Chanti

Hello!! I want to talk about chianti wines today. Last night was the Winers get together and we did pizza night. Everyone brought a food and a wine pairing. I have to say, the pairings get better and better with this group. Anyway, because there were pizzas, there were two different chianti wines. I love this wine. Chianti has gotten some bad press in the past. Forget about all that! There are some fabulous chiantis out there. And I'm always impressed with sangiovese varietals. Sangiovese is the main varietal in chianti, Brunello, Montepulciano di Nobile, Super Tuscans, and is sometimes labeled as Sangiovese, especially when produced outside Italy. I'm fascinated by how different these wines can be from each other and with how much variation exists between different chianti wines based on style and winemaker. I've personally discovered a very llightly oaked chianti, Tiziano, which is light and fruity. I often serve this wine instead of a rose (I'm not much of a rose person). It's a very good wine when having guests that are not big wine drinkers and food that begs for an Italian wine. I serve it with Italian food made with light tomato based sauces. A little heavier than the Tiziano is Da Vinci chianti. We had this last night paired with a pepperoni and cheese stromboli. It was very smooth and mellow, still with the characteristic cherry vanilla, a bit of earthiness, and fairly soft tannins. Bigger than the Tiziano, but still very easy to drink and a good choice for people who don't drink a lot of Italian wines. Not a very complex or challenging chianti, but pleasant. We also had a Gabbiano last night. It was a little harsher, with firmer tannins. I liked it, but it might be a little rough for some people. I believe it would have been better if it had more time to open. Then there's one of my favorites, Cecchi chianti classico. It's a bigger wine than any of the previously mentioned wines. I'd drink it a lot more often, but I spend a lot of time exploring different wines. There's so much out there. I think the Cecchi is a terrific food wine for many Italian dishes. It's great with lasagna, spaghetti, pizza, steaks, anything with a tomato based sauce. It's much like the Da Vinci, but with more structure and complexity. And finally I want to mention one of my all time favorite italian wines, Francobaldi Chianti Reserva. It's big but mellow, with a wonderful velvety weight on the palate. Maybe the Cecchi would become more like this with age, but I lack the patience to find out. The Francobaldi is a little more pricey, at close to $30 a bottle, but it's worth it. It approaches a really good Montepulciano di Nobile in character. I keep at least 3 different chiatis in my winerack. Right now, we have the Tiziano, the Cecchi Chinati Classico, and the Francobaldi Chianti Reserva. This way, I always have the right chianti at hand. I'm considering adding the Da Vinci just to round out my lineup.
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Dinner guests: 2008 Martin Codax Albarino, 2007 Sebastiani Pinot Noir, 2006 El Coto Rioja, 2005 Las Rocas Garnacha

Hello!! Well, we have been drinking wines this past week, but nothing new until this weekend. We had another couple over Saturday evening. For starters I fixed little crostini with green beans, zucchini, salsa verte, and feta cheese. We had the Albarino with this. It was very quite good. Subtle aromas of jasmine and white flowers. I picked up well integrated flavors of peach, mild citrus and hazelnut. It was very well balanced and had a nice rich body. It was my first Albarino and now I know what all the fuss is about. I'll be keeping one in my winerack. This particular wine was $16 at Ashes. They have one on sale now for $10 or $11 which was rated 90 or 91 by the Wine Spectator.

Next came Italian mushroom stuffed crepes and salad. Our guests brought the Sebastiani pinot noir, and we opened it with dinner. It was a pleasant, soft well balanced pinot, somewhat lacking in complexity, but it was a nice wine with dinner and took a bit of a back seat to the food. It had soft tannins and acids and pleasant, easy to drink fruit flavors of strawberry, cherry, and plum.

The other two wines were after dinner sippers. The Las Rocas is one we have had before, $19 at Ashes. This is one of my current favorites. It's a fairly big wine with a big, aromatic nose which rises right out of the glass to greet you. The aromas are dark cherry and a soft spiciness. On the palate it's dark cherry, blackberry, and cedar with a little bit of pepper. It's fairly smooth and full bodied with firm tannins and a nice balance of acid. It had a pleasant lingering finish. Lastly, we opened the El Coto. To me, this was a bit of a disappointment, but Al liked it better than I did. It had a big, in your face nose, with bright cherry and oak. The taste was pretty much the same. It seemed simple and very "new world" after having had the Las Rocas. It wasn't bad, but was a bit of a fruit bomb and the oak monster was definitely with us on this one. Personally, I think you can find better Spanish wines. To each his own.