Wine event of the day: On Thur., Oct. 16 (wait, that's tonight!) Andrew Lampasone's Wine Watch of Fort Lauderdale and Bogart's Bar & Grille will host a wine dinner benefiting the Foundation of Jimmy Mancbach, the late fine wine guru for Southern Wine & Spirits. Purpose is to create scholarships to let young South Florida wine professionals study and work in California wine country.
There'll be a showing of the wine movie Sideways. Dinner features arctic char and osso buco, and you'll get to try the Hitching Post Pinot Noir featured in the movie. It's $150 each. Call 954-523-9463
Fred's Wine Column
For rieslings, practice makes perfect
There are those who say riesling is the world's noblest grape: infinite in variety, versatile in food pairings, inspiring in its subtlety, so pure that winemakers seldom blend it with other grapes or age it in wood barrels.
Most of those people, unfortunately, are not Americans.
We don't understand riesling. Its labels are hard to read, its sweetness-dryness rules are hard to comprehend. We've heard it's sweet, and that scares us. We're not sure what foods it goes with.
Well, the best way to get past this is to practice. Practice drinking riesling. See which you like, which you don't. (It's not as if the homework is unpleasant.)
Here's an oversimplified but workable rule about sweetness to get started: The average table wine has an alcohol level of about 12 per cent. That's the level you reach in fermentation when the yeast has turned all the grape sugars into alcohol.
• If a wine has less than 12 percent alcohol, there are some sugars remaining, and the wine will taste sweet. Sweet rieslings can be 11 percent, 9 percent, sometimes even 6 percent alcohol.
• If a wine has more than 12 percent alcohol, it will taste dry. Some dry rieslings reach 13.5 percent alcohol and more. These, not surprisingly, are powerful wines.
I've listed the alcohol levels in the tasting notes below, but you can find them on the labels.
Here are some wine-food pairings for Rieslings:
• Sweet rieslings go well with spicy foods. The sweetness seems to sooth the palate for the next fiery bite. So they're great with Caribbean, Chinese, Thai, even Cajun dishes.
• Dry rieslings go well with creamy cheeses, chicken and fish with creamy sauces, grilled seafood, roast pork, risottos.
So get out there and practice. (This will be on the test.)
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
• 2007 Pacific Rim Wallula Vineyard Riesling (pictured at right), Horse Heaven Hills, Columbia Valley, Wash. (13 percent alcohol): dry, full-bodied, smooth and crisp, with hints of ripe peaches and cloves; $20.
• 2005 J. Lohr White Riesling, Monterey County (11.5 percent alcohol): lightly off-dry; white peaches; crisp and fruity; $12.
RECOMMENDED
• 2008 Kendall Jackson Riesling, Vintner's Reserve, California (13 per cent alcohol): White grapefruit flavors, crisp, dry; $14.
• 2007 Pacific Rim Solstice Vineyard Riesling, Yakima Valley, Wash. (13.5 percent alcohol): ripe pears, tart limes; full body, lively crispness; $32.
• 2007 Robert Mondavi Riesling, Private Selection, Monterey (12.5 per cent alcohol): floral aroma, white peach flavors; $11.
• 2007 Chateau Ste. Michelle Riesling, Columbia Valley, Wash. (12 percent alcohol): tart lemon-lime flavors; crisp and dry; $13.
• 2005 Chateau Ste. Michelle "Indian Wells'' Riesling, Columbia Valley, Wash. (13 percent): aromas and flavors of ripe peaches; light and crisp; $15.
• 2006 Schmitt Söhne Riesling, Mosel-Saar-Ruwer, Germany (9 percent alcohol): aromas and flavors of ripe, golden apples and minerals; sweet and soft; $9.
• 2006 Thomas Schmitt Riesling Private Selection, Mosel-Saar-Ruwer, Germany (12 percent alcohol): tart lemon flavors; crisp, lean; $14.
