In spite of what you may have heard, wine lovers are not perfect. We need New Years resolutions too. Here are mine:
· I will lose 30 pounds (OK, that’s out of the way).
· I will taste every wine I come across that I’ve never heard of before. This is a very rewarding resolution. In 2008 I learned about grillo, a delightful, light, crisp wine from Sicily that tastes a little like green tea. Couple of years ago I tasted a cabernet sauvignon allegedly made in Cuba. One out of two isn’t bad.
· I will try wines from every new wine area I learn about. Ever have a syrah from British Columbia? It’s by Mission Hill, and it tastes of black plums, tobacco, black pepper and red meat. Yes, all at once.
· Speaking of that, I will adopt the philosophy of illegitimati non carborundum (look it up; they won’t let me say it here in English) when people get on my case about my enthusiastic wine descriptions. It’s my hobby. As Billy Joel would say, I have been a fool for lesser things.
· In hard economic times, I will become relentless in pursuit of really nice wines under $10. Last year’s winner was the 2007 Bodega Norton Malbec from Mendoza, Argentina: chocolate-cherry aromas and flavors; soft, ripe and mellow; $9.
· I will take with a grain of salt those medical studies that say wine prevents heart attack, stroke, glaucoma, diabetes, Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer’s. I will take comfort that those researchers are raising some of the healthiest mice on the planet.
· I will taste an English wine, if I can find one (and work up my courage). The British press says that, due to global warming, there are more than 200 wineries today in the sceptered isle. And if English wines are as good as English food, well….
· Oh, don’t write in. There’s nothing I love more than strawberries with clotted cream. (I just wonder how they clot it.)
· Even though Chateau Mouton Rothschild’s price has plummeted by half to less than $600 a bottle, I will not urge a federal bailout of the wine industry.
· I will try not to lose my taste for expensive wines. I will try to cultivate richer friends. (If they have a boat, so much the better.)
Sparkling wine is for celebration
Hooray for sparkling wine. It’s not champagne, and it doesn’t pretend to be. But it’s the same idea -- usually chardonnay and/or pinot noir still wines allowed to re-ferment in the bottle to create those bubbles that make it the beverage of celebration. Usually at a lesser price than champagne.
Sparkling wine is great as an aperitif, or for toasting, especially during the
holidays. Top chefs have also created all-champagne dinners in which different sparkling wines are served with each course.
It’s easy. See what it says on the bottle. If your sparkling wine is a “blanc de
blanc,” it made entirely from white grapes, probably chardonnay. This bubbly is light and frothy, great for toasting, hors d’oeuvres and fish or light chicken dishes.
If the sparkling wine is a prosecco, it's an Italian bubbly made from the grape of the same name. It usually has softer bubbles than other sparkling wines, and it can be dry or slightly sweet.
If the label says “brut,” the bubbly is probably a blend of chardonnay and pinot noir. Yes, pinot noir is a red grape, but the juice is white even in red grapes. It’s just a matter of separating the juice from the skins as soon as the grapes are crushed. Brut bubblies are good for mid-range dishes -- creamy fish and chicken dishes, casseroles and so on.
And if the label says “blanc de noir,” it means the sparkling wine is entirely from red
grapes like pinot noir. There are bubbly lovers who would drink this with prime rib or a
charcoal-grilled steak. Or other red-meat dishes. This can be a bit of a stretch: Try it
and see if you like it.
Rosé sparkling wines have just enough red wine in them to turn that lovely
salmon-to-cherry color, and have tiny hints of tannin from those red grapes. When made
dry, these are great with steaks, or even fruit desserts. If made sweet, they’ll match the
deepest chocolate dessert.
So if you’re a real purist, you could drink nothing but sparkling wine for the rest of
your life. As I was saying, Hooray for sparkling wine.
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
• Nonvintage Piper Sonoma Select Cuvée Brut, Sonoma County: crisp and rich and firm,
with lemon/lime flavors; $14.
• Nonvintage J Brut Rosé, Russian River Valley: crisp and full-bodied, with rich red
berry flavors; $40.
RECOMMENDED
• Nonvintage Santa Margherita Prosecco Brut, Valdobbiadene, Italy: frothy, mineral
flavors; $22.
• Nonvintage Piper Sonoma Blanc de Noir Sonoma County: rich, red berry flavors; $17.
• Nonvintage Codorníu Cava, Sant Sadurni d'Anoia, Spain: firm body, green-apple
flavors; $11.
