We were going to meet The Caller, as they live in a remote area, and they asked us to get them some wine.  Which was opportune, as we could get together to see them for the Christmas season, as they will begone for the next couple of months on one of their vagabond vacations.  When one doesn’t have children or grandchildren it is easier to get away.  My Bride would be lost.

We always try to meet somewhere midpoint between our two homes, so we agreed on the Ciao Amici in Brighton, Michigan for lunch.  It was just the three of us, as his wife had made a quick trip to see some friends, before their extended road trip.  The Caller started lunch off with one of his exotic cocktails, that he is very partial too, and my Bride decided that she wanted a Negroni.  I, in keeping with the theme of my articles had a split of Da Luca Prosecco DOC NV.   Prosecco is a sparkling wine produced from nine provinces of the Veneto and Friuli-Venezia Giulia regions.  Prosecco wine is made from the Glera grape, but when it comes from the Prosecco DOC region, the grape is called Prosecco; and sparkling wines from outside of the region still use the name Glera.  It is one of the sparkling wines that is often referred to as “a poor man’s Champagne.” It is made using a low-pressure carbonation process, known as the Charmat Method, the Marinotti Method or the tank method; the bubbles tend to be bigger, lighter and less persistent.   This pale straw-yellow wine offers notes of peaches, apricots, and white flowers.   On the palate the wine offers tones of stone fruits, yellow apples and lemon candy in an off-dry style with crispness, bright acidity and a medium-count finish of pineapple.

After our drinks, we started looking at the lunch menu, but ended up ordering from the dinner menu, I guess we are just anarchists at heart.  The Caller had his Sausage Rustica, Italian sausage pan seared with sautéed banana peppers and onions.  My Bride had the Butternut Ravioli stuffed with Butternut Squash puree, walnuts and mushrooms in a creamy Marsala-sage sauce.  I had the Shrimp Luca, lightly breaded jumbo shrimp that was flash fried with fresh vegetables and polenta, finished with a lemon-garlic-cream sauce.  We shared a bottle of M. Chapoutier Belleruche Cotes-du-Rhone Blanc 2022.  The Chapoutier family has been in the Rhone since 1808 and have transitioned from just a grower to a Bwinemaker and a negociant, and a genuine force in the area and France; not to mention that they have holdings now in three other countries beyond France.  They have also included Braille embossing on their labels for some time now, since their estate in Hermitage was originally owned by the creator of the modern version of Braille.  The Belleruche label is their popular priced wine and readily available at many restaurants.  The wine is a blend of White Grenache, Roussanne, Viognier, Clairette and Bourboulenc grown on vineyards of stony marls and clay-limestone hills.  The fruit is mechanically harvested at night, light maceration, with fermentation at cool-controlled Stainless-Steel tanks, and five months on the lees.  A soft golden-yellow colored wine that offers notes of apricots, fennel and irises.  On the palate there were tones of citrus, pears and dried fruits, fresh and balanced with a medium finish with a trace of anise.

We were getting ready to enjoy some dessert, and while The Caller and my Bride were deciding, I was going to just have a glass of dessert wine, and maybe as I am getting older, I am enjoying my after dinner wines more and more.  I was going to have a glass of Warre’s Otima 10 Tawny Porto NV, and our waiter suggested that I get some Vanilla Bean ice cream, and he would drizzle some of the Tawny on the ice cream as well.  The other two’s ears perked up, and they wanted to try this as well.  Warre’s is one of Portugal’s most famous Port houses and it began in 1670.  William Warre became a partner in 1729 and then it was known as Clark, Thorton and Warre.   The house stayed exclusively in the Warren family until 1905, when Andrew James Symington was admitted as a partner of Warre and Co.  Warre’s is managed by the 13^th generation of the Symington family, who also own the Dow’s and Graham’s Port houses.  The Otima 10 and Otima 20 Year Old Tawny was developed about twenty-five years ago aimed at a younger demographic group, than what is usually associated with Port drinkers.    While there are over eighty sanctioned grapes allowed in the production of Port, most have been forgotten, lost, and intermingled over the centuries.  The five main grapes used are: Touriga Nacional, Touriga Franca, Tinto Barroca, Tinta Roriz (Tempranillo), and Tinto Cao; and some other relatively common varieties are Sousao, Tinta Amarela and Mourisco Tinto.   Port wines are what is known as fortified wines, and is achieved by adding high proof grape spirit during the fermentation process as the spirit kills of the yeast before all the sugars have fermented, then it is aged in barrel, where the coloring comes from.  The wine is a golden red color and offers notes of golden raisins, figs, dried fruits and butterscotch.  On the palate there are tones of dried apricots, orange marmalade blending perfectly with raisins, figs, butterscotch and caramelized sugar with enough acidity to keep the wine fresh and not cloying, and the finish is a nice long count of dried fruit and barrel aging.