Spanish Monster

The grape is Monastrell, in France the same grape is Mourvedre. In the hands of Juan Gil of Jumilla in Spain it is a monster red wine. Spend $19.99 on a bottle of a big juicy rich red wine that is equally at home with a steak on the grill, roast of lamb or a big hunk of sharp cheese like a Manchego from Spain. You will get more than your money's worth. The wine is so big of flavor you might not finish it the first night, don't worry, the wine holds up well for finishing with leftovers on the second night. Fruity, rich and a nice smokiness to the wine is probably at its best with the hunk of meat off the grill, but it is complex and enjoyable to sip on its own. Just dont forget to share.

Pacifist and Delicious

For those of you old enough to remember DMZs in Vietnam and Korea, the De Morgenzon farm in South Africa has come out with two wines that are huge values. The labels, attractively made and with the letters DMZ in big BIG print are hard to miss. Both types retail for $14.99 a bottle.

The red is made from Syrah, labelled Shiraz, legal name, but the style of the wine is more French than Aussie. Linger over the glass as aromas of coriander, cinnamon, blueberry, vanilla, and back to more brown spices waft out of the glass in no particular order. The wine is not a heavyweight, but rather an elegant middleweight that will compliment the fall dinner palate perfectly. I had it with a braised lamb shank.

As fantastic as the red is the Chardonnay is even better. The use of ageing the wine in a blend of Alliers and Nevers oak barrels, the classic Burgundy style, the wine is a dead ringer for high quality Meursault but at only a third of the price. Fruit flavors and aromas in concert with balancing oak flavors can only remind you of classic French White Burgundy. Live on the East Coast? This is the wine for that special lobster dinner. I had it with an herbed pork dish.

Peaches and Cream, Herb or Anise?

If you picked Peaches and Anise, you win! There is a white grape from the Valdeorras region of northwest Spain called Godello. Wines from this grape have a remarkable peaches and anise aroma and flavor. As the wine sits in your glass, or you have patience and let it breath a half hour or more, the peachy sensation fades as the anisey herby (half credit if you picked Peaches and Herb) comes out more. It has a richer mouthfeel than a Pinot Grigio, but not as heavy as California Chardonnay. Most of the ones we have bought are un-oaked. Unfortunately, many of our suppliers have not brought in many cases and we have already cleaned out a couple of them.
In stock as this goes to web is one called Castille de Papas. It has an unforgettable bright orange label and retails for $14.99 a bottle. Very peachy when first opened, it almost seems to be a bit sweet, but it isn't. And it has great lasting flavor as an opened but resealed bottle tasted even better the second and third nights. Now this does not go to full flavored licorice, but it is noticeable. As such, it is fantastic with fish dishes. Now where is my Peaches and Herb 8 track?

Wrong Again

I am frequently asked, "Bob, I want a Chardonnay that is oaky but not buttery and not expensive, what have you got?" I fumblishly reply that it doesn't exist, oak aging lends to butteryness. Well, guess who proved me wrong?

If you said a South African winery, you are correct. Jardin 2008 Chardonnay at $14.99 a bottle surprised the bleep out of me with its rich complex oak flavor in harmony with great acidity, minerality and all-around yummy flavors. I can see this wine being the lobster clambake wine for the summer of 2009, if the sun would ever come out this year in New England.

For you international folks, the Jardin label exists for the United States. In South Africa, the Jordan family owns the property, makes the wines and has no relation to the Jordan family of California, hence the name difference. The rest of the world sees the wine as Jordan Chardonnay of South Africa.

And a real clambake has chowdah, made with milk. State law in Massachusetts.

Name Dropping

I had dinner the other night with Brewer Raats. One of the larger than life itself wine characters in the trade, he prides himself in Chenin Blanc and Cabernet Franc. Heck, he owns an Irish pub in South African college town, how cool is that?

He told a story about a night of wine tasting with fellow South African winemakers where each winemaker had to bring "the wine that changed you" or something to that effect. He brought Chateau Cheval Blanc, one of the seven great Bordeauxs, along with Mouton, Lafite et al. Cheval Blanc has lots of Cabernet Franc in its blend and his desire was to create a wine in the style of Cheval Blanc.

