Sauvignon Blanc...from Slovenia

Wine is an adventure. At least that's what I've always thought. So many grapes. So many styles. So many countries to visit--even if it's only through the liquid in your glass.

So when one of my favorite addictions--er, on-line retailers--Garagiste up in Seattle offered a three-pack of Slovenian whites to try, I jumped at the opportunity. The three-pack cost around $45, which meant there was a $15 investment per bottle for a Riesling, a Chardonnay, and a Sauvignon Blanc. Recently, I opened up the Sauvignon Blanc and was extremely pleased at my first foray into Slovenian wine.

You might not think "Slovenia" and "Sauvignon Blanc" in the same breath, but there's no reason why you shouldn't do so. Most parts of the globe have a history of wine-making, and that includes central Europe. I had some amazing Merlot when I visited Prague, and have enjoyed some wonderful Romanian wine here on the blog, and one of my all-time-favorite wines from Trader Joe's comes from Hungary. As for Slovenia, they have a venerable viticultural tradition that goes back to pre-Roman times (check this site for more information). So don't be afraid to try wine from regions you may be unfamiliar with, as they often represent very good value, as in this very good QPR example.

2008 Marof Sauvignon Blanc ( purchased in a three-pack from Garagiste; available in the market for around $11) This terrific Sauvignon Blanc had tart lemon pith, gooseberry, and lemongrass aromas and flavors. It was very clean and precise, without being overly herbaceous. A nice balance of fruit and acidity made it an ideal partner for food, and you can't complain about the price! It would be excellent with all kinds of dishes, from salads, to fish, to roasted chicken with lemon. We had it with a soup made with ancient grains and vegetables, and the lively acidity was a lovely counterpoint to the earthiness of the kamut and lentils, and picked out the bright tarragon herbal notes.

Beating the Bordeaux Blues

So, how are your purchases of 2009 Bordeaux futures coming along? If, like me, you decided to sit out the hysteria this year (the prices are epic and the hysteria just as epic), you may be feeling a little blue. For me, its budgetary. I just don't eat enough of the kind of food that goes with a fantastic bottle of aged Bordeaux to warrant the splurge. Riesling or Champagne? That's another matter.

It's not that I don't like the taste of Bordeaux wines--I do. But I think I've got enough 2003 bottles in my cellar (none of which will be ready to drink for another few years) to keep me going.

Meanwhile, if you are watching/listening/participating in the 2009 Futures Follies, you may want a nice bottle of Bordeaux to go with it. Here are two bottles--one unusual bottle from Bordeaux and one Bordeaux-like bottle from California--that will help see you through the process.

The first bottle I'm recommending is the 2007 Château Tire Pé DieM ($7.99, Garagiste; available currently for $10-$14) This is not your father's Bordeaux, but it's just fantastic. Imagine, if you will, the vinous love child of a wine from Bordeaux and one from the Beaujolais and you've pretty much got this wine. It's a classic blend of Merlot, Cabernet Franc, and Cabernet Sauvignon that oozes personality and old world charm but is much lighter in weight than most bottlings from this part of France, which tend to be heavy, complex, and age-worthy. The first impression of the wine is crushed raspberries, some soil, and some rocks--very Beaujolais, in my book. The feeling of the wine is silky in the mouth. Then the funkier notes kick in, along with some vegetal greenness, some spice, and a hint of pencil lead--all very Bordeaux. And it's a terrific excellent QPR buy that certainly constitutes a great candidate for a house red (and when was the last time you said THAT about 2007 Bordeaux??) For food pairings, think of any foods you would pair with Gamay or Cabernet Franc, such as roasted chicken, sausages, or pork.

If you are looking for a heavier, more complicated wine made with true Bordeaux style, reach for the 2007 Trefethen Double T (available for $16-28) from the Napa Valley. I was extremely pleased with this blend that includes all five classic Bordeaux varieties. The wine was unusually complex for an excellent QPR bottling, with cassis, plum, and tobacco leaf aromas. Layered cassis, graphite, and herbal notes are present in the flavors, with a juicy aftertaste that lingers long enough to invite you back for another taste. Excellent with heartier fare, like this molasses/mustard marinated pork tenderloin.

Full Disclosure: I received the Trefethen Double-T as a sample.

New Grape of the Month: Jacquère

For a grape I've never heard of before, Jacquère certainly has a lot of synonyms and variant spellings.

What is Jacquère? It's a white grape grown in the Savoy region of France. (photo from Charles Neal Selections)

Where is the Savoy, you ask? It's tucked up next to the Alps. And though the region makes good wine, most of it never leaves the area's fondue parties and ski lifts. Nevertheless, I've been trying to get to know the wines of Savoy a bit better, and while they can be hard to find they tend to be very good value when you manage it, and pair nicely with food, to boot.

