The best wine resource out there

Whether you're a collector of fine wines or just like the occasional bottle of red, Wine Spectator is an invaluable resource. Each issue has features that focus on different wine types or regions, as well as dining and travel articles. The best part, however, are the wine reviews. Wine Spectator's ratings are some of the most accurate and well respected. Aside from rating somewhere in the neighborhood of 100 wines per issue, they feature wines in different categories from Cellar Selections (wines meant to be aged), to great wines at affordable prices. So if you like wine, you'll love this magazine.

Wine or lifestyle magazine?

I've had gift subscriptions to the Wine Spectator in the past but have always dropped them at the end of the run. Why? Well, I'm serious about wine and the Spectator is more of a lifestyle rag. Travel and food articles generally take up half the magazine. Another complaint is the number of wines they review for people with more money than sense, the $.../bottle with 125 cases made in a year wines. Still, it is a good resource and the wine reviews section is a great assist in filtering through the hundreds of new wines released each month.

I can't taste them all, much as I'd like to.

The Magazine That Created The Modern Wine Snob

Used to be on the most pretentious types walked around talking about vintages and vinyards and things like nose and legs and such. Thanks to Robert Parker and The Wine Spectator, now every pretentious yuppie with a few bucks can be heard to go on and on about "roasted plum scent" and "tobacco undertones" and other such pretentious rot. Stores have contributed to this mess, too; go into any wine shop or grocery and you'll see bottles with tags saying "Wine Spectator 87! Rasberries and Citrus!" and other nonsense.

Truth of the matter is 90% of the wines found in The Wine Spectator will never be found in your local wine shop, so all these reviews are just fodder for pretentious yuppies. And in any case, wine is a personal and subjective matter that cannot be reduced to a simple number. Save the money you'd spend on this, and instead make friends with your loal wine merchant. He or seh will give you far better advice. Unless, that it, he or she is a fan of Parker....