Zip forward to last weeks dinner in Boston and he brought his Raats Family 2001 Cabernet Franc and a 1998 Chat. Cheval Blanc. His is $30 a bottle, the Cheval Blanc is conservatively worth about $300. The only difference I could detect was that the Cheval Blanc had a little sweeter fruit flavor. Presently at the store we offer the yummy 2006 Raats Cabernet Franc at $29.99 a bottle and will add the 2007 at the same price. Drinkable and cellarable for less than $30 is ridiculous. That night we had them with Wild Boar and Mushroom over Pasta. Great match.

And if you want to really splurge, he is in partnership in a wine called MR de Compostella. Around $100 a bottle, and you can only imagine what a wonderful age-worthy wine this is.

Alternatives to Chardonnay

and Pinot Grigio. The two most popular white wine grapes in the USA are Pinot Grigio and Chardonnay. When I started in the business 2 score ago Chenin Blanc was the most popular grape variety. I remember my first trip to California and visiting the tiny J. Lohr winery in a former fire station in San Jose, if my memory is not failing me, and being told they were discontinuing my most favorite wine, Chenin Blanc.

Today, the best bang for the buck white wine is Chenin Blanc. Lighter than Chardonnay, richer than Pinot Grigio, it can be made in a variety of styles to the whim of the winemaker and vineyard manager.

South Africa produces the best Chenin Blanc values in the world today. Our most popular white wine in the store for the last few years has been the Ken Forrester Petit Chenin Blanc at $9.99 a bottle. However, I just set up a display in the store of 3 different and delicious Chenin Blancs, each for $14.99 a bottle. You get to pick your favorite.

First, the "Unwooded" Chenin Blanc from Raats Family is a crisp refreshing minerally essence of peach dry white wine. Lovely bank of the Charles River cheese and cracker wine for a warm spring-summer day.

Second, the lightly wooded Ken Forrester Chenin Blanc. This touch of oak adds a component of vanilla to the wine. You could also take this to the Charles but the picnic basket with chicken and salads in addition to the cheese would be a better match.

Third, the moderately wooded Graham Beck Gamekeeper's Reserve Chenin Blanc is oaked more like a California Chardonnay. This richer wine is yummy with the rainy day picnic with the chicken right out of the oven.

Finally, if you want the outrageous Chenin Blanc, you are more than welcome to plunk down $59.99 a bottle for the FMC. Save this bottle for a great white meat meal for a very special occasion. First time I tried it, I thought it was over-oaked. But it passed the empty glass test. You know, when you try a variety of wines, the glass that keeps being emptied most often is the best wine.

Peanut Butter and Jelly

I love the classic matches, bacon and eggs, peanut butter and jelly and Champagne and caviar, even though I hate caviar, but I get how it works. I am nominating pork and Rioja as the new classic match.

This past Easter my sister-in-law regaled the family with a ham and a pork loin on the bone. Among her guests were a couple visiting her parents from Barcelona, Spain. Since I was in charge of bringing the wine, I opted for a variety of red wines including a few from Spain. The fruitier reds were a nice match with the ham, always go for fruit with ham to counterbalance the sweetish glaze, but the Rioja and the pork created oohs and aahs from myself and the guests. Everyone got it!

The simple Rioja, Vina Hermina $12.99 at the store, was enhanced by the pork and the pork brought out the best in the wine. Synergy! It seemed like the pork smoothed out the edges in the wine and brought out the best flavors. The wine in concert with the pork seemed to make the meat juicier and more flavorful. Gah, just re-read what I just wrote and this is one instance where 1000 words are not worth one taste.

Next time you are roasting or grilling pork, whether ribs, chops or loins, serve any red Rioja and taste what I am attempting to write about. Caveat, it doesn't work with barbeque sauce.

