Las Vegas

Posted on April 12, 2014 by thewineraconteur

Off on another trip to Las Vegas to see the glitz of the city and also to remember the past glamour of the city as well. The city is host to one of the largest clothing shows twice a year, and I have attended some of those, but this time as is our norm, we are there to visit two of our children and five of our grandchildren. This trip will even be more of an event as our third child is getting remarried to a charming young lady and we will have photo ops that will be unique, in that we will have pictures of all of our grandchildren together for the first time. By the time this article is published, we will be back home, so I have been busy writing plenty of articles ahead of time, so that I can concentrate on other aspects that the trip will entail, like reservations and packing.

NV Sands MB
I have to admit and I have probably stated it several times that I am not fond of what has happened to Las Vegas since my earliest visit there in my youth. Maybe in my halcyon years I was enamored by the glamour of the city, but there was a feel to it, that is no longer there. I remember getting dressed up each evening for dinner, a show and a tour of one or more of the casinos. While we still dress for dinner, we are now a true minority in this city. There was something about standing around a gaming table where all of the men were in coats and ties, and the ladies all looked elegant. The waitresses and the tobacco servers were always attentive and your requests were brought to you and they were all complimentary. The cocktails and the glasses of wine were brought to you, as long as you were having a good time. I wish that I had even kept some of the miniature packs of cigarettes as mementos of those days, they would bring you out a pack of five or six cigarettes of your brand, or they would even bring you a cigar in the style that you wished. All of this was in the name of customer service and the concept of keeping you happy as you “donated” your money to the casino.

NV Desert Inn MB
In the old days the strip was gaudy, but only in the amount of lights festooned around the entrances to these fabled casinos. Today some of the casinos are more like “Disneyland” for adults, while they may look prettier, the charm is all superficial. Somehow I have not gotten used to shorts, tee shirts and sandals at a gaming table, let alone in a fine restaurant, and the restaurants are now far superior to the ones in the early days. Las Vegas has become a Mecca for foodies and for fine wines and liquors. As some things get better, others have degenerated.

NV Riviera MB
I also no longer enjoy walking on The Strip, it used to be pretty and fun and clean. Now you get accosted by hawkers of day trips, bordellos and cards advertising ladies of easy virtue. All of these were available even back in my early days, but not as blatant as it is today, not to mention that The Strip is now strewn with debris from all of the advertising handouts and fast food that is no longer deposited in the receptacles. I can picture the likes of Benjamin Siegel and the early founders of Las Vegas rolling over in their graves. The likes of Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and the Rat Pack have now evolved into spectacular theatrical shows that can run for years if not decades with recorded music, instead of big bands. I have seen some of these shows, but I long for a real entertainer to make the evening. Even the lounge shows are a distant past, when the likes of Louis Prima and Keely Smith would pack people in for an hour or so at a time. I remember even sitting down and relaxing with Frank Sinatra Jr. entertaining in a lounge all for the expense of a couple of glasses of wine.

NV Stardust MB
Some of the casinos are gone, the landscape of The Strip has changed and gotten much longer, but I know that we will still have a grand time. There will be more wine to try, more dinners, though it will not just be my Bride and I any more. This raconteur will have some more tales to weave about this trip, and there are still remembrances of past trips as well. So humor me, as this article is light on the wine, but for setting the stage for more to come.

NV Caesars Palace 2 MB
“So ’scuse me as I disappear.”

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A Lunch in St. Clair Shores

Posted on April 10, 2014 by thewineraconteur

I was asked by one of the members of my dinner club to join him at a restaurant to check if the facilities would be good for another venue for the group. I have to admit that I felt honored to be held in enough esteem, that my thoughts would be valued. I went and picked up the gentleman and we went out to see what would ensue. One of the criteria that are used for our club is that the venue must have a private room for at least thirty five members plus additional room for displays and presentations. This criterion eliminates the majority of restaurants today, which are built for maximum use of a building, as private rooms can cut into the use of the dining area. The other criteria that is more important to some of the members is the price of an entrée as they will be hosting, there are normally three hosts for an evening, including drinks.

