Celani Family Vineyards The Family and Ardore

Posted on December 14, 2021 by thewineraconteur

Even the best of times at a tasting at my local wine shop The Fine Wine Source of Livonia, Michigan has to come to an end. Tom Celani from Celani Family Vineyards was holding court and it was a joy to listen to him talk about the winery and his wines.  We only had four wines left to taste, but there were two different vintages of each wine.  The first two were the Cabernet Sauvignon, and in 2018, the name was changed to “The Family.”  The last two wines were from his “Ardore” collection and I have to smile each time I see a bottle of it, as the label reminds me of a cigar wrapper, another one of Tom Celani’s passions and since his roots are from Detroit, he has a charity event centered on cigars, which I am sure is a great event, as I see some of my former customers listed on the ads, but I gave up cigars, which makes my Bride happy and to finalize that chapter of my life, I just sent my eldest grandson my humidor that I have had from college and he has just started his college days.

We had a chance to try the Celani Family Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley Unfiltered 2016 and the Celani Family Vineyards “The Family” Napa Valley Unfiltered 2018, the ’16 vintage was only available in a Magnum format.  The production notes for these two wines are the same. This wine is made using fruit from two respected Napa Valley AVA districts; Mt. Veeder and Coombsville.  Here is a wine that was aged for twenty months in French Oak, of which ninety percent was new. That wonderful nose of black fruit, especially black cherry and blueberries. There were several spices that were mingling in the taste along with supple tannins that made this wine great fresh from the bottle and will be stellar ten to fifteen years from now.  To be totally honest, this was such an excellent Cabernet Sauvignon, that I could not really discern that much difference between the two vintages, so I opt for the ’16, because I could drink it sooner, though I really think the new name “The Family” is very cool and deserves a couple of slots in the wall.

If Tom Celani was Sam Spade, he would probably refer to the next wines as “The, uh, stuff that dreams are made of.” It was time to taste the Celani Family Vineyards Ardore Napa Valley Unfiltered 2016 and 2018.  Once again, the production notes of these two vintages are the same.  There is a meticulous selection process to secure the finest ten barrels of the Coombsville AVA Cabernet Sauvignon juice.  These ten barrels are then aged in one-hundred percent new French Oak barrels for twenty-two months with no fining or filtering.  The nose was even more concentrated compared to the Cabernet Sauvignon and there were floral tinges as well.   This was a very big, bold wine that was chewy, balanced, with tannins that all contributed to a wine that will probably become a cult wine, since they only make two-hundred-fifty cases and this wine will be great for at least twenty years, if not longer.  The ’18 was a bit more fruit forward and some notes of black tea and violets and the tannins were a bit more velvety and rich.  I didn’t mind getting a second taste.  I am sure that I will be seeing more wines from Tom Celani in the future.  

Posted in Wine | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Celani Family Vineyards Tenacious

Posted on December 12, 2021 by thewineraconteur

I have to admit that I was not the only person at The Fine Wine Source in Livonia, Michigan to taste the wines that Tom Celani was pouring.  The shop is not that big, and everyone that was there, was definitely courteous to the others to make sure that we all got a chance to taste the wines, and also to offer opinions.  It was also interesting to watch the buying strategies of some of the regulars.  As a retired merchant, I always enjoy watching customers buy, because for years, we always believed “that buying is contagious” and more fun than any other bug out there.

We started off tasting the Celani Family Vineyards Tenacious Estate Grown Proprietary Red Wine Napa Valley 2018 and they were taking pre-orders on this wine, as they were getting more from the winery. Tenacious is Tom Celani’s homage to Chateau Petrus and Le Pin, as he said that he fell in love with those wines, well he started learning and assembling his wine collection before he had the winery.  Very lofty and ambitious goals, and I have never had either of those two wines, but I am still young.  This wine is all Estate Grown since 2011 and is seventy percent Merlot and thirty percent Cabernet Franc.  It is aged for twenty-two months in new French Oak and is “unfiltered” and that word scares the first-time taster, until they realize how much more vibrant and alive the wine is. The wine offered notes of black fruits, with tastes of black cherries and plums, with traces of mocha and tobacco, with beautiful tannins and a delightful long finish of terroir.  This wine was stunning straight from the bottle and another five or ten years in the cellar would be awesome.