Turns out there are lots of Quenards making wine in Savoy, as the signposts to the right indicate. The Jacquère I tasted was the 2007 Jean-Pierre et Jean-Francois Quenard Vin de Savoie Chignin Anne de la Biguerne ($12.93, Garagiste; for more information on purchasing, contact the importer at Charles Neal Selections)

The wine was surprisingly hard to describe based on the usual fruit and flowers vocabulary. Instead what I tasted was "clean," followed by "snow." It was very fresh tasting, with faint, pure lemon and mineral aromas and flavors if you dug under the clean snow to find them. For under $13, this was excellent QPR.

What to have with your Alpine Jacquère? Something gooey and cheesey (fondue, grilled cheese, Croque Monsieur) would be lovely. But if you really want a treat, pair it with shellfish. That's what we did recently, when we stopped into the Four Seasons Biltmore Resort on the Santa Barbara coast in Montecito. They have a Thursday night seafood buffet that is a far cry from most sad buffets you are now thinking about with horror. The Biltmore's tables were loaded with fresh shucked oysters, snow crab legs, sushi, lobster, and grilled fish. And they don't charge corkage at the Thursday buffet, so I brought along this bottle and the clean-tasting wine was just perfect with the clean-tasting shellfish. All in all, an excellent value in food and wine in pricey Montecito.

Sitting by the ocean on a beautiful Santa Barbara night, sipping Alpine Jacquère, all I could hope for was that somewhere in Savoy someone was cuddled up to the fire keeping warm with a nice bottle of Central Coast Pinot Noir!

A Reminder About New Zealand Pinot Noir

Wine drinkers who love Pinot Noir and have to watch the bottom line can have a tough time finding good bottles for under $20. I'm not talking about searching for a $15 bottle of Pinot Noir that will rival a $50 bottle from Burgundy or elsewhere. My sights are set lower--I just want a bottle of Pinot that doesn't taste like liquefied raspberry jam.

This week I got a reminder that New Zealand can be a good source for such bottles, when I opened up a 2006 Catalina Sounds Pinot Noir from New Zealand's Nelson region ($18.93, Garagiste; available elsewhere for $19-$21).

This was a lovely Pinot Noir for under $20, one that managed to be open and lacy without being weak and insipid. And though it was fruity, it did not have the jammy intensity that I think can ruin Pinot Noir. Instead, the wine had raspberry and mineral aromas and flavors accented by a touch of earthiness that deepened them nicely.

For me, though, it was the texture of this wine that made it stand out. Texture is important to me when I drink Pinot Noir--maybe more than it is for most people. I want my Pinot Noirs to have a seductive silkiness of texture. This wine had it, the silkiness turning gossamer and airy in the aftertaste.

While the wine lacked the complexity to make it truly outstanding, this was a very good QPR bottle--and I would buy another vintage of Catalina Sounds Pinot Noir without hesitation.

And note to self: remember to check out the New Zealand aisle next time Pinot Noir is on the shopping list.

Cabernet Franc from Italy's Trentino DOC

One of my favorite things about setting the goal of drinking wines from every region in Italy--a process that began in 2008 and will continue through 2009--is that I buy wine I wouldn't taste otherwise. These are often the wines I remember months later because they were unexpected treats, wines that caught my imagination even though I often have low or no expectations and no real frame of reference for what I am tasting.

That happened last week when I opened up the 2005 De Tarczal Cabernet Franc. I purchased this in April 2008 from Garagiste in Seattle, received it in November, and promptly put it in the back fo the cellar for the month I finally got around to Trentin0-Alto Adige. ($16.90, Garagiste; available elsewhere for $19)

When I opened it, I was greeted with promising aromas of bell pepper, sour cherry, earth, and minerals. It struck me as less weedy than Cabernet Franc from the Loire, with a depth to the cherry aromas that made me eager to taste the wine. Flavorwise, the wine had a lovely, satiny texture wrapped around earth, leaf, and sour cherry notes. This was a really lovely, well-balanced Cabernet Franc from a region that (perhaps in my ignorance) I don't usually associate with Cab Franc. Excellent QPR.

Mushrooms go beautifully with a wine with this kind of flavor profile. Make yourself a portobello burger slathered with pesto mayonnaise and topped with roasted peppers and arugula--your tastebuds will thank you.

New Grape of the Month: Cortese

I'm continuing to explore the Italian wine region of Piedmont this month, and today I have a new grape: Cortese.

Cortese is a grape indigenous to the Piedmont that makes bright, refreshing white wines. If you want to know more, follow the link to AbleGrape where (as the founder so rightly reminded me!) there is lots of information available.

Like many Italian whites, Cortese is lean and acidic--a far cry from the fruit-bombs many of us are used to drinking. As such it represents a delightful change of pace and gives your palate a good spring cleaning.

