As You Wish

Posted on May 5, 2015 by thewineraconteur

Just a short time ago, I had to mention the Centenary of the Armenian Martyr’s Day and I had mentioned that I had never had a bottle of wine from Armenia; I have had beer and brandy, just not beer. A couple of years ago, when we were out in Las Vegas visiting the children and grandchildren, my daughter got very excited because it was near my birthday and she presented me with a bottle of wine that she had bought at an Armenian market out there. Alas the wine was from the adjoining country of Georgia and she really thought she had made a coup. As the old saying goes “the best laid plans of mice and men…” With all of the postings on Social Media about the Centenary, my daughter’s mind began revolving. I received a message from her, asking if I was going to be home on a certain day, because there was a package coming that I had to sign for; yes, she can be very cryptic when she desires. It turns out that I had to sign for the package the next day, and since the weather had been cool, after I signed I could hear the tell-tale rattling of a Styrofoam sleeve in the carton and I knew it was a bottle of wine. When I opened the carton up, I discovered that she had found a bottle of wine from Armenia for me, and there was a note enclosed with the shipping that she must have dictated to the person that had taken the order. When I looked at the carton, I had realized that it had not been shipped from Las Vegas, but was from New Jersey and the shipper was WineWorksOnline; my daughter can be quite determined when she wants to be, as I have learned over the years.

Zorah Karasi 2012

I was looking at a bottle of Zorah Karasi 2012 from Rind in Armenia. Karasi means “from amphora” the way that beverages were stored and aged centuries ago in large clay vessels (amphorae). Zorah Karasi and their first wine was a tribute to 6,100 year wine tradition in Armenia. During excavations of “Karmir Blur” or Red Hill near the capital city of Yerevan in Armenia four hundred ancient wine barrels were found. The other more interesting find was in the excavations of Areni-1 cave in the Yeghegnadzor region they found the world’s oldest winery and the first historical evidence of wine making on an industrial scale. The vineyards of Zorah in the small village of Rind are in the heart of Yeghegnadzor region and continue the tradition of the earlier vintners of antiquity.

Thank you note

While some of the wine in Armenia is made from the pomegranate fruit, this wine was made from a grape varietal, and a new one for me, and those that are chasing the Century Club should take notice. Zorah Karasi is made from the Areni Noir grape that is indigenous to Armenia and later on in Turkey as well. It is its own grape, maybe dating back to the time of Noah, because his Ark did land on Mount Ararat the fabled mountain of Armenia. This grape varietal, just like the Armenia language and alphabet are exclusive to the Armenians. The wine has been aged in French and Armenia oak barrels, so I am looking forward to trying this wine, but it has to be with a classic Armenia dish, perhaps a dish that I remember from my youth, that nobody has made for years, because it is labor intense. Just a thought and a warning to my Bride that now my brain is revolving for just the right dish and I have to publicly thank my “favorite daughter” for the gift, and all I need from her now is just a phone call on Father’s Day.

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My Third Year as The Wine Raconteur

Posted on May 3, 2015 by thewineraconteur

I guess it is time to open another bottle and give my self a toast, though I really don’t need much prodding to open a bottle of wine. I still consider myself a novice and I really don’t know how long most Blogs endure before ennui or burnout ensues with the average writer. I do know that there are some Blogs that I followed are no longer issuing articles and I cannot presume to know why. The first year that I started writing, I made sure that I had an article published every day and after the first year I cut back to an article every other day and so far that is working out well for me. If my count is right, this article will be my seven-hundred and thirtieth articles, and I am not sure if that is a lot or not, but when I hit the thousandth article I do think that I will celebrate that as a milestone. In three years I have also had over forty-seven thousand hits on my site, and I can not even say if that is a lot, but it does please me.

