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We meet a lot of people who visit France and stock up on their wine during their trip. As wine itself is really quite cheap if you buy it from the caves around the vineyards you can do really well even if your budget is rather tight.  But even if you buy the locally produced vin for next to nothing you will want to store it properly when you arrive home just as if it were a more expensive brand.

Some tips:

Red wine - store at room temperature in a cool-ish type environment. Never put red wine in the fridge - yuk.

White wine - keep it in the fridge as white wine should be drunk cool and crisp; but not at too cold a temp.

Rose - same as for white.

Now, what do you have in the way of wine storage? if not a cellar as such then have a look at some wine refrigerators; there are many on the market that will store just a few bottles of something more serious if you are an avid collector or have a cafe/restaurant. Most today are also environmentally friendly in that they don’t put out those harmful gasses and will come with full details as to how to store which wines you have.

Smaller compact size for your kitchen/entertaining area

Larger size for the serious wine buff or business owner.

Popularity: 9% [?]

We recently met some folk from around the Myrtle Beach region of South Carolina in the United States and from what they told us about the place it sounds like a brilliant place to go for a vacation.

Many Brit’s head off over to the US for their holidays and usually take the DisneyWorld option but I did some research and looked at Myrtle Beach myself and I have to say it looks really wonderful. It is on the Atlantic and has a huge range of family activities; the beaches look great and are well patrolled. The locals have laws in place to protect the coastline (no glass/bottles on the sand) and have certain dress regulations for around the towns and beaches (no topless sunbathing and no thong-like swimmers). If you have ever been to the Spanish Costa’s and seen the tourist fashion sense there you would agree that the Spanish should consider introducing the same dress codes…

We like the look of it there so much that we are considering a trip to Myrtle Beach ourselves and I thought I would suggest it here if you are looking for somewhere more quality-wise for your trip to the US. It happens to be one of the top destinations for Americans themselves and that’s a good tip as they are quite discerning in where they spend their valuable vacation time.

If you are interested take a look at the Myrtle Beach tourist guide. Maybe we’ll see you there sometime soon.

Popularity: 8% [?]

Is your food budget stretched to the limit this time of week? no spare cash available to do a stock up at Tesco…?

Here’s a great idea I just came upon today which just might get you through to payday and help you save what precious cash you do have, plus it will help you use up those things which never seem to get cooked.

Go to your pantry and fridge, have look through and make a note of all the ingredients you have sitting there (yeah, even those tins  and packs of pasta which seem to be permanent residents) . Now, go online and visit Cooking By Numbers and simply click on all the items you have listed.

The result will be simple and easy recipes using whatever items you have listed; takes the pain out of trying to come up with something new and interesting to cook for the family, or yourself, when you have very little to work with.

Popularity: 6% [?]