Recently I tried the 2006 Tenuta Merlassino Gavi, a very good QPR example of the grape. ($16.84, Garagiste; available elsewhere for around $20) Though the label here is for the 2005, we drank the 2006 and the label was identical. There were characteristic aromas of oily minerals, apple, and bitter almond. These aromas were followed up with flavors of apple and stony mineral water (Vitel was my pick) which were rounded up with a bitter aftertaste. The texture of the wine was slightly spritzy on first opening, then it smoothed out into a wine with a medium-bodied mouthfeel.

Fish is the typical food pairing for a Cortese, but I wanted to pick out the oily mineral notes and so made orecchiette with fresh tomatoes and an almond-pecorino pesto. The almonds did just what I hoped they would--they picked out the mineral and turned them nutty. And the wine's bracing acidity stood up nicely to the tomates and the basil.

If you like Italian whites--Pinot Grigio, Vermentino, Verdecchio, Garganega--I think you'll like Cortese. Give it a try if you see it on the shelf.

An Unexpected Red from the Veneto

I'm still learning about Italian wine, but when I think red wine from the Veneto I think Valpolicella or Amarone. Made primarily with local grapes Corvina Veronese and Rondinelli, these can be zesty and fresh or full-bodied and silky.

When I looked through my cellars for a Venetian red, however, I came across a bottle that seemed more like a Bordeaux. It was made from Cabernet Franc and Merlot. Cab Franc and Merlot?

Turns out Cabernet Franc is popular in the Veneto--and in nearby Friuli-Venezia Giulia, too. And Merlot, which was probably introduced into Italy at the end of the 19th century, is the 3rd most heavily-planted grape in all of Italy.

After drinking this bottle, I can see why.

The 2002 Serafini & Vidotto Phigaia "After the Red" was hands down an excellent QPR bottle of wine that cost less than $10. ($9.99, Garagiste; the 2004 is available elsewhere for around $20) Expressive aromas of greens, leaves, and a bit of red fruit were accompanied at first by a whiff of something that reminded me a bit of melamine. Happily, that blew off very quickly. The flavors were the real treat, with subtle layers of cranberry, then plum, followed by herbs, some leather, and a bit of tobacco. This complex wine was not the least bit intimidating, given its price tag and its gently unfolding flavors. It was a wine that rewarded active attention as it developed, but didn't demand you stop everything and take notice.

We paired the wine with a take-out pizza loaded with sausage and green peppers and the wine was the perfect backdrop to the herbal, green pepper, and fennel flavors of the pie.

This bottle was just the latest reminder of something I've felt with increasing conviction over the past 15 months as I've been drinking my way through the Italian peninsula: there are treasures to be had here--and some of them are quite inexpensive. Tuscan and Piedmont wines are great. I love them. But there's so much more to Italian wine, such as this unexpected Bordeaux blend from the Veneto.

New Grape of the Month: Tressallier

Once again, a new grape has crossed my dinner table.

This time it's Tressallier, a grape described by Jancis Robinson in The Oxford Companion to Wine as "a white grape variety grown in the Allier.... It is certainly traditional there, but not unanimously acclaimed nowadays."

Oh dear. Talk about damning something with faint praise.

With some trepidation I pulled the cork on my 2006 Château Courtinat Tradition Blanc. I purchased it from Garagiste for $13.86, and like most Garagiste wines it's difficult to find, although I think this shop may have the 2007 vintage (I'd check to make sure it's not Ch. Courtinat's red bottling before I ordered it).

The wine is made from 70% Tressallier grapes and 30% Chardonnay, and it wowed me. It didn't wow me because it was over-the-top or because it was the best white wine I've ever had, but it did impress me with its pronounced aromas of ripe Bosc pear. The flavors were more tart, full of waxy lemon notes with a bitter aftertaste. The wine tasted fresh and clean and was a nice change of pace from the wash of Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc. It was lower in alcohol, too, at 12-12.5% alc./vol.

Because of the slightly bitter aftertaste, this wine will be much better with food than without and when you're picking something to pair with it I'd steer towards lemon-inflected poultry or seafood. We had it with a smashing shrimp and goat cheese risotto that included tiny amounts of lemon peel, ginger, and parmesan cheese and the wine was stunning with it.

I should warn you that I'm starting to get a serious crush on wines from the Auvergne like this one. Some are designated as wines from the Loire, and others as wines from the Midi. However they're labeled, I think they're fabulous, unpretentious, and delicious wines with great value. So look forward to seeing more reviews of them here.

Spanish Wine and Food Synergy

Recently, I opened up a bottle of the 2004 Bodega Luzdivina Amigo Viñademoya that I purchased a while back. ($13.99, Garagiste; available elsewhere from $7-$18) When I first tasted it, I wasn't that impressed.

It was just a simple, rustic red with aromas and flavors of boysenberries and a little bit of earthy funk. Nothing memorable, nothing to spend time writing about.

