Wine Pick of the Week: February 4, 2016

Pasqua 2011 Passi Mento (Italy)

This week and next, I’ll feature romantic wines for Valentine’s Day, and, since I’m featuring Italian food on the “Soul” page, the wines will be Italian, too. First up is this red blend from Verona with the intriguing label.

Verona, as you may know, is the setting for William Shakespeare’s tale of Romeo and Juliet. There is a house there, La Casa di Giulietta, said to be where the real Capulet family (and Juliet) lived. A tradition developed of people writing their beloveds’ names on the wall outside, believing that by doing so the love would be everlasting. Awww.

Pasqua has made this wine a tribute to their hometown attraction and named it for the “appassimento” process by which it’s made. The process leaves hand-harvested grapes to dry in wooden trays for one month, reducing the water content and concentrating the sugar.  This wine is 40 percent Merlot, 30 percent Corvina, and 30 percent Croatina.

The 2011 has a deep purplish color and a rustic sense. The nose is blackberry and cherry with chocolate and coffee. There are red cherries to start on the taste, a little earthy spice, then that coffee and a little tobacco. It’s off-dry and slightly acidic, but softens and sweetens as it lingers in the glass.

It isn’t a terribly complex wine—there’s a blast of flavors, then it finishes with red fruit. Passi Mento is dry enough yet sweet enough to handle the cured meats and hard cheeses of antipasti. It would also be good with pasta and red sauce, pizza, bleu cheese and a burger with grilled onions and mushrooms.  

Next week, prosecco with dessert. Molto ben. 

Wine Pick of the Week: November 5, 2015

Project Paso 2011 Lonely Oak Red (California)

This time last year, I was just about to embark on a cross-country trip with a friend of mine. She was moving back to California and asked me to drive the UHaul truck for her. We decided to forgo the jaunt to Las Vegas and head to Paso Robles instead. This month I’m going to re-visit Paso through four weekly wine picks.

The first is a mainstream red blend, Project Paso 2011 Lonely Oak Red, around the $10-$12 mark. This label is a Sebastiani Family product that features grapes from Paso Robles vineyards. The 2011 blends Zinfandel, Petite Sirah, Malbec, Tempranillo, Valdiguie and Grenache.

It looks and sounds heartier than it tastes. The nose is fruity with cherries and berries, the color ruby with a tinge of purple. The first taste note is heavy spice (some black pepper) which transitions right away to tart cherry and berries. There isn’t much more too it—it’s not a “sit and ponder” kind of bottle. Definitely more sweet than dry, but some tannin steps in for an appearance about the same time as the tart cherry.

Drink it with food, particularly grilled pork or pulled pork. Turkey and cranberries would also be complementary because of the tart fruit aspects. 

Wine Pick of the Week: October 28, 2015

Apothic Dark 2014 Red Blend (California)

For dark and stormy nights—or Halloween—this blend is just the thing to turn heebie-jeebies into warm fuzzies. The color is a deep, inky purple that shows highlights of ruby when held to the light. Blackberries and blueberries rise to the nose, a waft of leather and—what’s that? Ahh, cinnamon, a little chocolate.

Fruity transitions to off-dry with a slightly tannic finish. Coffee, spice, blackberries, jammy with a hint of plum—dark flavors swirling around your mouth, then smoothing out. The grapes are part of its mystery but most likely include Syrah, Zinfandel, Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon.

Hearty without being monstrous, Dark is drinkable on its own, but would also pair well with a burger, grilled medium rare, maybe with some sautéed mushrooms that crept up from the earth or with some melted bleu cheese, crumbly with moldy veins.

Don’t be afraid to try this one. And at $10-$12, it’s safe to stock up, because once your friends have a sip, you won’t be alone. There’s nothing scarier than running out of wine.  

Wine Pick of the Week: May 10, 2015

Karmere 2012 Kade du Rhone (California)

This is one of my favorite wines of the year. I tasted it at the Amador County winery in November and brought back two bottles with the intention of ordering more.  Karmere’s Kade du Rhone is a GSM—Grenache, Syrah, Mourvedre. The ruby color is beautiful, and the nose evokes the berries in the Grenache and Syrah. The Mourvedre comes through with a hint of earth and chocolate. It has just enough sweetness.

