Treble Journey: On The Finishing Line, #293 – #297
300. Getting closer and closer. It is amazing what dedication and focus can do – fine, yes, we learned that in school, the trick is to practice that “dedication and focus” thing.
When I restarted this crazy “grape quest” in May of 2010, I had no idea that I will be able to move from about 210 grapes to almost 300 in 7 month. But it’s actually happening – after this report, I will be 3 grapes away from 300. And those 3 additional wines (grapes) are simply waiting for its moment, quietly resting in the cellar. Looking back, yes, I had to use some clones, but in any case I was able to advance here without use of a secret weapon, the wine with 152 grape varieties in it!
Last big group of new grapes was largely based on varieties from Georgia. This latest group consists of 3 grapes from Italy, one from Hungary and one from Israel. Another interesting detail is that 4 out of 5 are part of the main application table – I really hope that main table will be complete one day!
So the new grapes are:
Schiava – 2009 Elena Walch Schiava Alto Adige DOC, Italy – nice soft red wine, medium body, has a little gaminess.
Ruche – 2005 La Mondianese Ruche di Castagnole Monferrato DOC, Italy – Nice, gamey wine, very earthy and well balanced.
Erbaluce – 2008 La Torrazza Erbaluce di Caluso DOC, Italy – very acidic while cold, and showing some fruit when warms up, but not very distinguishable overall
Portugieser – 2008 Gere Villany Portugieser, Hungary – Again, gamey wine, very tight initially. Opened up after two days, became quite drinkable. Will beneft from a few years in the cellar.
Emerald Riesling – 2009 Teperberg Terra Emerald Riesling, Israel. It is not the fiurst time I write about Teperberg wines. This Emerald Riesling was a bit sharp on the edges and a bit dryer than you would expect from “semi-dry white wine”, but it was drinkable nevertheless.
The Treble Journey is nearing it’s finishing line. Will there be a Quattro Journey? Well, you will be the first to know…
Daily Glass: Grolleau, A Treat For The Palate
Previously, we discussed how expectations affect the taste of wine (you can read about it here and here). Sometimes, it is probably better to have no expectations at all! You don’t get upset, and you don’t get too excited if you simply have no expectations at all and just take life events one by one as they come up – oops, let’s stop this philosophical spur, I might not dig out of that hole or get beaten up.
Let’s talk about wine, for which I had no expectations whatsoever. On the Treble Journey road, you come across many different wines. Some of them make you regret you ever touched the bottle, and some of them make you feel really happy you did. This wine, Le Cousin Rouge from Anjou region in France, made out of the grape called Grolleau, definitely belongs to the second category.
The reason? This wine is unique and different. Not because it is bio-dynamic wine – this is great, but not enough. It is simply different from majority of the wines I ever had, and has very unusual flavor profile. In one of the earlier posts, I called the wine I had a liquid steak ( and I said it was the most unusual). I didn’t know that the “unusual” wine will have competition – and it does, as I would like to call this Grolleau wine a liquid salami. Yes, you read it correctly. It has such a balance of acidity, earthiness and pungent feeling it leaves on the palate that I can only compare it with nice Italian salami. You don’t have to believe me – just find this bottle of wine, try it and let me know what do you think.
And of course the great thing is that I’m inching forward towards that 300 number, which gets closer and closer. I’m glad to make such discoveries along my Treble Journey – and I wish to your palate many happy experiences!
Messa, Chef Restaurant
Once again, I would like to state the obvious – it is great to have friends. I’m in Israel again, and thanks to my dear friend Kfir, the culinary journey continues (I already wrote about few of my favorite places in Tel-Aviv, and you can read about it here and here). The new discovery – Messa, Chef Restaurant in Tel-Aviv.
Few years ago, I was quite lucky to visit (well, the right word is “to experience”) restaurant called Orca in Tel-Aviv ( lucky simply because the place is now closed – and it was on the list of 100 best restaurants in the world). This might be a bit far fetching, but Messa reminded me of that Orca visit. May be in ambiance, may be in food presentation and quality, may be in expectations – but I found some resemblance between the two.
For wine, we decided to go with Judean Hills Har’El Syrah 2008 from CLOS de GAT, one of the boutique Israeli wineries (it also represented very good value at about $55 on the wine list). This wine was round and polished, with hint of spices, leather and dark red fruit, complemented by soft tannins.