But I corked it with some inert gas, and tried it again a few nights later. This time I paired it with a traditional dish from Rioja: patatas a la Riojana. A cross between a soup and stew, it's full of earthy potatoes, has some spicy kick from the inclusion of chorizo and peppers, and lots of flavor from the garlic and onion. I used Anya von Bremzen's recipe from her fabulous cookbook, The New Spanish Table. Here's a slightly different version that's available online.

Wow. What a difference the right food made to this wine.

Sipping it along side the soup, with its smoky pimenton and potatoes, made the flavors of boysenberry expand out to include blackberries an cherries. The earthy funk turned into a pleasant background note that kept the wine from becoming too fruity and flat. A wine that I had mixed feelings about was transformed into a good QPR bottle.

Wine and food synergy--that moment when you realize the combination of what you're eating and drinking is greater than the sum of its parts--happens all too rarely. When it does, it can result in a memorable meal and make you glad that you gave the wine a second chance.

Advanced Fruit: Cabernet Franc

My friends all make fun of me because I have two classifications of fruit: regular fruit (apples, oranges, bananas, strawberries--the fruits suburban children in the 70s grew up with), and advanced fruit (pretty much everything else).

I don't know why, but fruit just is not my thing. I am pretty sure I didn't taste a cherry (minus Maraschinos in cocktails and on ice cream) until I was over 30. And yes, this does in fact mean I am not a fan of pie. When I got into wine, I had to start tasting advanced fruit--star fruit, litchis, gooseberries, currants, plums.

When it comes to wine, I think Cabernet Franc qualifies as advanced fruit.

After the holidays, when I've had my fill of rich foods and rich wines I find myself gravitating towards Cabernet Franc. It's like a tune-up for your palate. And, a great Cabernet Franc can be a challenging and rewarding wine to drink because it doesn't taste like apples or strawberry jam. Instead, it tastes like some green and red mix of herbs, fruit, and spices.

This year's advanced fruit selection came in the form of the 2006 Clos Saint-Fiacre. ($13.73, Garagiste; I can't seem to find any retailers who stock it) Made with 100% Cabernet Franc, the wine had aromas of cherry and chalk accompanied by hints of green pepper. A satiny texture made the flavors of cherries, stony minerals, and green herbs slide down your throat without any problem. Unlike some Cabernet Francs, which can be a bit aggressive in the green pepper department, this one had a lovely balance between the herbal, fruit, and mineral notes, and I thought it represented excellent QPR as a result.

I had to get on Twitter and ask for food recommendations for this wine, since not everybody likes mushrooms at my house and that's one of the best pairings for Cabernet Franc. Jill from domaine547 said "anything with rosemary," so I took a pork tenderloin, rubbed mustard and brown sugar on it, and then rolled it in rosemary and thyme. I roasted it in a 350-degree oven for about 30 minutes after searing it in a cast iron fry pan on the stove, and served it along with some wild rice and green beans. All the flavors--the mustard, the rosemary (thanks, Jill!), the green beans, and the earthy rice--went perfectly with the wine.

I finished the meal feeling like my tastebuds had been given a workout with some advanced fruit and that I was ready for whatever the new year brings.

Memorable Wine

I was browsing through tasting notes on CellarTracker and fellow-Tracker drphil described a wine as "more drinkable than memorable."

That got me thinking about wines I've had that remained with me--their color, their taste, their smell--long after the bottle hit the trash and I'd moved on to something else. Happily, many of these are drinkable, too. Recently, I had a wine that was both memorable AND drinkable: the 2006 Frank Cornelissen Contadino. I purchased my bottle from Garagiste in January of 2008 for $17.99. Only 25 cases made it into the US, and I can't find it anywhere, so there are no links for you to follow so you can get some of your own.

Azienda Agricola Frank Cornelissen is located on the edge of the Mt. Etna national park, home to volcanoes and free-thinkers, in Sicily. It's got that mix of progressive while backward-looking agriculture that is making many of us think we are in a time warp as people adopt traditional farming methods in order to preserve the land and their traditions. Here are a few excerpts from their website that help to explain:

"Our farming philosophy is based on our acceptance of the fact that man will never be able to understand nature's full complexity and interactions. We therefore choose to concentrate on observing and learning the movements of Mother Earth in her various energetic and cosmic passages and prefer to follow her indications as to what to do, instead of deciding ourselves. Consequently this has taken us to avoiding all possible interventions on the land we cultivate, including any treatments, whether chemical, organic, or biodynamic, as these are all a mere reflection of the inability of man to accept nature as she is and will be."

So, these guys aren't even using biodynamics because it's too interventionist. You can imagine, then, their perspective on the use of sulphur:

"Our products are made without the use of preservatives (i.e. no added sulphur) in order to be able to develop freely to their full potential. This requires transportation and storage below 16°C. When you open a bottle, we suggest not to decant. Rather, take the wine at cellar temperature (12-16°C), pour into Burgundy balloons, nose immediately, and follow its full aromatic progression as it expands, warms up. If a little frizzante upon opening, keep the bottle cool at 14-16°C, and allow to settle for circa 15 minutes. Our wines have only natural - no added - protection against colour degradation, so if left open a few hours, you will see the colour evolve from granite red to volcanic black ash!!! Don't worry - the flavours become more complex with time, as the colour turns."

