'Passion for wine'

After years in the corporate world, Charley Colette of Libertyville opened Parkview Gourmet with his wife five years ago to specialize in boutique wines and artisan cheeses.

"We had a passion for wine and food," Colette said. "We felt it had a nice fit for the downtown Libertyville area."

Decorated to resemble a European market, the store caters to the discriminating "foodie" with more than 2,000 items, including homemade dips, pies and 250 wines from small- production wineries around the world.

Free wine tasting is held on Saturdays from 1 to 4 p.m. and a big holiday wine tasting with up to 50 wines is held each November. Private wine and cheese parties can be arranged in the store after hours or in a home, and customers can arrange customized cheese platters.

Parkside Gourmet was the first in Lake County to offer an oil and vinegar bar, where customers can sample the olive oils, vinegars and grape-seed oil before the store seals a bottle for you.

"Our No. 1 item is balsamic vinegar," Colette said.

The store makes about a dozen different spreads and dips, such as feta artichoke, roasted garlic humus and even its own barbeque sauce. Savory pies and sweet fruit pies are also baked there.

Putting together corporate gift baskets for the holiday helped the store's December sales equal last year's despite the downturn in the economy, Colette said.

"We put together about 300 gift baskets and shipped a majority of them," he said.