The Royce and a Muscadet

Posted on May 17, 2022 by thewineraconteur

A friend told me about a wine tasting for Mawby and Big Little Wines at wine bar called The Royce, that I have heard about, but we had not been there.  Of course, the friend that told me about the tasting, didn’t make it, but we went down to check it out.  Many years ago, when I was going to high school in Downtown Detroit, I walked by the building and never thought about it, at all.  I cannot place what type of business was there, but it is rather unique in that it has a mezzanine within the confines of the building, which in today’s parlance would be called a loft.  It is owned by a woman that has a restaurant with an adjoining butcher shop, on the east side of Detroit, in the West Village, and she has recently opened a fish-centric restaurant in the Corktown section of Detroit.

The Royce, besides being a wine bar, also is a wine shop and they offer to rent out the “loft” for parties.  There were tables outside to drink wine on the sidewalk, as well as some tables inside, and my Bride and I just bellied up to the bar, as they used to say.  They had fourteen bottles of wine that they were selling by the glass and they were posted on a blackboard, a tried-and-true method since I can remember at some restaurants, when the menu can be adjusted very quickly with an eraser.  There was also another blackboard that had a list of assorted cheeses, cold cuts, munchies and preserved fish.  Since, we arrived early, we had a plate of Portuguese Sardines (served in an open tin) with crackers and lemon slices, and an order of Spanish Manchego cheese.  The sardines were excellent and my Bride photographed the label, so that she will attempt to find them in her travels. 

Of course, we had some wine to prepare us for the wine tasting that we came for.  We enjoyed Eric Chevalier Domaine de l’Aujardiere “Les Clos de la Butte” Muscadet Cotes de Grand Lieu Sur Lie AOC 2020.  Eric Chevalier was a negocient in the Pays Nantais region of the Loire Valley for ten years, in 2005 he moved back to be with his family and the following year took over the family domaine. In 2020, the domaine which is thirty hectares, and now under the fourth generation, was certified organic.  All Muscadet wines are made from Melon de Bourgogne or sometimes just referred to as Melon.   The land at one time was underwater and hence the soil is basically quartz and limestone.  The vineyard for this wine is about six hectares and the average age of the vines are fifty years.  The grapes are gently crushed and the juice is transferred to Stainless Steel tanks.  Natural fermentation is by indigenous yeasts, and this wine aged for about ten months on the lees and stirred regularly.  The grapes are known for having high acidity and that is the reason for the extended aging on the lees for a richer and creamier texture to the palate.  This soft golden color wine offered notes of apples and citrus, while on the palate soft fruit, a touch of pepper, and a salinity factor that was refreshing with a nice finish of chalky terroir.  Just as we were paying the bill, it was announced that the tasting up in the loft was now open and ready to begin.      

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May 2022 Club Selections

Posted on May 15, 2022 by thewineraconteur

It always feels to me that I am over due for a visit to my local wineshop, The Fine Wine Source in Livonia, Michigan, even if I am tripping over some cases of wine at the house.  Today was just a short and sweet visit with no wine tasting as they were busy with real customers.  Though while I was there, I also booked a dinner reservation at their restaurant Vertical for later in the month, since we are going to an exhibit downtown.  I also like to make reservations with a person and not a computer site as I feel that it is so impersonal, and dining is such a personal art. Yes, I am from another century, but it is fine with me.  I also enjoy the wine club as I get a couple of wines that for any number of reasons I may overlook, just wondering around.

The wine club selection representing the European side of the Atlantic Ocean, but going further south to the Republic of South Africa and Mulderbosch Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon Rosé Stellenbosch 2019.  Larry Jacobs founded Mulderbosch Vineyards in 1989 and the farm property was referred to locally as “vuilplasie,” which is Afrikaner for “dirty little farm.”  He soon partnered with Mike Dobrovic and they cleared and planted the first vineyards of twenty-five hectares.  They soon built a small winery and cellar and the first wines produced were a Sauvignon Blanc and a Chardonnay.  Mulderbosch Vineyards was acquired by the California-based Terroir Capital in 2011.  In 1999, they created the Cabernet Sauvignon Rosé, the very first in South Africa.  The vineyard for this wine is specifically farmed to produce a Rosé, with early picking and then to vinify the wine as if they were making an aromatic white wine. By picking early the grapes have a naturally high level of acidity, once pressed the wine is handled the same as if they were making a Sauvignon Blanc with a short period in Stainless Steel and early bottling to preserve the wine’s freshness.  This blush pink wine with a touch of copper shimmer offers notes of fresh strawberries and floral notes and spices of a Cabernet Sauvignon.  On the palate the bright acidity and vibrancy offer tones of black cherry, pomegranate and watermelon with a medium length finish offering aromatics and terroir, along with the desire to have another taste.