Antonin Rodet Chablis 1999
We went to a restaurant that had just opened on the East side of the Detroit area; they had already opened two other locations. We went to Fishbone’s, the original was in Greektown, and the parking is an issue downtown for some of the members. The second location is in Southfield, but we were looking for another venue on the East side, as some of the members were starting to call our club the “West Side Club.” I thought this was fair and I did not like to seem impartial to any of the members. We went and enjoyed the lunch and at the same time I check into the size of the private room, to see if it would accommodate our needs, not to mention the prices of the dinner menu. We started with a cocktail and then we ordered our lunch. We both ordered a simple plate of perch, especially since I was not too concerned about a beef or a chicken dish, but I wanted to see how the fish was, and it was a wonderful dish. It was not pretentious, but a fine presentation and the portion were more then adequate for our members.

MI Fishbone's MB
We also shared a bottle of wine for lunch, as this was a very leisurely lunch and we could there would be no time constraints upon us. We settled on a bottle of Rodet Chablis 1999. The name Chablis has almost become generic, but it is actually an appellation in France. It is considered part of the Burgundy region even though it is about a hundred miles north of the Cote d’Or, the center of Burgundy. Chablis is the name of the village and there is almost as much basic petite Chablis made as there is Grand Cru and Premier Cru, but the bottle we had was petite Chablis. Chablis is made from the Chardonnay grape and it is a very crisp white wine and even the lesser wines still show some of the terroir of the chalky hillsides of the area. I enjoy a good bottle of Chablis, though it is not seen as often as a California Chardonnay these days.

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A Quandary

Posted on April 8, 2014 by thewineraconteur

Is it chutzpah and do I have the chutzpah to try it? Very recently the law regarding bringing wine in to a restaurant has been changed here in Michigan. It is now legal to do so. My question is, is it ethical to bring a bottle of wine into a restaurant? Is it morally right to do so as well? The newspapers have been very quiet on this subject, other then than the mere reporting of the change in the law. I question the ability of newspaper journalists to bring any sound reporting anymore, as I find that I have to read some articles a couple of times, because of the built in bias of the so called writer.

Ch Mouton Rothschild 1964
I have been to a few restaurants where the owners have graciously allowed friends of ours to bring in a special bottle of wine for a celebration. I might also add that the bottle of wine is each time was a bottle that even the finest of restaurants would be hard pressed to have in their cellar and if they did, the storage and investment of the wine would be astronomical and the restaurants did it as a favor to a good customer on the q.t. as we used to say. For the last decade or say, there have been grumblings that restaurants were scalping diners on the price of a bottle of wine. It seems that the markup could be three to four times the retail price of the bottle of wine, but in all fairness, this was usually noticed on popular priced and popular wines. I have noticed many times in a restaurant that fine wines are not nearly as steep in price as the popular price wines are. It seems to me that fifty dollars is usually the point of diminishing returns for a restaurant on a bottle of wine. Where a ten dollar bottle of wine in a store can return forty dollars and thirty dollar bottle does not bring a hundred and twenty dollars.

Ch Lafite Rothschild 1990
There does not seem to be a consensus yet among the restraunteurs about what to do with this new ruling. How much should a reasonable corkage fee be? Will the fee be waived if another bottle of wine from the carte is purchased? Should they allow a bottle to be brought in, that they already have on their carte? What if the wine that is brought in, is an embarrassment to the establishment? I think that these are reasonable questions for both sides of the table.

Gaja Barbaresco 1982

As a retailer, I understand about the hidden costs of doing business. I mean some restaurants have the finest and pristine crystal wine glasses, especially for their reserve wines. That has to be done by hand. Then there is the service performed either by the wait person or the sommelier in the opening and the decanting of the wine. I wonder what a restaurant would have paid to secure a Chateau Mouton-Rothschild 1964 in today’s market at an auction. How does one figure in the tip for a bottle of wine that one brought with them? I think we have all looked at a wine carte and thought my price was better. I would be interested to hear from anyone that lives where this has been an allowable practice for some time, and what they have encountered. At the moment I think that I shall refrain until I feel more comfortable with the concept.  Perhaps it may cause the markup to be reduced, we shall see.