Work, work, work

My first day of Spring is the annual Cape Cod Wine Tasting Show held in the beautiful Chatham Bars Inn. In my foolish youth, I tried to taste all the wines at the show, this year close to 700, but like fine wine, my age has made me better. 200 wines tasted in about 3 hours is my limit now. Here are the few winners that I ordered for the store. They should, repeat should, arrive within the next two weeks, hopefully in time for Easter. This short list further proves, that I taste all the bad wines so you don't have to. These wines are in no particular order, they are just good and good value.

Casillero del Diablo 2006 "Riserva Privada" Cabernet/Syrah blend $17.99
Big, luscious and yummy

A.A. Bastianich (yes, that family)2007 Malvasia $39.99
Hole in the head wine, I don't need it, but it was a stunning dry white and I had to have it.

Josh Cellars 2006 Cabernet Sauvignon "Amber Knolls" $19.99
Just what you want in California Cab.

Lioco 2007 Unoaked Sonoma Chardonnay $19.99
Surprisingly rich flavors for an unoaked Chard.

The Wishing Tree 2008 Chardonnay AND 2006 Shiraz $11.99 each
From Western Australia, more acid, less over-ripe flavors, well done.

Angeline 2006 Chardonnay Russian River $14.99
Great value for classic California style

Angeline 2006 Merlot Russian River $14.99
Way too tasty and smooth for its price point!

Martin Ray 2006 Pinot Noir Santa Barbara $19.99
Only wine I tried that I inquired about buying the entire Mass. allotment.

Ken Forrester Petite Pinotage 2008 $9.99
Hate-Love, Hated this wine for years. Love this vintage!

De Trafford Shiraz "Blueprint" 2005 $39.99
BIG , enjoyable, cellarable, for a leg of lamb. Very limited!

Corte Rugolin Valpolicella Classico 2007 $14.99
Too good for red sauce!

Graham Beck Chenin Blanc "Gamekeeper's Reserve" $14.99
Tired of Chardonnay? Drink this!

Vinos Sin-Ley M5 (Monastrell) 2007 $14.99
Big, smooth, smokey, perfect for Catsup covered cuisine.

Vinos Sin-Ley Puntazo Rose' 2008 $9.99
A snoutful of fresh strawberries in a dry pink wine. Bring on Summer!

Typical average results, 7.5% worthy, 92.5% I don't want you to taste.

Blisters on my tongue healing until the second Cape show in 10 days and I get to do it all over again. New wines of course.

WWW-Wine Wont Work

Happy St. Patrick's Day! Wine won't work with corned beef and cabbage. The saltiness of the corned beef desensitizes your taste buds, plus all that salt makes you thirsty, so pour a couple of cold beers, green color optional, and enjoy your gourmet kinship with the Irish. And it is beer to be served whether your corned beef is pink in color, the NY style, or grey, the New England style. Another battle between New York and Boston. Again, there are no wrong answers, just your personal preference. If you find a butcher that makes his own New England style corned beef, ask a couple of weeks in advance if he will make you corned spare ribs! Then make sure your next appointment with your doctor is in the far away future so you dont get yelled at.

Wine Mythbuster

Rule # 1. If you like the wine, it's good wine.
Rule # 2. If the wine tastes good to you with the food you are serving, it's the right wine to serve.

Chianti does not go with red sauce! In fact almost all red wine from Tuscany, Chianti the most famous, does not go with red sauce.

Tuscany is home of white beans, olive oil and Sangiovese. Sangioves is the dominant grape of Chianti. It has a slight sour cherry, Morello, flavor. So would you put sour cherries in your red sauce? Nope. Other than a homemade pasta called Picci, you do not see pasta in Tuscany except in tourist places. The nickname for the people of Tuscany, and I apologize in advance for the spelling, is Mangiafagioles, The Beaneaters. For you Boston Red Sox fans, that was the name of the Red Sox, before Red Sox. Tuscans pour olive oil on their dishes like American kids pour ketchup on their fries! The cloyingness of the oil is a perfect foil for the high acid of the Sangiovese grape. The best steaks are to be found in Tuscany too. Chianina, again spelling apologies, is the local best breed of cow for meat. It is high in fat content, cooked rare on a wood fire and is yummy with Chianti and other Tuscan reds. The beef is so rich that it is common to liberally apply Kosher salt and lemon juice to a Tuscan steak. The Tuscans also love grilled game birds and wild boar stews. These foods taste terrific with Tuscan reds. Secret ingredient in stew from Tuscany, a spoonful of unsweetened cocoa powder at the finish! You will not believe how it enrichens the colour and flavor of stews.

