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Wine Words
Test your knowledge with our wine crossword!

While Linda and I were in California in August, we noticed a wine lover's crossword puzzle in the San Luis Obispo Tribune. It had been designed by Chicago Tribune columnist Bill Daley using an online puzzle creation site. Linda and I took a few minutes one afternoon and worked it and it really was a lot of fun. We only used Google for spell checking and managed to get 35 out of 40... and he really did use some obscure questions. When we got back, I thought it might be fun to create one of our own, so I downloaded a free program called Eclipse and Mark Finch and I went to work. The result is this fifty question exercise in wine knowledge. We tried to stay away from the obscure, so this is a puzzle that I think any one of my staff could get at least 40 correct answers.

If you like, you can go to this link, open the puzzle in a new window, and work on it online.

What's your wine IQ?
(without using Google for anything other than spelling!)
50 correct - Robert Parker may have a job opening for you...
40 - 49 correct - We may have a job opening for you...
30 - 40 correct - Certified Wine Geek
20 - 30 correct - Come see us, you need to try new things
10 - 20 correct - Do you ever read this newsletter?
0 - 10 correct - A rum and coke fan, I presume?

Across
1. Aussie slang for dessert wine
5. The five classifications of Bordeaux
7. Bordeaux grape that found a home in Argentina
9. Indentation in the bottom of a wine bottle
10. Aussie for Syrah
11. Where Sherry is aged
13. French wine house
14. Spanish name for the Mourvèdre grape
17. Wine limbs
18. Zinfandel’s Italian Cousin
20. Crock of wine
25. Lost Grape of Bordeaux now grown in Chile
27. California's most famous wine valley
29. Red Grape of Burgundy (two words)
30. Very dry Champagne
31. Miles’ least favorite wine
32. Wine contaminated by TCA
36. Red winner of the 1976 Paris tasting (three words)
38. Country where Cabernet still grows on original Cabernet root stock
39. The turning of sparkling wine bottles as they ferment
41. Sometimes stirred in the barrel
42. Grape of Barolo
45. Symbol of Chianti Classico
46. Poe’s sherry
47. Roasted Slope (two words)
48. Nook that Coppola bought
49. Australian Valley famous for big Shiraz
50. Used to preserve wine

Down
2. Pope’s house (three words)
3. Lightly sparkling (Italian)
4. Name for a 3 liter wine bottle
6. French word for blend
8. Root louse that forced the replanting of France in the 1850s
12. World famous wine shop (two words)
15. Spanish red wine (can also be white)
16. Spanish white wine grape
19. Beaujolais grape
21. Fortified wine from Portugal
22. Blush
23. Most produced white wine in Austria (two words)
24. California Central Coast wine region (two words)
26. Grape’s sugar content
28. Traditional closure
33. Famous Austrian wine glass maker
34. Northwestern AVA region that spans two states (two words)
35. German Riesling classification
37. Winery famous for Cabernet founded by Justin Meyer
40. Noble rot of Sauternes
43. Sparkling wine from Spain
44. Best thing you can do to improve a tannic red wine

Give up? The solution is here.

October 22, 2008