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Impromptu Reflection On My Favorite Subject – Amarone
This blog post was not planned for today – nope, had totally different ideas in mind. And then the comment arrived on one of my older posts (click here to see it). And the comment was more of a question, which definitely stroke a chord – someone was looking for that perfect Amarone moment, exactly the same way as I was trying to replicate mine…
Yes, I responded to the comment, but I couldn’t miss the opportunity to reflect on the magic of Amarone – and practical impossibility of re-creating that magic “at will”. That full-bodied, perfectly dry but rich, voluptuous and perfectly balanced (you will have to forgive my use of double-perfect wording) which I experienced only once (I’m talking again about 1997 Le Ragose Amarone) – was almost never replicated in any of the wines I had. The only two which come close were 2001 Masi Mazzano Amarone Classico, and believe it or not, 2000 Carlisle Dry Creek Valley Zinfandel. I have one wine on my “must try” list – Giuseppe Quintarelli Amarone – which must be magical based on what the others are saying, but this wine would really require a [very] generous sponsor…
Out of curiosity, I decided to check on the classic Amarone at the Wine Spectator web site – there are only 11 Amarone which have “classic” rating (95-100 points) throughout all the years:
| Wine | Vintage | Score |
Release Price | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Michele Castellani Amarone della Valpolicella Classico Cinque Stelle | 2005 | 96 | $105 | |
| Romano Dal Forno Amarone della Valpolicella | 2004 | 96 | $NA | |
| Lorenzo Begali Amarone della Valpolicella Classico Monte Ca’ Bianca | 1997 | 95 | $NA | |
| Lorenzo Begali Amarone della Valpolicella Classico Monte Ca’ Bianca | 2004 | 95 | $70 | |
| Michele Castellani Amarone della Valpolicella Classico Cinque Stelle | 2003 | 95 | $64 | |
| Michele Castellani Amarone della Valpolicella Classico Cinque Stelle | 2007 | 95 | $75 | |
| Romano Dal Forno Amarone della Valpolicella | 1998 | 95 | $480 | |
| Romano Dal Forno Amarone della Valpolicella | 1997 | 95 | $370 | |
| Romano Dal Forno Amarone della Valpolicella | 2003 | 95 | $425 | |
| Masi Amarone della Valpolicella Classico Mazzano | 1999 | 95 | $120 | |
| Masi Amarone della Valpolicella Classico | 1988 | 95 | $NA |
As you can see, Wine Spectator is not much of a help…
Have you ever experienced the magic of Amarone? Do you have a favorite? Let me know! Cheers!
Traif! Small Place, Big Experience
Do you ever wonder how could we live without modern technology? For instance, how did we go about finding the good places to eat? Looking in Zagat? Calling a friend? Reaping and storing newspaper reviews and pages from the magazines, only to be never be able to recall where did we put them and what was the name of the restaurant? Despite being a techie, I can’t stop being amazed at what you can do today with such a “simple” tool as Google.
Couple of weeks back, we planned a weekend with friends in Brooklyn. Of course visiting the restaurant is a great form of entertainment, and as we do it pretty rarely with my wife, I really want to make sure that every visit would be a great experience. How can I do that? Two words: Google and Bloggers. You can use Google to get piles of relevant information. And then you can use Bloggers’ “labor of love”, their posts, in order to extract jewels from those piles.
Let’s go back to my restaurant search. Google faithfully produced a whole bunch of references when asked for the Brooklyn restaurant recommendations. One of the references attracted my attention – it was for the blog called Becoming Brooklyn, where I found the post with 5 recommended restaurants. Quick scroll through the relevant links and the decision was made – we are going to try the restaurant called Traif. Why? First, the menu looked interesting, and prices appeared to be reasonable. And the second reason? The restaurant offered chef’s tasting menu, priced extremely reasonably at $40 per person.
I love chef’s tasting menus. It gives you an experience instead of just a meal – and this is something which I would definitely prefer at any time. And so when we visited Traif this past weekend, chef’s tasting menu was our choice. To give you an idea of how was it, I need only one word – WOW! Taste, texture, presentation – everything was perfect. There was not a single dish we didn’t like. Every little morsel was absolutely delicious – this was really an Experience. The only way I can share it with you is through the pictures – I think they came out reasonably okay (just so you know, I’m rarely satisfied with the quality of my pictures) and you will get a feel for that experience. Of course the best thing you can do is to go and experience it for yourself, but meanwhile – here are the pictures.