Southern Italian red wines are the perfect foil for red sauce. The acidity from the tomato and the low acid from grapes like Primitivo, Negroamaro and Nero d'Avola compliment each other for some sure-fire tasty combos. In addition, those three grapes make great inexpensive wine! And in this economy, inexpensive and delicious is a great match.

Alphabet Soup/Wines

Simple as ABC! With all due respect to the Jackson 5, it is that simple. A few years ago ABC was an acronym for Anything But Chardonnay or Anything But Cabernet. Chardonnay and Cabernet are the two most popular white and red respectively wine grapes in the US today.. but people were getting tired of them. Most great red Bordeaux are a blend of up to 5 varieties of grapes and today more winemakers are having fun creating some interesting blends that you would never see in Bordeaux.

A staple in the store for years and exceeds expectations in the 2007 vintage is the CMS from Hedges of Washington state. A tasty blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Syrah/Shiraz, the 2007 is an easy guzzler as well as a nice tasting red dinner wine. The Cabernet gives the wine complex flavors, the Merlot is for smoothness and a pleasing vanilla-cherry flavor and the Syrah/Shiraz gives the wine some weight, smoke and spice flavors. Great with all catsup,covered cuisine. I will use this as a backyard bar-b-que summer wine and serve it with a slight chill. It retails for under $15 a bottle.

SMG is not a new global positioning system, but rather a fantastic red blend from golfer Ernie Els' Guardian Peak label of South Africa. This $25 a bottle red bombshell wine gets the gamey-peppery flavors from the Syrah, mucho smoke from the Mourvedre and extra weight and power from the Grenache. If you get the chance, have lunch at the Guardian Peak winery for a great meal with a better view. Great winter/spring red wine for lamb in all its forms. Too good for the ketchup, but great with a steak, open the bottle a half hour before serving to allows its massive flavors to expand out of the glass.

President Gourmet

Washington may have chopped the cherry tree, but it was Thomas Jefferson who was the first wine geek president. While living in Paris as a diplomat he not only developed his taste for fine wines and foods, Ben Franklin acquired the same habit the same way and both lived into their 80's, but also used his farming skills and brought back vine cuttings from Bordeaux to his home at Monticello in Virginia. Alas, the yet undetected native American vine mite, Phylloxera, destroyed the vines and no wine was ever produced by Jefferson. Eventually this microscopic bug was transported to Europe and ruined most of the vineyards there in the mid 1800's. Surprisingly, today almost all vines are grown on American root stock. Think of Concord underground and Cabernet on top.

With that knowledge today there is a healthy and high quality wine growing region in the Virginian Piedmont. Jefferson would be proud. Unfortunately, these yummy wines rarely are available outside of the Commonwealth of Virginia and the D.C. area. If you live there, you know, but for the rest of us... road trip!

When Jefferson was alive, he enjoyed fine Bordeaux, but the Bordeaux of the 1700's was different than today's Bordeaux. Today, only 5 varieties of grapes are allowed in the blend; Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Merlot, Petit Verdot and Malbec. Back then there was a 6th grape, think of the 5th Beatle, Carmenere. When the Phylloxera bug hit, the winemakers of Bordeaux allowed the Carmenere to go extinct because the grapes need to hang on the vine for an extra week than all the others. This extra week of ripening was not always reached as the Earth was in a cooling time back then, think of global warming in reverse. Until recent scientific advances, ie. DNA mapping, the way you determined what grapes were growing in your vineyard was the science of Ampelography. No, Ampelography has nothing to do with silicon implants, but rather it is the science of tracing leaf patterns to determine grape varieties, sort of fingerprints for leaves. Unfortunately, the Merlot and the Carmenere have the same pattern, so DNA to the rescue. Today's almost all of the known Carmenere is grown in Chile.