• Nonvintage Jacobs Creek Chardonnay/Pinot Noir Brut Cuvée, Barossa Valley, Australia:
full-bodied and rich, pineapple flavors; $12.
• Nonvintage Domaine Ste. Michelle Blanc de Noir Columbia Valley Sparkling Wine,
Washington: tart melon flavors, crisp; $13.
• Nonvintage yellow Tail Sparkling Wine, Australia: lighty sweet, soft, white peaches;
$10.
• Nonvintage Freixenet Cordon Negro Brut, Sant Sadurni d'Anoia, Spain: light and crisp,
with citrus flavors; $11.
• Nonvintage Domaine Ste. Michelle Extra Dry, Columbia Valley Sparkling Wine,
Washington: lemon-lime flavors, lightly sweet; $13.
• Nonvintage Korbel Natural Russian River Valley, Sonoma: crisp, light, red berry
flavors; $18.
• Nonvintage Mumm Napa Blanc de Noir, Napa Valley: frothy, light, apricot flavors; $21.
• Nonvintage Schramsberg Blanc de Blanc, North Coast, Calif.: lemon meringue flavors,
rich; $37.
Wines for top chefs' holiday fare
So you've been watching TV cooking shows and perusing websites all year, and you're gearing up to try one of their fancy dishes for Christmas or Hanukkah. But you realize those chefs didn't mention what wines go well with their masterpieces.
I've got you covered. Happy holidays!
APPETIZERS
Martha Stewart's mini-Asian crab cakes with wasabi www.marthastewart.com
• 2005 J. Lohr White Riesling, Monterey County: off-dry; white peaches; crisp and fruity; $12.
Daisy Martinez's Cuban black bean soup www.daisycooks.com
• 2007 Martin Codax Albariño, Rias Baixas: ripe pears and melons; rich and creamy; $15.
ITALIAN SEAFOOD
Lidia Bastianich's jumbo shrimp Buzara style www.lidiasitaly.com
• 2006 Placido Pinot Grigio delle Venezie, IGT: light, lively, crisp; $10.
VEGETARIAN
Giada de Laurentiis' Gorgonzola Porcini Risotto www.foodnetwork.com
• 2003 Rutz Cellars Pinot Noir, Sonoma Cuvée: cinnamon and tart cherries,
smooth; $17.
Beverly Lynne Bennett's Moroccan vegetable stew www.veganchef.com
• 2007 Murphy-Goode ‘‘The Fumé'' Sauvignon Blanc, Alexander Valley: rich, ripe and complex, with tropical fruit; tart finish; $12.
HOLIDAY ENTREES
Martha Stewart's roast goose with wild rice www.marthastewart.com
• 2004 Sartoni di Varona Amarone delle Valpolicella: dark cherries and dark chocolate; $34.
Three Guys From Miami's lechon asado (icuban.com).
• 2003 Marquis de Riscal Reserva Rioja, Spain: tart plums and cinnamon; $17.
Paul Prudhomme's turducken (chicken inside a duck inside a turkey; www.chefpaul.com
• 2006 Columbia Crest ‘‘Two Vines'' Gewürztraminer, Columbia Valley, Washington: crisp, lightly sweet lychee flavors; $8.
Christopher Kimball's roast beef loin with mushroom-onion stuffing www.cooksillustrated.com
• 2005 Antinori Tignanello, Tuscany IGT: mulberries and mocha; ripe, powerful, smooth; $90.
Linda Gassenheimer's kosher brisket with latkes www.dinnerinminutes.com
• 2003 Barons Edmond & Benjamin de Rothschild Haut Medoc Bordeaux (kosher): cassis and black coffee aromas and flavors; $31.
CHRISTMAS COMFORT
Rachael Ray's turkey and stuffing meatloaf www.rachaelrayshow.com
• 2006 Black Swan Shiraz, Australia: soft, ripe, black plum flavors; $11.
DESSERT
Ming Tsai's Tahitian vanilla crème brûlée www.mingspantry.com
• 2006 Mission Hills Five Vineyards Riesling Ice Wine, VQA British
Columbia: very sweet, soft; candied orange peel; $20 per one-quarter bottle.
Sandy Moyers' dark Christmas fruit cake www.bellaonline.com
• 2006 M. Chapoutier Banyuls dessert wine (red grenache): red raspberry and chocolate flavors; moderately sweet; $30.
Sherry's a wine for all seasons
Here’s my rant about sherry from last week’s WLRN food & dining show:
Poor sherry. It’s the most misunderstood, misused wine in the world.