Airfield Estates Cabernet Sauvignon, Yakima Valley 2019 represents the New World.  Airfield Estates goes back to 1907 when H. Lloyd Miller was pioneering this area as he was into the buying and selling of farm properties, and this area did not have access to irrigation water.  He was instrumental in getting water from the Roza Canal Project and he also leased part of the property to the Olympia Air Transport Corporation, which constructed a flight school for hundreds of Army Air Corps pilots needed for World War II.  Eventually they got their property back and it was the basis for Airfield Ranch and a portion became Airfield Estates originally selling grapes to other wineries, until 2005 when they began producing their own wines.  This is an Estate Grown Cabernet Sauvignon.  The grapes go through a cold soak for twenty-four hours and inoculated with several different strains of yeast. Fermentation on the skins was for fourteen days and then the skins were gently pressed and then all the juices were sent to a variety of French Oak barrels still with the lees for Malolactic fermentation for four months and then aged for eighteen months in French Oak, of which forty percent was new.  The deep red wine offers notes of black fruits and sandalwood, while on the palate slightly sweet notes of blackberry and black cherry with tones of coffee grounds with a medium bodied wine with a medium finish of fruit and toasted oak.  

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Mother’s Day 2022

Posted on May 13, 2022 by thewineraconteur

It is a holiday that is popular and celebrated around the world.  It is also a day that seems to get more chaotic each year, as we try to make plans.  For restaurants, it is a powerhouse of a holiday, as a lot of people think that Mom should not have to cook on her day.  I have thought about making reservations, but my Bride wants to make sure that everyone gets together for Mother’s Day.  It is getting harder to coordinate the families to agree on a time and to get them to actually get there, though this year, the highway construction teams went out of their way to make it difficult to get from Point A to Point B with all of the detours not with actual construction, that even the handy-dandy GPS systems were not aware of.  So, even with my Bride trying her best to get everything done at a certain time, everyone basically showed up later.

She always enjoys making fruit and vegetable platters for all the noshers to get started on, and sometimes I think that it is the most labor-intensive part of the meal.   We may not have a charcuterie plate, but we always have cheese.  One of her cheeses of choice that she like to prepare is warmed Brie with a savory onion jam topping and she had some wonderful brown crusty bread to go with it.  Along with our trusty “go-to” white wines, since my Bride is also a mother, I had to make sure that we had a Pinot Grigio for her to enjoy.  I opened a bottle of Pratello Pinot Grigio Garda DOC 2020 from Azienda Agricola Pratello di Bertola.  Pratello was founded in 1867 on the morainic hills off of Lake Garda.  The estate is now one-hundred-twenty-hectares, of which eighty are vineyards and the balance is for olive groves and borders two districts; Valtanesi and Lugana. Lake Garda is Italy’s largest lake and it splits up two DOC areas; Lombardy and Veneto.  In 2017, Garda DOC combined with Valtanesi and Riviera del Gard Bresciano to become the Riviera del Garda Classico DOC.  The fruit is hand harvested with a soft pressing in Nitrogen saturation.  The initial fermentation is for about fifteen days, and then aging in Stainless Steel for five months, with an additional bottle aging for three months.  The wine was a pretty golden color with notes of pear and golden apples, and on the palate, great citrus flavor and acidity and a finish of fruit. 