Not shown – Gazpacho (sorry, I was slow at the beginning)
Butterfish Carpaccio with peach slices:
Not shown – blistered shishito peppers, canteloup, marconas, feta, mint, orange (sorry, people were too hungry! And I was slow again…)
dayboat scallops, creamy corn
spicy, bigeye tuna, tempura japanese eggplant, kecap manis:
crispy soft shell crabs, crushed avocado, pineapple sambal, red papaya:
seared foie, fingerlings, ham chips, sunny egg, maple, hot sauce:
sautéed veal sweetbreads, asparagus, bacon, snap peas, shiitakes:
strawberry-cinnamon glazed baby back pork ribs:
bbq, braised short rib sliders, sweet potato fries, smoked paprika aioli:
And for the dessert:
momʼs key lime pie, graham crust, pineapple:
bacon doughnuts, dulche de leche , coffee ice cream:
not shown – watermelon squares with molasses
I hope you liked my photo report, and I hope you are convinced that you need to experience Traif for yourself – believe me, you will not regret!
In case you wonder where is my favorite subject, wine, in this story – everybody were in the mood for cocktail or a beer, so I just had a glass of red Portuguese wine which was simple enough to not interfere with most of the dishes. But I have to note that wine list looked pretty good, diverse and reasonably priced.
Adding to the words of Iron Chef judges: Thank you Traif for the wonderful meal experience! Cheers!
Traif
229 S 4th St
Brooklyn, NY 11211
(347) 844-9578
From Wine and Books To Wine In Books
What do you take your wine with? There are few options, I guess. One (and most obvious) would be food. Another one would be a conversation (wine and conversation – a match made in heaven?). And then there is wine and the book – both get you in the mood, both complement and enhance each other and make the moment special (take your average week as an example – how many times per week you get to enjoy a quiet moment with book and the wine? What, zero? I hear you…).
Sometimes, wine even gets into the book – and I don’t mean by spilling it all over. Today is a Wine Blogging Wednesday #79, dedicated to Summer Reading, Summer Wine. The main question you are supposed to answer in your blog post is “What wine would your favorite fictional character drink?”.
I have two problem with this question – the same way as I can’t name my favorite wine, I can not name my favorite fictional character (there are many). And the second problem? Drinking wine (or any alcohol) is not necessarily a priority, no matter what the character is doing, therefore pinning it down is far from simple.
While I thought of a few different approaches ( including writing of the short essay about a character and the wine), advancing from thinking to the writing was not getting in sync with me. But then I thought of one of my all-times absolute favorite science fiction book. I can’t tell you how many times I read this book while I was growing up – 10, 20, 50 – I have no idea), but every time it was fresh and fascinating. This book was written in 1965 by two brothers, Arkady and Boris Strugatsky (originally in Russian), and it is called Monday Starts on Saturday. It is a science fiction (border line fantasy) book, talking about a research institute where wizards, sorcerers and just researchers work on exploring of the meaning of life (anyone who read the book in the original – I ask for your forgiveness for such a representation of this book). If anyone cares to read it in English, here the link to the full English text – however note that a lot of charm might be lost in translation.
So I decided to do a simple check for what kind of alcohol was mentioned in the book (using the word “bottle” as an anchor and remembering some of the key scenes). Here is the list:
- Wine (generic term, nothing specific)
- Champagne (again, nothing specific)
- Vodka (after all, this is a Russian book!)
- Cognac (with the perfect string attached: “A human might be just an intermediate element of evolution necessary to build a masterpiece of creation – a glass of cognac with slice of lemon” – note that translation is mine).
- Amontillado (pretty good, huh? This type of Jerez was mentioned by the name!)
- Elixir of Bliss (clearly a magical creation, but based on the personal experience, I would approximate it to an extremely old Pedro Ximenez Jerez)
Of course I might be missing something, but I like the list even as it is.
There you have it, my friends. My major point here? No matter what the characters are drinking, wine and books go perfectly hand in hand – hope you can find the time to enjoy both! Cheers!
Serious Fun With Wines
In case you are wondering about the “serious fun” versus “not so serious fun”, somehow this title just got stuck in my head when I thought about this post, and I decided not to fight that. Also, when you have Gaja, Ornellaia, Turley, Bertani and whole bunch of other interesting wines, I think “serious fun” is a good way to put it. And to stress even further how serious the fun was, I’m even using different style of pictures for this post instead of usual “just label” style (and yes, you are right, I also use an opportunity to play with my new camera).
What is your first thought when you see the name like Gaja on the wine list? I don’t know about you, but in majority of the cases I would expect to see a red wine there. Yes, I can think of Gaja Chardonnay, and only because it typically looks at least as an affordable possibility on the wine list, as opposed to the Gaja red wines, which are not. So the wine we had was a white wine made out of …(wait for it)…Sauvignon Blanc!