I didn't try this experiment. My wine remained hot pink, as shown in the picture, throughout. What goes into this hot pink, take no prisoners wine? 80% of the juice comes from Nerello Mascalese and the remainder comes from Nerello Cappuccio and other indigenous grapes.

So what did it taste like? First off, do you know what an unfiltered, unfined, sediment-laden Nerello Mascalese from Etna is supposed to smell and taste like?? Neither do I. We chilled it down at first from the 58 degree cellar temperature at which it was stored, and then set it in the fridge upright for 12 hours to try to settle the sediment, which was abundant. Then we pulled the cork, uncertain of what to expect.

When opened, this wine smelled of the holidays with orange peel, mace, cinnamon, and clove. The flavors were redolent of spicy cranberry and pomegranate. As we drank it, and the wine warmed, the flavors bloomed and became more pronounced. This was best with food--sausage, cheese, and we thought it would be excellent with pizza. Even though it's pink, it's not a "light" wine at 15% alc/vol.

It was excellent QPR, however--because it was so memorable and different. What was the last memorable wine that you had? It doesn't have to have been expensive or famous to be memorable. It just had to make you sit up and pay attention.

Summerwines for Summertime

As you may have been able to tell from yesterday's post, I'm in the mood for summertime. When the temperatures climb there's nothing like a chilled white wine to put a smile on your face and a bit of pep in your step. In the summer, I tend to like wines that are either bracing (think: New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc) or brightly floral (think: Riesling, Gewurztraminer, Rhone whites, Spanish Verdelho). Recently I had two whites that are widely available that fit the bill for summertime white wines perfectly.

The first wine, from the bracing side of the coin, was the 2002 Domaine des Baumard Savennieres. ($17.29, Costco; available for $16-$22 through online merchants) Loire fans like fellow wine blogger Brooklynguy think highly of wines from this region, and I've picked up a few of them over the years and not been disappointed with any of them. This bottling was a very good QPR example of a French Chenin Blanc with some age. Chenin Blanc can be held for quite a while if you've got a good cellar or wine fridge, so it's not one of those white wines that you have to drink before the summer is over for fear it will get tired. I purchased this bottle a year ago at the Costco in beautiful downtown Burbank, and was worried it was corked when I first opened it, but any possible taint blew off quickly. Once poured, the wine was pale straw in color. It had abundant and easily detected aromas of lime, chalk, and almonds. The flavors were also nutty, citrusy (somewhere between a lime and a lemon), and had some nice mineral notes thrown in there. The flavors were piercing and very intense, but not acidic or sharp. There was a chalky aftertaste left in your mouth after you sipped it. We had it with a citrus-rubbed salmon grilled on the BBQ and an Asian-style spinach salad with orange and avocado and the wine's citrus notes paired beautifully with all the citrus in the two dishes.

From the floral camp I tried a 2006 Pyramid Valley Kerner Estate Pinot Blanc from New Zealand. ($22.80, Garagiste; available through online merchants for $24-$32). Even though this wine is a little pricey, it is still an excellent QPR choice for the flavor and quality it delivers and is well worth the splurge if you are having a special dinner in June for a graduation, Father's Day, or pre-wedding event. Like the Baumard, the Pyramid Valley wine was noteworthy for its intensity of flavor and aroma. But in this case the aromas were of apple, honeysuckle, and beeswax and the flavors were of honeyed apple and stone. The wine had a juicy aftertaste and would be a nice change of pace for lovers of dry Riesling. It was so good we fought over who would get the last bit from the bottle! We had it with an equally aromatic dish of pork medallions with a light Chinese sauce of ginger and lemon. The honeyed notes in the wine paired beautifully with the ginger.

Whether you like your summer white wines bracing or floral, or somewhere in between, there are a lot of wallet-friendly choices out there for you to try. And stay tuned for next week's Wine Blogging Wednesday because white Rhone varieties make for terrific summer drinking, too.

An Aglianico from Molise

Behind this black and iridescent pink exterior is a wine that is quite extraordinary. It has quite a following, too, among merchants, bloggers, and readers. This may have to do with the wine's consistency--vintage to vintage people seem to find it rich and delicious. It certainly doesn't have to do with the Aglianico grapes that go into it, since Aglianico is pretty obscure here in the US. And the Molise region where the wines are grown is relatively untraveled, too, by American wine drinkers.