For the main dishes my Bride went with some tried and true and one new dish.  She made a classic Roast Beef with roasted vegetables and gravy with mashed potatoes.  She made her Bourbon Salmon, Armenian Pilaf, Candied Carrots and Fennel and Onions.  This time she also tried Braising Center Cut Pork Chops in a Port-Fig Sauce.  She also made her own Cream Puffs to go with Hot Fudge and Ice Cream.  I brought up from the cellar a bottle of Langtry Estate & Vineyards Guenoc Victorian Claret North Coast 2007.  Lillie Langtry the famous British actress bought the estate in the Guenoc Valley in 1888 and introduced vineyards in the area.  The property is over twenty-three-thousand acres going from Lake County to northern Napa Valley.  The winery was built in 1981 and looks like another barn on the property.  It is now owned by Foley Family Wines.  A proprietary red wine and is a blend of Petite Sirah, Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon, Petit Verdot and Malbec.  The nice dark claret wine offered notes of black fruit, cloves, tea and vanilla.  On the palate were tones of black cherry, raspberry and blueberry with soft tannins and a medium finish of spices. Father’s Day will be a brunch.             

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We Went to the Cinema

Posted on May 11, 2022 by thewineraconteur

I don’t know how movie houses were treated elsewhere, they were under lockdown for about a year, and we got kind of used to not seeing any movies.  I mean my Bride started doing “binge” watching almost anything that was suggested to hear, and most of the descriptions were enough to keep me from ever watching television again.  It has been over thirty years for television and once I give up something, it is almost impossible to make me return to a habit, just like cigars.   Anyways, we went to see the third part of a film series, a prequel to a nine-part film series that I enjoyed.  The big “shock” was filmed in such a way that any country that wanted to censor the scene, could without any problems,as long as it wasn’t in the States.  Also, the villain and one of the main actors was paid a fortune to not work, in the film, and he may have the last laugh, because the replacement actor, I only remember as a villain in the latest series of James Bond films.  We went to a huge I-Max theater presentation where you had to select your seat, which was kind of silly, as there were only eight people in the audience, the clean-up crew outnumbered the attendees.  I guess the old days of a Saturday matinee with popcorn, Pepsi, a candy bar and return bus money for a buck is history, or maybe a figment of my imagination.  

It was a date night, at least in my generation, a movie and a film with your wife is a date.  We had some gift cards to a chain restaurant and I really want to get rid of all the gift cards we had amassed, before the lockdown, as I am not sure how stable any of the chains are that survived.  On top of that, I do prefer independent restaurants, as I think they work harder to keep the customers satisfied.  We were kind of full from all the popcorn we ate and my Bride wanted a Caprese Salad, but this was house made Burrata cheese and grape-tomatoes with a light dressing.  She had a large pour of Chloe Wine Collection Pinot Grigio Valdadige DOC 2020.  Romanian born Georgetta Dane is the winemaker for the Chloe Wine Collection and they are based in Northern California, but she sources wines from famed regions.  This is one of my Bride’s favorite varietals when she is out and about, and this wine came from an area that is known for Pinot Grigio in Northern Italy.  I am sure that this wine was produced in Stainless Steel with minimum aging.  The wine was a soft straw color and offered white fruits and soft floral notes.  On the palate fruit forward tones of peach, apple and honeysuckle with a crisp finish.  

I started off with a bowl of Lentil Soup with Italian Sausage and there was a nice little zing to it.  My entrée was the “Shrimp & Scallop Linguine Alla Vodka” in a tomato Vodka cream sauce.  I paired it with their suggestion of Il Borro Pian di Nova Toscana IGT 2018.  Il Borro is located in hills of Tuscany and have forty-five hectares of famed international varieties and also Sangiovese, planted in 1997.  The grounds are mostly loamy and sandy with excellent drainage.    The majority of their portfolio is a collection of Toscana IGT wines.  While this wine is an entry level product for them, it still gets a lot of attention.  The wine is a blend of seventy-five percent Syrah and twenty-five percent Sangiovese.  The two varieties are vinified separately, but under the same regimen of maceration for two days in Stainless Steel and fermentation for ten days and then the juice is left on the skins for an additional twenty days.  After the racking of the juice, the wine is kept in Stainless Steel to mature for six months, then the wine is decanted and the two wines are blended and matured for twelve months in used oak barrels and then aged for an additional six months in the bottle before distribution.   The wine had a nice ruby red color with notes of black and red fruits, floral and spices.  The wine offers tones of black fruits and mellow tannins and has a medium length finish of fruit and spices.  A delightful affordable wine, even in a restaurant setting.          

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What is Going On?

