There sure are wines suitable for vegetarians; they are usually wines that have been produced without the use of additives that required animals to be killed. The use of eggs and dairy processing aids is okay, but wine for Vegans are made using no animal-derived ingredients.

Corked doesn’t refer to bits of cork floating in your wine glass. Natural corks are made from the bark of cork trees grown in Spain and Portugal; they naturally contain a chemical compound called “trichloranisole” or TCA. This can sometimes interact with the wine and cause “taints” in the wine. This is a musty or rotten sock smell, not nice. It can be just a hint, and people quite often do not know the wine is tainted and still drink the wine when it is like this. It won’t kill you, but the wine will not be up to par. It happens with around 8% to 10% of all wines. This is a good reason to look at buying screw capped wines for wines that are to be drunk young, fresh and fruity.

If everybody is a wine drinker, (and drinking, not driving), I would suggest about half a bottle of wine per person. I would order 12 bottles of White, 12 bottles of Red and 6 bottles of Champagne or Sparkling wine for the Toast. Don’t forget a selection of minerals for non drinkers.

Un-Oaked simple whites really should be drunk the next day. White wines aged or fermented in oak will last maybe two days and for red wines 2/3 days. A little tip for red wines: stick the cork back into the bottle; put the bottle in the fridge over night. Red wine is affected by light, so do not stick it on your windowsill. The next night take it out of the fridge about 15 to 20 minutes before you drink it. This helps preserve the fruit flavours in the wine that tend to drop out overnight.

Try finding out the region in Italy dish you are cooking originate from, then see what wines they produce locally. Most regions in Italy produce great wine, once you have the name of type of wine from your region, take it into any Next Door store and a member of staff would be pleased to see if they have this style of wine in stock or recommend something similar, to match what you are cooking. Or alternatively use our extensive food and wine matching guide.