• 2006 Blue Nun Winemaker's Passion Riesling, Germany, H. Sichel Söhne (10.5 percent alcohol): sweet and soft, with peach and pineapple flavors; $9.
News of the weird in wine
* Wine and politics: A small, organic winery in Chile finds itself caught between U.S. Dems and GOPs because it makes a wine called Palin Syrah. Republicans are proudly buying bottles; Dems are buying them, crossing out her name and writing in the name of Obama.
* Wine and the White House: That Chilean wine won't be served in the White House. It pours only U.S. wines, says Daniel Shanks, whose official title is "usher of food and beverage" there.
* Wine and the environment: Chile's Vina Errazuriz is unveiling a wine bottle that's 12 percent lighter than regular bottles. Doesn't say if it breaks more easily.
* Wine and food flavors: The usual list of perceived tastes -- sweet, salty, tart and so on -- is far too narrow, a top European chef says. He would add such new "flavors" as fat and CO2 to the list. Imagine what he can do for wine.
California winemaker creates a wine in Jimmy's name
"Jimmy Mancbach has the best job in America,” I wrote in a 2004 story about him. He flew to California wine country several times a year to find and bring back its very best wines, as director of fine wine for Southern Wine & Spirits.
Jimmy died last year of diabetes complications. His friends have set up a scholarship fund in his name to enable one young wine student each year to travel to wine country and work with the pros.
Now top Napa winemaker Tony Soter has created a wine in Jimmy’s name (literally: it’s the 2005 Jimmy Red Blend Napa Magnum), selling at about $100 per double bottle. Andy Lampasone, for one, has it at his WineWatch in Fort Lauderdale.
In his e-mail newsletter, Lampasone writes: “This unique, limited edition wine was specially crafted by Winemaker Tony Soter to celebrate Jimmy Mancbach's remarkable life and the significant contributions he made to the contemporary American wine scene. The wine is a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Malbec and Merlot all sourced from some of the finest vineyards in Napa Valley. Just 450 cases were bottled all in Magnum format.”
French warm up to American style
FRED'S WINE COLUMN
It used to be that when France's respected Burgundy wine growers had an especially hot
year with ripe grapes and fat wines, they would refer to it as a "California harvest."
They didn't mean it as a compliment. They saw California chardonnays and pinot noirs as
flabby "fruit bombs'' with little elegance and less ability to age.
Then they discovered how popular California wines were -- part of a bigger, richer,
fruitier "international style'' that customers loved.
Today, while no one will claim the French have come all the way over, they do speak
more respectfully of warm vintages. They make richer, fuller wines, sometimes topping out
at 13 percent alcohol instead of the typical 12.5 percent, with a bit more fruit and less
acid.
The year 2005 was like that -- warm and dry, with an early harvest producing grapes with
thick skins for extra color and flavor and ripe flesh for more grape sugar. It reminded
growers a bit of 2003, one of the hottest, ripest vintages in years.
Putting a fine point on it, Faiveley announced that 2005 matches its established house
style: "intense, powerful but lean, and built to last."
Wine Spectator magazine loves the vintage, giving it a rating of 95 to 100 points.
‘‘The quality of the 2005 vintage for red Burgundy is stupendous," it wrote.
Founded in 1825 in the heart of the Nuits-Saint-Georges district, Domaine Faiveley has
flourished under seven generations of Faiveleys, expanding into the Côte de Beaune and
Côte Chalonnaise. It's big for a Burgundy house, with 296 acres producing 80 percent of
its wines. (The balance are from long-term contracts with private growers.) It has two
wineries, one in Mercurey, one in Nuits-Saint-Georges.
The wines give excellent value for their prices, which are pretty good compared to many
top Burgundies.
Faiveley says its red wines go with pheasant, hare, duck and quail; its whites with
fish en papillote or vol-au-vent in puff pastry. This could be true. But when's the last
time you had that?