Posted on May 9, 2022 by thewineraconteur

My dinner club has been slowly getting back into a real schedule, for almost two years, a society that has been in existence for getting close to one-hundred-fifty-years was almost scuttled by the harridan that can’t fix the roads that she promised.  The club has slowly but surely been picking up steam and getting more members back to the fold, each successive meeting.  My group’s turn was coming up, and the club secretary contacted me, to see if there were any changes for the meeting.  I contacted the restaurant, first of all, they have a private room and second, they have good food.  I am talking to the manager and he eventually found our reservation, and then he told me that he was going to charge me a hundred dollars just for the enjoyment of having the room, which I refused.  He said that he had to make sure that the waitress would get compensated, and I told him that with about twenty-five men having dinner and drinks, with the mandatory group tip rate, the waitress would be finely rewarded. 

The entrée selections for the evening were a New York Strip Steak with a choice of starches and vegetables, Chicken Piccata or Broiled Whitefish.  The meal would begin with a house salad, except for me, as I love the Black Bean Soup and I even ordered a quart of it to take home, after I paid the group’s tab.  When the manager saw the menu selected, he said that he knew that the evening would be beneficial to the waitress and dropped the idea of a room charge (a good business man, seeing that the group goes to the restaurant about four to five times a year).  I guess I was in sticker shock when I got the bill, I didn’t expect a New York Strip Steak to be over forty dollars, thank God it wasn’t Kobe or Wagyu, as I might still be washing dishes. 

My wine drinking partner in crime was in attendance, and we usually share a bottle of wine, as it is more advantageous compared to the offering by the glass from the bar.  He prefers Pinot Noir, and he is a regular at my local wine shop as well, so we can usually agree on a wine.  We handicapped the wine carte and, in the past, I have won him over with a couple of Merlot selections, that he would have never tried, if it weren’t for my insistence.  We ended up having the Celani Family Vineyards Robusto Napa Valley 2019.  Celani Family Vineyards was established in 2005 at the foot of the Vaca Mountains.  Seventeen acres of vineyards planted on twenty acres of land, originally planted in the Nineties with Merlot and Chardonnay.  The original Robusto was a Proprietary Red Wine, but it now is pure Merlot and aged for nine months in a mix of French Oak barrels.  I have never denied that Merlot is one of my first loves, back in the Sixties and Seventies when I first started learning about wine.  This estate wine is just a deep inky wine with notes of red and purple fruits, strawberries, cherries and some pepper.  A nice wine with balanced tannins and a nice medium finish.  I drink Robusto before meals, as well as during meals, it is great with appetizers and conversations, and I like it with pizza, as well as fancy elaborate meals and my wine partner now agrees as well 

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We Had Two Non-Vintage Wines

Posted on May 7, 2022 by thewineraconteur

After the appetizers, we had The Caller and his wife move into the dining room which was also renovated since they had been here last.  It was fun, because he was looking at the room and trying to remember the color scheme and the décor and some aspects of the change, he missed, but that is understandable.  I mean, we do get together for wining and dining and not for studies of architecture and design.  I worked hard, but then so did my Bride and she made another fine dinner.  She started off with her famous Caesar Salad that she learned when we were on our honeymoon and it has been a hit here, ever since, but we do not do tableside service.  She made Brussels Sprouts with bacon, Armenian Pilaf, Coquilles St. Jacques al crème de Xeres (Sea Scallops sautéed with mushrooms and garlic, pan-sauced with Sherry and cream) and Roasted Lamb Chops marinated with garlic and rosemary.  For dessert, Mrs. Caller made a very light cake of lemons and peaches with a whipped Citrus Icing, which was both light and rich. 