2006 Gaja Alteni di Brassica Langhe DOC, Italy was a total surprise. Mineral nose, with wet stone, smoke and heavy grass. Touch of white fruit on the palate, more stone, touch of lemon, perfectly balanced. Finish lasted for 3 minutes, if not longer! Very beautiful wine. Drinkability: 9
The next wine we had was also coming from a very respectful Italian producer, Tenuta dell’Ornellaia. And the wine was…yes, white again! The grape? Yep, Sauvignon Blanc. 2010 Poggio alle Gazze dell’Ornellaia, Toscana IGT was simply delicious, with perfumed nose of lychees and white apple. Palate was exhibiting nuts and ripe apple. Very long finish with some tropical fruit notes coming in later on. Bright, round, amazing! Drinkability: 9
We continued our “whites’ extravaganza” with 2009 Ken Forrester The FMC ( (Forrester Meinert Chenin), South Africa. This wine was made out of the Chenin Blanc grape. While Chenin Blanc is one of the signature white French grapes from Loire, it also makes great wines around the world. It does particularly well in South Africa, where it is also known under the name Steen. This particular The FMC wine is a single vineyard flagship wine of Ken Forrester, one of the oldest producers in South Africa. This wine had a beautiful nose very similar to a typical chardonnay – nutty with some acidity, bright yellow color, very round. Drinkability: 8+
Done with whites. Before switching to the reds, we had a different, very unusual wine – as you can judge from the color above, this wine is not called “Orange” for nothing. Orange wine is one of the latest trends, where skin of the white grapes is left in the contact with juice during maceration. This imparts a nice deep yellow/orange color, hence the name, orange wine. This wine also was not some fly by night experimental plonk. 2008 Marani Satrapezo 10 kvevri, Georgia (100% Rkatsiteli grape, all coming from specific block of the Kondoli vineyard) was made in a traditional Georgian style with maceration for 20-25 days in historical clay vessel called Kvevri.
The wine had beautiful orange color. On the nose it had aromas of a bright fresh apricot. Palate was dry, full bodied, vegetative with enough brightness, touch of apricot but no sweetness whatsoever. After three hours in decanter the wine softened considerably – this wine definitely would benefit from a few years in the cellar. Drinkability: 8
Okay, we are finally switching to reds – with it’s own set of surprises. We started from 1997 Estancia Meritage Alexander Valley (Cabernet Sauvignon/Merlot/Cabernet Franc blend). The wine had perfect color – dark, concentrated ruby red. Eucalyptus, wet stone, dust and raspberries on the nose. Bright red and black fruit on the palate with cassis, eucalyptus and licorice – perfect balance, nice, soft tannins. Drinkability: 8+
This was probably the biggest surprise of the evening – 1997 Toasted Head Cabernet Sauvignon Syrah California. Generally, Toasted Head makes simple everyday wines – which you generally are not going to age. This wine was simply lost in the cellar, and we opened it to taste but with the full readiness to dump it. To our astonishment (too strong of a word, but – why not), the wine had perfect acidity, bright youthful color, good black fruit, soft tannins and a touch of cassis. Drinkability: 8
The next wine was Giribaldi Cento Uve – but this will be a subject of a separate post, so I will skip my tasting notes for that wine. And the next wine was the one … we killed – it sounds way too strong, I know – but please read on. Amarone are typically big enough wines, so we decided to decant this wine – without even tasting it first (but the nose was perfect!). This was a [big] mistake. After 3 hours in decanter, the wine became barely drinkable. Another 30 minutes later, the fruit came back, both on the palate and the nose, only to disappear shortly after. Note to self – be careful with decanting. Considering this experience, I will not give this wine any rating – it simply wouldn’t be fair.
As you might expect, we didn’t just drink – we had a lot of good food as well. Just to give you an example, here is lamb kabob in the process of making:
To complement the lamb, we had 1996 Turley Duarte Zinfandel – nice fruit, raspberries on the nose and the palate, hint of jammy fruit later on, plus some eucalyptus. Very good overall balance for the wine at 15.4% ABV. Drinkability: 8-
And then of course there was a dessert – Clafoutis (no further comments, just look at the picture):
This was definitely a great experience. Pretty rare case when all the wines worked very well and were absolutely delightful – if I can only re-taste that Amarone… Well, may be one day. Wishing you great wine experiences! Cheers!
Daily Glass: 2009 Chorus Effect by Field Recordings
I have a question for you. Have you ever experienced a special bottle “today is the day… or not” effect? It is when you have a bottle you want to open, but you can’t decide if today should be the day, or you need to wait a bit longer? I’m not talking about special bottle which. let’s say, bears vintage year of your son or daughter’s birthday – those are easy, you only contemplate once a year whether to open the bottle or not. I’m talking about more of an everyday, reasonably priced wine, of which, let’s say you have only one bottle, and you know that you can’t get another one – this is the case in point.
Ever since I was blown away by the bottle of Fiction by Field Recordings (here is the link to my post about that experience), I wanted to try another wine made by Andrew Jones – Chorus Effect. I had the bottle for about half a year in “to use in the near term” place, and I can’t even tell you how many times I was in the “today is the day” mood, and … nope, I guess it was not.
