Wine!

[Opsa]

Thanks, dear Blue! It certainly seemed off to me. I told Mr. Ops that if we'd been served it at a restaurant I'd have been a pill and sent it back! The cork did not seem saturated, but it looked like it may have been too dry, as it someone hadn't stored it correctly. It seemed a little cracked- or maybe that was just me!

Mr. Ops drank the rest the next night. He is a simple soul. Eats my cooking, too. Bless 'is 'eart.

[Lindorm]

A while ago, Darlica and I enjoyed a very nice red Bourgogne:

Bourgogne Haute Cotes de Nuits -Les Dames de Vergy

From winemakers Domaine Dominique Guyon.

This was a very nice wine in a classical Bourgogne style. It wasn't actually all that deep-red, being of a lighter colour, but with a powerful nose that was full of fruity aromas and a bit of shale and fudge. The taste was quite complex and multi-layered, with a first wave of fruit and wild berries, followed by a more austere taste of black pepper and fudge (perhaps some anise?), and a looong aftertaste of wood and shale. The wine comes from the higher regions of Bourgogne, and it shows -the taste feels quite strict in a way, but also quite rich and packed with flavour. I suppose an analogue would be those wild raspberries you can find in a rocky clearing out in the woods, covered in thorns and old branches. They are quite small and a bit difficult ot get to, but your persistence is rewarded by a berry that is a concentrate of fruit and sunshine. This wine is by no means a flattering socialite, but if you take your time to get acquainted with it, I don't think you'll get disappointed.

We had it with a quite simple dish -entrecõte marchand du vin, a nice slab of entrecote* roasted in a hot pan, and then set aside to rest while I threw a lump of butter, chopped shallots and some garlic in the pan, and let them melt for a while, before I deglazed the pan with  more butter, some stock and red wine, giving a splash of buttery, creamy sauce for each entrecôte. This went very well with the wine which, while not as dense as a hefty Alentejo or a Gnarly Head Zinfandel, still has quite a bit of an oomph and can stand a bit of spice in the food. While we haven't tried it yet, I suspect it would be very good as an accompaniment to some cheeses, too -say, a nice gruyere, or a peppery goat cheese.


*The entrecôte is cut from the rib area of the animal, as the name literally says. I believe that the closest approximation of the traditional entrecôte in US parlance would be a rib-eye steak, perhaps cut from the end towards the short loin.

[Sibling Zono (anon1mat0)]

How much did you pay for it?

[Lindorm]

Not that spendy, SEK 129:- per bottle, which translates to roughly €13 or USD18.
Back in the days of the state alchohol monopoly, Systembolaget was one of the biggest single purchasers of wine and spirits in the world, so you could find some absolutely amazing bargains here in Sweden. Those days are unfortunately gone, but you can still find som very nice wines at not-too-outrageous prices.

[Sibling DavidH]

In the UK that would be reasonable for a good wine.  Sounds good: I'll have a look in one of our two decent wine outlets.

[Opsa]

We've been enjoying a very nice cabernet sauvignon called La Finca from Mendoza, Argentina. We get it at Trader Joe's for $3.99 per bottle.

[Lindorm]

For our New Year's Dinner, Darlica and I had a very nice wine: Yet another Bourgogne, but a white one this time.

Bourgogne Blanc Les Setilles 2009 by Olivier Leflaive

This is a 100% Chardonnay wine, with the grapes coming from various growers in the area. Most of the wine is aged in oak barrels, about 10% of which are new. Thus, it is a far cry from the sterotypical California Chardonnay, oaked so heavily that it feels like you are chewing on your dog's toy chewing stick. 

The wine is pale yellow in colour. It has a very big nose, with lots of aromas of apples, minerals and something buttery. The taste is dry, crisp, somewhat tart with hints of apple, plum, minerals and butter again. There is also a nice nuttines with a vanilla trace, probably from the oak barrels.