We started with EL Ixsir Cuvee X’eme Anniversaire Red Non-Vintage.  It came in a custom box and was number sixteen of an issue of one-thousand, and the box held three bottles of this special edition wine as well as a beautiful “coffee-table” book The Wines of Ixsir.  Ixsir Winery was founded in 2009 in the northern part of Lebanon in Batroun which is a coastal area.  They are a mountain winery, and one of the highest in elevation for the Northern Hemisphere.  The name Ixsir derives from the Arabic word “Iksir” the original Arabic word for “elixir.” History has recorded that man has searched for the perfect elixir for eternal youth and for love.  The winery is very progressive and has been named one of the greenest buildings in the world.  The winery owns one-hundred-twenty hectares in the Batroun with several different vineyards capitalizing on the terroir.  The winery grows Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah, Tempranillo, Caladoc, Cinsault, Merlot, Obeidy, Viognier, Muscat, Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay and Semillon.  Quite impressive for a young company, as far as I am concerned.  The EL Ixsir Cuvee X’eme Anniversaire Red Non-Vintage is a special bottling of three very recent vintages of their EL, which is their top cuvee and a blend of fifty-five percent Syrah, thirty-five percent Cabernet Sauvignon and ten percent Merlot.  Each of the wines had aged for twenty-four months and then had been blended and aged in French Oak, of which half were new barrels. The concept of having the three bottles in the case was that the first bottle should be tasted in five years, and then at least ten years for the second bottle and the last should be held even longer.  As a reference point, this wine was issued 30 April 2019 and the Wine Advocate awarded it a score of 93 Points and a suggest “Drink Date” of 2022-2040.  When we tasted the wine, we were told that the 2014 vintage which was the real powerhouse of EL was leading this wine and it was big and inky and really overpowering; it was way too young and feisty to be properly enjoyed and there was real merit in cellaring this wine.  Since 2022 was the first year to try this wine properly from notes from the winemaker, I was impatient, especially since this was a Christmas present from my Bride.  The wine was a deep purple-red with note of red fruits and a touch of incense.  On the palate was red and black fruits, almost like a liqueur with tinges of mint and cedar, and a nice long finish of limestone terroir.  It was big and totally awesome, better than from the tasting that made my Bride buy it for me.

I decided to get another wine from the cellar and I decided to continue the theme of a non-vintage wine. We then had the Roberts + Rogers “Napa 5” Cabernet Sauvignon NV.  The wine came from five different vineyards, all from the rockiest part of the Louer Vineyard.  It is non-Vintage, as it is blended from a couple of vintages and very proprietary for a Cabernet Sauvignon wine.  Hand harvested from the loamy terrain, the wine was aged for a total of eighteen months in French Oak and the initial release was June 2018.  There were three hundred cases produced and all were done with a screw cap.  This was a beautiful red, fruit forward with plenty of deep red fruit and a surprisingly long finish with a lot of terroirs.  They felt that a screw cap was the perfect way to offer this casual wine that could be drank immediately or it could be cellared.  The rave reviews for these two wines from the other tasters, was enough to make sure that our order was filled with these two for sure, somehow, we can always squeeze some more room for a couple more cases of wine.  This deep colored wine offered notes of black cherries and red fruits, and on the palate, it was a big jammy Napa Cabernet that didn’t miss a beat and had a nice long finish of terroir.  It was a crowd pleaser.    

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Showing Off the Renovations

Posted on May 5, 2022 by thewineraconteur

We have been hard at work getting the house fixed up and we are almost there.  And we have started to have dinners here in between the moving of furniture, new hardwood floors, wallpaper removal, painting, plaster repairing, hanging new wallpaper, stripping, staining and lacquering woodwork, new electrical fixtures and eventually some new carpeting, and I do not install any flooring; though I think that I can do everything else and I also think that I am a twenty-something individual, but my bones and muscles know better. 

We had The Caller and his charming wife over for dinner, and he didn’t even realize that he wouldn’t bump his head on the chandelier in the front entry and then he started to notice the difference in lighting and color and then he saw the living room and the total makeover there.  We started with appetizers in the living room, as we are old-fashioned and like entertaining there.  We just had some simple appetizers to get the evening going.  We had Shrimp Cocktails, Roasted Garlic and some wonderful White Cheddar with Black Truffles.

We also introduced them to my Bride’s new “go-to” wine.  Artomana Txakolina “Xarmant,” Arabako Txakolina, Spain 2020 made with a distinctively Basque colorful label.   Artomana Txakolina, S.L. began in 1988, when the Association of Artisan Producers of Txakoli from Alava (Arabako Txakolina) was founded with the desire to return a wine tradition to this region.  It started with six hectares of hand planting and the vineyard is now up to twenty hectares.  This is now a three-generation family project, now using modern technology to create a wine that they wish to have worldwide distribution.  Arabako Txakolina is a DO wine zone, which was conferred in 2001.  Txakoli is a Basque word meaning “wine from the village” and Arabako is the Basque name for the village of Alava. “Xarmant” means “charming and delicate.”  The region was devastated by phylloxera in the late 1800’s and basically laid dormant until the 1980’s.  The majority of the wines from this region are white made from the Hondarrabi Zuri varietal and also from Petit Courbu.  Hondarrabi is named after the local village and Zuri in Basque means white, and the grape is indigenous to the region and the perfect local pairing for the local cuisine of seafood and hot peppers.  Petit Courbu another white varietal was originally found in the Gascon region of France.   Artomana Txakolina “Xarmant” Txakoli 2020 is a blend of eighty percent Hondarrabi Zuri and twenty percent Petit Courbu.  The wine undergoes cold fermentation and maceration and the juice is left on the lees for a couple of months.  The quick aging allows the wine to offer natural flavors and the wine is actually bottle with the lees, which gives the wine a bit of natural residual carbon dioxide with a lightly sparkling finish similar to a Vinho Verde.  A pale-yellow wine with green tinges, has notes of citrus, florals and cut grass.  On the palate soft flavors of peach and green apple, a bright acidity (that calls for an immediate second sip), balanced with a nice finish of minerals (terroir). 