birthday-cake-three

If you have ever noticed, I do not have anything posted about samples and my policy towards samples and that is because I have never been offered to write about a wine. I think that I have had two tasting room fees waived, during the course of the tastings, as I have mentioned my Blog and produced a business card that I have for the site. So that has not been an issue for me, the same for all of the restaurants that I have written about. I like to talk about wine and food, but I am not a critic of either per se, and I do not try to pass myself off as one either. I have been to some of the finest restaurants in the United States over the years and yet most of the finest eateries that I have visited have not produced large numbers for that article. I mean I have eaten at The French Laundry in Napa and at Daniel in Manhattan and they have been mere blips for the statistics. A couple of restaurants that I have written about in the last couple of years that have had remarkable statistics and the funny thing is that all of the articles that have done stellar are no longer in business. Perhaps I have hit people with nostalgia or they have found my articles doing internet searches with perhaps no interest in the wine aspect. The top three restaurants per readership that I have discussed are: Joey’s Stables, Major’s and The Canopy.

As for wine, and I have written about plenty of wine since I began and I am glad that I have the labels as proof. Since I do not write about wines like most other writers, perhaps I am consider a “light-weight” and I can live with that, because to me wine should be enjoyed and shared and not be put under a microscope. I have had the chance in my lifetime to enjoy some excellent wines and I have also had my share of table wines. I have had a ’21 Richebourg, most of the First Growths and I have even had Screaming Eagle; and statistically they have all been mere blips on the screen. Perhaps it is because I wrote about them, very early in my blog. At one time I just wrote a couple of articles about Bordeaux showing labels that I have had and those articles over the years have done well especially Pauillac, Saint-Emilion and Sauternes/Barsac. One of the best articles in regards to readership was about a table wine that my Barber suggested a 2008 Chariot Gypsy Red.

The French Laundry Entrance

Then I have written a couple of articles that just keep getting readers, and I really cannot tell you why, other than perhaps they are all from internet searches and curiosity. I have written about wine parties at home, wine tasting kits and even about kitschy ceramic wine bottles; and they are all great subjects for searches I guess. I have never been abroad, which is strange for a wine writer, but I have visited many wineries and shall keep visiting them, because it is my passion and true enjoyment. I am still feeling my way around, still reeducating myself about the craft of writing, because my literature and English classes were many years ago. I still feel that I am most comfortable writing to my invisible guest as if he or she was at my table as we share food and wine and I just try to give them some insight into the wine of the moment. I am not technical and most wineries can give more information than the average person needs as far as I am concerned. So I shall beg your indulgence and continue to write in my casual manner about how wine can make any moment so much more magical.

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A Big Thank You

Posted on May 1, 2015 by thewineraconteur

“Who’d a thunk it?” I just have to take a moment to thank my peers, the fellow Wine Bloggers that voted for the last Wine Writers Challenge. I had the good fortune to be selected this time as the “winner” for the Challenge. I have always tried to live up to the challenge, but there are so many fine Wine Bloggers that just trying to keep up with the quality of writing that they do is a challenge by itself. Jim van Bergen of JVB Uncorked had won the challenge and the theme he had selected was “finish.” I was sort of petrified by the theme, as I wrote that I do not usually write descriptors and notes about a wine, as that is not my forte. As I reread my entry several times, proof-reading and just checking to see if it sounded like me, my one concern was that it sounded a bit like a rant, because it was not a subject that I usually write about.

winnermwwc

As our gracious coordinator of the Challenge, Jeff of The Drunken Cyclist mentioned, it was a slow month for the challenge as on seven authors entered, which probably helped my chances. The high count for the Challenge so far has been twenty-five entrants which does make for a more interesting race, just compare it to a little horse race that will be off and running in a day or two in Louisville. Though I was happy to learn from Jeff’s announcement that I had come in second a number of times; which surprised and pleased me that my labors have not been all in vain. I do believe that I have entered submissions to every Challenge, only because it makes me write an essay that is out of my comfort zone, and when one is a Raconteur comfort is part of the dialogue. I guess my writing has been noted by more peers and as I said earlier “a big thank you.”