I like its reds with grilled meats, roast chicken and hard cheeses. As for its whites --
one of the finest taste matches in the world is that all-American favorite, chicken pot
pie.
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
• 2005 Domaine Faiveley Nuits-Saint-Georges, (pinot noir) AOC: hint of oak, aromas of
black cherries and cloves; smooth and silky; long finish; $59.
• 2005 Domaine Faiveley Montagny, "Domaine de la Croix Jacquelet," (chardonnay) AOC:
bright, lean and crisp, with pineapple and citrus flavors: $25.
RECOMMENDED
• 2005 Domaine Faiveley Mercurey Premier Cru, "Clos des Myglands," (pinot noir) AOC:
aromas and flavors of tart cherries and anise; ripe tannins; rich and smooth; $40.
• 2005 Domaine Faiveley Bourgogne Chardonnay, "Georges Faiveley," (chardonnay) AOC:
hint of oak; aromas and flavors of vanilla, white peaches and citrus; rich and soft; $20.
• 2005 Domaine Faiveley Mercurey, "Clos Rochette," (chardonnay) AOC: rich, smooth and
ripe, with tart pineapple aromas and flavors; $30.
• 2005 Domaine Faiveley Mercurey, "Domaine de la Criox Jacquelet," (pinot noir) AOC:
black cherries and pepper; ripe tannins; long finish; $23.
What's hot? Rose wine. Here's one to try
I just tasted a new rose wine that I have to tell you about.
Now, just in case you’ve been under a rock for the past 10 years, I should point out that rose wines, pink wines are no longer outré. They’re not only cool, but seriously cool. These aren’t the old sickly sweet blush wines. These are crisp, bone-dry, packed-with-flavor wines.
The new one is by Bonterra, the organic winery, with grapes from northern Mendocino County. It’s 54 percent sangiovese, 24 percent zinfandel and 22 percent Grenache. It’s dry, very lively and spicy, with flavors of tart strawberries and red raspberries.
Most wine shops should have it, and it’s only $14.
You can sip it by itself or serve it with picnics, chicken salad, tuna salad, fruit salad, all kinds of sandwiches, even ham. Good stuff.
(The above is from my wine talk on Linda Gassenheimer's Food News & Views program on Joe Cooper's Topical Currents program on WLRN (FM-91.3) from 1:30 p.m. to 2 p.m. today, Thursday, Aug. 21, 2008. Tune in!)
A do-it-yourself California Bottle Shock tour
If you’ve seen the new movie Bottle Shock, a Hollywood film about the famous Paris Wine Tasting of 1976 that put California on the world wine map, here’s a way to tour the locations where it was filmed.
The California Travel and Tourism Commission has put together a Website with a self-guided tour of such locations as Chateau Montelena, where the winning wine was made, the real restaurant that played the role of the Aqua Vira in the movie, even balloon rides and massages.
It’s a guide, not a tour. You have to make all the reservations yourself, including the almost-impossible-to-get-into restaurant French Laundry.
If you go, let me know how you make out.
Another exceptional year in Napa
California growers just starting the harvest are crowing about an "exceptional" year.
I know, I know. Don't they always.
But this time they say they mean it.
Time to hurry to see California's grape harvest
If you’re thinking of visiting California wine country for this year’s harvest, you’d better hurry It’s already started – the earliest in at least 25 years. Blame it on global warming.
Actually, it’ll extend into October, so you have a little time left.
It’s a heady experience. You can drive up California Route 12 in Sonoma or 29 in Napa, pull over almost anywhere and literally smell the luscious, ripe grapes all around you.
But you have to get up early. Temperatures can swing from 50 degrees in the Pacific fog of the mornings to 100 degrees in full sun at noon. Pickers start at 4 a.m., stop when it gets too hot.
And now you can extend your trip into Mendocino County, north of Napa and Sonoma, if you listen to one grower. He says global warming will soon make his county a better place to grow grapes.