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Ten Years

Posted on May 3, 2022 by thewineraconteur

It is hard to believe that I have been slaving at the computer and drinking wine for the last ten years to write an article here, every other night.  Years ago, in Junior High School, I had to read Richard Henry Dana, Jr.’s “Ten Year Before the Mast” and it seemed that long to finish that tome, but ten years doing this, has just breezed by.  There have been times when it seemed like a job, because of my self-imposed desire to do an article as often as I do, sometimes working under a deadline, and other times, I am a writing machine, because if I am going away, I don’t like to announce it, until I have returned.  I never quite understood telling the world that your house will be empty, because you are on holidays.  So, here is to some great articles that people have consistently responded to, by finding an article on a search-engine while they are researching something else, and to some fluff pieces and some pieces that are just there, all with my same rambling prose and narrative.    

There was plenty of doubt when I began, as to whether anyone would read my writings or if they would even care, and I still sometimes feel that way, but what the hell, it is fun.  I look at my early articles and I am a bit dismayed at the very amateurish feeling to them, not that I am polished and professional now, but I think that I have found my voice here.  I still get messages that I should stop writing, because I don’t talk about wine properly, with all of the descriptors that are all the rage for at least the last ten years.  Some brush me off, with their messages, and inform me that I have no designations, no formal training, so it is impossible for me to speak of wine properly.  The funny thing is, that most of my detractors, are no longer around, at least writing a wine blog.  Some even took umbrage, when another blogger conferred upon me, the title of “Street Somm” and I thought it fit me well, since it fits my background and my sense of humor. 

When I started out, I wrote my blog and then I would advertise it on Facebook.  The blogging world is a tough audience and that is fine, Facebook on the other hand seems to go out of the way to make it more difficult periodically, because I will not pay them to get me an audience, which I think defeats the purpose of writing, plus they have a hard time with the fact, that I refuse to pay them, for the work, that I do not generate any income from.  Then later I started to advertise with Twitter, and I am still at a loss on how to use Twitter and “tweets,” and I sometimes wonder if anyone else does, though perhaps with the new ownership, it may become less of a mystery.  The last big hurdle that I discovered and has made my readership grow is Instagram, which is owned by Facebook and also has inscrutable and unwritten rules, that one can get reprimanded for.  It is also a challenge to retrofit some of my articles, because I do tend to ramble and there is a word count (not mentioned in the missing rules).  And I find it, a fun environment for discussing wines and eventually, I will have all of my articles up-to-date and in sync with Instagram, so that all four parts of my blogging world will be on the same page. 

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When You Just Want Something Different

Posted on May 1, 2022 by thewineraconteur

There are times when you are having dinner at home, but nothing really fancy, though with my Bride she does try to make everything special.  We just finished the season of Lent and in this house, it means that we are having fish on Friday and somedays it may just be a traditional serving of Fish and Chips.  Those are the days that one would expect one of our “go-to” wines, but every now and then, one has to shake up the moment and grab something unexpected and that is the joy of a cellar. 