Carmenere is one of the most lovable dry red wines in the world today. When the grape is allowed to hang to ripen perfectly it yields a smooth dry red wine with some fruit and spice and chocolate flavor/aroma sensations. My two favorites are the Vina Chocolain 2007 retailing about 12 a bottle and the luscious Arboleda 2006 around 20 a bottle. They are equally good with steaks as well as roasts and braises of beef or lamb. And I would not be against serving them with a game bird such as goose or duck.

To pronounce Carmenere, try Car man air.

NASCAR, Born in the PIEDMONT

No, not that Piedmont. The real Piedmont is the Foot (pied) Hills (mont) of the Alps in northwest Italy on the French border. The Piedmont is home to Italy's best red wines, sorry Tuscany, but this is my blog.

The 2007 vintage in the Piedmont is legendary great!

Well, the best wines of the region, the Barolo and the Barbaresco have yet to be released, but the everyday Nebbiolo, Barbera and Dolcetto have been released and they are Wowyummy. Copyright Wowyummy.

Normally these wines rarely have enough fruit flavor to balance typical intense acidity. In other words, not enough sweet to pull off a balanced sweet and sour sensation. The 2007s are so wonderful and easy to drink and wicked tasty, sorry about using wicked as an adjective but I am Boston bred, they can please a New World wine drinker as well as the classic Europhile imbiber.
Tasty with northern Italian cuisine, (bag the red sauce), they show especially well with mushroom influenced dishes. This vintage with its lush fruit flavors, smooth balance and just enough acid to cut into a properly butter/cream dish, offers enormous value. Expect to spend in the 10-20 a bottle range for top quality wine. The few more expensive ones I have tried are properly more impressive. The Enzo Boglietti Barbera blew me away. You can drink it now but at least 5 years of cellaring will be rewarded.

As for waiting for the bigguns to be released, I have a hold on my piggy bank, but the hammer is ready and poised above the porcine Pinkerton.

Oh, these wines are just ok with barbeque, but would be fabulous with a salami and cheese sandwich or sausages cooked on the grill.

Valentine Wines

Say it with pink bubbles. Tastes better than flowers, looks better than chocolates, smells better than a card!

The best bang-for-the-buck pink bubbly in the world today is Graham Beck Brut Rose. This delicious South African blend of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay grapes has the classic aroma of raspberry and strawberry in concert with fruit flavors in a dry gorgeous pink wine. The richness of the wine as it coats the inside of your mouth is rare and only found in the most expensive French Rose Champagnes, but if you can find, and this is the tough part, the Graham Beck, expect to spend around $20.

Great bubblies at any price have one thing in common. They taste like great wines that just happen to have bubbles. Most sparkling wines taste and feel like club soda with some wine flavor added. If you have never had a great Champagne, the Graham Beck will give you the quality and save you about $100 a bottle. Yeah, it's that good. And although Graham Beck makes two other bubblies in the more classic white style and they are delicious, it's the Rose you want for Valentine's Day. Serve chilled, but not with chocolates. And I am not a big strawberries with bubbly fan either. But that's another day's rant.

Not with chocolates?! Yup. Ignore those movies and TV shows showing how romantic Champagne and Chocolate are, they go together like a Hollywood romance. Both great separately, but marry them up, and no chemistry. A quick look at chemistry gives us the reason. The yeast and acid of wine do not help nor balance the sweetness and power of flavor of chocolate. The best wines with chocolate are those luscious sweet Ports, Sherries and Aussie dessert wines. My best value pick is the Delaforce Curious and Ancient 20 year old Tawny Port around $40 a bottle. The nicest thing about Port is it keeps for a few weeks after opening. It also is around 20% alcohol so be careful. It is sweet and nutty and yummy. Serve it at room temperature in small stemware glasses. 20 years on the label indicates that the wine did spend 20 years in a wood barrel to smooth it out and add some nice nutty flavor from the wood as well as the tawny-brown color. It also is wonderful with a cigar that my wife has me smoke outside no matter what the weather is.