Hip Tastes: The Fresh Guide to Wine Book

Looking for a way to up your wine IQ in just a few sips? Courtney Cochran's Hip Tastes is the only guide you'll need.

Welcome to wine education with a fresh spin. No mammoth encyclopedias, just simple, hip tips that will help you navigate the world of wine quickly and with confidence. Here, Cochran brings you up to speed on the basics every budding enthusiast needs to know—from vintages and varieties, to shopping, serving, storing and - most importantly - tasting wine. She also offers candid shortcuts to help you enjoy wine like a pro including:

• Surefire techniques for not getting ripped off in restaurants
• Complete food pairing guides for simple flavors and more difficult foods—including sushi, salads, pizza, and bbq
• Label-reading essentials
• Phonetic tips for difficult-to-pronounce wine terms
• Must-have wine gear
• Best crowd-pleasing party wines
• Recommended producers in the hottest wine-making regions throughout the world, and much more

A go-to guide for everyday drinking at home, in restaurants, and anywhere else wine is found, Hip Tastes is for passionate wine novices everywhere. It proves anyone can enjoy drinking, serving, and talking intelligently about great wine. Cheers to that.

Courtney Cochran is a certified sommelier and founder of forward-thinking wine businesses Your Personal Sommelier™ and HIP TASTES Events™ in San Francisco. When she's not entertaining private and corporate clients as a private sommelier, she enthusiastically caters to wine enthusiasts in San Francisco nightclubs and bars with her popular HIP TASTES Events™ wine tastings. C Magazine called Cochran “San Francisco's Most Wanted Wine Guru” and she has been profiled in Vogue.

Christine Holmes - Library Journal

While there are plenty of wine books on the market to educate the novice, Cochran, a certified sommelier who owns her own wine catering business in San Francisco, offers a delightful addition. What sets this work apart from other wine guides is its light touch that engages, entertains, and teaches amateurs about wine appreciation. Cochran packs in a lot of commonsense, tips, and solid advice for the novice short on time but keen on getting up to speed on the essentials of wine. The usual topics are covered, including vintages, food pairing, serving, storing, and buying, in breezy, hip, and easy-to-digest prose. She does a good job debunking myths surrounding cork vs. screw cap and table wines. An appendix includes phonetics tips for difficult-to-pronounce wine terms and recommended producers in various regions. The author gives budding wine enthusiasts enough information to get started in just a few sips. Recommended for public libraries.