argentina, New Zealand and South Africa. Good examples of old world countries would be France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Hungary, Greece, Austria and Switzerland. The difference is mostly in the winemaking techniques used, as well as the labeling and how long the wine is aged. 
• The old world wines are more focuses on the French term "terroir," meaning "somewhereness." Really vague I know, but it makes sense. Terroir is the idea that wine can tell you where it originated just from a taste, tell you it's story. Which I find really romantic and special. New world wines are mainly focused on the different flavor you can impart into the grape by process, so the credit goes to the winemaker, not the vineyard or region.
• When storing your wine, make sure if its a corked red wine, to store it on it's side, so that the wine comes into constant contact with the cork, keeping it moist and preventing oxidation. Keep it a cool, dark place, about 55 degrees and 75% humidity.
• Serve sparkling wine at 45 degrees, white wine at 55, and red wine at 65.

That's all I got for today folks, see you next week, same bat time. My parents are coming in to town tonight to take an enthusiast class tomorrow morning with me all dressed up in my chef clothes. Yay! Also...I made Perfect Attendance!
M