Memorial Day Weekend: Bourdeaux, Super Tuscan , Sauterne

Friday night was pizza with Berbera. A fabulous wine. Already wrote about that.

Saturday night was little filet mignon steaks, garlic mashed potatoes, and slow cooked onions with my first real Bordeaux. The Bordeaux was Chateau de L'Estang 2005, about $15 at Bob's. Now I know what all the fuss over Bordeaux is all about. It was a big red, at least for me. It was very aromatic, with a great nose which was pretty oaky, but balanced with dark fruit, licorice, and a mulch/forest scent. It was full bodied in the mouth with fairly intense blackberry, dark cherry, and blueberry flavors balanced with good acidity and firm tannins. On the finish I picked up some chocolate. It was more complex and a little bigger than the California cabernets I've had. I figure if this is what a $15 Bordeaux is like, no wonder people collect the big house Bordeaux wines. I'm planning on keeping a bottle of this (or another affordable Bordeaux) in the winerack. To me this is a great wine with steak, but a bit much for drinking by itself. It wants a strong flavored food to balance it. Not loads of alcohol at 13.5%, which just goes to show that big wines don't necessarily need high alcohol content.

Sunday was chicken with olives, zucchini, and a barley dish with roasted red peppers, onions and tomato and the 2006 Monte Antico super tuscan. A very nice meal. This is a great "go to" wine for me. Last fall it was listed in the Wine Spectator's 100 best wines of the year. It listed number 61 and was only about $15. I've recently seen this for as little as $11 a bottle. It showed up everywhere (in Knoxville at least) probably because there 70,000 cases produced. Monte Antico is also listed in Robert Parker's Wine Bargains book and is noted for consistently producing quality wines at affordable prices. This wine is not a complex or as big as the bordeaux, but is very pleasant and easier to drink. Also easier to pair with food. the nose is not as big as the Bordeaux, lots of cherry and oak, with vanilla. At first I tasted loads of dark cherry, bright acidity and somewhat weak tannins. It was a little weak on the mid palate. But it opened over 45 minutes or so and the flavors mellowed and blended. It rounded out became much better. The tannins actually seemed to become stronger, maybe because the cherry mellowed out as it opened. Overall, this is a great wine for the price. I often choose this wine when I think a white will be overpowered by the food and I don't want a really lightweight red. This was great with the heavily seasoned chicken and vegetable dishes.

Monday night was ribs (what else?), corn on the cob, and slow cooked onions left over from the steak dinner. We had a small glass of box white wine with dinner and later a little glass of 2003 Chateau d'Arche Grand Cru Sauterne. This producer is actually listed Larousse Encyclopedia of wine. Ok, I've been really looking forward to trying this. I picked up a half bottle at Bob's a few weeks ago for about $30. I've read so much about how wonderful Sauternes are. Sunshine in a glass. Poetry has been written about Sauternes. It's hard for the actual experience to live up to all that press. I'm still trying to decide if I like it. It has that funny smell that Rieslings often have. It does have a glorious golden color and a rich syrupy mouth feel with a pleasantly sweet lingering finish. It tastes nicely sweet with apricot, apple, and pear flavors, and maybe a little cinnamon or nutmeg mixed in. I also definitely get the taste of yellow raisins. But it also has the odd Riesling smell in the taste as well and it's a bit of a turn-off. Maybe I should try another producer? I'd have to get another good buy. Yquem runs about $125 per half bottle in a newly released vintage. These wines can age for 50 years or more. If you've never had Sauterne and you have had dandelion wine, the two are similar but the Sauternes is definitely the heavier of the two.

Barbera

Wow!!! I had forgotten just how good this wine is. The plan was to fix Friday night pizza at home and open a Barbera (it's next on Kramer's Italian wine list, and we've had it before with pizza). Very good with the pizza, especially the one with the tomato based sauce, but also good with the pesto and goat cheese pizza. The Barbera starts out very bright, lots of acidity and nice cherry and blueberry. Also a little oak on the nose, but subtle, as an undertone. As it opened, it just got better and better. By an hour to an hour and a half after first being opened and poured, we were done with pizza, but were still slowly sipping at the wine. By that time, it had mellowed and ripened into this wonderful velvety rich deliciousness that was just amazing. How can that happen?? The smooth cherry,blueberry, chocolate finish held hints of licorice or spiciness. This is why I love Italian wines. Wow!!

This particular wine was a 2008 Briccotondo by Fontanafredda. I believe I got it at Bob's package store for about $12 a bottle, but I've seen this particular wine at several different places.

Try it! Try it with something unpretentious like pizza or a simple pasta with red sauce. Then sit and finish the bottle, sipping a little at a time. You'll see what I mean.

Maso Poli Pinot Grigio 2007

This is a wine I've had many times over the years. $18 a bottle at McScrooge's. Not a big nose, but floral with hints of minerality and apricot. Al also picked up a little pear and maybe a little citrus. It was pretty full bodied for a pinot grigio, nicely balanced, fairly dry, and mildly acidic. Not overly fruity, as are some pinot gris. Nice minerality on the mid-palate. Apricot again on the finish. A good food wine, but not as crisp as many pinot grigios. There was more color to it, too. It was a pale golden color, as opposed to some pinots, which have little color at all. Not one of those semi-sweet "sipping on the patio" wines, but good with food. It would pair well with pasta with white sauce, chicken or fish. We had trout with lemon zest and capers, broccoli with anchovies, raisins, and pine nuts, and polenta with onion and zucchini. Not one of my best pairings. The seasoning of the food somewhat overwhelmed the wine. Actually, the trout would have been better with a simpler preparation, just olive oil, salt and pepper. The wine would be ideal with something with a little more weight, and a little less spiciness. A nice pasta with white sauce or chicken breasts rather simply prepared, maybe with a mild buttery sauce with shallots. Overall a nice solid food wine, but not a "wow" wine.

