Wine Blogging Wednesday #43: Unwinding with Wine

Joel at Wine Life Today will be our host for Wine Blogging Wednesday #43, the online tasting event started by Lenn Thompson of Lenndevours. This one is coming up quickly--in just under 2 weeks on March 5--so I wanted to get the word out ASAP.

Joel's theme is comfort wine. He wants us to drink a wine--any wine at all--that we enjoy just because it helps us to relax and unwind. Which wine do you drink under these circumstances? A particular maker? A particular variety? Pick your comfort wine, drink it, and write it up for March 5. Full details are available on the Wine Life Today blog.

See you back here on March 5!

Sicily Makes White Wine, Too

When you think Sicily you might think of big, brawny red wines that go along with ample bowls of pasta with red sauce. This side of Sicilian wine and food is well known--but Sicily makes white wine, too. The island off the toe of Italy's boot is known for its volcanic soil, and its rich whites that seem to soak up the essence of warm Mediterranean sunshine.

One of the wineries that makes the most of the sun and soil is the Gulfi winery, located in the ancient province of Ragusa. Evidence of Ragusa's viticultural heritage extends back as far as the 4th century BCE. Gulfi's owner, Vito Catania, has been making wine in Ragusa since 1996, and specializes in Sicilian grape varieties, including Frappato (my choice for WBW #42).

This time, though, I picked one of his whites to try. The 2005 Gulfi Valcanzjria was a very good QPR choice. (K&L Wines, $10.99; available from other merchants for $12-$14). Made from a blend of Chardonnay and an indigenous Sicilian variety, Carricante, it had rich aromas of apple, honey, and almond. Carricante is known for its nuttiness and citrus-like acidity, with brought nice dimensions of richness and freshness to the wine. On the palate, the mouthfeel is rich and round with apple and citrus notes. The wine had a lovely satiny texture, and the nuttiness turned into a slightly bitter almond aftertaste.

We had our Sicilian white with some cheddar cheese grits topped with pan-seared sausages tossed in the pan with apple, fennel seeds, and a splash of apple cider vinegar. A southern Italian white was the suggested wine to go with this dish, and it was a very nice pairing. The nuttiness of the Carricante went well with the earthiness of the grits, and the acidity cut through the fat of the sausage and picked up the sharpness of the cheddar cheese.

I'm only two months into my Italian wine adventure, and feel like I've already learned an awful lot. I can already tell that Italy's white wines are going to be a revelation and an inspiration as I continue through the other regions.

Book club, and wine blog awards, and new sites--oh, my!

There's a lot going on in the world of wine blogs, so I thought I'd catch everybody up on the news.

First, a reminder: next Tuesday, February 26, will be the first meeting of the Wine Book Club. Our fearless leader, David McDuff of McDuff's Food and Wine Trail, will be leading our online efforts to post reviews and generate discussions about Vino Italiano! by Joseph Bastianich and David Lynch. If you've read all or part of the book we hope that you will post your reactions on Tuesday by leaving comments on David's blog, on the Wine Book Club sites on Shelfari or Facebook, or posting on your own blog if you have one. Stumped about what to write? David has posted a fantastic set of questions to get you started. The questions had me thinking about what I'd read in the book in new ways, and I'm looking forward to bringing all those thoughts together next week--and to hearing what other people thought about the book, too.

Second, Tom Wark has the put out the call for nominations for the 2008 American Wine Blog Awards. This is the AWBA's second year, and there are is a new category (Best Business Wine Blog), and a slightly modified voting method (70% popular vote, 30% panel of judges). Tom does a terrific job running these awards, and they provide a great opportunity to shine a spotlight on the wine blogosphere. When you reach Tom's site you will see a set of easy buttons in the right sidebar directing you to nominations in the various categories, which include Best Wine Blog, Best Wine Blog Writing, Best Graphics, Best Business Wine Blog, Best Winery Blog, Best Wine Review Blog, and Best Single Subject Wine Blog. Everybody gets three nominations per category, so think through your favorite wine reads and if you don't see one of them mentioned in the comments/nomination area you can make them a nominee simply by mentioning the blog's name.

Third, fellow blogger John G. from Quaffability has a new blog: the Web Tasting Room. It's a great new format: a combination of video blog, on-camera tasting, discussion with a winemaker, and wine store that is linked directly to the wineries involved. I really liked seeing someone taste the wine and talk to the winemaker about it at the same time. It was like being a fly on the wall in a tasting room. Kudos to John G. for coming up with something new. Head on over, check it out, and you'll probably end up signing up for the feed like I did.

I think that's everything. Have fun cruising around the blogosphere, and see you back here tomorrow.

Grape Variety # 94: Touriga Franca

Portugal is home to numerous grape varieties that are relatively unknown in the US. One such grape--Touriga Franca--is used in the blend that makes up Port. But it also goes into Portuguese table wines, where it imparts rich flavors and aromas. With Portuguese wines in general rare finds on wine shop shelves, I was thrilled to find an example of Touriga Franca in a local store for under $10 and check off another box on my Wine Century Club worksheet.

The 2004 Symington Altano is made from a blend of Tinta Roriz--the Portuguese name for Tempranillo--and Touriga Franca grapes. ($6.95, Chronicle Wine Cellar; available from other merchants for between $7 and $9) The wine was dark, dark ruby in color--a characteristic of the variety. There were heady aromas of plum, flowers, blackberry, and chocolate. Flavors of black raspberries and sour cherries picked up a deeper, earthy note as it moved across your tongue. There flavors dissipated quickly after the wine was swallowed, and the aftertaste was predominantly of earth. Good QPR.

Where this wine shone was with food, which helped to keep the earthiness of the wine in balance. It was especially good with pork in tangy BBQ sauce, since the sourness of the cherry paired nicely with the sweet, tangy sauce.

WBW #42 Roundup of Italian Reds in Seven Words

Andy from Spittoon has posted the complete round-up of reviews from Wednesday's WBW #42--and it's only Friday!

Fifty-three wine bloggers from around the world accepted the challenge to drink an Italian red and describe it in just seven words. The entries were wonderfully creative, evocative, and fun. I highly recommend that you head over and read them all--they're all posted on Andy's site in their entirety--and then click over to find out the identity of the reds that the 7-word reviews describe. You'll find yourself chuckling at some of them, and then marveling at their accuracy and insightfulness. An entry from Baltimore's A Food and Wine Blog just may have been my favorite: "Closed for business--opens in three hours."

Thanks again to Andy for one of the most difficult and fun Wine Blogging Wednesdays ever. And remember: if you would like to come up with a new logo idea for this monthly event, the deadline for submissions is March 31, 2008. See the Wine Blogging Wednesday community site for details.