We then had the Celani Family Vineyards Tenacious Estate Napa Valley Red Wine Unfiltered 2019 which at the moment was only being offered in magnums.  This wine was produced exactly like the 2018 and I thought it was lighter, but the majority around me were all going for the 2019 vintage, while I was enraptured by the 2018.  I went and looked at my notes from when I tasted the 2012 and I was excited by this wine as well, but I also noted that I thought ten years in the cellar would be spectacular.  I was relating that we just recently had a bottle of the 2012 and to me it was sublime, and Tom’s face kind of beamed and he said that year was rather legendary.  Tenacious is their affordable signature wine.       

Posted in Wine | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Celani Robusto 2019

Posted on December 10, 2021 by thewineraconteur

I do enjoy tasting wines at my local wine shop The Fine Wine Source in Livonia, Michigan and it is a bonus when they have a guest host, such as having Tom Celani of Celani Family Wines.  We have had the good fortune to have some of the 2017 and 2018 Robusto wines in our cellar, as well as knowing that it is a great wine to have at a restaurant.  Not only did we get to taste the new wine, I had a great Robusto story to share with him, that he may be able to use at another tasting.

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.

Being the Raconteur that I am, I had to relate a story during a slight lull, while we were tasting the Robusto ’19, I had a story about the Robusto ’17.  During one of my dinner club meetings, one of the men, that I usually share a bottle of wine with dinner, instead of ordering “well” wines, and he is a Pinot Noir man.  The wine he wanted to order was sold out that evening and I knew that he would enjoy this wine, if I could get him to relent about the Pinot Noir.  He said he was not partial to blends, and I finally told him, that if he didn’t like the wine, I would pay for the bottle; and that won him over.  He wasl very impressed and gushing over the Celani Family Vineyards Robusto Proprietary Red Bend Napa Valley 2017, At this time, I think that the wine was a Proprietary Red, as their website did not go beyond that description, and some of the wineries treat their Proprietary Blends, as if they are part of the Manhattan Project. Oh, by the way, he agreed to split the price of the bottle with me, and he was very happy; he is also a mutual friend of the owner of The Fine Wine Source.  I know that this story made Tom Celani smile.        

Posted in Wine | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Another Tasting Session with Tom Celani

Posted on December 8, 2021 by thewineraconteur

I was told and then I also got a follow-up test message that Tom Celani was going to visit my local wine shop The Fine Wine Source in Livonia, Michigan.  The last time he was here for a tasting was 19 December 2019 when the world was fair and innocent, at least from a certain bug that seems to get mentioned in the papers quite a bit. Since my earliest days as a clothier, I had stopped listening to music on the radio and listened to the top news radio station in the Detroit area, so that I, as a clothier could speak rather intelligently with the customers, a trait that has been lost, I have noticed among the clerks that I now encounter.  I lead in with this introduction, because for years I had heard Tom Celani and all the philanthropic work he has done in the Detroit area, long before he had a winery.  Tom Celani is lauded in the Detroit area for his largesse for charitable organizations that he helps in a grand manner.  He and his father ended up creating one of the largest Miller distribution companies in the United States along with other beers and wines.  Tom Celani fell in love with wines, first as a drinker and a collector and finally acquiring a Tuscan-style estate with seventeen acres of grapes and one-hundred-twenty olive trees in the foot hills of the Vaca Mountain range in Napa Valley.  As the proprietor of the Celani Family Vineyards he has chosen to bottle wine without costs becoming a consideration, to him wine is about quality and not quantity.  In fact, he was joking that he is not sure if the winery, will ever truly show a profit, because of his concern about getting the best wine each and every time.

