Talk-A-Vino

Meritage Time!

Let’s start from the answer to the wine quiz #50, Hiding in the plain sight.

In the quiz, you were presented with the little fragment of fiction where you were supposed to find as many wine names as possible:

– Hey, Justin, see that skinny girl standing there?

-Which one, the one in the “to the rescue” t-shirt, almost naked?

– No, the other one, with the cupcake in her left hand.

– Ahh, that is Patrina, she is one of the three girls in the Bryant family, the middle sister. Let me introduce you.

– Hey, Patrina, please meet my friend Kris – he is the worshiper of Orpheus, the poet.

As you can see above, now all the wine names are bold and actually linked to the available wine info, so you can check them out. There are 14 wine names plus a little curve ball – Left Hand is the name of the beer brewing company. And I have to honestly admit that I learned that Ahh is the wine name only from thedrunkensyclist‘ s answer, so I guess that should make him a double-winner here. I’m glad to mention that this was a very successful quiz, with many answers.

And the winners are (drum roll, please)… thedrunkensyclist, who identified 15 wines and gets double-award for exceeding expectations. Both armchairsommelier and Zak get honorable mentions – they both did very well. Now, I can’t decide if I want to repeat this quiz trying to focus on European wines, or the wine names with the numbers in them – but you will be the first to know. Decision, decisions…

And now, to the interesting stuff around the web. This time around I came across a number of interesting posts by Steve Heimoff, an editor for Wine Enthusiast magazine. The first one is about the coveted subject of the wine world – terroir. In this post, called The End of Terroir, he is talking exactly about the whole concept of “terroir” and whether it is real or not. The debate is endless, but for me, terroir, or “sense of place” is something I always look for in the wine (I rarely find it for real, in most cases I only think I do) – and looking for that “sense of place” is a part of enjoying the wine, so I will continue doing that no matter what the general consensus is.

His next post is about the California wines and whether they can taste too sweet, which I’m sure they do for many of us, at least from time to time. No need for me to comment here, but it is an interesting read.

And the last one from Steve Heimoff posts relates to the restaurant experience, and the power of Sommelier’s suggestion (or not). How many times have you being in the restaurant, asking for the wine recommendation? How many times did you actually end up taking that suggestion? Did you enjoy the pairing after all or did you dislike it? Hmmm, I think this might make it for a nice poll (note to self). Anyway, read the post, I think it is interesting.

And that now leads us to the last post I want to share with you for today – this one is written by W. Blake Gray and it talks about unwanted but related part of the restaurant experience – corked wines. What do you do when you come across corked wine in the restaurant? Do you actually drink it? Enjoy it? Send it back? Again, I think this is an interesting subject for the whole blog post.

Okay, we are done here. The glass is empty. But another pour is on the way. Until the next time – cheers!