If you ever watch a British drawing room comedy, or the antics of Niles and Frasier Crane, you see them picking a bottle off the shelf and pouring it into a thimble-sized glass. Wrong and wrong.
Sherry is wine; when it’s opened, you have to keep it in the refrigerator.
And sherry has marvelous aromas; to properly swirl and sniff, you should pour it into a regular white wine glass.
But when you become familiar with sherry, it’s a marvelous drink. It comes in several styles, so it can be served as everything from an aperitif to a dinner wine to a dessert wine. Here are some of the tyles.
· Fino sherry: The lightest, driest sherry, made from the palomino grape, with a delicate, nutty flavor. In Spain, it’s the standard aperitif wine.
· Oloroso sherry: It’s fuller in body and richer, but still totally dry, with walnut flavors. A good wine with dinner. It’s especially good with lamb. Oh, I have some nice memories.
· Sweet sherries: For these they take oloroso sherry and add various amounts of wine from the Pedro Ximinez grape, which is picked, then laid out on mats in the sun to turn almost into raisins, raising its sugar content. Examples are Harvey’s Bristol Cream, Croft’s Cream Sherry and Old East India Sherry. These are the sherries I would drink with cookies, fruit tarts and so on.
· Super sweet sherries: The sweetest sherries are made from the Pedro Ximinez and/or Moscatel grapes, which are also picked, laid on straw mats in the sun, and dried almost into raisins to concentrate their sugars before fermenting. These are so thick and sweet their favorite use is to be poured over really top-quality vanilla ice cream. Fabulous.
Sauvignon blanc is fun to play with
Winemakers love to play with sauvignon blanc. First, there's no consensus about how it should taste -- it can range from feline to flinty to gooseberries and ripe pineapples. Second, it takes readily to such experimentation, its flavors changing noticeably with the addition of less than 1 percent of another grape.
This makes it hard for wine fans to know what to expect. In many cases the only way to tell is to buy a bottle, open it and taste it.
Not that that's a hardship.
Here's some of what's going on:
At Robert Pecota Winery and many others in California, winemakers seek a style that centers on crispness and purity of fruit. They ferment the grapes at cool temperatures in stainless steel tanks, they avoid oak-barrel aging and the secondary (malolactic) fermentation that softens many chardonnays, they bottle it early to preserve the fruit. It's a great style to go with food.
Other wineries seek a richer, rounder, riper, more complex style of sauvignon blanc. Murphy-Goode winery, in Sonoma County's Alexander Valley, uses 80 percent regular sauvignon blanc grapes but adds 20 percent of a different clone of sauvignon blanc called sauvignon musqué -- for its added richness and citrus flavors. It ferments 72 percent of the grapes in French oak barrels and puts 9 percent of the wine through malolactic fermentation, seeking richness. It makes a great wine for sipping alone, as an aperitif.
Kendall-Jackson Estate Vineyards pulls out all the stops, seeking richness and complexity using grapes from Lake, Mendocino and Sonoma counties, blending in small
proportions of semillon, viognier and muscat canelli, fermenting 8 percent of the grapes in new oak barrels. This, too, is great as an aperitif.
Outside the United States, still other experiments are going on with sauvignon
blanc. Henry's Drive Vignerons in Australia blends its sauvignon blanc with chardonnay and verdelho – a practice seldom seen in America -- producing a wine that is particularly rich and ripe.
So, class, here's your homework assignment: Try every sauvignon blanc you can get your hands on, take notes and figure out which style you like best. It's a free country.
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
• 2007 Robert Pecota
Winery Sauvignon Blanc
‘‘L'Artist'' Loney Vineyard,
Napa Valley: crisp and lean,
with flavors of white grape-
fruit, green apple and miner-
als; $16.
• 2007 Kendall-Jack-
son Vintner's Reserve Sau-
vignon Blanc, Calif. (93 per-
cent sauvignon blanc, 4.4
percent semillon, 0.3 percent
viognier, 0.3 percent muscat
canelli): a complex blend of
ripe tropical fruit, from man-
gos to oranges, with crisp
white grapefruit; $11.
RECOMMENDED
• 2007 Patianna Vine-
yards Sauvignon Blanc,
Mendocino County: aromas
and flavors of ripe peaches
with the crispness of limes
and white grapefruit; $18.
• 2007 Murphy-Goode
‘‘The Fumé'' Sauvignon
Blanc, Alexander Valley:
rich, ripe and complex, with
ripe tropical fruit flavors and
a tart finish; $12.