123rd Kentucky Derby

As most of the Wine Bloggers know, the award for winning the Challenge is to pick the next “theme.” Since this Raconteur tends to write about current wines as well as discussing wines from years ago, I am going to lean toward nostalgia. Jeff will make the official announcement along with the required dates for the next Challenge. So the “theme” that I have decided on is “Epiphany” and I do not mean in the classic religious concept, though if one can make it work, all the better. I am using the theme “Epiphany” for that one wine that really changed your attitude towards wine and created your appreciation for wine and what it offered you, and started your new journey of appreciation. I think that this will be a fun read. Once again, a big thank you to all the Wine Bloggers that have entered in the different Challenges and all that took the time to vote.

Posted in Monthly Wine Writing Challenge | 7 Comments

Déjà vu….Kind of

Posted on April 29, 2015 by thewineraconteur

Phoenix Academy and Sherry’s on Vernor were just names to me. Woodrow Wilson Junior High and The Cruise Inn are institutions to me in my lifetime. I guess nostalgia is a passion or a rite when one achieves a certain age, and I guess I have stumbled into that certain age, along with about eighty others one Saturday afternoon. I had a prior commitment for part of the day, and I joined the others after they had already started on this journey of nostalgia.

A glass of wine

There I was pulling into the parking lot, which used to be a second school yard where I had attended my Seventh, Eighth and Ninth grades when the Detroit Public School System called these structures Junior High Schools and now they are called Middle Schools. The only difference now is that Woodrow Wilson Junior High became somewhere in recent times Phoenix Academy and now it is for students from Kindergarten to Eighth Grade, where for me and my fellow classmates it was for three years. I have written about my Junior High reunions on several occasions, and the reunions are an open year reunion, and it has even opened its arms to the students that lived in the area that attended parochial schools as well, because we all grew up together. This bond has even encompassed faculty members that have taught at this school over the years. Since I got there late, after everyone else had a guided tour by the present principal of the school, I had to give myself a quick and abbreviated self-guided tour, but it was alright, since I remembered the classrooms that I wanted to see. I saw my old homeroom which was also doubled for the art room; I wandered over to where the music room was, and where I played (?) my alto saxophone, but it was no longer a music room.  I also looked next door to my homeroom where the homeroom was for all the blind children that took public bus transportation from all parts of the city to come here for their education. As I was running down the halls and corridors, which was a no-no back then, and as I raced up and down stairways, I marveled that those blind students were able to traverse the school as well as they did, especially when I look at the stairs of a building as old as it is. There were even two teachers in attendance at this special planning meeting for the upcoming reunion, and I met everyone at the cafeteria, just prior to a whole big assortment of pizzas which were delivered from one of the original pizzerias from my day. Gosh it was fun and it brought tears and similar sentiments to almost everyone that was there.

MI Sherry's On Vernor Facade

Afterwards most of the alumni decided on getting together at a local watering hole for some beverages a little stronger than the soft drinks that we had with the pizzas. I was one of the first to arrive in the parking lot of Sherry’s on Vernor, which I had no problem finding since it was The Cruise Inn when I was a lad (and that I have wrote about in the past), and the hangout for all of the Armenians of my Father’s generation. They were known for their food and for their drinks, and for the card games that were played there, often with one or two of Detroit’s finest among the crowd; of course life was different and more easy going then. I had to enter from the front door, which was the usual way everyone entered back in the day, after all maybe the back door was easier to get to, but that was how deliveries were made and one had to announce their entrance. I looked up at the façade of the building the name had changed, but the two light buoys were still above the doors in the mosaic tiles from when the “Cruise” opened. As I walked into the vestibule the front door was locked until I was buzzed in, almost shades of speak-easies from the Roaring Twenties. As I walked up to bar, the young lady behind the bar surmised from my attire that I must have come from the gathering, as I did not look like any of the locals, but back in the day every patron that I remembered was dressed to the nines, after all it was the Sixties and the Seventies. As I looked around the room like a farmer in the city for the first time, I realized that the “bones” of the bar were the same, but there were changes, the most obvious was that the mounted sailfish that the owner of the “Cruise” had caught was not in sight. I asked for some wine, and was told that they didn’t have any, so I ordered a Whisky Sour and that was a no-go, so I asked for a Margarita and the two of us had to figure out how to make one, it was a lot of fun, as she kept reminding me that this was really a shot and a beer joint nowadays. After all of that fumbling at the bar, my other alumni started coming in the door and I moved from the bar to the group of tables in the center of the bar and joined with the chatter and laughs of the group. I mean some of the Alumni were older and some were younger, but clearly we were all past the legal drinking age, not like when we were kids. The bar maid came over in a bit and handed me a glass of wine; she said that she found a bottle unopened in one of the fridges behind the bar where the beer was kept. She laughed and told me, it was on the house. I looked at the wine, smelled the wine and tasted the wine, but it was beyond my “educated” palette to identify this wine, though later on someone said that they watched it being opened and that it was from the Sutter Home line of wines and if I had to guess it would be a White Zinfandel.  It was fun to be in a bar again, as it has been a long time since I have spent some time just in a tavern.   I even realized that the owner of the establishment was someone that I knew from the neighborhood and a landsman of mine as well, so in a sense the bar was still Armenian. So far the group that I was with that afternoon and early evening was a case of déjà vu … kind of.

