Adding to the closet

It seems I haven’t written anything here since my trip to Arizona, and there’s good reason for that. It’s not that I’ve been negligent in writing about the wines I’ve been drinking, it’s just that I haven’t been drinking all that much wine of late.

There were a couple wines, but in those few cases I was negligent because I didn’t jot down any notes. In one case I did jot down a few words. It was for a 2001 Rioja, the Aribau Cuvee Reserva, a Spanish Tempranillo about which I wrote: “Very light, almost like a Pinot. Delicious fruit.” I think I drank this wine at a tapas restaurant in Columbia, S.C., but I’m not certain. Apparently Parker rated this vintage with a 90.

I did find a Kim Crawford 2010 Sauvignon Blanc for just $11; it was an exceptional bargain as this wine usually retails for $17. It was excellent!

And there was a white from Portugal, the 2010 Casa de Vila Verde, the first white wine I’ve had from Portugal. I recall it being very fresh and delightful, but I jotted down nothing for notes.

But I haven’t been completely idle. I’ve added some exciting wines to my cellar – er, closet – and some of them I expect to be drinking this Thanksgiving with family.

One addition to the closet is a 2009 Lirac, which is in the Southern Rhône, the Chateau de Segries Cuvee Reservee by Henri de Lanzac. I drank this one twice so far – once at a restaurant in Conway, S.C. and the other during a dinner with my friend Curt – but I’m afraid I didn’t take any notes. Suffice it to say that I was very impressed with this wine, considering it was just $15. Ah, but I have two more bottles and I will definitely devote a post to this exceptional find. And if you can’t wait, just go out and buy some! It’s that good!

I’ve decided I’m going to attempt to create a vertical flight – or at least as close as I can come to creating one – for Châteauneuf-du-Pape. With the exception of 2008, I have bottles going back to 2005. Even accounting for the fact that my wine cellar is a closet, these wines are age-worthy, many of them for 15 to 20 years.

My most recent additions of these are the 2009 vintage from Domaine Jean Roger, about which I know absolutely nothing (Cellar Tracker suggests you hold until at least 2014), and the basic bottling from Domaine de Cristia. This latter wine comes from a very consistent producer and the 2009 vintage was rated with a 92 and is expected to cellar through 2023. Domaine de Cristia offers some higher end Châteauneufs that are also 90+ wines, but these will cost you; the basic bottling you can find for about $32.

I also recently added a 2009 Beaujolais, the Domaine Diochon Moulin-a-Vent, which we may drink this weekend.

Some new ones for drinking right away I picked up include the 2010 vintage of the Dry Creek Vineyard Wilson Ranch dry Chenin Blanc. The 2009 vintage was such an exceptional value with its fresh, crisp taste that I thought it worth the risk to try the 2010. We shall see.

For Thanksgiving, Curt was kind enough to donate his Italian Merlot, the2009 Falesco from Umbria. This is a reasonably-price wine from a consistent producer who has offered solid wines for the past decade; this should be a decent match with turkey. We’ll also have the Gruet Blanc de Noir sparkler from New Mexico, which Wine Spectator rated as a Smart Buy recently and gave it a score of 90. Not bad for $13.

So while I may have been silent recently, there will be plenty to write about very soon!

A “ghostly” and “insane” dinner

I enjoyed another wine tasting menu while in Jerome, Arizona, and I also want to share with you the wines I drank with a nearly splendid meal I had at The Asylum, the restaurant in the Jerome Grand Hotel (which allegedly is haunted!).

When I saw that The Asylum had a tasting menu, I knew I had to try it. You may select four wines from their tasting menu for a reasonable price of $10. It’s a great opportunity to try new varietals as well as new producers.

My first choice was the Schwartzbock Grüner Veltliner 2009. This was a light, fresh, juicy and crisp Austrian wine, one of my favorite varietals. I loved this one.

The next one was a Spanish blend that was 60 percent Verdejo, 25 percent Viura and 15 percent Sauvignon Blanc. The Con Class Rueda 2009 was full of orchard fruit on the nose and had a clean mineral taste with a bit of lemon. It finished like a cool mountain stream lined with Colorado columbine. It was, indeed, a delightful wine.

Moving on to reds, I tasted the Los Lobos Malbec 2009, a very interesting wine from Mendoza that was spicy on the nose with a hint of cassis. Yet despite that intriguing aroma, the wine was very subtle on the pallet without much tannin. The finish was smooth and nice. All the flavors were very interesting and I couldn’t quite nail them down, but I know that this is a wine that I would enjoy a bottle of.

My final wine of the flight was the Villa Pozzi Nero d’Avola 2009 from Sicily. I’ve been disappointed by these wines in the past, but this one redeemed all its brethren. It had a rich, blackberry nose heavy with fruit, but not off-putting. It was delicious, juicy with plum and cherry with a tight, dry finish. You don’t taste the tannin until the finish, which leads me to think that this has some closet time potential. This was very good, certainly the best Nero d’Avola I’ve had after a string of disappointments. In fact, I ordered a full glass of this to enjoy with my entree, their delicious grilled Achiote rubbed pork tenderloin, prepared perfectly.

The previous night I had dinner at The Asylum as well, they had so many good wines! I began that evening with the Indaba 2010 Chenin Blanc from the Western Cape, South Africa. I haven’t had much success with South African wines, but this was a nice find. It was smooth and delicate like an excellent Chenin Blanc, ripe with apple, pear, and even a bit of pepper on the finish.