 

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“What Ever Lola Wants…”

Posted on April 6, 2014 by thewineraconteur

“Lola Gets” the lines in a lyric that is so appropriate since baseball season has begun. Detroit is a major sports town, win or lose, the fans always support the teams. That is not just for baseball, but for football, basketball and hockey as well. My Bride and I are not major fans of any sports team, we like to see our teams succeed, but we are not avid or rabid fans. I don’t mind playing any sports, except for maybe basketball or soccer, to me these games are more organized chaos, but I do not enjoy sitting and watching over aged millionaire kids perform, a minute of action and it seems minutes of inactivity; OK so I am not a big fan, but I do have other activities that hold my fascination. One evening we were going to see Jerry Lewis in the theatrical production of Damn Yankees as Mr. Applegate, the personification of the Devil in this play. If you have seen the cinematic version of this play with Ray Walston portraying Applegate, you would have been surprised when the play stops for about ten or twenty minutes to allow Jerry Lewis perform his shtick in the middle of the first act. It was almost a Borscht Belt production of Damn Yankees, but it was still fun, to see a seasoned pro doing what he does best.

Raymond Estates Cabernet Sauvignon 1994
As is our usual custom that prior to seeing a theatrical production we go and have dinner and of course some wine. We get a chance to relax a bit after work and then we can enjoy the play. We went to the Traffic Jam and Snug restaurant, a venue we have gone to many times and I have even mentioned it before in another article. There are a few restaurantsDamn Yankees Stage Book near the Fisher Theatre that we like to go to before a play and TJ’s is one of them. When I was in high school, this restaurant was only a very small version of what it is today and it was called the Snug, and that is how one felt dining there on some great soups and sandwiches, just off the campus of Wayne State University. When the restaurant grew it became the Traffic Jam and the menu grew to a full fledged eatery. There are still traces of the Snug with the soups and sandwiches that are offered, but some of the entrée offerings are unique. There are some evenings when the dishes are a bit avant-garde for me, but I know that I can always find some thing that will sustain me; my Bride is more adventurous about food than I am. That evening I had a steak, while she had a fancy dinner salad. The only thing I knew before I looked at the menu that evening was that I was not going to have ham, as I knew that there would be enough ham at the theatre.

MI TJ & S MB
The real fun at this restaurant is selecting the wine. They sell all of their wine by retail, so you go into the wine shop and just wander around until you discover something that sounds interesting. They have a couple of neat framed posters that show many of the great art works that are featured on the labels of Chateau Mouton-Rothschild and that is really fun to look at look, and wish that you could have tried them all. Since my Bride was having a fancy salad, she was going to be happy with any wine I chose, and I really avoid having any wine with a salad because of the dressing, I was free to select a wine for my steak. I chose a Raymond Estates Cabernet Sauvignon 1994 from Napa Valley. This is a fine moderate wine that I felt could be consumed with out the concern of needing a lot of cellaring time. The wine selection here turns over quite quickly as the pricing is very modest and the corkage fee that they charge is also very modest, since you were buying from them as well. All in all the dinner, wine and the play made for a fine evening out.

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A trip to Essex Golf and Country Club

Posted on April 4, 2014 by thewineraconteur

Years ago one of the members of my dinner club belonged to the Essex Golf and Country Club in Windsor, Ontario. I remember meeting another of my club members and we drove together to go there. I had never been there, but as I looked at the map, it dawned on me that I knew the area from when I was a kid; I had even rode my bike with friends over the Ambassador Bridge to a park near where the country club was located. My friend looked at me as I started to take some back roads to get there and he was amazed, but I explained that it was like old home week for me to get there. I even took a side route to pass by where my Grandparents lived in Windsor, as I was the only one of my siblings that had even been there.

E Guigal Cotes du Rhone
When we finally got to the country club, it was time to have our meeting and dinner. The club always has a cocktail hour prior to the meeting just for socialization. I even ran into some of my customers who were members there. In the Seventies and Eighties a lot of Americans took advantage of the exchange rate on the American dollar versus the Canadian dollar and had joined the Essex Country Club, as it was much more economical to belong. One of the members of our club had done this, and that is why we were at this venue. I remembered that I had ordered a Whisky Sour as that is my choice of a cocktail, and the mix that they offered, let us say that I have had better, so I looked at the available wines that were being offered and decided what would be the best wine to go with the dinner. The usual choices at my dinner club is a beef, chicken and a fish entrée, though this particular evening they were offering a pork dish, which was a fine change of pace. After dinner our host that belonged to the country club also brought out a bottle of his homemade Cherry infused Brandy to go along with our desserts.