We started off tasting the Celani Family Vineyards Napa Valley Rose 2019 made from Cabernet Sauvignon.  This wine was aged on the lees for nine months in neutral French Oak barrels. The wine was an estate grown Cabernet Sauvignon Rosé that was mouthwatering with its refreshing taste.  Strawberries and rose petals wafted up to tempt the nose, after studying the deep pink color of the wine, and the wine delivered in spades, essences of strawberries, cranberries and red fruits with a layer of mineral terroir to make this wine an excellent dry finish and so satisfying.  It was a great way to start the tasting off, and I do think that the other tasters are getting used to my lame photography sessions and my questions directed to our guest host.

The next wine that we had was a new wine for me, from the Celani Family Vineyards.  We were tasting a Celani Family Vineyards Estate Chardonnay Napa Valley 2020 from the Oak Knoll District.  The Chardonnay was whole-cluster pressed and fermented on its lees using forty percent new French Oak and sixty percent in self-stirring egg-shaped concrete fermenters. To maintain the natural acidity of the Chardonnay, malolactic fermentation was inhibited.  The nose on this wine was excellent with notes of apple, pear, tropical flowers and brioche and some soft notes of spices and jasmine. The taste was a crisp balance of fruit and floral flavors with a very decent length finish of oak and roasted nuts.  And to think, we had just begun.         

Posted in Wine | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Annual Ladies’ Party 2021

Posted on December 6, 2021 by thewineraconteur

Long before I was on the scene, there was an Annual Ladies’ Party that my Bride has hosted and I am sure that if I ask, she could produce the first year and all the pertinent information.  In fact, it has been going on for so long, one of the participants plans a trip up from Florida, to coincide with this event that has always occurred on the First Friday of December.  We had a Herculean endeavor to get the house ready for this party, as after this past Thanksgiving, all the furniture had to be moved out, so that we could have the new flooring installed and then we had move as much stuff back to have a functioning living and dining room for the event. 

She is even fortunate, that there are some younger participants to replace some of the older participants through various means of attrition.  She keeps a log of everyone there, and if they were there last year, she puts them on the spot, as she reads what there last year goals were, and if they were attained.  They are also assigned a number when they enter, which later on will coincide with the annual Christmas gift selection.  The numbers are random, so the first to arrive, may not be the first to make a selection.  I know all about this, by osmosis, as nowadays, I conveniently go upstairs and hide in my office, which is probably the safest place to be.

The one benefit is that I usually get to start the food portion of the evening going and after I fill a couple of plates, I disappear to enjoy my reward.  The women bring beverages, appetizers, food and desserts.  There were several cheeses, crackers, vegetables and fruit to start off the evening.  There was a tossed salad, Armenian Pilaf, Sauteed Lamb and Mushrooms and Hummus.  There was also a huge assortment of cakes and pies, because I did make a sneaky return to take advantage of the desserts.  The ladies had the industrial size magnum of Mezzacorona Forte Alto Pinot Grigio Delle Venezie DOC 2020.   Mezzacorona is a group of co-operative wineries and brands, established in 1904 in Trentino.  The winery is known as the “Citadella del Vino” and they recently built a state-of-the-art facility to better serve their fifteen-hundred growers.  Mezzacorona claims to produce more Pino Grigio and Chardonnay than any other Italian winery.  With the wine being produced by so many small vineyards, the fruit is hand harvested to this day.  There is no production information, but I sure that I may surmise that the fruit is aged in Stainless Steel for a short period.  I say this, because the wine is green and flinty, crisp with a light floral nose and a soft finish.  A perfect wine for food and lots of talking and merriment.  I know that my Bride is already thinking about the next party. 

Posted in Dining, Wine | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

A Dinner at St. John’s

Posted on December 4, 2021 by thewineraconteur

Periodically, I get to accommodate my Bride to social functions for her business.  Some of the meetings are tied in with sessions held at resorts in different parts of the state, to make it fair to members, as the membership is state-wide.  This particular session was held only a couple miles away from our home, so it would not be financially prudent for us to stay at the resort.  The sessions were being held at the Inn at St. John’s in Plymouth, Michigan.  St. John’s began as St. John’s Provincial Seminary in 1949 for the Archdiocese of Detroit.   There was also a private nine-hole Don Ross golf course, which has expanded to twenty-seven holes, since the Seminary closed and it became a hotel, with a beautiful chapel that is still used to this day.   The Seminary ceased in 1988, in 2000 it became St. John’s Golf & Conference Center, and in 2006 with the Inn at St. John’s.