My dinner was a Rocky Point shrimp scampi with tomato Beurre Blanc and shredded Parmesan brown rice. With this I had the Zolo 2010 Torrontes from Mendoza. The Torrontes had a really nice bite with my appetizer, a delicious butternut squash soup that was divine! By the way, if you visit the restaurant’s website, you can find the recipe! The wine was also quite good with the entrée, although the shrimp was a tad overcooked.

All in all, the wines found at The Asylum were delicious and the variety inspiring.

Dry Chenin Blanc with Coho salmon

What goes with a really well-prepared Coho salmon fillet? A really inexpensive dry Chenin Blanc, that’s what, and the 2009 Clarksburg vintage of Dry Creek Vineyard’s Wilson Ranch Dry Chenin Blanc is a great match and value at just $10 a bottle.

The first word I tapped into my iPhone notes about this wine was “Wow!” I’m going to be buying some more of this, that’s for sure! This crisp, dry, bright wine has a mineral quality and bright acidity that really buoys the citrus fruit and juicy green apple. The finish is clean and fresh. Just really grand for a $10 wine.

The Coho served with this wine was simply prepared. I sprinkled some fennel seed onto the fish and pan fried both sides in a bit of olive oil. I then added some sake and lemon juice for a final steam before serving. The Chenin Blanc was excellent with the preparation, the licorice-like flavor of the fennel playing really nicely with the fresh citrus of the wine.

I score this wine a 9 using my scale at the left. It’s worth repeating, I will be getting some more of this while it lasts in the stores!

A wine bar weekend

On Saturday a new friend of mine and I went to a wine bar in Lincoln Park and sampled two of their flights, one white and the other red. My friend, Andrew, wanted to learn more about wine and the wine bar was a perfect solution.

D.O.C. Wine Bar has many locations throughout Chicagoland, and like many wine bars, offers you the opportunity to sample flights of similar wines so you can get an idea of what a region offers or what a varietal offers. It’s a great way for neophytes to learn about varietals and regions, as well as learn the techniques to discern flavor differences and test your pallet. For more experienced wine drinkers, these wine bars can present opportunities with their various flights to sample new wines you may be unaware of, as well as give you opportunities to sample varietals that you might normally not purchase.

The abbreviation D.O.C. in Italian is for Denominazione di Origine Controllata, and is the equivalent to France’s Appelation D’Origine Contrôlee. It reflects a wine region’s denomination designation, and for the DOC, this is defined by the geographic area of production and specifies the varietals that may be used for wine making in order to earn that designation. This board also controls the minimum alcohol content in the wine, the maximum allowable yield with the grapes, and specifications for aging.

For our tastings, Andrew and I started off with three wines in the “Euro trash” flight, a curiously named trio of varietals that I am aware of, but haven’t much experience drinking. I tapped my notes into my iPhone as we drank, and below is what I chronicled.

Strele 2009 Soave, Vento, Italy: Light nose, orchard fruit, apple, peach, a very light flavor, not too sweet, very fresh and crisp, juicy.

Reventos 2009 Muscat/Macabeo, Penedes, Spain: Nose more rustic, longer finish, more herbal, fruit gradually exposed, a curious, almost medicinal flavor, not unpleasant.

Chateau Moncontour 2009, Chenin Blanc, Vouvray, Loire Valley, France: Light, fresh nose, juicy, spicy apple, light finish, best of the three.

Andrew and I both agreed we thought it interesting how the three wines were ordered. The Soave presented juicy and delicious orchard fruit followed next by the Muscat, which was decidedly more herbal and even a bit suppressed. Andrew didn’t care much for it, but I thought it good, though very different from the first. And then the Chablis placed itself right in the middle, having both the light juiciness of the orchard fruit, but still presenting complexity and mineral qualities.

We thought, then, that the ordering was deliberate, so when we ordered a Pinot Noir flight next, we anticipated a similar progression. Before tasting, I explained to Andrew why Pinot Noir can be so beguiling, how difficult it is to grow and how delicate it is to craft into good wine. Nebbiolo is also like this, which is why red Burgundy and Barolos can be such huge disappointments at times: both tend to be expensive, and both varietals are very similar in character. So when Burgundy or Barolo is made well, these wines are extraordinary. But when made poorly, they can be enormous duds.

Nieto 2010 Pinot Noir, Mendoza, Argentina: Can’t peg the nose, the smell is familiar, but can’t name it. A very young wine, thin, watery, no finish. Color a beautiful transparent ruby.

Block Nine 2009, Pinot Noir, California: Light berry nose, bit of spice, tannin noticeable, longer finish, a hint of cinnamon. Tasty, but nothing special.

Vincent Sauvestre 2008, Pinot Noir, Burgundy, France: Nothing on the nose, literally sans smell, bright fruit, but again diluted.

With this flight, we experienced the ephemeral quality that is Pinot Noir. All three wines were generally disappointments in my book, although I must say it was curious to see a Pinot Noir from the Mendoza region of Argentina. If I hadn’t of done this, I wouldn’t have known about the fact there are growers dabbling with Pinot Noir in Argentina.

Repeat visits to wine bars like this are a good idea because the tasting flights do change periodically, so there will be something of interest. And the bottle selection can be relatively deep, although rather expensive, particularly for the higher end wines. For example, D.O.C. has a Chassagne-Montrachet that goes for $116 a bottle, and a Chateuneuf-du-Pape that goes for more than $300.

All in all a delightful experience and one that shall be repeated.

Are there similar wine bars in your area? Tell me about them and your experiences by leaving a comment. What new wine have you discovered through similar tasting flights?