JAT and Mr Gonzalez

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The Barrio in Plymouth, Michigan

Posted on April 27, 2015 by thewineraconteur

Once again, I found myself having dinner in Plymouth, Michigan which is the next city over from me, so we do go there quite a bit for a night out. Barrio Cocina y Tequileria is a brand new restaurant that has taken over from another establishment that we used to frequent, which was a wine bar and now it a Mexican restaurant. The beautiful wine racks that were built against the walls are now gone, and there is a huge mural painted on one wall that reminds me of what one encounters now in my old neighborhood in Southwest Detroit. As soon as we were seated, our waiter came and explained that this restaurant is not the usual Tex-Mex restaurant that is found all over the Detroit area and suburbs. This restaurant had a much smaller menu and was trying to convey the feeling of street vendors in Mexico, or maybe some of the now current food trucks that have been plying food without being a brick and mortar establishment.

Flaco Tempranillo DO Vinos de Madrid 2013

We started off with a couple of Margaritas, my Bride had a Blood Orange Margarita and I went with a classic Margarita. Even the drinks were served differently; they arrived in what I used to call a tall Tom Collins glass. We had a very busy morning, so we had a good appetite when we arrived. We started off with a classic bit of Mexican appetizers, namely some Guacamole and some Chips and Salsa. To maintain the aura of a street side vendor the chips were served in a paper bag with the top half cut off for a breezy casual dish. They had a series of “Street Tacos” and “Signature Tacos.” My Bride had the Carnitas from the “Street Tacos” and it was a dish of braised spice pork, Pico de Gallo and cilantro; while I tried the Camarones from the “Signature Tacos” which was shrimp, cebollitas, Pico de Gallo, shredded lettuce (actually micro-greens), Queso Fresco and cilantro. There were three tacos served on miniature corn tortillas on each plate, and another air to the street vendor theme was that each plate had a lining of wax paper over the plate; while it looked cute it made the cutting the tacos a bit more challenging. In hind sight, I think we should have taken the tacos off of the main plate and put each one on our side plate, oh well, the next time.

Rio Madre Rioja DOCa 2013

For our dinner we switched over from the Margaritas to wine. Not only did the Barrio have a large selection of Tequilas to choose from, they also had a good selection of Mexican beers on hand, but what caught our eye was they had a couple of Spanish wines on the menu. My Bride instantly decided that she wanted Rio Madre Rioja DOCa 2013. Most Rioja wines are made from Tempranillo and Garnacha, but this Rioja wine was made entirely from the varietal Graciano, still one of the accepted grapes for the Rioja designation and it had a slightly different taste, but still very appreciated. The Graciano is known as the Morrastel and is found mainly in the Languedoc region of France; this varietal is also known as Graciana, Morrastel, Tinta Miuda, Tintilla de Rota, Minustello and Parraleta (for all you Century Club entrants). The Graciano is harvested almost ninety-five percent world wide in Spain, so it is truly a local varietal. I on the other hand went with a glass of Flaco Tempranillo DO Vinos de Madrid 2013 from the Compania de Vinos Del Atlantica. Flaco is Spanish for “dude” and all I kept thinking of was the White Russian drinking Dude from “The Big Lebowski.” Madrid has only in the past thirty or forty years started producing artisan style wines, the area was known for its bulk wine production for years. Tinto Fino as Tempranillo is called in the Madrid area is one of the varietals that has been leading the change over from the bulk wine business. This particular wine was aged both in Stainless Steel and Concrete and then blended together. Both of these wines worked very well with the dinner, and this humble Dude “abides.”