Messa doesn’t offer tasting menu, however, a lot of appetizers and main dishes are offered in small and large sizes, which essentially allows to create a tasting menu – this is what we decided to do. We had three different appetizers – Purple Calamari, Veal Sweetbreads and Foie Gras, out of which the Foie Gras had the best balance of flavors:
Purple Calamari with lemon cream, eel and goose liver
Veal Sweetbreads with sweet potato tortellini, sunchoke cream and pearl onions
Foie Gras
For the main dishes we decided on Black Truffle Ravioli, Seafood Couscous in Crab Lemon Broth and Mushroom and Goat Cheese Risotto. The first two dishes listed Lemon among the ingredients – and it was A LOT of lemon in those dishes. To be more precise, it was too much of it, so the winner of the entree taste contest was Mushroom and Goat Cheese Risotto, which had amazing earthy and heart warming taste profile. And of course, with the pictures:
Black Truffle Ravioli
Seafood Couscous in Lemon Crab and Thyme Broth
Risotto with Mushrooms and Goat Cheese
Dessert? Of course there was dessert – your waistline doesn’t take priority when you in a restaurant like this. We ordered one dessert, Valrhona Chocolate Delight, and got a nice surprise in a form of Strawberry Banana Crumble desert “on the house”. There was no competition here – both were great:
Valrhona Chocolate Delight
Strawberry Banana Crumble
Israel is growing at tremendous pace as a country, and its culinary landscape is getting better and better all the time. I wish all of us many pleasant discoveries along this culinary journey…
Looking For Substance in Cristal
I had an opportunity to try few of Louis Roederer Champagnes last weekend (to be politically correct, the first was California Sparkling Wine, not a Champagne). It was an interesting experience, as I was able to compare three of the well known sparkling wines, side by side.
California version, Roederer Estate Anderson Valley Brut, was nice and refreshing, with some hints of an apple and balanced acidity. The next wine, Louis Roedered Brut Premier, had more pronounced acidity and probably a touch smaller bubbles. However, I believe that in the blind tasting, it would be extremely difficult to distinguish between the two. Both wines were also priced accordingly to their categories ( California Sparkling and Classic Champagne), at under $20 and about $35, respectively.
These two wines served as a very good prelude to the main point of the tasting – the famed Cristal Champagne. Cristal was created in the 1876, specially for the Russian Tsar Alexander II, who was afraid of possible assassination – so the bottle was made clear, with the flat bottom and therefore required reinforced crystal glass – hence the name Cristal (you can read more here). Of course it was not the first time when the wines were created, labeled and packaged for the special reasons or persons (and of course commanded much higher price) – most recent example was described by Dr. Vino in his Cuvee 88888888 post, talking about special Bordeaux production for China market. While I didn’t have a chance to try that Chateau Lafite-Rothschild masterpiece, I was able to try Cristal.
The wine I tasted was Cristal 2002, vintage Champagne. It was second time for me trying Cristal – I failed to recognize the value for the first time, and was really hoping that trying this wine as part of the tasting flight would help to put things in prospective. Yes, the wine was more interesting than the regular Brut non-vintage – it had a hint of yeast and fresh bread on the nose, and it was more creamy than the non-vintage version. However, this was still not enough to understand the value of this champagne, priced at almost six times the cost of non-vintage version ($196, minimum state-allowed price in Connecticut).
The magic didn’t work this time again – and I will keep trying, but for now, can I please have a glass of Krug…
Pairing Wine and Weather
What do you drink when snow is couple feet high outside? Of course hot tea or coffee are always appropriate, but having a cup of hot wine wouldn’t be bad either.
There are different names for the “hot wine” – if you look into the Wikipedia, you will see a number of different names coming from the different places, all signifying the same “hot wine” – most popular terms I believe are “mulled wine” (Brittish), Glühwein (German) and Glögg (Scandinavian). Under any name, the basic premise is basically the same. First you take red wine. Any red wine will do – I’m sure that it would be bad use for cult Cabernet, so you need something simpler. It is also possible to find the wine which is already prepared to be used in the hot wine, like the one I used today. It can be called “spiced wine”, like this one from Williamsburg Winery.
The next step is to add spices – allspice, cloves, cinnamon stick, orange peel, and set the wine to heat up. You can use any appropriate vessel for that – I personally use a special vessel typically used to make Turkish coffee. Also, if the wine you are using is not sweet at all, you might consider adding some sugar, to make it more pleasant.
The technology is simple – you add spices to the wine and start heating it up. The trick is to avoid boiling of the wine and take it off before boiling starts. 
You can also add a shot of brandy or rum – if you feel like it. Take it off before the wine boils and … voila! You have a delicious cup of warm beverage, and life is much better already…
Experiencing Wines, Self-Serving Style
Las Vegas is undoubtedly a culinary paradise. At least when it comes to food. As far as wines are concerned, I wouldn’t fair it so highly. No, this is not about the selection. Of course there are plenty good bottles to chose from at any restaurants. However, when asked to pay 4-5 times markup over retail, water sounds as a very appealing option.
