When you are passionate about wine you begin collecting it … and when you begin collecting it you need a place to store it.

A closet can easily be turned into a mini wine cellar to store your growing wine collection.

Consider the position of the cupboard or closet in relation to the outside walls of the house before you construct your wine cellar.

Avoid converting a closet situated against an outside wall into a mini wine cellar. The outer walls of your house or apartment can frequently be subject to wide fluctuations in temperature. Ideally, choose an internal closet where your wine will be able to be stored at a more constant temperature.

The degree and the speed of the temperature change are critical to successfully storing and aging wine. A gradual change of a few degrees between summer and winter shouldn’t be a cause for concern. A similar change each day will hurt your wines and age them too quickly.

A major rule when storing wine is to avoid large (or quick) temperature changes. You’ll be aware of this damage straight away from the sticky deposit that often forms around the capsule. Over a period of time the continual contraction and expansion of the wine will damage the integrity of the cork. It’s just like having the cork removed and replaced every day. When this occurs, tiny quantities of wine can be pushed out along the edge of the cork (between the cork and the bottle neck) allowing air to seep back in. Your wine will be ruined once air comes in contact with your wine and the irreversible process of oxidation begins.

At 55º to 58ºF the wine will age as intended, enabling it to fully develop. Higher temperatures will age wine more rapidly and cooler temperatures will slow down the ageing process. Irreversible damage will occur if your wine is stored at a temperature above 82ºF for a month or more.

The most difficult part of creating a wine cellar in a closet can be finding other places to store the original contents of the closet! Don’t hesitate … get rid of all the present contents (one way or another) and start with a blank slate!

Cheap wine racks can be purchased from a hardware store, online retailer or storage shop and you’ll have a simple but very effective mini wine cellar.

Wine rack designs will vary in bottle density; price variations are more to do with aesthetics than efficiency.

Individual racking makes it easy to select bottles. If you have racks against only one wall of the closet you may still have floor or shelf space available for wines that you purchase by the case.

It seems like there are new coffee makers coming onto the market every week.  With this level of choice it is no wonder making a decision as to which is the best coffee maker for you can be so difficult.  If you understand the different types available it will be easier to make your choice.

Automatic Drip
One of the most popular coffee maker types is the automatic drip. One of the most favored features of the automatic drip coffee makers is their simplicity of use. They are by far the easiest of all coffee maker types to use, and they are also very cost-effective.

[DFR::645017-10389303-cj|align_right_1]For these types of coffee makers the coffee grounds are first measured into a filter which is then placed into the filter holder of the coffee maker. You then simply pour the recommended amount of water into the reservoir and turn the machine on to brew. It is best to brew a full pot but you can just make enough for a cup or two if you prefer. The automatic drip coffee machines produce a clear and very light bodied coffee, and of course as with any other coffee you should serve it immediately after brewing. The manual and automatic drip brewers are comparable in cup quality, and features of automatic drip coffee makers include the ability to heat and maintain a hot water temperature, spray heads for even dispersion of water over coffee grounds, and the use of filter holders which are designed for high extraction.

Percolator
Of all the coffee maker types, the percolator is considered to be the ugly duckling. This is because it does not respect the ground rules for brewing coffee. Instead, the coffee is boiled in a percolator, and the water is passed several times through the grounds. Although this is certainly not the standard way in which coffee is brewed, and the coffee can often come out tasting flavorless and bitter, when brewed properly it can be quite delicious. Remember that the method of brewing that you choose is entirely up to you, but it will greatly change the flavor of coffee that you buy. This is why it is important that you learn about the different coffee maker types and that you make the most intelligent decision and choose the right coffee maker for you and your taste preferences.

The oldest man-made brew may be Beer, with wine a distant second.  Beer recipes are at least as old as 6000 BC, but the oldest winemaking processes date ‘only’ from about the turn of the first millennium.

Their younger cousin, coffee, arose a few hundred years later, though no one knows how old the plant itself is. Some archaeological evidence shows that humans were eating the berries as long ago as a hundred thousand years.

One legend says that a goat herder in Ethiopia observed his charges eating the red berries from a nearby tree and became excited.  Trying them himself, he too felt a great lift.  By 600 AD that magical berry, and the brew made from drying and grinding its seeds, had found its way to what is now Yemen, on the southern tip of the Arabian peninsula.

Stories tell of a native of India smuggling the precious seeds of the tree out of Arabia around 1650 AD, then planting them in the hills of Chikmagalur.  Arabian law forbad the exporting of beans that could germinate, effectively controlling coffee trade for centuries.  Whether myth or history, the fruit of those seeds now forms a third of India’s large coffee output.

Europeans – the British, Dutch, French, and others – spread the beans to other countries during their travels.  The Dutch were responsible for its introduction to Java in the 18th century.  From those plantings, history tells us, came the famed tree coveted by France’s King, presented to him as a gift.

Louis XIV of France, finding the tree didn’t tolerate frost well, had a greenhouse erected to supply him with the beans to make the brew he so savored.  It is said that from that source came the cultivars used in Central and South America.

Reaching Martinique around 1720, sprouts were planted and grew well in the hot Caribbean climate.  From the thousands of trees that resulted, some were transported to Mexico where the product now forms one of their largest exports.

Making its way to French Guiana around the same time, the tree grew well in that steamy atmosphere.  Seeing an opportunity, a rascal named Francisco de Melo Palheta solicited the aid of the governor’s wife to smuggle seeds out of the country.  As he prepared to part for Brazil, the lady handed him a bouquet of flowers containing the illicit beans.

Today Brazil is one of the largest coffee producers on the planet.

From Brazil the seeds complete the circle, making their way in the late 19th century to Kenya and Tanzania, not far from their original home in Ethiopia.  Six centuries to return home is a long journey and an excellent excuse to rest and have a cup.