ON Essex CC MB
Wines for the most part were not as popular then, as they are today. I had to get a couple of other members to agree on a bottle of wine, so as not to add an onus to our hosts for the evening. In Ontario, the wines are under the auspices of a liquor control board, so the selections are not as vast, as we would see in the states, and even back then the selection of wines were not as large as what is now available. We settled on a French wine, at the expense of a Canadian wine, and I got a bottle of Cotes du Rhone, unfortunately I do not have the neck ring that showed the year of vintage, only the label itself. The particular bottle was by a very large negociant in the Rhone are E. Guigal. I have had this wine over several years, perhaps decades and know it to be a good choice, and I have also had a bottle or two of Cote Rotie from this same house. The traditional choice of varietals for Cote du Rhone is a majority of Syrah, blended with some Grenache and a small amount of Mouvedre, so I am presuming this to be the case for a wine that I had around thirty years ago, as it is the basic blending format of today. I just continue to have some great memories around wine.

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Another Charming Greek Nightclub

Posted on April 2, 2014 by thewineraconteur

I have had my rants against the commercialization of Greek Town in Detroit. I guess it is because I remember the good old days of the area when it wasn’t a tourist trap and now a gateway to one of the casinos. Back in the old days, it was a haunt of the assorted Hellenic ethnic groups and a few other nationalities. There was the fabled Pegasus, the New Hellas, the Bouzouki Lounge and the Grecian Gardens. It was known for a night life all of its own, there was dining, dancing, Greek and lounge type entertainment; and then there were the belly dancers, not to mention the wink-wink games of chance that possibly could occur if you had the right entry. Several blocks away and more in Downtown Detroit, another Greek night club opened up called the Pier One, and I wonder why do I not have a matchbook from this place that I went to often.

Cambas Rouge NV
I had a next door neighbor that was much older than I, but younger than my Father and his associates. He was a fellow Armenian, but he came from France, accent and all. There were Sundays in the summer time when the windows would be open and the neighbors could hear him singing beautifully in French, the songs of Charles Aznavour and the likes. He used to take me with him to the haunts of Greek Town, and then later he preferred the Pier One. He would get up and sing with the Greek musicians that were performing for the diners, when the belly dancers would not be performing and he would dazzle the audiences. All I remember is that everyone that would be at his table would share in his talent, as we would have dinner and drinks, courtesy of the owners and management of the club. What fun it was for a sixteen year old to be in such a favorable position there, and then to have the company of the dancers as well at times. He also, I believe made it possible to have the assorted Armenian nights there, where the Armenian bands would come and perform, and then my old club members would come in for a night of dining and dancing and a great time.

Shemsi
Of course we would all be eating Greek food, which was very similar to Armenian food, though with our proud heritage, we would claim it was not as good, all in good fun. We would dance the night away, and now I wonder, how did I ever get to school in the morning. It always seemed that there were bottles of Greek wines on our tables. One of the more popular wines that would accommodate the Greek cuisine was Cambas Rouge NV. I tried many sites to find out the varietals that are in this wine, to no avail. I saw some sites that listed this as a Cabernet Sauvignon, a Merlot and even a Savatiano (which is a popular varietal for Greek white wines. More modern labels of this wine list that it is made of classic Greek varieties and varieties cultivated in various vineyards across Greece. I guess that I shall just say it was a very agreeable wine for the food and is a classic Peloponnese proprietary red wine. The wine was even more enjoyable because of the good times that would surround each evening.

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Dusty’s Cellar or Cellar Dusty’s

Posted on March 31, 2014 by thewineraconteur

I have now actually visited this restaurant and wine purveyor in Okemos, Michigan and I have to smile because of the conundrum that I have about the name of this venue. If you search on the web by either name you still find the same location, though the domaine site is for Dusty’s Cellar, while the wine tote bags say Cellar Dusty’s; and that is as far as I will go into the name.