Over the years, my Bride has been there for different professional meetings at the Inn at St. John’s, and we went there once, to dine at their 5ive Steakhouse, which is a play on their location on Five Mile Road.  The dinner began with a wonderful appetizer table, featuring about a dozen different fresh fruits, and then there were vegetables, a couple of different types of hummuses, breads and then some hot appetizers as well.  I thought I grabbed a remaki (bacon wrapped around a water chestnut and chicken liver pate), and it turned out to be rolled bacon around Gorgonzola cheese.  I lived.  After the appetizer and cocktail part of the evening, we then went and sat down and we had preprinted cards with our dinner selection that we had previously ordered, and the staff was also checking for any last-minute food allergies that the kitchen should know about.  We both started with a field greens salad with a Balsamic dressing, and then we both had a Petite Filet and Salmon with mashed potatoes and asparagus.   Followed by a very decadent Flourless Chocolate Cake that demanded some Black Coffee. 

The bar set up for the party had a nice selection of fine liquors and imported beers.  The wine selection was not of the same caliber, but that happens and I am sure that the caterers are happy to suggest their basic house wines.  All the wines were by Sycamore Lane, all were non-vintage and all were from California.  They were offering a Rosé (White Zinfandel), Chardonnay, Pinot Grigio, Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon.  Sycamore Lane is an on-premise wine brand owned and produced by Trinchero Family Estates.  It was originally conceived to be a foodservice-only wine, but it can sometimes be found retail as well.  We started off with the Pinot Grigio and it tasted like a bulk version of a Pinot Grigio and it was rather dry, and I had people switch over to it from the White Zin and from the Chardonnay.  During the dinner portion of the evening, I had both a glass of the Pinot Grigio and a glass of the Merlot.  The Merlot was not indicative of that grape, but surprisingly it was rather nice with the Chocolate cake, that I tried out of curiosity as a pairing. The Pinot Grigio was the wine of the evening.

Posted in Dining, Wine | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

At Least Four Shades of Gray

Posted on December 2, 2021 by thewineraconteur

Normally the weekend after Thanksgiving would give shivers to me.  For ages in the retailing industry, it meant extended hours.  It also meant that I would have to find time to schlep some thirty cartons that are stacked and stored in a makeshift closet in the basement that is two bookcases wide and two bookcases deep, and for years I tried to rebox the decorations and indicate that they hadn’t been used and hopefully for my knees and back, that the number of cartons could conceivably diminish even by one carton.  The reason for the urgency, is that the first Friday in December has become the Annual Ladies’ Christmas Party, that has been staged, long before I arrived on the scene. 

This year, actually a couple of months ago, after twenty-seven years, my Bride wanted new flooring in the living room and dining room.  We had heard rumors from the neighbors that the original owners who had built the house had a small fire caused in the basement from an incinerator, when back when people could legally burn stuff, so we had refrained from a fear of the unknown.  Why a fear?  We knew from the library that we probably had beautiful natural hardwood flooring in the living room, but the dining room would have been directly over where the incinerator was.  My Bride found a wonderful bamboo flooring that she wanted, now you have heard horror stories about no merchandise, we had the flooring delivered almost immediately.  Our horror story was that due to a lack of workers, even in the building trades, we had to wait almost three months for the installation and it was after Thanksgiving.  I proceeded to pack everything in those two rooms, and we figured out how to move the existing furniture elsewhere in the house.  Our paint scheme was three shades of gray, two opposite ends of the spectrum of gray and what was called in the clothing industry as griege (the natural tone of wool and the stock market used to quote griege goods and they may still do); as the bamboo was a streaked multi-shade of gray and taupe. I have to admit that I can still paint, even though the ceiling in the living room seemed to get larger as the day progressed.  After all the painting we had to get the furniture back for Thanksgiving and then moved the furniture back out for the new floor installation.  We also discovered that we had the most beautiful and almost pristine natural hardwood flooring that we were now covering up with another hardwood flooring.  Who knew?