And somehow it happened that the day was finally today, and the bottle was open ( one easy move, you know – those screw tops are perfect for easy opening).
This 2009 Field Recordings Chorus Effect Koligian Vineyard, Paso Robles ($26, 15.3% ABV, 249 cases made) is a Bordeaux-style blend – you can see the exact composition on the picture of the back label.
The wine had beautiful purple color, bright and fresh. Nose was showing sweet cherries, plums and a touch of spices. But the palate… If Fiction, which I mentioned earlier, had absolutely astonishing nose, this wine had the same on the palate. This was a textbook study of a red wine, all in one sip – not the Bordeaux specifically, but the red wine overall. Sweet cherries, ripe plums, blueberries, tar, sweet vanilla, licorice, violet, chocolate, pepper, tobacco, eucalyptus – you could easily taste each and all. At the same time, the wine was balanced, with soft tannins, without any jamminess which can be often observed at such high alcohol levels. I’m not sure if I’m ready to rate it – I really want to see what will happen with this wine tomorrow – but for now, I will put the Drinkability at 8-, mainly due to the alcohol burn which was not noticeable at the beginning but showed up couple of hours after the bottle was opened.
Did you open your special bottle today? Will be glad to hear your story. Cheers!
Wine = Art
The title of this post is not misleading. I plan to talk about wine as an art form, which is the way I look at it. Why all of a sudden? Couple of articles, both great in its own right (I mentioned both in the Meritage post a week ago), prompted this blog post, despite my claim that I’m not going to enter this debate. I don’t know why is that, but I have a habit of saying “No” where deep inside, as soon as I finish my full and long “no” sentence I already know that, “oh it will be a yes”. Anyway, this blog post is not about me, it is about wine, so let’s get closer to the subject.
In case you didn’t have a chance to read those two articles, they were both on the beaten up (badly beaten up, I have to say) subject of cheap wines versus expensive wines. The first article, published in the Forbes magazine, provided a number of illustrations to the fact that…there are many factors affecting perceived taste of wine – temperature, label, feel of the moment, critics’ opinion, rating and many more (I’m not going to cite a full article here – it is well worth reading if you are into the wine world). I believe that one of the points of the article was to suggest that for the most of us, we can’t distinguish between cheap and expensive wines anyway, so why bother – drink any wine, be happy (I’m oversimplifying, I know).
Then Steve Heimoff took the subject close to his heart and went on to explain that there is a very big difference in taste between $15 and $150 bottles of Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon, that more expensive wine is always better than the cheap wine and that the the whole premise of Forbes article in Steve’s words is “man bites dog” attempt at a cheap publicity.
Let me take step aside and explain the meaning of the concept “wine = art”. When you are at home, take a look around you. I would make a safe assumption that for absolute majority of people, your home is decorated in one way or the other. You might have pictures and photos on the walls, statues big and small, flowers live and not, little (or big) mementos and many other things which surround our lives with only one purpose – to give us pleasure, set the mood or may be create lasting connections between time and memories. Taking pictures as the simplest example, they can be your kids’ pictures, copies of the works of the famous artists, works of the completely unknown artists or may be they are actual original paintings. Those pictures can be mass produced and acquired at the neighborhood convenience store for $4.99. But they also can be acquired after a long battle at the auction, where you had to put down $4.9 million to beat another guy and get that painting you always dreamed of.
Now, when was the last time you read an article telling you that you are not supposed to buy any works of art more expensive than $19.99, because you are not capable of understanding the difference between $19.99 and $199 pictures? Or when was the last time you read an article telling you that expensive painting is always better than cheap print? I can bet I’m giving you a very taxiing memory-combing exercise which will yield no results.
So my question is – why wine is treated in any different way than any other works of art? Read (or talk) about the wines, read about vineyards and places, read about wine makers, grape growers, oenophiles, wine collectors – what do you get out of that reading or talking? Passion, obsession, emotions, feelings. We eat because we have to, but we drink wine because we want to, because of its ability to resonate with our beings, to create emotional response. This is my premise of “wine = art” statement. I believe that wine is a form of the renewable art, which also has a pretty unique advantage compare to a simple painting, for instance. Whatever you see on the painting will be exactly the same in 10 years or in 50 years. It will create different emotions on a different day, of course – but it will not change in principal. At the same time, even the simplest wine will change in the bottle. For better or worse, but it will change. Last weekend we shared a bottle of 1997 Toasted Head Cabernet Sauvignon/Syrah blend (probably $9.99 or less) – believe it or not, but this wine was outstanding – it evolved, it had beautiful fruit, great balance and nice finish. It was memorable, it solicited emotions, it created mental staples for that particular moment. If this is not art, I don’t know what is.