MI Barrio Cocina Logo

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Fume Blanc

Posted on April 25, 2015 by thewineraconteur

My dinner club had another meeting and I tried a new wine, or so I thought. My club was meeting once again at The Courthouse Grille in Plymouth, Michigan. We have had several meetings there, because they fit our criteria very well for what the group requires. We require a private dining room to hold our meeting, and this restaurant has several rooms beyond their dining room and bar/tavern. We also require a restaurant that can offer us a variety of entrée dishes that have to be better than decent, if they want us to return. Most of the venues had figured out that a Wednesday night of thirty or more men for dinner along with cocktails and wine are worth a little extra effort and so far we have been pleased. I have written about The Courthouse Grille and some of the other names this restaurant has been associated with it.

Ferrari Carano Fume Blanc 2013

Our abbreviated menu for the members this past meeting was more than adequate; some venues let us pick three different dishes, but The Courthouse Grille offers us a fine selection that is chosen ahead of time by our hosts for the evening. The menu for that evening was Veal Marsala, Shrimp Scampi Roma, Grilled Salmon, Sautéed Perch, Chicken Piccata, Lasagna and a New York Strip Steak. The meals come with the appropriate vegetables and starches, along with a salad, fresh baked dinner rolls and a Chocolate Sundae for dessert. I had the luxury of having several heavier dinners that week when I was with my Bride, so I opted for a lighter dinner that evening and chose the Sautéed Perch that was sautéed with capers and lemon and served over a roasted vegetable risotto. The dinner was a winner, and I did remark that the Veal Marsala that a couple of the members at the table I was at, looked great, and they also said that it was done to perfection.

MI Courthouse Grille Menu 4 15 15

I had started off the evening with my traditional Whiskey Sour during the Cocktail Hour prior to the meeting and the dinner. During this time, I was also requested and received a wine list from one of the servers that was taking care of our group, and this restaurant has a very fine selection of wines by the bottle. Since I was not hosting, I was looking at the wines by the glass, as not to be onerous to the evening’s hosts. There was a white wine listed as Ferrari-Carano Fume Blanc 2013 and I decided to order a glass of it for dinner. I have had many wines from Ferrari-Carano over the years and they are a good dependable winery. This wine was from Sonoma County and the grapes were harvested from Dry Creek, Alexander and Russian River Valleys. This was all fine and good, now onto this mystery varietal Fume Blanc, that I had ordered. Fume Blanc is a marketing name coined by Robert Mondavi for Sauvignon Blanc, which at the time was suffering an image problem, as most people were associating this varietal for a sweet white wine, which it can be when it is in the production of French Sauterne. It can also be a dryer white wine, when it is from Graves in Bordeaux or from the Loire Valley of France. It is from the Loire Valley that Robert Mondavi created this wine term of Fume Blanc playing on the reputation of Pouilly-Fume. The most remarkable thing is that several other wineries including Ferrari-Carano have jumped on the band-wagon and call their dry Sauvignon Blanc Fume Blanc. They also tend to make the wine more in the tradition of the Loire Valley by using both Stainless Steel and used French Oak barrels for the production of the wine, and I also have to say that Fume Blanc is not a trademark name, just one that has been used and accepted; and there are no actually regulations or requirements for this “proprietary” name.