In case you were wondering, to celebrate the new completed flooring, we a dinner of Pork Tenderloin and a bottle of Acrobat Pinot Gris Oregon 2019.  Acrobat wines are made by King Estate Winery, and back in October 2016, there Pinot Gris was listed as one of the “Top 100 Best Buy” by Wine Enthusiast.  The winery sources fruit from all three main AVAs in Oregon; Willamette Valley, Umpqua Valley and Rogue Valley.  The wine is aged Sur Lie for four months in Stainless Steel.  The wine was a nice soft straw color and offered floral notes, and flavors of Fuji apples and pears, with balance acidity and a finish of fruit and minerality.  Just for the record Pinot Gris happens to be more famous as the Italian Pinot Grigio, and both Gris and Grigio translate in English to Gray.  

Posted in Dining, Wine | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Thanksgiving 2021 Part Two

Posted on November 30, 2021 by thewineraconteur

We had all the food even after twenty-four diners from Thanksgiving, so we all went to the missing sister’s house to continue the revelry.  More Thanksgiving, more birthdays, more food and of course more wine.  It was also the meeting of the dogs.  The Louisville clan had just gotten a new puppy, as they got used to having their one son’s dog always underfoot and then he moved and took the dog with him, though that dog is always making appearances at their home as well. The one sister that didn’t come for Thanksgiving, just got a second dog and they are still training the puppy and they were afraid to leave the dog alone.  The day reminded me of a French theatrical farce, because we had the puppy up on the second floor of the house, the older dog on the main floor of the house and the puppy from Louisville in the basement, but all three kept making appearances throughout the day and night.  I decided to stake out my claim at the Dining Room table and I opened up a bottle of Louis Jadot Macon-Villages Chardonnay 2020. Louis Jadot began as a negocient in 1859 based in Beaune, one of the centers of the Burgundy region of France.  The Louis Jadot firm has a portfolio of wines from the basic regional wines to some of the most lauded vineyards in the region.  This wine is from the southern part of Burgundy, close to Beaujolais.  Macon-Villages is the largest appellation of the Maconnais, as there are forty-three communes that can use this designation.  The wine is done in Stainless Steel and it is very crisp and fruit forward with a nice finish of terroir.

So, I just kind of stayed put for the entire time and a lot of the other men ended up sitting at the table, as the sisters seem to congregate at the kitchen table.  My Bride when she wasn’t playing cards or putting out appetizers or reheating all of the food that we brought from the night before, would bring me plates of cheese and crackers, and she would also get a pour of wine, in fact my table was good for visiting, because of the wine.  The other great thing is that she has finally stopped asking me what I would like on my plate.  You understand that since she is already in the kitchen with the buffet set-up, I am just one less body to add to the congestion of an ad-hoc buffet line.  Speaking of wine, we also opened a bottle of Black Star Farms Arcturos Sur Lie Chardonnay Old Mission Peninsula 2017, a Michigan wine.   Black Star Farms is rather unique in that it has vineyards and tasting room facilities on both peninsulas, so that they are kind of surrounding Traverse City which is kind of the focal point for all of the wineries in the area.  In 1998 Black Star Farms purchased Sport Valley Farm which was a one-hundred-twenty-acre equestrian facility, and the stylized black star was part of the architectural décor in the main house.  This was a nice medium bodied wine done in Stainless Steel.  It offered notes of ripe citrus, and some floral and finished with a bit of terroir.