Maybe this wine is so popular because the unfamiliarity of the grapes and the region make it an unqualified steal when it comes to the price. I bought mine from Garagiste as a future some months back for $11.95. Now it's on the market for between $11 and $17. The 2004 Di Majo Norante Aglianico was a beautiful medium-dark garnet in color, although if you pour yourself a full glass expect it to look plummy purple. There were aromas of cherry and earth when the bottle was first opened, and the taste was a bit astringent and drying when I took the first sip and left an aftertaste like strong black tea. One of the readers here, Pat, suggested that I decant the wine first, and folks on CellarTracker seemed to agree, so I decanted it for a little over an hour and the wine had strikingly different aromas and flavors. Where before there had been cherry and earth, I now smelled blackberries, tea, and a whiff of roses. The flavors, too, had changed and now reminded me of blackberry tending towards blueberry--which is to say it tasted like huckleberries to me. There were also tea and sassafras notes, and a little minty lift in the aftertaste. This was a wine that was complex, easy to drink, and a great value--so I think it represented excellent QPR.

Aglianico is made for drinking with spicy Italian food, so think pepperoni pizza, sausage tossed with your favorite pasta, or something that uses a bit of chili pepper for heat. We had it with a slightly adapted version of Rachael Ray's gnocchi and chicken meatballs that uses lots of basil and fennel seeds, as well as some red pepper flakes, and the moderate spiciness of the food stood in interesting opposition to the clean huckleberry fruit and the herbal and tea notes in the wine. If you love spaghetti and meatballs but are trying to cut back on red meat, you will love these chicken meatballs every bit as much as the beefy originals.

Because this wine changed so much from opening to first sips, and because it was so affordable, I would be tempted to buy a case or half-case of this wine and drink it regularly over the next few years to watch it develop and change. It's lovely now, but I suspect it will continue to improve. I would buy this by the case and drink over the next 4 years. Thanks to Pat, the reader who recommended this wine to me, for suggesting I decant it. This wine is a great value--I highly recommend you try it, too.

Beating the Late Winter Blahs with Gamay

Think Gamay and you probably think Beaujolais. I hope you think real Beaujolais, but maybe you think Beaujolais Nouveau, the grapey brew that arrives just before Thanksgiving in time for your leftover turkey sandwiches. Gamay is one of the world's most food-friendly and affordable red wines. It's also the perfect wine for beating back winter blahs and blues. (image from Kobrand USA)

The next time you're in the wine store, I want you to keep your eyes peeled for Gamay. But don't just look for Beaujolais bottlings. Look for a Gamay from the Loire. The Loire also has a strong tradition of cultivating this old grape variety. Gamay is grown throughout the Loire, and it tastes a bit different from Beaujolais examples. This isn't surprising, but it confirmed my sense that the Gamay variety can have the same interesting variations from region to region as the finest Pinot Noir--at a far more affordable price.

I recently tried an excellent QPR Loire Gamay: the 2006 Chateau Courtinat Tradition. Made exclusively from old vine grapes grown in the Saint Pourcain VDQS, I bought this from Garagiste as a future for just under $12 ($11.84 to be exact) in the fall. It's no longer available through Garagiste, and I unfortunately can't find it elsewhere on the web. But I wanted to write about it anyway because it was so distinctive--and so good.

It had a beautiful deep ruby color, just like your favorite Pinot. There were lovely aromas of raspberry, cherry, earth, and mushroom with a pronounced whiff of iron. The flavors were perfectly balanced between fresh red fruits, earthiness, and mouth-watering acidity. I liked the silkiness of the wine, and the mineral taste, that reminded me of iron, that hung around in the mouth after you swallowed. The sense of depth in this wine belies its 12.5% alc/vol indication. This may not pack an alcoholic punch, but it certainly isn't a lightweight in the taste department.

At a time when many of us are struggling with the late winter blahs, Gamay is a perfect wine choice. It's not too light, it's not too heavy--it's just right. It will be just as good now with a bowl of soup as it will be in a month or so with ham (if that's what sits on your spring table) or even in June with some BBQ. Right now, you can give yourself a nice jolt of the summer eating to come by preparing a Greek pasta dish with olives, capers, tomatoes, feta cheese and lots of parsley. It will blow some of the cobwebs out of your winter diet, and the garlic and feta are just lovely with the smooth, cherried flavors of the wine.

It's time to bring some excitement back to your wine list, and your table. All the things that make Gamay a perfect fall-into-winter wine make it a perfect winter-into-spring wine as well. Drinking Gamay is kind of like putting your wine habits on daylight savings time--it's a sure sign of spring.

Grape Variety #96: Negrette

Back in the 12th century, when crusaders belonging to the Order of St. John of Jerusalem returned to France from the Middle East, they brought all kinds of souvenirs home. Some of these souvenirs were grape vine cuttings from a variety native to Cyprus called Negrette.

Intensely perfumed like a Mediterranean garden, when you drink a rare variety like Negrette, you are drinking history. The grape may well have died out were were it not for a few careful viticulturalists around Toulouse who resisted ripping out the vines out and planting Cabernet Sauvignon in their place.