Where am I going with this? I don’t believe cheap versus expensive is a meaningful or useful argument for the wine world. Yes, there are many reasons for the wine to be expensive – best quality grapes with very low yield, state of the art facilities, manual processes, need for aging before release, market demand, reputation and many many other factors define the price and can drive it very high up. But if you will exclude snobbery, arrogance and blissful ignorance, price is simply one of many factors which affect your buying decision – nothing more and nothing less. Yes, $150 bottle will taste different than $15 – but can we say “better”? If someone is a Pinot Grigio drinker (and enjoys it very much), will you be able to prove to him or her that $150 Cabernet Sauvignon is really better that $15? I want to see that happening. When it comes to wine, “better” is a difficult category, as the definition of the best wine is 100% personal – the best wine is the one which tastes best to you. Yes, critics matter, ratings matter – but only as a reference, as food for thought.
Wow, did I bore you to death? I truly hope I didn’t – I think this post was brewing for a very long time, slowly ripening to the point of wanting to get out. These are my true feelings, this is how I see the wine world, and “wine = art” makes it so fascinating for me.
Is this arguable? Of course (comments section is down below and only a click away). I don’t pretend to possess the absolute truth – but “wine = art” makes me open a bottle of wine with hope and excitement. No matter what anyone said about that bottle, how much it costs or what the rating is – I hope you will enjoy it and I hope it will create a special memory, a special moment – just for you. Cheers!
Crus of Beaujolais, Year 2011 – Part 2
I like sequels, Well, in the movies – sometimes, not so much. But when it comes to the writing, whatever you forgot to say in the first part, you can say in the second, and feel good about it, claiming that this was the intent from the get go.
What I didn’t mention in the first post about great tasting of Georges Duboeuf 2011 Beaujolais portfolio is that red Beaujolais make one of the best red wines for summer – they are typically light in alcohol (if you noticed, 13% ABV was the most for all wines mentioned in the first post), and they also taste the best when they are slightly chilled. Considering how hot this summer is across pretty much the whole US territory, I hope this will help you to find a good red wine for the hot day, because sometimes it just have to be red.
In the first post, I described a self-guided part of tasting. That tasting was followed by the lunch, both of which (tasting and the lunch) taking place at db Bistro Modern, one of the restaurants of the famous chef Daniel Boulud.
Georges Duboeuf opened the event with presentation of 2011 vintage. Here is my best effort transcript of what he said (remember, I’m not a professional journalist, I’m only pretending): “2011 was a great year. Budding started in April, then flowering started in June, and then harvest started August 22nd and lasted for two weeks. Some areas experienced periods of drought. Overall, grapes reached very good level of ripeness. 2005 and 2009 (considered best in a very long time) were good, but 2011 might be even a little bit better than 2009. Throughout the vintage, there are lots of black cherry and earthy notes.”
After Georges Duboeuf’s presentation, the first dish was served – “Legumes du Marche” – Young Garden Vegetables, Fromage Blanc Dressing, Lavender Honey Vinaigarette.
This dish was paired with 2011 Georges Duboeuf Beaujolais-Villages, and it worked together very well by wine complementing soft and earthy flavors of the vegetables.
Next, Frank Duboeuf presented two white wines, Macon-Villages and Pouilly-Fuisse (please see detailed note below). He said that 2011 was equally good year for both whites and the reds, which is a very rare situation. I didn’t take the detailed notes though, as I was preoccupied with parallel discussion at the table and delicious pairing of wine and food ( bad journalism : ( )
White wines were served with the next course, Seafood Risotto – Black Sea Bass, Scallops, Squids, Cockles, Fennel, Tomato Confit “Fumet” Emulsion.
Pouilly-Fuisse worked perfectly well with risotto, which was a unique experience for me. Creaminess of risotto cancelled out some sharpness of the chardonnay, creating next level of experience.
For the next course, Georges Duboeuf presented two red wines, Morgon and Julienas. He described Morgon as having “violet, cassis, kirsch on the nose, same flavors on the palate. A lot of structure. This wine will age very well”. Regarding Julienas, he said that “it is a very special wine, it has great personality. 2011 was a lot like 2009. This particular wine had the biggest success over the last 5-6 years. It was very critical to expand the vineyard (by 4 acres) for the success of this wine. This is a very noble wine with great aging potential. The wine was bottled a week before, right before the event”.
These two reds accompanied the last course of the meal – Duo of Beef – Braised Short Ribs, Beef Tenderloin, Spring Vegetables, Sauce Bordelaise.
I have to tell that while both food and wine were delicious in its own right, they didn’t work together, so the pairing was not successful by not elevating the whole meal to the next level. But I also have to admit that both food and wine really didn’t bother each other too much – they were really two absolutely parallel experiences without a merge or a collision (which is often the case when wine and food don’t work together).
