If only everyone on my Christmas gift list were a wine lover! While I fret over what to give my 86-year-old mother and a 9-year-old grandson, there are endless gift possibilities this year for friends and family who share my wine passion.

	Bill Wade, Post-Gazette Vinum wine glasses by Riedel are specially priced for the holidays at state stores. Click photo for larger image.

For starters, there are bottles of wine at all price levels and in all categories. I try to find ones that might be unknown to the receiver. In the under $20 range, I found a princely bottle of dessert wine from the southwest corner of France (Roussillon). Les Clos de Paulilles Banyuls 2003, made from grenache grapes, is a fortified wine similar to port. Serve it as a dessert replacement or paired with chocolate. (Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board #10097, $18.99).

You have no doubt read about the record-breaking prices being paid for the 2005 vintage of grand cru Bordeaux wines, but you don't have to spend up to $500 to get a great wine from that "Vintage of the Century." The vintage also produced amazing rieslings in Germany, especially in the Mosel region. Unlike many white wines, the nobel riesling will improve for decades and the 2005 vintage would be a great one to buy for a collector to hold. I suggest one of the following:

Heribert Kerpen Riesling Kabinett Wehlener Sonnenuhr 2005 PLCB #26117, $15.49. (Only 400 cases made.)

St. Urbans Hof Piesporter Spatlese 2005 PLCB #25810, $20.49. (Only 200 cases made.)

St Urbans Piesporter Auslese 2005 PLCB #26083, $49.99.

Wine paraphernalia

There is a new gadget for improving the taste of a young and inexpensive wine. The Bev Wizard Wine Smoother is a pouring cap that you place over the lip of a bottle. The cap is equipped with powerful neodymium magnets. When wine is poured through the cap, it converts the harsh tannins in young wines into a softer form, giving the wine a silky texture in the mouth. It might sound like a modern version of snake oil, but blind tastings have shown that the Bev Wizard does enhance the pleasure of a highly tannic wine. Although not yet in shops in Pittsburgh, the BevWizard is available online at www.bevwizard.com for $30.

A new wine preservation system for home use can preserve an opened bottle of wine's taste, color and aroma for up to 14 days. Epicurean Presorvac Wine Saver replaces hand-pump systems that remove oxygen from opened bottles. The system consists of a recharging base for an electric pump and four wine stoppers. When the pump is placed over a bottle closed with the special wine stopper, it extracts the air and seals the bottle in seconds.

The unit costs $79.95 and is available at Williams-Sonoma or Bed Bath and Beyond stores locally.

Games and stocking stuffers

The Oxford Companion to Wine is available at amazon.com at a dis-counted price and with free shipping. Click photo for larger image.

My own request from Santa this year is for the new edition of The Oxford Companion to Wine. This exhaustive encyclopedia covers every wine-related topic imaginable from viticulture and oenology to wine history and geography. It is essentially an entire reference library in one volume and as such is invaluable for any serious oenophile. The retail price is $65 but Amazon sells this book for $40.95 with free shipping.

Two new games on the market this year are perfect for the competitive wine-lover. Vitivini is a card game based on wine and how to pair it with food. Designed by wine experts, the game offers an entire course on wine, wine tasting and food pairing. It is a fun way to learn more about wine. The price is $19.95 and it can be purchased at www.vitivini.com/shop.

Another fun wine game is Wineopoly, a wine-centric take on the classic board game for two to six players. Participants buy and sell wines and vineyards and learn many wine facts in the process. It is available locally at Mike Feinberg, 1736 Penn Ave. in the Strip for $22.50.

And when in the Strip, a stop at Palate Partners, 2013 Penn Ave., is essential. This little shop is crammed full of unusual items that will delight anyone with an interest in wine or food. There are all sorts of wine accessories, many of which would make great stocking stuffers.

I love the little aluminum sheets that become drop-stoppers to avoid red wine stains on grandmother's linen cloth ($5) and label lifters ($10 for 10) that will remove the label from an empty bottle to keep in a wine journal. Palate Partners is also a great place to buy Riedel wine glasses and decanters.

The best glasses

And speaking of glasses, they might be my all-time favorite gift. The shape and quality of stemware plays an enormous role in the enjoyment of wine. The first rule is that the glass should be clear, not colored or frosted. The second is that the bowl must be large enough to hold a generous 6-ounce pour while leaving ample room above the liquid to allow the wine to be swirled and to trap the aromas that develop inside the glass. The bowl should taper in at the top to concentrate the wine's aromas toward the nose.

The Austrian crystal manufacturer, Riedel, makes what is considered the gold-standard tasting glass. This is the Sommelier Series, hand-blown from crystal that is 24 percent lead. There are a number of different shapes, each specifically designed to enhance a particular style of wine. These glasses are expensive and fragile, but they are the benchmark for serious wine tasters. Normally they sell for $75 each but the PLCB stores are offering the Sommelier Burgundy glass (PLCB #29929) at a special price of $49.99 each and the Bordeaux glass (PLCB #29930) for $54.99.

Riedel also makes a similar but less expensive glass that is machine-made and sturdier. The Vinum Series comes in shapes that resemble the Sommelier and these glasses also are specially priced for the holiday at our state Wine & Spirits shops ($79.99 for six glasses, PLCB #29919). A new addition to the Vinum line is an all-purpose stemmed glass, suitable for red or white wine. This glass has a shorter stem, making it dishwasher-friendly. It comes pre-packaged in a cardboard tube containing four glasses for $39.99 at Palate Partners.

Palate Partners also carries the Riedel stemless glass called "O." Why this glass is popular is a mystery. Wine purists would as soon drink out of a jelly jar as a stemless glass!

	"Marilyn Merlot and the Naked Grape: Odd Wines from Around the World," by Peter F. May, compiles witty -- and sometimes off-color -- wine labels from around the world. Click photo for larger image.

Spiegelau, a German company (recently acquired by Riedel) makes a value-priced glass that is used by many fine restaurants. Amazon.com is selling a set of six red wine glasses for $49.99 or six white wine glasses for $44.99 with free shipping.

Sur La Table at the Southside Works carries a glass made from a process that replaces lead with titanium and zirconium. They are dishwasher-safe and harder to break ($39.50 for four glasses). Another durable glass made from magnesium claims to be the most break-resistant glassware in the world. Fusion Stemware is available in sets of four for $49.95 from The Wine Enthusiast online store at www.wineenthusiast.com.

Wine jokes and leftovers

Want to hear your wine-lover laugh out loud? You might tuck a little book titled "Marilyn Merlot and the Naked Grape" (Quirk Books, $16.95) in his or her stocking. Wine writer Peter F. May has collected an amusing assortment of odd wine labels from around the world. From South Africa there is Goat-Roti, Screw Kappa Napa is, of course, from California and Scraping the Barrel is a tempranilo from Spain. Each page contains a reproduction of a label with the facing page giving details of that wine.

For the wine-lover who has absolutely everything, how about a vinegar making kit? Every kitchen in the wine regions of France has a small wooden keg on a shelf where they recycle the dribs and drabs of wine left in bottles. The wine is diluted with water, injected with a vinegar "mother" and in a few months out pops a flavorful wine vinegar. This is literally a gift that keeps on giving. Oak barrels with spigots can be purchased from www.oakbarrel.com/vinegarmaking for $150. A more affordable container is a pottery vinegar crock available at www.beer-wine.com for $71.95. For $16.95 you can purchase the vinegar mother and the book, "Making Vinegar at Home," and supply your own wide-mouth glass jug (www.wine-hops.com/HowTo/vinegarhowto.)

And don't forget to leave a glass of vino for Santa on Christmas Eve!