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Armenian Martyr’s Day and Some Anecdotes

Posted on April 23, 2015 by thewineraconteur

April 24, 2015 will be the sad one hundredth anniversary of the Armenian Genocide. While I do not normally do any political statements here, because this is a Wine Blog; I feel that it would not be proper if I did not mention it. Two of my Grandparents were born in Armenia as well as some of my other relatives. While they did not speak much of the atrocities that they witnessed and suffered at the hands of the Ottoman Empire (now known as Turkey), it has always been in the background of the family and our ethnicity. They came to Canada with nothing and started a life anew, with no knowledge of a new language or the customs or the mores of their new land, only with a determination to make a life and some happiness, after so much pain and sorrow.

Ararat Brandy

So allow me to digress from my usual writing and mention a few things for fun. I went down to my cellar today, in hopes of finding a label that is pasted on the wall with many other wine labels, and there is a custom built wine rack that is mounted on the wall. I could not find the label, but it is a label for Ararat Brandy from the Yerevan Brandy Company and this is as close as I will be for a wine related story; after all Brandy is distilled wine. They use thirteen varietals in the production of the Brandy and the three main ones are Voskehat, Garan Dmak and Kangun. I had a bottle of it, but I had to get an image from the internet, because I could not find my label, and the name Ararat is for the most famous of the three mountains in Armenia and the site where Noah’s Ark landed after the rains subsided. The other great thing about Ararat is that it is my late Father’s name in Armenian.

Kilikia Beer

I have never had any wines from Armenia, but one day I am sure that I will. On one of my trips to see my children in Las Vegas, my daughter was so excited that she had a bottle of Armenian wine for me, but alas it was from the neighboring country of Georgia. One of interesting discoveries I made years ago, doing a paper in college was that the first recording in history of beer was by Xerxes on his way to another battle and he wrote about a wonderful draft that he had in Armenia mid way on his travels. There are several different beers made by Yerevan Brewery and the brand is called Kilikia, which is the Armenian pronunciation of Cilicia, which is historically known as Lesser Armenia, and one of the Holy Sees of the church was originally from Cilicia.

ACC Plate
A fellow that I met through my association with my junior high school reunions who writes about beer and food send me an email a few days ago. He was having a meal at a Mexican Taco Trailer and the group he was with had ordered four plates of food. The neighborhood that I had grown up in Detroit now has a majority of Mexican families. As he was finishing up a plate of Chorizo Tacos, he was crumpling up the wax paper and noticed the writing that was on the plate underneath, and he wrote that this plate had my name all over it.  He was able to get the plate from the eatery and it will soon be in my possession.  As soon as I saw the plate in the accompanying picture I had to laugh, it is the old style industrial porcelain dishes from another era and it had a picture of and scroll in English and Armenian of the Armenian Community Center in Detroit 9, Michigan. Detroit 9 was a mailing code that was used in Detroit for sorting and was a precursor to the Zip Code that is now in effect. The Armenian Community Center was the home of my old Armenian Church and where I went to Armenian School. There was also room in the basement of the hall, one side had a coffee shop for the men to get together, and on the other side were rooms for the Armenian Youth Federation. I remember all the years that I went to Armenian School and the classroom that I was always in was directly above the coffee shop, and occasionally when the men had enjoyed too much “coffee” and were playing cards or backgammon there would be arguments in the most colorful Turkish that one would ever hear; there are no curse words in the Armenian language as when there is a need to curse they have always used the more foul Turkish language and I can remember how my teacher, who was the Priest’s wife would turn red when those expletives would be heard from the floor below.  In between the two sets of rooms was the smaller banquet hall with the kitchen adjacent to it and there was a dumbwaiter that was used to send the prepared food from the kitchen up to the main floor where the grand ballroom was located. I remember the plates being in the kitchen when I was a kid; in fact that is where I had my high school graduation party. Years later when the church built a new location, the building was sold to a Latino self-help organization. I would have forgotten about those plates and I am wondering how a Taco Trailer ended up with some of them.