One of the nights we enjoyed a bottle of Bernardus Chardonnay Santa Lucia Highlands, Sierra Mar Vineyard 2014.  This wine immediately brought a smile to me, as we had actually visited Bernardus Winery on one of our trips to Carmel-by-the-Sea. The winery is located in the Carmel Valley and besides the winery, there is also Bernardus Lodge and Spa, and a spectacular restaurant on the grounds called Marinus; where we dined there after a tour of the grounds and a wine tasting. Sierra Mar Vineyard is a new vineyard on a hilltop location in the southern end of Santa Lucia Highlands, and so far, I have not experienced a bad bottle of wine from the Santa Lucia Highlands. This particular wine is made from three clones of Chardonnay and the grapes are all hand-picked and sorted at harvest. There were three-hundred-fifty cases made of this wine and the wine was estimated to having an aging potential of five to six years and this one was an eight-year-old, and it was excellent.  The wine showed as a golden hue with notes of white fruit and vanilla.  The fruit was still quite evident, with good acidity and a medium length finish of terroir that is always a hallmark of the Santa Lucia Highlands.

Another evening we also went away from the norm and had a bottle of Le G de Chateau Guiraud Bordeaux Blanc Sec 2018.  Chateau Guiraud is in the 1855 Classification of Sauternes and Barsac and was originally known as the Noble House of Bayle, until it was bought by Pierre Guiraud in 1766 and continued for many generations until it was bought by a group of French winemakers in 2006.  In the old days many of the chateaus of Sauternes and Barsac made a dry white for their own consumption and for some of their friends, but the world has discovered these little treasures.  While most Bordeaux Blanc Sec wines are predominately Sauvignon Blanc, Le G de Chateau Guiraud is fifty/fifty of Sauvignon Blanc and Semillon.  The fruit is manually harvested using small baskets and fermentation is for about three weeks.  Eighty percent of the wine is aged in the barrels from the last vintage of Chateau Guiraud and twenty percent is done in Stainless Steel. The average aging in the barrels is seven months with regular stirring of the lees.  This is a very lush and full-bodied white wine with a delicate gold tinge, a very refreshing wine that leaves one chewing the wine to appreciate the suppleness of the fruit and the terroir that lingers and beckons for another taste. 

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What a Great Memory

Posted on April 29, 2022 by thewineraconteur

My Bride got excited and bought a bunch of filet mignons at the butcher counter and each was almost the price of a gallon of gas.  OK, not at nineteen cents a gallon during the gas wars that occurred during my first real job in the late Sixties, but like almost five dollars today, a couple of weeks ago.  She was excited and who can blame her, as we are approaching full retirement and the rampant inflation was not one of the factors that we had seriously planned on about three to four years ago as we were working with financial planners.  She decided to splurge, actually, she almost had to, at that price, so we were going to have a nice dinner with an appetizer, a salad, potatoes and vegetables and a dessert, just with out a waiter or a waitress. 

I went into the cellar, looking for something interesting and looked at the collections of dwindling splits, which is alright.  A split, for wine is a half-bottle and we used to be able to find them, but they have seemed to disappear.  When I saw the bottle, I knew that I had to open it up, and see if she remembered the wine and the memories.  She remembered the wine and the restaurant associated with it.  On our first trip to Carmel-by-the-Sea we dined one night at Casanova’s.  A couple of things stand out, it was the first time I had Abalone, which is legal there, as an appetizer, the first time I had free-range chicken which made me realize how wonderful a simply prepared dinner could be, and they issued Laguiole steak knives, those perfectly balance knives adorned with a bumble bee.  The following year, when we went back, they were not using them and when I mentioned it to our waiter, he said that if I wanted one, he could bring me one, but that the knives “disappeared” even in such a fine establishment.

We were enjoying Georis Winery Estate Merlot Carmel Valley 2000.  Walter Georis immigrated to the USA from Belgium in 1956 at the age of eleven.  He spent his early years in Southern California and ended up opening a family restaurant that became internationally famous as Casanova’s both for the cuisine and the wine cellar.  In 1981, he bought a ranch in Carmel Valley and began planting grapes.  The fourteen-acre estate has terroir of sandy clay loam, gravel, river rocks and one small pocket of chalky soil.   Alas there is nothing to glean about this wine, but I have to say that the wine still had a beautiful deep purple-red color with notes of red and black fruits and spices.  On the palate this twenty-two-year-old still had a jammy finish of plums and cherries with silky tannins and a nice long finish of fruit and terroir.  I can’t help it, but I will always be in love with Merlot, since my High School days, because the Right Bank of Bordeaux was more affordable then, until the world discovered the majesty of Merlot, the beautiful and feminine grape of the Medoc.    

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