• Pillar Box White
Wine, Henry's Drive Vigne-
rons, Padthaway and Ade-
laide Hills, Australia (56 per-
cent chardonnay, 30 percent
sauvignon blanc, 14 percent
verdelho): soft and ripe, with
aromas of oranges and man-
gos; $12.
• 2007 Fortress Vine-
yards Sauvignon Blanc,
Red Hills Lake County: pow-
erful and dry, rich and miner-
ally; $15.
• 2007 Bohemian High-
way Sauvignon Blanc, Cali-
fornia: crisp, herbaceous,
fruity, with pink grapefruit
flavors; $8.
To Bob: Here's the real scoop on late-harvest riesling
A note to “Bob,” who called me on Linda Gassenheimer’s WLRN show Food News & Views last Thursday: You asked me about some good late-harvest Riesling dessert wines, and I gave you bad advice. Sorry.
Here are some good producers who make late-harvest Riesling: Hogue, Beringer, Chateau St. Jean, Dolce, Erath, Grgich Hills, J. Lohr, Navarro. They cost $9 to $25 a bottle.
Late harvest dessert wines are made of grapes – Riesling, sauvignon blanc, Semillon, gewürztraminer-- that are left on the vine until very late in the fall, well past the usual picking time of September or so. They get riper, and they shrivel, concentrating their sugars and acids. Sometimes they’re attacked by botrytis – the “noble rot” – that pricks tiny holes in the skins, concentrating them even further.
The result: sweet wines with honeyed viscosity and the flavors of ultra-ripe peaches, nectarines and/or apricots. They’re great with dessert, especially fruit tarts made of apples, pears, apricots, plums. I like to have them not with dessert, but as dessert.
So if you know a guy named Bob, call him and let him know.
Inexpensive everyday wines from Sicily
One of the great joys of travel is visiting vineyards in exotic places. The ancient, narrow caves of Tokaji in Hungary, the parched plains of Spain's sherry region, the neat lines of vines reaching down to the Columbia River in Washington on the route Lewis and Clark took to the Pacific. A quick e-mail to make an appointment, a warm welcome at the winery gate.
For a while, sadly, wine travel may have to take a back seat to paying the mortgage and putting food on the table. But we can still do it vicariously. Call this a virtual mini-tour:
• Sicily: Wine was made here centuries before Christ, long before it caught on in the mainland of Italy. But only in the past five years have Sicilian wines made an impact in America. The island's searing summer heat and low rainfall, plus cool nights in vineyards up to 3,000 feet in elevation, make it ideal for several varieties.
Sicily makes such international varietals as chardonnay, cabernet sauvignon, merlot, even the finicky pinot noir. To our good fortune, it also perseveres in two ancient indigenous varieties -- grillo, the white grape often used in making marsala cooking wine, and the sturdy red nero d'avola.
State-of-the-art wineries, such as the solar-powered Fuedo Arancio, by Gruppo Mezzacorona, are springing up. We'll be seeing a lot more of these well-priced wines.
• France's Languedoc Region: Even if we could travel, we'd find the Languedoc hard to visit. Nestled between the Mediterranean and the Massif Central mountains in the far south of France, it's spread out and lacks the glamorous chateaux of Burgundy, Bordeaux or the Loire.
What it does have is lots of new vineyards, planted mostly in such international varieties as cabernet sauvignon, chardonnay and syrah. And its relative obscurity has an advantage: very nice prices.
A new line of such wines is Petit Bistro, imported by Palm Bay International.
Both Sicily and France's Languedoc are rushing to provide just what we need today: good, inexpensive, everyday wines. Next year, with any luck, we'll be drinking Chateau Margaux.
RECOMMENDED
• Nonvintage Fuedo Arancio
Grillo, Sicilia IGT: aromas of herbs
and tea; flavors of limes; crisp and
minerally; $9.
• Nonvintage Fuedo Arancio
Nero d'Avola, Sicilia IGT: aromas
and flavors of black cherries and
espresso; sturdy tannins; $9.
• Nonvintage Fuedo Arancio
Pinot Noir, Sicilia IGT: spicy cassis
flavors; full-bodied and smooth; $10.
• 2006 Petit Bistro Cabernet
Sauvignon, Languedoc, France: pow-
erful cassis flavors; big, rich, smooth
and soft; $10.
• 2006 Petit Bistro Chardon-
nay, Languedoc, France: aromas and
flavors of ripe Golden Delicious
apples; big, rich and soft; $10.
