One of the perks of owning a wine shop is the availability of wine for tasting. Many wine makers love to share their passion and gift wine to us in hopes we’ll want to carry it and spread the word about them. The distributors in our industry do the same thing…they want us to sell the wines they sell, so they will, from time to time, share wines with us to try.
Today I spent some time with one of my reps and tasted some delicious wines. Typically, I have a request – something specific in mind. For example, soon I will be introducing a new flight for our guests, and I need, say, a Tempranillo from Spain to support the Texas example I already have in mind, and to compare to two Temps that we brought back from Mexico.
This time around, I had two needs. I specifically needed a Texas Muscat with fruit flavors and not just a healthy dose of residual sugar, which would compare with the California and Italian options I had previously chosen. And, I was looking for something in the way of a sweet red wine – maybe Lambrusco – to offer by the glass.
Before jumping into my requests, our rep poured a taste of a lovely French Chardonnay. Let me explain that I am a huge fan of white Burgandy and I love the bottle we pour right now, Chartroom et Trebuchet. With that said, Doug happened to have this bottle opened from pouring for his last client, and he knows how I like a crisp Chard, so he shared it. The bottle was 2016 Vincent Girardin Macon-Fuisse Les Vielles Vignes Chardonnay. It will retail for $36 and I found it to be a well balanced, flavorful wine with notes of apple and a hint of cooked pears, lemon cream cookies, and a minerality that was refreshing. I could easily pair the wine with my infamous veal scallopine with butter, garlic, capers and lemon zest. In a month or so, we may switch out this wine for the Chablis that is current on the Chardonnay flight. Both are true White Burgandy wines, but hailing from two different subregions. If you’re a Chard lover, keep an eye out!
Once we fully enjoyed the taste of this lovely offering, we moved on to the sweet needs of our guests. Doug presented the 2017 Sister Creek Texas Muscat, which is sweet, of course, but also full of flavors of lemon pie and a hint of pistachio nut earthiness. This wine will now grace our new sweet wine flight and will retail for $21 a bottle.
Moving on to a sweet red, I was shockingly pleased with the Medici Ermete iQuercioli Lambrusco Reggiano Dolce. This red wine from Reggio Emilia, Italy is a vibrant wine, meant to drink now, and featuring flavors of fresh strawberries, dried apricots and a hint of dried cherries. I’d serve this with a pizza, or any chocolate dessert, and it’s now available by the glass for $10 with us.
Next was the 2013 Late Harvest Sauvignon Blanc from Napa Valley. I currently offer a dessert wine flight, but the New World option isn’t flying off the shelves, so I was looking for an alternative. This bottling wasn’t a favorite for me, as the deep layers of Late Harvest flavors were undermined by a harsher dirty note, like mold. Of course, there was no mold in the wine, it’s just one of the elements of flavors I picked up on. In the end, we determined the wine was past its prime and I’ll continue to seek out another option to fulfill our needs with this lovely flight.
And we finished off our tasting with the Royal Tokaji. I must admit, with all of my 10 years of avidly studying wine, this was my first experience with this Hungarian gem. The wine is thick in the mouth, reminding me of honey, with flavors of apricot, honeycomb, cardamon and candied orange peel. I’d serve this wine with a slice of toasted Italian bread slathered with ricotta and sliced local peaches this spring. With a bottle price of $80, it’s not a wine I’m adding to our list today…but maybe down the road, for a dessert wine class, I’ll have to bring it in!