Well, there are some exceptions, of course. My favorite place in Las Vegas to get reasonably priced glass of wine is called Fortuna Wine and Coffee bar, and it is located in the lobby of Hilton hotel, across from registration desk. What is so special about this place? Until my last visit this week, my favorite part was their “50% off bin”, where one could find decent bottle of wine at practically a retail price, if not less.
This time I found that the place evolved even further – you can chose and pour the wine yourself. Ok, let’s clarify that. No, I’m not talking about those cheesy machines (self-serving tanks) Dr. V wrote about before, where you can dispense by yourself god-knows-what-kind-of-liquid. At Fortuna you will wind top of the line wine dispensers, where wine is poured out of different bottles, in the amount you want!
The way it woks is that you buy a special card to operate the machine, insert it into a designated slot and then you can chose 1, 3 or 5 oz pour. With the prices like $1.75 for 1 oz, it beats wine tasting at many wineries, hands down.
Next time you are in Vegas – stop by the Fortuna and experience self-serving wines for yourself – you will not regret!
Vino Volo: Great Wines On The Go
Did you have any good wine at the airport lately? I hope you have, because I did. No, I didn’t need to sneak anything past security or convince myself that no name Merlot for $15/glass is great wine and great value. Your gateway to the good wine experience at the airport is called Vino Volo, and I recommend that you will look them up next time you are in the airport and in the mood for a good glass of wine.
Great thing about Vino Volo (actually, there are multiple) is that they have good wine selection and good prices, and you can also buy a bottle if you like something. On top of that is my favorite feature – wine tasting flights, opportunity to experience and learn. At any given moment they offer 4-5 different wine tasting flights, with selection slanted towards local wines – as much as possible, of course. So if you are in California, you should expect to find more Californian wines, and if you are in Portland, Oregon – you will find more wines from Oregon and Washington.
I stopped by Vino Volo in Oakland airport in California, and selected tasting flight of 3 California Cabernets (there were 6 different tasting flights available). I think spending $19 to try 3 different California Cabernets ranging from $48 to $87 per bottle represents a very good value.
All three wines were good and solid – no, they were not amazing, but they were good. Bremer Family Howell Mountain Cabernet Sauvignon 2005 was the best of tasting – it had all the classic cedar and blackberry aromas, and had good balanced tannins and acidity. Blackbird Vineyards Contrarian 2007, which is a Bordeaux blend of Cabernet Franc and Merlot, was not ready to drink. It was way to aggressive on the palate and will probably open up in another 5 years. And Flora Springs Trilogy 2007 had all the great aromatics, but unfortunately was disappearing in the mouth leaving you with the impression that something is missing (needed more structure). I might be totally wrong on this wine, however, as it might be simply too young – well, the time will tell. And last note I want to make here – out of curiosity, I wanted to check how bad Vino Volo’s prices are. I checked prices on the wine-searcher, and happy to report that all the prices were within $5 range from the best price which can be found on the wine-searcher (and it doesn’t include shipping), plus Bremer Family is available only from the winery so it is also a great find.
I can only thank folks at Vino Volo for their great service to all the wine lovers – and next time you are in the airport, remember – you CAN find good wine there…
First [Wine] Discovery of 2011 – Non-Vintage Champagne Can Age (and Improve!)
I like Champagne. I think this is a true statement. However, I wouldn’t say that I love Champagne. What do I mean? Simply put, for my personal taste, there is not much going in Champagne glass. Wine (which I love), typically has a lot happening in the glass – fruits, tannins and acidity, long lasting finish, all changing in a glass as wine breathes, all changes in the bottle over the few days as it was opened. Champagne, once in the glass, can only lose its bubbles and freshness, but will not challenge your palate after a while.
Well, to be completely honest, there are Champagnes which I love. Until this New Year day, I was under impression that those were only vintage champagnes, which can become alive in the glass. This New Year day, we happened to open a bottle of G.H Mumm Carte Classique, which was laying at the bottom of the wine cabinet for about four years. We opened that bottle and … it was amazing! It had all the traits of the vintage champagne. Deep golden color, extensive aromas of yeast and fresh bread, full body – everything which I like in Champagne was there. The plan was to compare classic Mumm Champagne with Mumm California sparkling version, Mumm Napa Brut Prestige. Mumm Napa is very good… by itself, but it paled next to the aged G.H Mumm. I’m glad to start New Year with such a great discovery – and hope for many more.
Just I’m writing this, I realized – all the good things have their dark side. Now I need more cellar space and more time – to age my Champagnes appropriately…
Happy New Year! Lots of Good Experiences, Good Memories, and Good Wine!
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