And then…there was a dessert, which was delicious and not paired with any wines (I also have no idea how this little cookies should be called, but it was very hard to stop eating them).
Here are the detailed notes for the wines:
2011 Georges Duboeuf Macon-Villages Domaine Les Chenevieres, Maconnaise, France (100% Chardonnay, SRP: $13.99, 12.5% ABV, 5000 cases produced) – Very nice, hint of hazelnut and citrus on the nose, good fruit, good balance, good acidity, hint of white apples, touch of vanilla and touch of oak on the palate. (Drinkability: 7+)
2011 Georges Duboeuf Pouilly-Fuisse Domaine Beranger, Maconnaise, France (100% Chardonnay, SRP: $17.99, 13% ABV, 3500 cases produced, 1200 imported) – this wine comes from the best area, the actual town of Pouilly-Fuisse. This wine had more pronounced chardonnay qualities than the previous wine – vanilla, touch of citrus and oak notes, excellent balance. (Drinkability: 8- )
2011 Georges Duboeuf Beaujolais-Villages, Beaujolais, France (100% Gamay, SRP: $9.99, 12.5% ABV) – very nice, good balance, a little tartness on the palate, but good overall. (Drinkability: 7)
2011 Georges Duboeuf Morgon, Domaine Jean Descombes, Beaujolais, France (100% Gamay, SRP: $15.99, 13% ABV) – good acidity, fresh fruit, light, soft, a bit too grapey to be great – but should improve with time. (Drinkability: 7)
2011 Georges Duboeuf Julienas Chateau des Capitans, Beaujolais, France (100% Gamay, SRP: $18.99, 14% ABV) – excellent depth, good power, good body, excellent balance. (Drinkability: 8)
All in all, it was one great event, both in the information and experience. Summer is still on, my friends – go find a bottle of Beaujolais to kick it off after a long day. And make an extra effort to find one of Georges Duboeuf wines – it will well worth it. Cheers!
Father’s Day Escapades
This Father’s Day was one of the best ever, so I decided to share with you some of the experiences – as you can imagine, mostly in the form of the pictures.
The day started with the cards from the kids – this is always a great beginning. Then the weather gradually changed from overcast to a beautiful clear sunny day with just the right temperature (don’t know what is your idea of a great summer temperature, but for me 75F and a light breeze is almost ideal). From there on, there was great food, great wine and … some interesting new experiences.
Here are few pictures to give you an idea about cooking (well, yes, not so much cooking, mostly grilling).
Grilled chicken tights:
Kebab, on the grill:
And the same kebab, off the grill:
I don’t know why, but potatoes fry the best on the side burner of the grill (we have electric stove in the kitchen):
And then mushrooms… I don’t know about you, but I’m ready to eat mushrooms any time and any day:
Enough about the food. Let’s talk about the drinks now.
First, we had some [very lazy] cocktails. Just take it out from the freezer, squish in the glass and voila! 8 different flavors are available in the store – and Mango Daiquiri was the best out of the four we tried:
Then we switched to Champagne – errr, Sparkling wine. We had Marques de Gelida Cava Brut Reserva, which is Rose (Pinot Noir based) – very nice, round, medium bodied and refreshing (Drinkability: 7+) :
The best part about this sparkling wine was… opening of the bottle. Despite the fact that I told you not to saber a bottle of Champagne at home, I decided to ignore my own recommendation and try to saber the bottle (you should know that deep inside I’m a 10-years old, masquerading as an adult). Sabering was an absolute success, as I managed to do it from the first attempt. I have even a short video of that process, but it will require time to process, so for now, I can only show you some pictures which will illustrate what happened. Here is the top of the bottle:
And here is the very top of the neck – the glass top was completely separated during the opening, cork and glass together:
The only problem is – Sabering was so much fun, now I want to do it again!
Then we had a very nice red – 2009 Cave de Tain l’Hermitage Crozes-Hermitage Les Hauts de Fief (13% ABV, $17.99)- earthy nose with some roasted notes, same on the palate – deep concentrated ( but not jammy) fruit, great acidity, touch of spices, round tannins, very balanced (Drinkability: 8).
Then we had scotch – 41 years old Lonach Glendarroch (from Highlands, distilled in 1967) – absolutely amazing. I can’t even try to describe complexity of that scotch here – it will take a few tasting sessions to figure that out (my wife said that it was by far her favorite scotch ever):
Now last, but not least – my Father’s day present – 2005 Giribaldi Cento Uve, Langhe, Italy:
In case you are wondering what’s so special about this wine: it is made out of 152 grape varieties (you can read more here), so it will mean a serious progress of my grape count.
That’s all folks. I’m very happy with my Father’s day. How was yours? Cheers!