What a loss that would have been, because you have never had anything like it.

The Chateau Bellevue La Foret Ce Vin is a 100% Negrette wine, and was not blended with other red varieties which is common in the region. ($11.84, Garagiste; available elsewhere for under $10) It was deep plum verging on aubergine in color, and smelled like a garden. I detected aromas of violet, plum blossom, and jasmine with a touch of spice that managed to keep it from becoming cloying. Flavors of rich plum and sour cherry were combined with nice, spicy notes. The wine was low in tannins, and when it was first opened the aromas overwhelmed the other aspects of the wine. I think it could do with 6-12 months more age in the bottle, or about an hour of decanting to be at its best. Very good QPR.

Negrette is not on most food and wine pairing charts, so you may be stumped with what to have with it. I would recommend something aromatic and meaty, like Korean BBQ beef ribs or a tasty stir-fried pork with tomatoes and basil. Both dishes will pick up the peppery spiciness of the wine, and the wine will do its bit to accentuate their full flavors.

If you like Syrah and Grenache, you will love Negrette. Keep your eyes open for a bottle, and taste some history.

Grape Variety #92: Pineau d'Aunis

It's pink. It has bubbles. It's under $15. It's Pineau d'Aunis.

It's what?

Pineau d'Aunis is a red grape variety that is native to the Loire. Popular in the late medieval period among those who could afford it, Pineau d'Aunis is relatively obscure today. With spicy flavors inflected with what some call piney and others graphite notes. The grape can also make a sparkling wine, which is even harder to find than the still reds made with this variety. In my hunt for the seldom-sipped to fill out my Wine Century, this was definitely a grape on my "must taste" list.

Vincent Girault, the winemaker at the biodynamic and organic Chateau Gaillard, makes just such a wine, and when I had the chance to buy it from Garagiste back in June, I jumped at the chance. Doktor Weingolb has had a Cab Franc made my this maker, and Girault also makes two sparklers, a NV Brut and this NV Rose Brut. I've had both, and definitely prefer the rose. As usual with the biodynamic wines I've tasted, I found that this wine had a nice mineral twang as you swallowed the wine.

The NV Chateau Gaillard Cuvee Charlette Voyant was a dry rose sparkler with very good QPR. (Garagiste, $11.84; unable to find this one online at any merchant). The wine had aromas of those tiny little European wild strawberries which are always a bit tart. Accompanying the strawberries in the flavors was a pleasant creamy note and a bit of stone in the finish. When you poured the wine there was lots of frothy mousse/foam, and a relatively large bubble or bead. Still, it was a great sipper, especially for early spring, and a definite conversation piece.

I know lots of folks are looking for sparklers for next week's celebrations, so if you are on the hunt for a wine to share with your loved one on Valentine's Day, ask your favorite merchant if they stock a sparkling wine from the Loire. You may not be able to find a biodynamic Pineau d'Aunis based sparkling wine, but you still may find something with great QPR.

Decanting Old Wine: the '99 Mount Langhi Ghiran Shiraz

A few weeks ago I decanted a young red, and led you through the steps necessary to get your young, tight red to open up and strut its stuff. Today, I'm going to show you my efforts to decant an older red. I should admit at the outset that I made a huge boo-boo (see below, step #4). So take this as not only a step-by-step guide of what to do, but also a reminder of what NOT to do.

The wine up for decanting was a 1999 Mount Langhi Ghiran Shiraz that I purchased, complete with authentic cellar dust, from Garagiste back in September for $19.99. You can't get the wine from them anymore, but you can get your hands on a bottle from the auction market for between $30 and $40. I've never had a Shiraz this old, and the early notes on CellarTracker were all over the place--it was still tight, it was over the hill, etc. One thing was clear: it had sediment.

Sediment is common in older wines and it is the primary reason most people decant them. Wines that are old have already opened up in the bottle, and are showing subtle flavor complexities that are not apparent when the wine is young. So in the case of older wines, you don't necessarily want to open them hours ahead of time and let them sit in a decanter. This can expose the wine to so much air that it dulls the flavors. Instead, you want to decant a bit before serving in order to remove sediment and to give it a chance to breathe just a little bit.

First things first: the morning of Decantation Day, set the bottle upright, so that any sediment in the bottle has a chance to settle into the bottom. Put it in a cool, dark place. Then, when you are about 20-30 minutes from drinking it, begin to decant the wine.

1. Gather equipment. This is still a good idea, since it puts everything you need within arms reach. Here's we see corkscrew, foilcutter, wine (complete with dust, for those with sharp eyes), decanter, funnel, and the screen that will help catch sediment.