AYF Blvd Sign

So I thank my readers to allow me to ramble off a bit, and I will get back to more words about wine the next time. I just felt that it was honorable to remember the past and hope that some good will come from all of the suffering and deaths that had occurred. A toast to the fallen, and may God bless their souls.

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A Hoarder or an Artist?

Posted on April 21, 2015 by thewineraconteur

Corks can be everywhere for a wine lover. The wonderful sound they make when they pop out of a bottle just perfectly and the wine is at its peak. Sometimes they can be the devil incarnate, it seems, when they refuse to come out of the bottle the way they should. Sometimes they crumble, sometimes they break in half and sometimes they just have to be pushed into the bottle and then the wine has to be strained before serving. I have a collection of assorted cork screws and apparatuses to help get a cork out of the bottle, some work great and some I just kind of shake my head at. This entire introduction and I am not going to go into a diatribe as to whether there should or shouldn’t be corks for sealing a bottle.

Corks for Trivet

I have been saving corks, just like I have been saving wine labels for years. For a long time I just saved the labels instead of mounting them in my wine scrap books for reference. They all ended up as “wall paper” inside of my wine cellar and the funny thing is, most of them you cannot see, until you remove a bottle of wine from the rack, but I enjoyed that labor of love. Now I can resume my wine scrap book, but I decided the other day to go and gather up all the corks that have been hiding throughout my house.

I am going to get creative again, and just like the wine labels, the corks are now going to become a decoration in the wine cellar. I am going to use them as a type of crown molding, and I have been thinking about this labor of future love for some time and the time is getting near.

Heart of Corks

I spent an afternoon opening up cookie tins, coffee can, popcorn tins and even those cute cork canisters that my Bride has bought to be decorative. I sorted and sorted and sorted corks. I now have one big bucket that has just plain corks with no decorations on them. Then there are two big buckets that have corks with designs and wordings on them. I also filled another bucket with sparkling wine corks, and I am still thinking of how they will fit into the grand scheme.

Accumulation of Corks

All the while I was also tossing some corks into a special bucket. These were special corks. Like a Chateau Latour or a Colgin. There are several assorted Opus One corks, because they even have the vintage stamped onto the cork. The Domaine de la Romanee-Conti has a special design. All the while I am lamenting about all the corks that crumbled that were special like all the First Growth Medoc wines from 1961. Why you may ask did I make a special grouping of these corks? Several years ago, one of my Bride’s cousins bought me a special Christmas present, it was a trivet or a hot plate where the main part is corks that you supply, fit into the box like a jigsaw puzzle. I will finally get that gift out of one of the bookcases in the library and actually finish that gift. When it is done, it will be either a trivet or it can be hung on the wall and be a corkboard note collector. So yes I was a hoarder for years and now I am getting ready to be an artist again. Down the road there will be pictures; and I know that you are all excited.

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MWWC # 16: Finish

Posted on April 19, 2015 by thewineraconteur

It is hard to believe that this is the Sixteenth Wine Writers Challenge, which is a way to shake us Wine Bloggers from our ennui and make us think and write about something in a different way. “JVB Uncorked” won the last challenge and his prize was to pick out the new theme; and the theme is “Finish.”

wine-stain Monthly Wine Challenge

I have been putting off writing this exercise, because unlike most of the community of wine writers, I do not tend to write about how a wine tastes, the nose (or the aroma) of a wine unless it is very striking. And I very seldom write about the finish of the wine. While I may wax poetic about wines, it is about the setting to me that makes the wine memorable, yes there have been some exceptions, but I try not to belabor the descriptors. I feel silly writing about “wet leather,” “cigar box” and “kiwi.” These are all good words to describe a taste, but it is just not my style. I have written about jug wines, home-made Dago Red Wines and First Growths all with the same deference and my economical use of descriptors.

The word finish has many connotations in the world beyond the wine experience. I have always lived in the Detroit area, so of course the automotive industry speaks of finish, the way the all the parts of the car mesh finely together, not to mention the myriad of paint jobs that are now the norm. The painter of your house talks of the different finishes that can be done to the walls and the trim. My favorite finish is on a grand piano, it is so rich and such depth that I always stop just to admire the job.