Magnificent Rioja
The title for this post didn’t come up easily. I was back and forth with myself many times. The reason? Tasting these Rioja wines was a phenomenal experience, something which doesn’t happen often during one’s lifetime. The brightness and openness of the 65-years old Rioja was nothing but stunning – but I think I’m getting ahead of myself, let’s go back to the beginning.
I happened to fall in love with Rioja wines about 4 years ago, after attending a Rioja seminar at PJ Wine store (the owner, Peter, is anything but fanatical about Spanish wines – of which PJ Wines houses an amazing selection all the time). At that seminar I was lucky enough to try 1964 Monte Real Gran Reserva Rioja and that was a revelation – the wine was fresh and bright, as it would’ve been maybe 5 years old, not 40+. After that tasting I became a Rioja fan for life. I have to also mention that even today, you can buy 1964 Rioja starting from less than $300 – for comparison, a bottle of 1966 DRC will set you back about $10,000. I rest my case.
When my friend Zak told me that we can get a bottle of 1947 Rioja directly from the winery for less than $400, the decision was instantaneous – this is a once in a lifetime opportunity and it is worth it (don’t remember how many bottles were still available, but surely there were not that many). So we got that 1947 bottle and after a little while, were able to set the date for the tasting.
To make sure our 1947 Rioja will not feel lonely, we got a few more bottles to keep it company. You can see the full line up on the picture above, and here is an exact list:
2008 Raventos & Blanc Reserva Brut Cava
1993 Lopez de Heredia Vina Tondonia Reserva Blanco
1947 Imperial Gran Reserva Rioja
1976 Imperial Gran Reserva Rioja
1995 Imperial Gran Reserva Rioja
Pinord Moscatel NV
There is one more bottle in the picture – Jorge Ordonez Malaga – but, guess what – we never opened that, being quite overwhelmed by the desert time (it is a great bottle of desert wine, but – oh well, there is always a next time).
We started with Cava, of course. It was fresh, round and pleasant – not necessarily hugely distinguishable, but definitely a nice bottle of wine to have before dinner starts.
The first foray into the magnificent world of Rioja was with the 1993 Lopez de Heredia Vina Tondonia Rioja Blanco. I will gladly challenge you to find a bottle of 19 years old white wine that will taste as fresh as this 1993 Rioja. Maybe you will have some luck with white Hermitage, Chablis or some of the white Burgundies, or may be some of the really obscure grapes like Romorantin – but in any case I’m sure it will not be easy. This wine was fresh and complex, with mineral notes, a hint of white apple, perfect mid-palate weight and still bright acidity. Definitely a ”wow” introduction to the ”wow” lineup of reds.
Needless to say we started with 1947 Rioja. Considering the tender age of 65 years, the first challenge of course was to get the cork out. I wish we had one of those glass-cutting devices described in the PJ Wine blog post, which simply allows you to cut the whole neck of the bottle with the cork in it, and not worry about the cork crumbling into your wine – well, we don’t drink wines of that age often enough, so we had to stick with more conventional tools, like the two-prong cork puller.
It almost worked.. and then not. It took two people and a good 5 minutes of time to get the cork out, little by little, piece by piece – but we managed to do it almost clean, with maybe one or two tiny pieces falling back into the bottle.
Cork is out, and wine goes into the glasses. The first thing to note is the color, which is still red and not brown – of course, it is not purple, but it is dark garnet red. And for the taste… Should I simply tell you that wine was magnificent and leave it at that? Well, okay, it wouldn’t be fair. Let’s continue. On the nose – cocoa powder, cedar dust, a hint of cinnamon, smoked paprika. On the palate – a good amount of red fruit, wine comes in bright and youthful, with good acidity. Then the second wave came in as wine opened up a bit, with more sweet fruit and then tannins kicking in. I don’t want to bring in exotic animals to describe this wine, as Joe Roberts did with a black panther, so my description will be simple – grace and elegance. I can only wish to have the same grace and elegance myself when I reach that age.
Moving along, it is now time for the 1976 Rioja. 29 years younger than the previous wine and… ahh, so different! Barnyard on the nose, very pungent, savory, with a hint of the same barnyard on the palate, dried cherries, earthiness. If umami is a part of the wine tasting profile, this wine definitely had it.
And for the 1995, we decided to give it a little breathing time – it spent 2 hours in the decanter. The wine was fresh, with beautiful garnet color, bright fruit, very good acidity and soft tannins, a touch of eucalyptus and cedar box. Very youthful and upbeat, if you will.