Bishops Peak Chardonnay 2012
When you walk into Dusty’s you enter into the retail half of the establishment with over a thousand wines for your selection, and they appear to be chosen for their quality and variety. There was not a large section of the “heavies,” but they did have representation. The scope of the shop was for the average and curious wine shopper to make selections with out breaking the budget, and the majority were in the popular to mid priced wines.  I was also informed that the majority of the wines offered in the shop were also available in the restaurant to compliment the meals.  There was also a fine selection of wine accessories for the home or for gifts. I also saw that they had a fine selection of beers and ales, as well as supplies for the home brewer, which is becoming a large cottage industry.

MI Dustys BC
There was a bakery counter in the shop, which also doubled as a carryout location for people on the go, and it seemed to be a very popular spot in the shop. All of the pastries and breads are made on location, so freshness is paramount. The retail side of the business also had gift baskets that could be ordered for any occasion. Another item that I noticed is that they maintained their own wine club and I am sure that it is a great way for them to spread the word on different varietals that the average wine shopper may not select on their own. I was also approached by one of the associates to see if they could be of assistance, as I do stick out where ever I go, I guess by my attire. We had a nice discussion about wines and collecting, and I did mention that I write a blog (imagine that).

As I was wondering around the retail half, my Bride and her friend showed up and then quickly disappeared and left me roaming around again. I was then called in to the restaurant half, by my Bride and found myself at the bar. The ladies had started with out me and they poured me a glass of wine, as they had bought a bottle to share with the others that we were going to meet as well. I got a chance to look around the restaurant and saw that they had an enclosed patio for when the weather was better, and they also had at least two private rooms as well for parties and events. Another thing that fascinated me, which does not take much is that the tables were covered with old wooden wine crates and then sealed over for a smooth table top finish. It reminded me of my cellar, as I had used the crates as paneling in my own room.

Cellar Dusty's Wine Tote Bag
I noticed that the wine list had about thirty wines to be offered by the glass, as well as they offered some wine flights. There were about eight pages to the wine carte and it was very well presented, even with a little whimsy or tongue in the cheek sections: “on the fringe” and “blends have more fun.” The wine that we were enjoying before we went into the wine dinner in one of the separate rooms was a California wine. It was Talley Vineyard’s Bishop’s Peak Chardonnay 2012. This wine is from the San Luis Obispo County in Edna Valley of the Central Coast and featured fruit from Oliver’s Vineyards as well as from Rincon Vineyards of the area. It was a very light Chardonnay with some refreshing acidity and is what I tend to expect from most of the Chardonnay wines from this area. I enjoyed my time there, and I still have to insist that my Bride and I go there for an actual dinner, as they do have duck on the menu, but that will be for another time.

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A Wine Pairing Dinner at Cellar Dusty’s

Posted on March 29, 2014 by thewineraconteur

One of the restaurants that I have wanted to go to, I finally got there. Cellar Dusty’s in Okemos, Michigan, it is owned by the same people that have the English Inn in Eaton Rapids, Michigan that I have been to and talked about. In fact there is so much to discuss, my next article will also be about Cellar Dusty’s as well. My Bride was attending a board meeting in the Lansing area, and one of her friends had bid on and won tickets for an event and she tied it into the meeting timeline. We were fortunate to be part of her guests for the event.