The science community has done a fine job explaining how different parts of the tongue sense different sensations which is part of taste. The have also wrote how aromas and scents can heighten the moment and add to the potential sensual nature of taste. Finish is the after affect of taste, how long or short the taste lingers after the consumption or for the professional taster – the spit.

When I was first learning about wines, and mostly it is self-taught, I have spoken over the years to many people that I regard to be highly esteemed in the world of wine. When one of the gentlemen that I met was explaining to me the concept of finish, and I think that I was still in high school, he said that I should count silently (of course) until I could not taste the lingering affect from the first taste of the wine. This might all be well and good, but I am a people person, even at the expense of the wine, so I have a tacit feeling for the finish.

Ch Pichon Lalande 1964

To this day I really marvel at the wine speak that so many people use, and while I understand it, I do not add much to those conversations. There are some wines that I have tasted where my experience seems to be lacking in the fancy words that I hear bandied about. There are some taste experiences that seem universal to everyone at the moment, but some just go out of their way to try to coin a new descriptor and that is just not me.

All of this rambling is just my way of saying that I find the finish usually is equal to the craft of the winemaker. The more artistry that goes in, the more art there is to appreciate when the product is done. I am by no means a wine snob, as for the most part I enjoy good everyday wines from good houses. I am not partial to bulk wines, because I find no artistry, but give me a quality product and that does not mean a hundred dollar or more wine, though through the grace of God, I have had my enjoyment of them; I find that the finish is indicative of the craft. Now I am finished on the subject of finish, and I still found this a very hard exercise in writing; now for a well deserved glass of wine.

Posted in Monthly Wine Writing Challenge | 25 Comments

World Malbec Day

Posted on April 17, 2015 by thewineraconteur

If I don’t watch out, I may start appearing to be a knowledgeable Wine Blogger, instead of the guy that has been having fun for the last couple of years in the cyber world, and in life for almost all of it. According to the American Winery Guide and their Wine Lover’s Calendar of 2015, April 17 is World Malbec Day.

Purple Angel 2006

Malbec is a varietal that has become one of the big boys; it has its adherents just like Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot. Of course it has not always been that way. It was a native grape in the South-Western part of France known as Cahors, and was the mainstay of their table wines of the region, and it was a happy little sleepy varietal. From this region the wine ended up being called besides Malbec, Auxerrois, Cot, Cahors and sometimes Malbeck. Then the winemakers of Bordeaux discovered it, and started growing some for its deep musky taste and dark color, but it was one of several that are known as the classic Bordeaux or Claret blend. This blend consists of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Petit Verdot and Malbec, but it hit a very cold winter and a lot of vineyards had to dig up this grape and replant. Back in the dark days for wine lovers, pre-Internet days, the varietals were not posted, so one can only take a stab in the dark whether a particular Chateau used Malbec in its wine. Over in the New World, some wine makers were trying to make their own Claret and christened the wine Meritage. Of course some of the pioneers that were doing this have resisted calling their wine a Meritage and use their own proprietary name, and some have been extremely good at their craft. In California and other states, where wineries are using the label Meritage they may use the following varietals: Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Malbec, Petit Verdot, Saint-Macaire, Gross Verdot and Carmenere. There are even some wine makers making Malbec wines, especially now to get on the bandwagon.

Cain Five 1994

So far, I have mentioned France and North America, but down in South America, especially in Argentina, is where Malbec has come into its own. I should also mention that Malbec is also planted down in Australia as well, and I am sure that it is being planted and used elsewhere as well. One could say that Argentina put Malbec on the map, or maybe that Malbec put Argentina on the map; which ever way you want to look at it, Malbec is the power house of Argentina. With all that wonderful Argentine beef, they needed a heavy red that could pair majestically with the cuisine and Malbec was a perfect choice. In North America the wine tends to be a bit more fruit forward, but in Argentina the wine is forceful and what a heavy red should be, but they do a great job with it and we are the fortunate recipients of their craft.

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