After tasting this lineup of magnificent Rioja wines from the same producer, the most interesting question in my mind is ”how will these wines evolve?”. Even 1947 didn’t reach the end of life considering the way it was showing, never mind 1976 and 1995. Will the pungency of 1976 stay, or will it evolve to something akin to 1947 in 29 years? How will 1995 taste in 48 years, and will it even last that long? These are all great questions I will not get an answer to – but this is part of the wine connoisseurship game – think about the future but definitely appreciate and enjoy what you have right now (huh – feel free to beat me up in the comments for banalities).
So far I didn’t tell you about the food – there was a lot of great food. While you can’t taste it anyway, here is at least a picture of one of the dishes – roasted potato-encrusted Striped Bass:
We also had “death by chocolate” dessert which perfectly paired with Pinord Moscatel, which happened to be well-aged (the bottle simply got lost under the shelf and was “discovered” many years later).
Overall, this was a great experience, which will stay in my memory for a very long time. To tell you honestly, I think it will not be easy to top off this experience, but as the very least I can promise to share all that with you. Wish you all great fun with wines – cheers!
Rediscovering Ridge
About five years ago, during one of my numerous trips to California, I had a little bit of free time. What do you do when you are in California, have a little bit of free time and love of wine? Of course, you go visit the winery!
A that time I decided to go visit Ridge Vineyards, located in Santa Cruz Mountains region, not far from San Jose. All I knew is that the winery is making wine called Monte Bello, which became famous after beating classic French Bordeaux during 1976 Judgement of Paris event. So I managed a steep 4 miles ride up the Monte Bello road, reached the winery, tasted 5 or 6 different wines and … didn’t like a single one of them. No, I don’t remember what exact wines and what exact vintages I tried, I just remember that none of the wines created any ”oompf”. I was disappointed and squarely put all the Ridge wines into ”I [really] don’t like it” category.
Holding that unhappy memory through the years, last year I even expressed my opinion in the comment to the twitter post by Jancis Robinson (she selected Ridge for a special wine tasting in Hong Kong), which caused some very unhappy reaction among her followers (to say “very unhappy” is a very mild understatement).
I can’t tell you why, but when this year I found out that I will be in San Jose area and I will have a bit of the free time, very first thought was ”I have to try Ridge wines again”. Four steep miles up the Monte Bello road and here I’m again. The air was beautiful, and so was the scenery – let me share a few pictures with you.
Ridge Vineyards is located near the top of Monte Bello Ridge. This is the “view from the top”:
These are the vineyards at Ridge (by the way, in case you recognize the picture, it gives you an answer to the wine quiz #10, Where in California – correct answer is Santa Cruz Mountains region):
Here are some beautiful flowers for you:
Can you guess what happened now? I tried 7 different wines and … I liked loved every one of them. They all had common trait – balance and elegance, a quiet beauty, and may be most importantly, a sense of place – terroir, as French would put it. None of the wines were in-your-face, see-how-much-muscled-fruit-i-have – all of them were rather subtle, thought provoking and requiring time to reflect upon the content of your glass.
I don’t have an explanation. How come I didn’t like any wines the first time? Was that a ”leaf day”, a ”root day” or ”generally unfavorable” day? Did my palate evolved (that one I’m quite sure is true)? As you can’t enter the same river twice, I will not be able to relive that day 5 years ago and understand my reaction at that time. But I’m glad someone somehow somewhere decided that I have to go and try Ridge wines again – and discover something really beautiful.
Here are the tasting notes for the wines I tried:
2010 Estate Chardonnay – A little edgy in unusual way, some herbal undertones, oak is unnoticeable, except back palate burn. Opens a bit cleaner later on, long finish with hint of lemon.
2009 East Bench Zinfandel (15.1% ABV) – dry, with some dry rub spices, nice nose of blackberries, unnoticeable alcohol level, very balanced, perfect fruit and acidity on the palate.
2007 Lytton Estate Syrah/Grenache (14.49% ABV) – nice fruit, touch of spice, hint of dry cherries, gentle tannins, good acidity. Perception of tannins increases going forwward.
2009 Estate Cabernet – Tremendous minerality on the nose, you can literally smell the earth. Very nice – hint of green, very Bordeaux-ish in style, restrained and balanced
2009 Buchignani Ranch Carignane – Tobacco and tar, nice bite of spice, nice simplicity. good tannins on the finish.
2006 Dynamite Hill Petite Sirah – Beautiful fruit right on top, dark fruit undertones, some cherries.
2006 Monte Bello – Beautiful fruit, perfect balance, very classic Cabernet Sauvignon blend, very long finish with tannins which are growing on you, hint of tobacco and earthiness on the palate. I’m glad this was the last wine I tasted, as the finish actually lasted at least for the next 20 minutes.
Yes, I was wrong before, and I don’t have any problems admitting it and getting over it – Ridge Vineyards makes great wines with the sense of place, and – better late than never – I’m very happy I made this discovery. Let’s raise the glass to the great discoveries of our lives! Cheers!
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