Aglianico

Aglianico is a not real well known wine from southern Italy. It's a deep dry red wine with rich, earthy flavor. I got this particular wine on-line from JJ buckley. They have a very extensive list of quality wines and they DO ship to Tennessee. I got this wine because I'm slowly working my way alphabetically through a book on Italian wines (they've always been my favorite). The book is Matt Kramer's Making Sense of Italian Wine. Not as detailed as Vino Italiano, apparently the current "bible" on Italian wine. Matt Kramer's book is not as thick, or as detailed. It's very approachable. Anyway, I got this book on a whim and I decided that it would be fun to work my way through it. It's laid out alphabetically. What could be easier? Well, finding the wines has been a bit of a problem. So far, I've managed to get everything. But I'm only up to Barbera. And I'm drinking lots of non-Italian wine, too.

Anyway, tonight we had Aglianico. Specifically Irpinia Aglianico cinque querce 2006 ($20/bottle). It says on the label that it was estate bottled by Salvatore Molettieri. We had this wine once before several months ago. Both times I served the wine with lamb, a very nice pairing. The wine had a nice nose of cherry, and oak. I could smell some vanilla and a little spiciness. When it was first opened the taste was very fruit forward with firm tannins and bright acidity. As it opened it mellowed and I picked up more flavor. The acid and tannins softened and I could taste the dark cherry, as before, but not so bright. I could also pick up a little raisin flavor and some licorice. The finish improved, leaving a nice lingering dark cherry and vanilla flavor. I'm too impatient to have lots of experience aging wines, but I bet this one will be better in another year or more. I've got one more bottle of this stuff and I'm going to sit on it until at least the next calendar year. In addition to being good with lamb (a local favorite in this region of Italy), it would pair with beef and other strong flavored foods. Kramer recommends it with hot red peppers, and pastas with strongly flavored sauces.

Dinner was lamb chunks (stewing lamb from Kroger) with black olives. We had polenta and spinach as side dishes. The spinach was sauteed with olive oil, garlic, anchovies, and golden raisins. Unusual and tasty. I sauteed onion, mushroom and zucchini and stirred it into the polenta. Also very tasty. Alas, the lamb should have been absolutely delicious. It was nice and tender. But, somehow, I over-salted it. Oh well, can't win 'em all. I'm thinking the lamb will make nice sandwiches. The bread will take the edge off the saltiness.

Curious about the site's name? I'm calling it Penny's winerack because I don't have a cellar. LOL

Knoxville Wine Scene / Review Vinho Verde

To Whom it May Concern:

Can't think of a better way to get started. How about, Hello All!

I don't know about you, but I've decided there is a need for this blog in Knoxville, Tennessee. There are quite a number of people in our little college town that are interested in drinking good wine and eating good food. Of course, there are groups available here such as the Wine Society of East Tennessee (a stuffy name, but actually some very nice people, not that I have met many of them). There are also various little informal local groups that get together to share wine and food. There are tastings and dinners held locally and sponsored by various liquor stores and restaurants. In short, Knoxville has more going on than an outsider might expect. But what about the voice of someone local who drinks wine, has a somewhat limited budget, and has no associations with the wine or food business? How about a format for sharing ideas on wines that are available locally? I read some of the national publications on food and wine, notably "Wine Spectator" and "Food and Wine". The complaint I hear from other Knoxvillians is that they read about a wine in one of these publications and then they go to their local liquor store and it's not available. Then they're discouraged. Same problem with those little wine buying guides. They probably work great if you live in New York city, but in Knoxville, you're going to have to do some hunting to find wines listed that are available here. Things have gotten a little easier since our state legislature made shipping wine to individuals legal in the state of Tennessee. But many of the on-line wine shippers still do not ship to Tennessee. Maybe they think the market here is too small to justify dealing with our state regs? I don't know. But I do know that many places will not ship to Tennessee. So, what we need is a way to share information on wines that we CAN get.

Vinho Verde

Metro Pulse just started a wine column. It's to appear monthly, and the first article contained some very good general information on Portuguese vinho verde (green wines). Green meaning young and relatively un-aged. I happened to have one of these wines last night. Husband, Al, and I had chicken piccata with a lemon-pepper flavored pasta and a side salad of fresh greens and tomato. It was delicious, if I do say so myself. The chicken piccata had lovely little capers and bits of pancetta and the lemony sauce coated everything wonderfully. We had never had this particular wine before (or any vinho verde that I recall). It was Quinta da Aveleda, 2008 vinho verde white wine from Portugal. I picked it up at Ashe's (for about $10) on a whim. It was very nice, crisp, semi-dry, mildly effervescent, citric, but with notes of melon and tropical fruit. It had a very nice citric, fruity nose and a nice level of acidity (for me). I thought it was fairly complex for a $10 wine and it had a pleasant lingering finish (for a white). It was very good with the chicken piccata and I think it would pair well with summer salads, fish, or any lemony chicken dish.