Michelle Brut & Eroica 2012
It turned out the event was a dinner and wine pairing featuring wines from Chateau Ste. Michelle of Washington state. The Mid-west representative for the winery was in attendance, Mr. “Chip” Davis was there and he spoke very effortlessly about the winery and of his products. It was very informative in a much laid back way, but one could feel the pride he had of his products. We talked several times through the evening and he gave our table a brief history of how he started in the food and beverage industry, with his first job at the legendary Golden Mushroom restaurant, which I have also, wrote about. I was not aware that Chateau Ste. Michelle is the oldest winery in Washington state, and that they have grown into an umbrella association with other wineries around the world. He also gave some information that I was not aware of, in regards to the Columbia Valley where the winery is, and how they are on one side of a mountain chain and the land is very arid, almost desert like and irrigation if the key to their success in growing the vines.
The dinner started off with Roasted Cornish Game Hen with a Tarragon Jus. The hens were brined with lemon and then the tarragon was added later, because the Chef had come out after the evening to discuss the menu. This course was paired with Domaine Ste. Michelle Sparkling Brut NV, a blend of Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Pinot Gris and made in the classic “Methode Champenoise.” I thought this wine would be very good for more informal moments of celebration; it had a brut finish, but not a lot of effervescence, though this could have been because the wines had been opened and poured before the event began. The next course, we were warned was a fish entrée being served with a red wine, and I had to smile to myself as this would make my Bride happy. The entrée was Seared Portabella Mushroom Dusted Sea Bass with an Artisanal Soy Barley Risotto. Now I enjoy Chateau Ste. Michelle BookletSea Bass as it is a firm, meaty fish and the dusting even made it even meatier. This was paired with a Chateau Ste. Michelle Indian Wells Merlot 2011, which also had 15% Syrah blended. This wine had a wonderful nose, a deep color and the terroir could be appreciated in this wine. Next we had a course of Michigan Maple Braised Pulled Pork over Creamy Truffled Polenta with Chipotle Barbeque Sauce. The pork was prepared very well, as I am not a fan of pulled pork and the sauce were very subtle and not overpowering. This entrée was paired with a Chateau Ste. Michelle Indian Wells Red Wine 2011. This red wine was a blend of Merlot, Syrah, Cabernet Sauvignon, Grenache, Malbec, Cinsault and Mouvedre and it was most enjoyable and complimented the dish very well. Our final entrée of the evening was Sliced Roasted Tenderloin of Beef with a Black Garlic Demi Glace over Mashed Potatoes. The meat was very tender and I am glad that the Chef came out to discuss his dishes, as he explained Black Garlic, which was new to me, and I am a major fan of garlic. The Black Garlic is a special controlled thirty day aged garlic, that acquires a fuller richer taste, and he says that it is just becoming popular, so I may be out of the loop on this one, and he used the same wine for the Demi Glace. The wine we had was Chateau Ste. Michelle Cabernet Sauvignon 2012 and it was full bodied with some nice tannins. I think it could use some cellar time, but that is me, as I like my Cabs aged. I was also surprised to hear that this was their basic Cabernet Sauvignon, and if that is the case the other Cabs that are up the ladder must be wonderful. For dessert we had Poached Pear with an assortment of four cheeses, and my Bride and I swapped some of the cheeses, because of my problems with certain cheeses, but that is my problem, and everyone else said that the dish as it was prepared was great. The wine that was paired with the dessert was Eroica Riesling 2012, not a true dessert wine, but rather an off-dry Riesling and very enjoyable. It was not cloying sweet and it complimented the pear and the cheeses that I had. The Eroica Riesling is a joint venture between Chateau Ste. Michelle and Dr. Loosen and produced in Washington State.

Three Chateau Ste Michelle
The dinner was wonderful; the tasting was excellent with a speaker that was informative with out sounding like a television informational advertisement. I asked the restaurant if I could have an empty bottle of each wine bottle for this blog, and they said no problem and even packed them into a very nice six pack reusable “green” wine bag. I think that I should also mention that we bought and I took home the Merlot, the Indian Wells Red Wine and the Cabernet Sauvignon. I was informed that almost everyone at the tasting ended up buying wine that evening and they had more orders, then they had stock, so they graciously filled our order and the rest from our table as we all lived at least an hour away from the restaurant, and the some of the locals would have to return in a couple of days to pick up their wine order, but it is a great place to return to, and I look forward to dining there again.

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A Canadian Golf Outing in New York

Posted on March 27, 2014 by thewineraconteur

I have to admit that I grew up with very colorful people. There were all my relatives and friends of my parents that I learn about life and developed a certain code to which I lived by. Most of these men grew up during the Depression and they had a certain outlook to life which was developed from that trial, not to mention that they learned other aspects that may have been foreign to them from the Warner Brothers films that they watched all of their lives. These were tough guys that enjoyed life and they partied most of the time. Most of them had very colorful nicknames which was the way of that period, and some of them I only learned their true identities at the funeral homes that I attended. These characters were not only found in the Detroit area, but also from my Father’s hometown and some of the other adopted hometowns in his life.