• 2006 Petit Bistro Merlot, Lan-
guedoc, France: black cherry and
black coffee aromas and flavors; ripe
and soft; $10.
• 2006 Petit Bistro Pinot Noir, Languedoc, France:
black raspberry and blueberry aromas and flavors; rich
and soft; $10.
• 2006 Petit Bistro Rosé (cinsault, grenache and
syrah grapes), Languedoc, France: strawberry and cherry
aromas and flavors; medium-sweet; rich, ripe and soft;
$10.
• 2006 Petit Bistro Syrah, Languedoc, France:
black cherries and licorice; rich and soft; $10.
News of the weird in wine
Presidential Preference: What kind of wine does president-elect Barack Obama drink? Well, we don't know if he drank it, but, in a recent People Magazine profile of him, a bottle of Kendall Jackson Vintner's Reserve Chardonnay was sitting on his kitchen countertop. Knowing opportunity when he sees it, KJ owner Jess Jackson quickly shipped two cases of wine to Obama, care of the Democratic National Committee in Washington, D.C. He points out that Nancy Reagan liked the wine, so it was often served in the White House of Ronald Reagan.
Grape Growers Hurting: It's not quite as big as the recent Chinese bailout of its economy, but the Canadian government has bailed out the country's grape growers to the tune of $4 million.
Wine a bad investment? I wrote recently that some affluent wine fans, scared off by the stock market, are investing in wine -- buying it and asking the wine retailer to keep it in perfect storage for them. Well, forget that. Comes the news now that fine wine sales fell 12.4 percent in October, with the hallowed Chateau Lafite Rothschild down 27.9 percent. Might as well drink up.
Easy wines for hard-times entertaining
I swear I’m no wine snob, but one of my pet peeves is to go to a party or an art show opening where they’re serving wine and cheese and see them pouring wine out of gallon jugs with ears on them.
I mean, have you ever had wine from a gallon jug that was even adequate?
Life is too short.
You’re telling your guest you care little enough to give the very least.
Even box wines are getting a better reputation than gallon jugs.
On the other hand, there are some very nice, quite inexpensive wines being sold these days in magnums – bottles that are twice the size of regular wine bottles, holding 1.5 liters of wine instead of 750 mililiters.
These cost about $7 to $15, and they’re how you can save entertainment money without shortchanging your guests. They come from all over -- chardonnays from California, pinot grigio from Italy shiraz from Australia.
I did a wine column on these in September, and I found some good ones. I’ll repeat some of the tasting notes here.
· 2006 Beringer Founders Estate Chardonnay, California: rich, crisp and fruity, with ripe pineapple flavors; $12.99.
· 2007 Yellow Tail Shiraz, Australia: soft and ripe with red raspberry flavors; $12.99.
· 2007 Frontera Merlot by Concha y Toro, Chile: soft and sweet with 2006 Placido Pinot Grigio, Italy: crisp apricot flavors; lively; $15.29.
· 2007 Woodbridge Chardonnay by Robert Mondavi, California: lean, lemony and crisp; $13.99.
· 2007 Woodbridge Sauvignon Blanc by Robert Mondavi, California: crisp and light; lemon and limes; $13.39.
· Nonvintage Corbet Canyon Sauvignon Blanc, California: soft and lightly sweet, with apricot and peach flavors; $9.99.
· 2007 Vendange Sauvignon Blanc, California: sweet lemons and pineapples; full-bodied; $9.25.
· 2007 Woodbridge Zinfandel, California: rich and ripe, with red raspberry and chocolate flavors; $13.39.
· 2005 Vendange Cabernet Sauvignon, California: soft and ripe, black cherry and coffee flavors; $8.49.
· 2005 Lindemans Shiraz/Cabernet Sauvignon, Australia: soft, lightly sweet; red raspberry and cherry flavors; $12.99.
· 2005 Turning Leaf Cabernet Sauvignon, California: black cherry and black coffee flavors, ripe tannins; $12.99.
· 2005 Fetzer Vineyards Valley Oaks Cabernet Sauvignon, California: firm tannins, black plum flavors; $12.49.
· 2007 Bolla Pinot Grigio delle Venezie, Italy: peach and apricot flavors; $14.99
· Nonvintage Rene Junot Dry White Table Wine (50 percent chenin blanc, 30 percent sauvignon blanc, 20 percent chardonnay), France: light, slightly sweet; lemons and minerals; $7.99.
· 2007 Woodbridge Chardonnay by Robert Mondavi, California: lean, lemony and crisp; $13.99.