2. Inspection time. Open the bottle, checking the cork for signs of damage which can indicate the wine is flawed. Pour yourself a bit, and take a taste to make sure it isn't corked or over the hill. You can tell if it's corked because it will smell like moldy newspaper. You can tell if it's over the hill if the flavors are completely flat (don't get me started on the white Chateauneuf-du-Pape that I forgot I had and which was undrinkable by the time I found it--but trust me, you'll know if this has happened). Good news here: the wine was lovely, bright and complex. I did feel it would benefit from some time in the air, so I decided to let it sit for 45 minutes because in my experience, this wine--for all its age--really was still just a bit tight and coiled.

3. Decantation time. Put the screen in the funnel, and the funnel in the decanter. Gently start pouring the wine through the screen. This is not the time to bottoms-up the bottle, or all the sediment will come out and the point of the exercise will be lost.

4. Stop pouring before you reach the sediment -- because sometimes, sediment is fine. In this case, I merrily poured my bottle, and the wine was a beautiful true garnet in color, and I thought "what's all this sediment everybody keeps talking about?" That's when the dregs of the wine hit the funnel, the abundance of fine sediment hit the screen--and went straight through. This rendered the wine a cloudy purple--not what I was hoping for. It didn't make the wine gritty, or spoil the taste, but the sediment did detract from the wine's aesthetic beauty. If you've ever seen an old movie where a butler pours a wine into a decanter with a candle behind the bottle, this is why: so you can see when you are getting to the sediment and STOP POURING. (bad shot of fine sediment clinging to bottle, but you see my point). So you lose a little wine.

5. Enjoy--even if you got some sediment in there despite your best efforts. What did the wine taste like after decanting? It was unlike any other Aussie Shiraz I've ever had: powerful but with balance and finesse. Aromas and flavors of deep plum, smoke and sandalwood kept this wine interesting all the way down to the very last drop. The sandalwood was particularly nice, and hinted at things old and rare. We had the wine with grilled rib-eyes and all the fixings, but given its complexity I think it would have been even better with lamb, as it would have been more softly suited to the wine.

For just under $20, this was very good QPR, especially for those who don't like the sensation of being hit over the head with a mallet when they open an Australian Shiraz. Given this experience, I will be tempted to let some of my reds from Down Under age just a bit longer in my cellar.

The Wine Retailer Nobody Talks About

After wrestling with my conscience, and despite the certain knowledge that some of my wine-loving friends won't talk to me after I reveal this (especially not the ones who told me about it in the first place), it is time to let readers in on one of the biggest open secrets among wine geeks: Garagiste, the Seattle-based wine retailer who only sells wine futures to a mailing list. They have a website, but the only point of it now seems to be that you can sign up for the mailing list there.

Jon Rimmerman, the brain behind Garagiste, buys wine direct from producers all over the world and then announces it is for sale to list of wine lovers so enthusiastic that it sometimes takes less than 5 minutes from the time the email gets sent for them to sell out of a wine. Yes, I said 5 minutes. Just you try getting some limited production demi-sec Vouvray from Garagiste--you'd better type fast. Wines on offer through Garagiste range from $10 bargain finds to wines that are many thousands of dollars, and they appeal to every consumer niche from Aussie Shiraz-lovers to those who like obscure old world bottlings from the South of France.

The thing to remember before you go on a wild buying spree is that Garagiste ships wine twice a year--in November/December and in March-ish--and they stockpile your order in between in their storage facility. Then they ship it to you by the case over the course of several weeks. Because these wines are futures, there is no guarantee exactly when you will receive them. Some of the wine I bought in May still hasn't arrived in the warehouse, never mind at my house. Still, the wine that I have received has been in perfect condition, and they back everything with a limited guarantee--although if you buy lots of wine, I'm not sure how you could open it all and test for cork taint in a week. Still, it pays to do a careful inspection of the bottles to check for seepage, label stains, and popped out corks. I've never had a problem, but you want to exercise all possible caution.

If you don't check your email regularly, Garagiste can be an exercise in frustration, since several calls for orders go out every day and the wines will most likely not be available for more than 24 hours. Usually, they are available for far less time than that. However, if you like weird varietals and are an intrepid drinker, you can get some genuinely wonderful wines. Recently, I picked up a Nerello blend from Sicily's Mt. Etna appellation made by Frank Cornelissen that is hot pink due to the significant amount of sediment that the winemaker leaves in the wine. This is not something you're likely to find at BevMo. You will see some reviews of Garagiste wines on the site in upcoming weeks that I purchased to fill in my Wine Century, so you can be your own judge as to whether Garagiste wines are likely to be of interest to you.

Should you take the plunge, KEEP TRACK of your purchases because a bottle or two here or there really adds up over the course of six months and you can find yourself having uncomfortable discussions with your bank manager and/or your loved ones to explain how you spent so much money on so much wine that now has no where to live and must be arranged in colorful "displays" on every surface in your house.

You can head over to the website to sign up, but don't expect much information there. It's all done by email. "You've got mail" never tasted so good.