Beaulieu Vineyard Claret NV
We would vacation up in Saint Catherines, Ontario at least once a year. These were occasions of heavy eating and drinking and boisterous parties. For several years in a row there was a golf outing, not just any golf outing, because these fellows belonged to country clubs, this was a destination golf outing and it was held in Ellicotteville, New York. Ellicotteville was a small town south of Buffalo that was known mostly for the skiing, but they were also trying to develop the area into a golf location for the warm months. It was a very challenging area to golf in, as the course was quite hilly, as one would expect since the area was a ski resort. All along the course you could look up and see the lines that were used to take the skiers to the top of the different hills and it was a unique setting. I really did not golf, not to the extent that these guys golfed, though there were lots of side bets and then there were the famous “gimmees;” sometimes even when the ball had not even got to the green. Some were serious and some were there for the good times. Since I did not golf, I was part of the entertainment committee. I drove a jerry rigged golf cart that held an enormous cooler filled with beer and ice, and a shelf that had plastic glasses and a small bar of Canadian Whisky and Scotch. I was one of more popular individuals during the outing and I constantly had to return to the central tent to restock for the golfers.

NY Ellicotteville MB
In the evening we would all convene at a restaurant that was reserved for this genteel group of “athletes” for dinner and more drinks. The conversations would center on one man’s ability to hit the ball, but most of the jokes had nothing to do with the golfing. By dinner time, I could not even tell you where we were dining, but we all found the location. The reason that they had the outing there was because some of the men had chalets there for the ski season and the town was known for looking the other way at some of the escapades of these over age boys. Dinner was just long tables of all the men with family style service from the restaurant. Starting with shrimp cocktails, salads, then onto platters of porterhouse steaks, lobsters, crab and an assortment of vegetables, the diners convened. As they liked to say, “They were eating like they were going to the chair” which I am sure was a trite line that was used in lots of the gangster films of the Thirties. Thankfully I was not the only one that enjoyed wine, or my masculinity would have been questioned that far back, I smile as I type that, because these were rough and tough beer and whisky drinkers. I am looking at the wine from one of the outings it is a Beaulieu Vineyard Napa Valley Claret (NV?). A very fine winery, but I am sure that it was the red wine of the house and I do not remember there being any white wine being served. This Claret was pure Cabernet Sauvignon, so it was I would say for the era, a good choice in wine, especially for this group outing.

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A Double Dose of Shiraz

Posted on March 25, 2014 by thewineraconteur

There was a fine restaurant in Michigan called Shiraz that we tried back in the day. It was part of a chain of restaurants under the umbrella of a chef and each restaurant had its own menu and ambience. So if one was not aware of it, there was no feeling of being in a cookie-cutter style of restaurant, which is a good thing. Some chains have it down to a science, but once you have been to one, the experience will be the same whether in Michigan or in Florida, unless the waitperson makes it more or less memorable.

Rosemount Estate Shiraz 2000
Shiraz the restaurant was not a large restaurant, but it was I felt, just the right size for a steak house. It did not overpower and the tables were not crowded, which is something I like when dining out. We started out with a couple of appetizers, one was a fancy mushroom dish, and the other was a shrimp presentation. Then we had a salad, my Bride tried the Caesar Salad, and I just ordered a house salad, as regular readers know my Bride makes the best Caesar Salad from scratch and I just don’t want to compare any others to hers. Even though this was a steak house and my Bride ordered a petite filet, I ordered the Braised Short Ribs as this is a dish I truly enjoy and tend to order whenever I get the chance; as it is a dish we have never tried making at home and perhaps one day we may, but that is the fun of dining out, getting something different. We ordered a couple of side dishes as most steak houses have everything a la carte. We finished off the evening with a Chocolate Bombe that we shared.

MI Shiraz MB
I thought it would be, oh, so clever to order a Shiraz wine at Shiraz. I am sure that many others had the same idea. Shiraz the varietal is genetically the same grape as the Syrah, but the Shiraz took hold in Australia as well as some other parts of the New World as opposed to Syrah from the Cotes du Rhone. This is a grape that I have enjoyed for years, mostly in the Rhone blends and I believe this may have been one of my first pure Shiraz/Syrah wines so I went with a popular wine. We had a Rosemount Estate Shiraz 2000 from South Eastern Australia which is a huge designation or region. I have to say that there was not a lot of artistry to the wine, but it was firm and full bodied and held its own against our beef dishes.

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