When we finally had the dinner portion of the buffet set up, a continuation of yesterday’s fine meal.  Imagine having a big gathering and getting to serve leftovers, but the food was secondary, and there was still more revelry surrounding the holiday and the November birthday honorees.  I had no problems enjoying a plate full of leftovers, though by the end of the week, if there is still some, I may not be as enthusiastic (though it will be good training as I get entrenched in being a retiree).  The last of the wines that I opened was Chateau Ste. Michelle Merlot Indian Wells Vineyard 2011.  Chateau Ste. Michelle is the oldest and one of the most prestigious wineries in the State of Washington.  They are known for their Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Chardonnay, but are famed for their Riesling.  It was founded as the American Wine Growers in 1954 by the merger of two that companies that followed the repeal of Prohibition; the National Wine Company and the Pomerelle Wine Company.  The National Wine Company had planted Vitis vinifera grapes in the Columbia Valley, and under the consultation of Andre Tchelistcheff they planted even higher quality grapes in 1967.  These were under the name of Ste. Michelle Vintners and the first wines released were Cabernet Sauvignon, Pinot Noir, Semillon and Grenache. This wine had fifteen percent Syrah blended in with the Merlot and was aged for eighteen months in a mix of French and American Oak, both new and used.  The nose was soft on this mature wine, and there was still black fruits and some vanilla, with a nice medium finish of terroir.    

Posted in Dining, Wine | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Happy Thanksgiving 2021

Posted on November 28, 2021 by thewineraconteur

If it is the time of the year, that all the Christmas cards and newsletters have gone to the Post Office to be mailed, the gifts for the out-of-towners have been posted and all the local gifts have been wrapped and bundled by family, it must be Thanksgiving Day.  It has been crazy here, beyond the normal craziness, as we have been updating the living room and the dining room, which is a story all by itself.  Let us say, that the Bone China, Silverware and Crystal had to be packed up along with everything else in those two rooms, first for the cleaning, then the painting and then getting the house ready for twenty-four guests for dinner.  We had a quiet Thanksgiving, not everyone came this year, but it was because of a new puppy.  By the time the crowd started filtering in, we said two, a few came then and some made it by six.  I cracked opened a bottle of Korbin Kameron Semillon Moon Mountain District 2018 from Moonridge Vineyards and Moon Mountain District is in a curious position as part of it is Napa Valley and part is Sonoma, and Korbin Kameron Semillon Moon Mountain District 2018 is an Estate Grown wine. Semillon is probably one of the least known, major varietals in the wine industry.  It makes some of the greatest sweet wines and it also makes some of the greatest dry wines.  Its home is Bordeaux, though it is done extremely well in parts of Australia and among a few wineries in California.  A wine that starts in Stainless Steel and finishes in oak.  I actually had a chance to try this wine ahead of time before the actual tasting and I reserved some of the wine for my cellar, and I knew that my Bride would love it.  She did. This organically made wine used native yeasts and had a nose that I would call plush floral and citrus, and it brought notes of citrus and ripe pear with a nice lingering long count finish.  There were only twenty-five cases made and we got a case.  The perfect start for the day, but it did overpower the other white wines on Thanksgiving Day.

We had an impromptu set up and used the breakfast room, the dining room and the living room to make sure that everyone had a table to sit at.  We had a mix of flatware, plastic utensils, fancy disposable plates and serviettes (that is Canadian for paper napkins). We started off with appetizers, nothing fancy but an assortment of cheese, crackers, fruits and vegetables.  We were utilizing every oven in the house to get everything done, and warm.  The turkey was carved during this time, I really couldn’t greet people properly as I was carving away.  Our turkey doesn’t look like a Norman Rockwell painting, but we did a twenty-three-pounder stuffed and put in a roasting bag and cooked in a roaster, upside down.  The bird actually was falling apart and I had to take it out of the bag in pieces to carve.  It was delicious, the best part of being the carver, is that you have to make sure and taste all the different parts to make sure that it cooked properly (who needs to eat after carving?).  The next wine of note that I want to mention is Roberts + Rogers Reserve Chardonnay Napa Valley 2018.   I should have probably opened this wine to start as this wine was aged for almost twelve months.  Sixty percent of the juice was aged in French Oak and forty percent was aged in Stainless Steel and then the two juices were blended and then finally bottled.  It was a stellar example of a California Chardonnay, that would probably fool people in a blind taste test.  It was crisp and buttery and very smooth, with some floral notes and a nice finish that evoked a desire for another taste. 

