Why, oh why, is it that I order a bottle of red wine in a restaurant in the United States and it is delivered at 75 degrees? In New York City, where so much revolves around the sophisticated Manhattanite, greater emphasis is placed on fashionable design than on proper wine storage. I can't count how many times have I seen wine storage over the bar or cleverly hung on the walls with intense lighting heating it far above room temperature? With wine accounting for such a healthy portion of profits, why is it treated so shabbily?

We recently returned from Spain, where every restaurant we dined in, no matter how humble or remote, had a wine refrigerator or cave. In Ribera del Duero, granted popular amongst the wine knowledgeable, El Molino, a lovely restaurant in Penafiel in an old mill over the Duero, had several top quality wine caves and an excellent list. Even in the remote alpine village of Villafranca del Bierzo, the tiny restaurant there had two small wine coolers from which our humble thirteen Euro bottle of local Bierzo was served! From that moment we played 'spot the wine-cooler' whenever entering a restaurant, and sure enough, they were always there somewhere!

So if it can be done in European restaurants, where expected profits are possibly much less, why can't it be done in the United States? Much of Europe is warm in summer, but try August in New York City! I'm sure wine is much more an everyday beverage and culturally more expected in European countries, though I just wish Americans would stand up and say we are not going to drink it any more at that temperature!