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Wine on the Go
Wine on the Go sounds too broad, and it definitely is. It is not my desire to write a 50-page essay to describe all permutations of travel options and wine drinking options.
The topic of today’s conversation is air travel, and conversely, the wine at the airport.
Generally, an airport is not the place to seek wine experiences. Of course, that depends. If you are in Europe, I guess your chances of a glass of decent wine are not zero, and having access to a nice airport lounge might improve them even further.
But traveling in the US, the airport is not a place for a decent wine – unless you like to grossly overpay for third-tier mass-produced substance. Except on those rare occasions when you come across Vino Volo.
I wrote about Vino Volo many times in the past. My problem is that I mostly travel on United out of Newark airport, and United severed ties with Vino Volo many years ago, so unless I’m on a non-United flight out of Terminal B in Newark, I don’t get to stop by Vino Volo.
As it’s been a while, let me give a little brief about Vino Volo, courtesy of Wikipedia:
“Vino Volo (Italian for “wine flight”) is a food and wine bar with a boutique wine shop. Founded by Doug Tomlinson in 2004 and bought by French travel and publishing giant Lagardère Group in 2017, the company operates in airports across the U.S. and Canada.”
Luckily, my last trip was taking me to Terminal B, and hence I had time to have a decent glass of wine at Vino Volo. Actually, even better – 3 glasses.
What I love about Vino Volo is that it is not just a wine bar – Vino Volo offers a variety of tasting flights, often including locally produced wines. It seems that New Jersey wines didn’t catch Vino Volo’s attention yet (which is a mistake, as New Jersey now makes quite a few very decent wines), so after extensive internal debate I settled for the tasting flights called Reds Around the World.
The flight included 3 wines from Argentina, Italy, and France, sufficient for a quick trip around the world. I also got a chicken pesto sandwich with a side of potato chips for a late lunch. Potato chips had cheesy popcorn mixed with them, which I ignored at first, until I tried them with wine… More below in the notes.
Here are my notes:
2024 Trapiche Oak Cask Malbec Argentina –
Inviting nose with tart cherries
Tart cherries on the palate, crisp, earthy, hint of blackberries and mint.
This was very nice with my pesto chicken sandwich, but – it was great with cheese popcorn! I don’t like popcorn and always thought that “popcorn and wine” was overrated – until I tried this popcorn with this wine! I’m now a convert 🙂
2024 Umani Ronchi Montepulciano d’Abruzzo Italy –
Open, inviting nose, a hint of fruit compote
Tart, crisp cherries, firm structure, fresh, with lots of energy.
If the previous wine was great with popcorn, this wine was simply wow!
2023 M. Chapoutier Côtes du Rhône France –
Blackberries and blueberries on the nose
Fresh blueberries on the palate, wow, round delicious!
And this wine worked very well with the sandwich – go figure…
There you are, my friends. Three wines on the go, one great experience. And the discovery of a wine and popcorn “together greatness”.
What are your favorite wine places on the go?
Wine On The Go: SF Uncork’d
My main line of work (the one which pays the bills) includes good amount of travel, which I don’t mind, as I like traveling. Well, yes, four hours delay, and especially a night of sleep on the airport floor make me reconsider this statement, but still. Different people have different approach to the travel logistics, of course. One of the sales people I worked with before would always say – “ahh, we still have an hour and a half before the flight, let’s go have dinner, I know a great place” – granted, it was in pre-9/11 days, but I believe this “style” is still used by many. I, on another hand, prefer to wait at the airport for another hour as opposed to biting nails in the standstill traffic.
Last week, coming back from San Francisco, I did exactly that – arrived to the airport with solid few hours to spare. Which translates into an opportunity to have a glass of wine – assuming, you can a place for that. Wondering through United gates section of Terminal 3, I noticed the place called SF Uncork’d. I’ve been through the same section of the airport many times before but never saw the restaurant – I believe it was simply a store selling California wine – at the airport prices, so I was never a big fan. Now, this was a restaurant sporting wine everywhere, so I had to wander in.
First glance at the menu made me pretty happy – not only were many wines listed by the glass (reasonably priced), but SF Uncork’d also offered a good number of wine flights at very reasonable prices ($10-$12), each flight consisting of 3 wines. In my typical snobbish fashion, I’ve chosen most expensive ($25) flight called Fab Cabs and consisting of Stuhlmuller, Jordan and Nickel & Nickel Tench – well, I think $25 is a reasonable price for an opportunity to taste 3 of California classics.
Care to guess which one was my favorite? Let me give you my brief tasting notes, and you will figure it out.
Generally, Jordan is one of my favorite California Cabernets. This 2012 Jordan Cabernet Sauvignon Alexander Valley had nice aroma of the fresh blackberries and mint, however on the palate it was rather hot. It had some fruit, but nothing of the signature clean Jordan style. The wine was dispensed from the preservation system (you can see it below), so I can’t tell if the issue was simply the temperature or there was something wrong with the dispenser, but the wine was definitely not what I expected.
Next I had 2013 Stuhlmuller Cabernet Sauvignon Alexander Valley, which had somewhat of a closed nose with a hint of red fruit, but on the palate this wine was singing – black currant, eucalyptus, good acidity – delicious Cabernet Sauvignon by all means. Last wine was 2013 Nickel & Nickel Tench Cabernet Sauvignon Oakville Napa Valley – and it was mostly closed both on the nose and the palate. I probably would be able to give you some nuances, but the big picture was simple – the wine was not ready to drink by all means – at least this is what I think, as I never had aged Nickel & Nickel. I don’t know if you guessed correctly, but as you can tell now, Stuhlmuller was my favorite wine. An interesting ‘sidebar” note – Stuhlmuller retails for about half of Jordan, and Nickel & Nickel is 1.5 to 2 times more expensive than Jordan. Yep, go figure…
Of course SF Uncork’d is not only about the wine – food menu looks good too. I settled on the salad and sandwich. For the salad I had Raspberry Walnut Salad (Spring Mix & Butter lettuce, fresh tomatoes, candied walnuts, crumbled Gorgonzola, fresh raspberries & a side of low fat raspberry vinaigrette) – served very nicely with fresh raspberries and raspberry vinaigrette on a side in a little jar – salad was fresh and tasty.
Yes, of course you will be paying airport prices, which means at least 30% higher than at the average retail store, but – everything has the silver lining – SF Uncork’d wine prices are still significantly less compare to Duty Free stores.
If travel will take you to the Terminal 3 in San Francisco, now you know where to get a good glass of wine, good food and good service, so Happy Travels. Cheers!
SF Uncork’d
San Francisco International Airport
Terminal 3 Next to Gate 83 (Post-Security)
San Francisco, CA 94128
Ph: (650) 821-8975
http://sfuncorkd.com/
Last Bottle Sign Up ($10 credit)
Talk-A-Vino 