Then we finally got to the dinner, which out of necessity is always set up as a buffet on the island counter in the kitchen.  Of course, she had to make her Caesar Salad and the turkey and the gravy were outstanding.  To be truthful, I never enjoyed turkey, until I had my Bride’s cooking, because I grew up thinking that turkey was a cousin of cardboard.  For the sake of honesty and transparency, there was something called a Tofurkey.  She also made two tenderloins, one in a traditional olive oil, garlic and rosemary and the other was braised in Mexican Molé Sauce for the more adventurous.  There were also all of the obligatory sides, ahem, except for the Armenian Pilaf and it was duly noted.  After the buffet counter was cleared it was filled up again with pumpkin pies, sweet potato pies, pecan pies, apple pies, cherry pies and of course a Birthday cake for all of the birthday honorees in November.  While some continued with white wines, I had to open up an interesting red wine for the day.  I went with a bottle of Celani Family Vineyards Tenacious Estate Napa Valley Red Wine Unfiltered 2012.  I had tasted and wrote and bought some of this wine about five years ago.  When I first had the wine, I was told that it was created in the image of Le Pin and Chateau Petrus, and quite a lofty goal.  The wine is a blend of seventy percent Merlot and thirty percent Cabernet Franc.  The wine is aged in new French Oak for twenty-two months and has become their affordable signature wine.  This had a big nose of black fruit and strawberries, with a taste that was dominated originally by the black cherry, and finishing with some rich terroir and some great acidity for cellaring. I may have opened it early, but it was a great way to see how it was cellaring, before I even think of a newer vintage that is resting.

Posted in Dining, Wine | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Shades of the Old Neighborhood

Posted on November 26, 2021 by thewineraconteur

At the end of my old neighborhood was Patton Park, named after General George “Blood and Guts” Patton, one of the military heroes of World War II.  The Park was famous in the day, because after the Independence Day parade, which ended at the park, later in the evening courtesy of the local merchants, there was fireworks, and it was the only place in the city for a parade and for the pyrotechnics. The extreme tip of the park actually was in the border of the adjacent City of Dearborn and across the street from the park was an Italian restaurant called Roman Village and by the fuzzy logic of the day, the tip of the park and the restaurant became part of the neighborhood, regardless that it was in another community’s boundary and jurisdiction.  There are times when I try to explain to my Bride the geography and the geo-political climate, that only a true resident of the area, will understand. 

I mention all of this as background, because my Bride had invited another couple out for a casual dinner at a restaurant named Antonio’s Piccolo Ristorante, it is called piccolo, because the size of the establishment is much smaller compared to their other restaurants called Antonio’s Cucina Italiana; and they all owe a debt to the original which is still packing them in at Roman Village; and why they didn’t use that name for the other restaurants, I cannot explain.  The other couple followed my Bride’s tout and had the Seafood Manicotti, stuffed with Mozzarella and Ricotta cheese, Lump Crab and Shrimp topped with a Palomino Sauce.  I had to be the rebel of the crowd, and find another dish that would work with a bottle of wine for the table, as the other couple were not as much of wine drinkers as we are.  I had the Polenta Delmar Alla Valentino which was a combination of fresh Shrimp, Scallops and Whitefish, sauteed in a Spicy Tomato Sauce over Polenta.

With all of the dinners ordered, it was easy, as I knew that we were going to have a white wine, of course, we knew that before the dinner selection, as the other couple only drink white wine.  We had a bottle of Livio Felluga Pinot Grigio Colli Orientali del Friuli DOC, Friuli-Venezia Giulia 2019.  Livio Felluga is named after its founder, who came to the region in the 1930’s, and is most known for their blended white wines. The family goes back six generations of wine makers originally from Isola d’Istria in modern day Slovenia.  Friuli Colli Orientali DOC (Eastern Hills of Friuli) is a famed district noted for the stratified, mineral rich soil, layers of marl and sandstone. The fruit was hand-harvested and gently destemmed and maceration and fermentation was done in Stainless Steel vats on the lees for several months, and then aged for a short time in the bottle before distribution, The wine was a pretty straw color with a nose offering floral notes and white fruit and natural spice. On the palate it had very pleasant fruit, with a tanginess, and a nice medium length finish of fruit, salt and terroir.  I think everyone was pleased, because they all wanted seconds.         

Posted in Dining, Wine | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment