Wild About Wine 2010

It's been crazy-busy lately, so please forgive me for not writing about the wine tasting we had back on the 13th sooner. We purposely invited about half as many people this time because last year it was out of hand and I hardly even got to talk to everyone there. Also, this time we wanted to do a full-blown blind tasting with notes and comparisons.

It turned out really well. Everyone had fun and we got to really pay attention to the wine. The theme this year was South American wines so we got to try all kinds of different good vino, mostly from Chile and Argentina.

Whitehaven

With the exception of Chablis and a few very expensive white Burgundies, this is my favorite white wine. Whitehaven Sauvignon Blanc. It's usually my birthday wine, but Heather came home with a bottle of it specially for Christmas Eve and that was pretty much the sweetest thing ever.

I love Sauvignon Blancs that are super crisp and acidic, and taste of tropical fruit. There are very few American SBs that show up like that, I think because California loves to oak everything. Geyser Peak from Sonoma being an exception.

The Marlborough region of New Zealand has developed a style of Sauvignon Blanc that is racy and fruity and hits your mouth like a zippy tropical explosion. The first NZ wine I remember like this was Cloudy Bay, which is still excellent but its popularity has sent the price into the stratosphere. Nobilo and Villa Maria make pretty good versions too, and you can get them at Trader Joe's, but they are still nowhere near Coudy Bay or my beloved Whitehaven.

Whitehaven is every bit as good as Cloudy and the bottle Heather got was only $15. Which is very cheap for this kind of awesomeness.

Thanks Heatherbaby!

Useful Stuff

As an offset to his stressful job in IT, my friend Chris is a woodworker in his spare time. He made me some very cool stuff for Christmas! A layered cutting board which will be great for serving cheese on, and a squirrel coffin!

And the squirrel coffin can also be used as a wine gift box! Talk about multipurpose!

Spinning At Parties

We traveled over the river and through the woods to the Weiss' house for their annual holiday extravaganza. Carol was kind enough to stock the place with excellent wine and we all had a great time.

Zach learned the fine art of upside-down dreidel spinning, frozen here using high-speed photography, for all to see, including Jay who didn't believe it for quite a while.

Despite off and on attempts, I never really mastered that technique so we can chalk this up to another thing my 9-year old son does better than I do.

Boxes And Boxes

Hey....'sup schoolgirls and schoolboys?

Yes, we're very light on blogging communications lately, partly due to the massive mountain of boxes we need to unpack and partly because the cable company needs to run wires (and maybe build a road?) out to our place.

The mail man found us yesterday, so we're on the map in at least one way. We'll see if the garbage man finds us today too.

We've got all major appliances working, with cold water and ice, and hot burners to cook with. No microwave oven yet, but you just know I won't miss it.

I am about to hack into the brand new garage drywall today to install the doggie door. Wish me luck. No more carrying pooches out to pee! Yay!

In other fun news, Zach slept in the house for the first time Tuesday night. He loved his room. Maddie loves hers too. I'll be building the bed frame for our room tonight, so no more sharing the low-down air with the dogs.

The office is "getting there", I have a slimmed-down manifestation of The Beast running enough to access my photographs. I put up some cool shiny aluminum blinds in there that really look nice, as well as serving to hide my many thousands of dollars worth of Apple hardware.

All in all, we're moving along nicely.

I'll chat more when I can. Until then, keep your chins up, raise a glass of red to us, and breathe easy in the knowledge that it is not YOUR time to move right now.

Relaxing With Liquid Grapes

Spitting And Swallowing

I don't have my wine tastings as frequently now as I used to, but they are still my favorite events of the year. They are just a big huge fermented blast. It's so fun seeing all my various friends from different circles mix together, catalyzed by wine and sweat. It's extra special for me, because I know that the only thing they all have in common is...me. :) Is that awfully self-centered, or what?

There are laughs, arguments, friendships made and broken, and sometimes even loves found or lost. They are costly and a huge mess, but I wouldn't live without them. I usually manage one big one a year now.

I was strolling through some old emails and found my invitation for this one, held interestingly enough on July 11, 2003, exactly two years before Maddie was born. This was before I knew Heather, but we have since had a couple tastings and integrating her friends into the mix has worked out great. I have noticed that the events get more and more casual as time goes on, with less tasting and more slurping.

I always try to make them sound fun in the invites, but they often blow past fun to something else. They are "Über-fun". I can tell you for a fact that many of the people reading this post have a favorite Wild Wine Tasting story. Care to share?

Ok, here goes...

Well, friends...it's time again. Just when you thought it was safe to let your liver out of the house un-chaperoned, along comes another bout of the thinly-veiled hedonism that we all know and love as a Wild Wine Tasting Extravaganza (If any of you Ford geeks turn that into an acronym I'm going to come after you and douse you with Ripple). Yes, this will separate the spitters from the swallowers (hey, I'm being very serious here :-)~

Here's the way it works: Dave picks a theme (which I have done, admirably). Everyone brings a bottle of wine, specified below (don't worry, I'll stick Dennis with the 1961 Mouton). Everyone also brings a food item (also conveniently specified below, no Meijer substitutes, please), their favorite wine glass(es), an open mind, an extra pair of stretchy pants, a skate key, and a feeling of unfulfillable wonder. Wine snobbiness will not be tolerated. Drunken debauchery will not only be tolerated, it will be rewarded. However, red stains outside of the designated stain areas are strictly prohibited, under penalty of electric shock.

The theme is Wines of France. We will be trying bottles from some of the various major wine areas: Bourgogne (Burgundy, including Beaujolais), Bordeaux, Alsace, Chablis, the Loire Valley, the Rhône Valley, Languedoc-Roussillon (maybe), and Champagne. As previous participants can attest, these things are really informal and loose, so we'll just have fun, talk about these areas a little, and dive in (remember, no splashing). There is no dress code, but if anyone shows up in a toga this time, I'm going to close the vomitorium. You know who you are.

Wines of France - Wine and Food Assignments

Please let me know if you have any questions. None of these should be that hard to find. If you're having trouble finding the wine, just walk out of Walgreen's and call me, I can help.

Jennifer
Wine: Louis Latour Chablis
Food: Fresh-baked bread!

Dennis & "Guest"
Wines: Burgundy - Rouge (better see me first), Loire Muscadet (ditto)
Food: Cheeses and Charcuterie!

Ingrid & Al
Wines: Vouvray, Trimbach Alsatian Riesling (sec) or Pinot Gris
Food: Cold watercress soup, Shrimp and avocado salsa

Howard & Glenda
Wine: Veuve Cliquot Champagne, or similar Epernay/ Reims
Food: Your choice!

Dave
Wines: 1996 Chateau Cantemerle Grand Cru Classe, Beaujolais-Villages
Food: Green olive tapenade, Leek and goat cheese tart or Chevre appetizer

Rob & Gail
Wine: Pouilly Fuisse, Macon-Villages, or some other white Burgundy
Food: Your choice!

Brandi & Guest
Wine: Côtes du Rhône Rouge, E. Guigal
Food: Your choice!

Brian & Carol
Wine: Sancerre
Food: Your choice!

Directions to Dave's

While my Villa in Siena is under construction, I currently live in the American Mid-West at (directions here). No loitering, the guards have strict orders about this. Knock the special knock and enter. If you don't hear B.B. King or Marley playing, something is very, very wrong. Back away slowly and leave, shaking your head.

We begin at 7. I have only one guest bedroom, and it goes to the first person to pass out. If you wake up in the middle of the night, watch out for the wooden giraffe, he bites. The second person gets the couch and it goes downhill from there. If you wake up in the garage, you'll know you held up to the bitter end. Please don't wake up in jail, I'd hate to have that on my conscience, and that's not a good place to go looking for dates anyhow. I will gladly accommodate anyone who needs to crash.

Seriously (well, as serious as I get), we'll have a great time and hopefully end up with a better appreciation for some of the many different styles of wine they make in France.

~Wildman~

"Water separates the people of the world, wine unites them" - Anonymous

(That 'Anonymous', he's so clever! Have you ever noticed how many cool quotes he's kicked out over the years?)

At Least I'm Not This Bad...

A Crushing Day

“Wine to me is passion. It’s family and friends. It’s warmth of heart and generosity of spirit.” - Robert Mondavi

Goodbye to one of the greats...Robert Mondavi has died at age 94 after a long and wonderful career as a winemaker in Napa. He helped to elevate California wines to great heights on the world stage. He also struck up a partnership called Opus One with a classic vintner on the other side of the Atlantic, the great Baron de Rothschild. But above all, he was known for his love of life, and for that reason alone I would admire him.

I'll miss just knowing you are out there, Robert...we'll raise a glass to you very soon.