Thanksgiving has now come and gone. The delicious smell of garlic mashed potatoes drifting throughout the house has been replaced with Turkey sandwiches. The screeches of playful children running gleefully under foot is now a faint memory as normalcy has settled back into the house. And kitschy paper Turkeys so meticulously pasted to the windows and hung from the chandeliers are now being packed up in exchange for the 12 boxes of Christmas gear located in the back corner of the attic. Ahhh, Thanksgiving. We absolutely adore this day, an ode to food and family, but it is one of the few cornerstone holidays in American culture which we give up our careful devotion to waistlines, and while throwing caution to the wind, allow ourselves little sugar and fat filled treats throughout the day over two solid months. And as much as we’d like to pretend that calories don’t accumulate upon themselves, as small bites don’t inherently have calories of course, our hearts know otherwise.

But rest assured that the Spanish have your back this holiday season with a magical substance called, Cava. The University of Barcelona recently found that Cava actually reduces the levels of substances in the body known to cause the buildup of arterial plaque, which may lead to arterial disease. And if this isn’t incentive enough for you to be stocking up on Cava this holiday season, the study also found that it reduces the inflammatory markers that predict atherosclerosis, a chronic disease characterized by the constant inflammation of the arterial wall. Simply by opening and pouring yourself a nice tall glass of Cava, you’ll not only be helping your heart while snacking on christmas cookies, but you’ll also be helping your palate. And, if you find yourself …

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Unlike entry-level port wines, vintage port wines cannot be summed up in a few adjectives. These are wines that can drank anywhere from a few months to over a century in bottle. Over a century! What else can you possibly consume that has not been sealed in an air tight container a century after it has been elaborated? Not even a Twinkie can make it that long. Consequently, you can imagine the range of colors, aromas, flavors and textures you’ll encounter depending on the vintage of the port. A wine is very much like a human being, able to grow, evolve, devolve and deteriorate over time, but few wines have the ability to acquire layers upon layers of complex aromas and flavors like those of a vintage port wine. A younger vintage port may be a very deep ruby-garnet color, showing complex and intense aromas of cassis, anise and ripe blueberry and plum. It may be very powerful in the mouth with bright black fruit flavors and a well-defined mineral undertone. Now, try this same wine twenty years later and suddenly, what was once intense has mellowed and softened. Vibrant garnet becomes a deep tawny brown and bright red fruit flavors are now showing more raisin, plum, charcoal and spice notes. What was once expressing tight and firm tannins has dissolved to express a smoother more silky mouthfeel. If we look at this style as a whole, it is not one that can be easily placed into a perfectly square container. It requires something more malleable, flexible, and able to change and grow over time.

Place of Birth: The Douro Valley in the northern provinces of Portugal.

Comprised of: Touriga Nacional, Tinta Roriz, Tinto Cao, Tinta Barroca and Touriga Francesca are the most popular …

Editor’s Note: Although our fly by night contributing writer, Adrienne Smith, has been busy doing what she does best, changing hats, we’ve managed to get her fleeting and rather romantic impressions of her recent visit to Porto. Porto, located just across the Douro River from Vila Nova de Gaia, is not only the second largest city in Portugal, but has also been recognized by UNESCO as a World Heritage site. A dozen sites in Portugal have been added to the World Heritage List, the most recent being the Landscape of the Pico Island Vineyard Culture in 2004.

I’ve been away for a month, exactly. A month filled with wine presentations, tasting classes, bobbing for apples (not really), working full time and achieving stiffer penalties for parole violators. And somewhere sandwiched right in the middle, I managed to escape to Porto, Portugal (sigh) city, a deliciously lovely city in the north of Portugal.

If I had a gun to my head forcing me to rate countries in terms of their national cuisine, Portugal would be right up near the top of my list. If I had to rate cities in terms of just sheer breathless romanticism and staggering drama, Porto would outrank most that I’ve ever visited. It is a city graced with the wide and elegant avenues typical to more northern European cities, but then interwoven with winding streets that cascade carelessly down from hilltop monuments. There are charmingly blackened and sometimes rundown buildings that seem perched almost haphazardly amongst the maze of streets, glints of brightly colored tiles in cherry and emerald tones, and intricately painted wedgewood blue designs. There are clotheslines winding like colorful flags though the building facades. There is an area near the cathedral that feels almost like a …

We are the first ones to admit that our website is not a money generator. If we solely relied on Catavino to pay our rent, you’d most likely see us on the train serenading passing tourists with songs of failed attempts to garner interest in Iberian wine. It’s not a pretty site, made less attractive by the fact that, even in the shower, we sound distinctly like two cats being strangled.

Recognizing our limitations, we’ve chosen to build upon a skill imperative to any blog: forming relationship and building community. As the cyber world brings us closer together, we’ve found ourselves creating bridges with people we may never physically meet in our lifetime, but have become an integral part of our lives. Our relationships are virtual and have grown only as a result of mutual trust and symbiosis.

Last month, we forged a relationship with Jill at Domaine 547 when she approached us with the idea of the Blogger Pack. As we were hosting Portuguese table wines for Wine Blog Wednesday, Jill suggested that Catavino recommended three Portuguese wines to encourage participation, while Domaine 547 provided the means to distribute them directly to you. For us, it was a no brainer. Although we receive no kick back from any of the packets sold, of which there are still a few left needing a good home, we did gain an entertaining, perky and extremely witty partner on the other side of the big pond. Plus, through the grapevine, we’ve only heard compliments as to how easy the wine was to order, how quickly it arrived, and how pleased people were of both the wine and the information that came with it.

Therefore, when Jill approached us again, quite pleased by the success …

On a chilly and gray January afternoon in 2003, Ryan and I arrived into the historic Oporto train station bubbling with anticipation and excitement. Our limbs rather sore from sitting for hours in the same position, we begrudgingly put our large backpacks onto our shoulders, and like to old creaky dolls, emerged out station into the lobby and face to face with the Gothic and mysterious Sandeman logo fixed just to the left of the exit doors. Although a rather eerie image to encounter on a drizzly and cold winter’s day, it set the mood for our visit in Oporto as city bubbling with history, legends and secrets.

The undisputed international symbol of Sandeman - the wide-brimmed Spanish caballero’s hat and Portuguese student’s black cape - was commissioned in 1928 by George Massiot Brown. Although I have looked far and wide for more of George Massiot Brown’s work, it appears that this single piece had been one of his most legendary, as well as a symbol which Port lovers around the world have associated with quality Port wine.

The company was founded in 1790 by George Sandeman, a rather determined and innovative young Scotsman, who with his father’s financial backing, began selling port and sherry from Tom’s Coffee House in London. Just a few years later, George was not only carrying the legendary sherries of James Duff of Cadiz (now, Duff Gordon), but also shipping and bottling one of the first Sandeman Vintage ports - Sandeman 1790. After his death in 1841, Sandeman was passed into the trusting hands of his nephew, George Glas Sandeman, who diversified the company’s holdings to include both insurance and the export of linen and textiles. And unlike other Port companies who were established around the same …