We had the wine with a very nice grilled norwegian Salma-salmon (a very good and lean salmon) accompanied by a "mayonnaise maltaise", a citrus mayonnaise with blood orange juice and a toasted crisp "risotto" of wholegrain rice. They went very well together, with the wine being powerful enough to stand up to the spicy mayonnaise, but at the same time being light enough to not drown the subtle flavours of the salmon. The wine also worked well with the nutty, buttery, roasted flavours of the risotto, providing a light, tart counterpoint.

The wine was quite sensitive to temperature, being a bit closed up at first since we accidentaly chilled it a bit too much. If in doubt, I would err on the side fo serving this wine a bit too warm rather than a bit too cold.

SEK 139:- at Systembolaget, roughly €16 or USD 20. Well worth the price, and definitely a wine we will buy again. The 2006 vintage of the same wine is supposed to be really good -we haven't tried it, but it has recieved some outstanding reviews.

[Opsa]

Who's got a big nose?!

Wow, that sounds lovely. The wine and the fish!

[Lindorm]

Here's one to stay away from: Chateau Ksara Blanc des Blancs 2009.

There are quite a few wineyards in Lebanon, making some quite good wines, with the very idiosyncratic ones from Chateau Musar probably the most well-known. While the Ch. Musar ones are very distinctive and very much a love/hate thing, the red wines from ch. Ksara are much more accessible and generally of a good to very good quality. We were curious, and decided to try out one of their white wines in order to taste what they were like. We have already tried a few of their red wines, and found them very nice.

The Chateau Ksara Blanc des Blancs is mainly composed of Sauvignon Blanc grapes, with some Chardonnay and Semillion thrown in, too. The grapes are grown in the Bekaa valley and recieve very little rainfall during the growing season, so they usually get a very concentrated flavour. The grapes are pressed whole, and the resulting juice is fermented in vats before being finished off in barrells. So far, so good, and sounding quite promising.

Unfortunately, the wine was a disappointment. Despite trying it out a t varying temperatures and grades of aeration, the wine stayed much the same: A closed, tart, slightly sour wine, somewhat reminiscent of unripe green apples, with a bit of lemon juice and allspice on the palate, and a aftertaste of mint. The nose was also very tart and mostly lacking in body. The wine felt unripe, unfinished and had only one dominant tastenote in the various phases of tasting, all trying to compete with an unrelenting tartness.

Perhaps another vintage might be better? I don't think we are going to buy this one again, though.

[Opsa]

I've had a couple of good Lebanese wines at a popular place in D.C. called The Lebanese Taverna. Since it's kinda expensive we only go for special occasions. We have such a great time there that I never remember what wines they were, later. Foo... But it's really fun if you have a big table of fun people.

Do you have a "wine bong"?

[Sibling Zono (anon1mat0)]

I just had an Argentinian Cabernet with my lunch:

Quite smooth and not very costly if you are into cabs, got it from costco.

[Swatopluk]

I still don't drink...wine

[Griffin NoName]

Why does white pino gregio give me a migraine but rose pinot gregio doen't?

I suspect it's sulphur but why would rose be any better on that score?

[Sibling Zono (anon1mat0)]

A few women in my family get migraine from red but not white wine, why rose would work for you escapes me, but then again I know a woman to whom coffee sends her to sleep, so different people, different reactions.

[Griffin NoName]

I began with red wine migraines and white wines no problem. (except specially selected red wines and ports that had been laid down for years and were VERY expensive which I had the good fortune to have quite often on High Table at college). Then maybe 20 years later, all the new country white wines, like Chile etc) had to be stopped - viscious migraines, also German white wines and defintely NO sweet desert wines - lethal). I could still drink most spirits. Again maybe ten years later, spirits had to be ditched. Finally even French/Italian extra dry wines started to give me migaines but stupidly I do have them occasionally as I LIKE wine, and put up with the suffering. I had never thought of trying rose, I always considered it a bit of a non-wine (my parents drank it!) until I tried it last week. Seems like my last hope.