Flavors include the berries, plum and raisins going to tart cherry and finishing with black pepper and a breath of oak. It has a nice, full body, is slightly tannic and is dry on the center of the tongue.

I think of beef steak on the grill when I taste this wine. It would also go with Italian sausage, salami and not-too-sweet dark chocolate. 

Review: Adams County Winery (Pennsylvania)

Pennsylvania isn’t the first place that comes to mind when one thinks of wine, and probably isn’t the second or third place either. The truth is the first vinifera were planted there before 1650, and 200 years later Pennsylvania was the third leading wine producer in the United States. Its climates are actually conducive to a wide range of grapes.

While other states’ wine industries recovered and thrived after Prohibition ended, Governor Gifford Pinchot, a Prohibitionist, established the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board intending to “discourage the purchase of alcoholic beverages by making it as inconvenient and expensive as possible.” In 1968 lawmakers finally passed the Limited Winery Act, allowing wineries to sell their own wines instead of selling through the LCB or out of state.

Today there are over 200 licensed Pennsylvania wineries (#7 in the United States) and it is the fifth largest grape producer in the country.

My introduction to Pennsylvania wines begins with Adams County Winery. A friend of mine, Chris Hughes, has a blog called CUontheRoad.net about her family’s travel adventures in an RV. They’ve used a hospitality program called Harvest Hosts to stay overnight at participating wineries and farms, and one of those is Adams County Winery near Gettysburg. Chris invited me to do a wine review in conjunction with her travel review. If you are thinking of visiting the Gettysburg area, do check out her blog.

Located in the fruit belt of south-central Pennsylvania, ACW, aka Gettysburg Winery, was established in 1975 and is one of the state’s oldest wineries. The 15 acres of estate grapes include Cabernet Sauvignon, Shiraz, Lemberger, Chambourcin, Vidal, Traminette and native Niagara. There is a website that is under construction, so it has limited information, but the staff is very friendly and accommodating and can email a complete wine list for orders.

I ordered three wines to taste: Tears of Gettysburg (white,) Metrose (rose,) and Turning Point (red.) Each label has a story.

Tears of Gettysburg, a Niagara/Vidal blend, was originally released in 1988 and is their top award-winner. It has the unmistakable Niagara nose. The expected strong Niagara sweetness, though, is tempered by the Vidal and gives it a clean finish. In the mouth, it is full and tastes of flowers, honeysuckle. There is also a slight buttery flavor and hint of oak as it progresses.

I would pair this with a buttery cod dish (or Pacific Northwest black cod,) tuna with sweet pepper salsa or pork tenderloin with sweet corn salsa. It’s kind of a sweet wine for the tartness of citrus, though grilled green apples with grilled chicken breast might be nice, too.

Turning Point was quite good. A blend of Cabernet Sauvignon and Chambourcin, it's packed with flavors of spicy blackberry that develop into plummy cherry. It has a pretty, dark garnet color but isn’t heavy like a Zinfandel. There is just a hint of chocolate in the nose. The wine’s fruit gathers around the sides of the tongue, and the finish is dry in the center of the palate.  

The Chambourcin grape is a French-American hybrid. Its origins are hazy, but it has been used since 1963 mainly for blending. It grows in the Mid-Atlantic and Midwest of the US, and in Canada, Australia, Portugal and France.

I did pair Turning Point with mild Italian sausage and whole grain pasta with tomato sauce. This turned up the spice, the heat and the plum flavors, and the finish wasn’t as dry.

Both of these wines—as well as the Rebel Red and Traveller--are part of ACW’s Historic Gettysburg Collection which commemorate aspects of the battle there, according to Dan Baumgardner, retail manager. He says the label on Tears of Gettysburg depicts a canon located outside of the Soldier’s National Cemetery, near where President Abraham Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address. Turning Point’s label depicts the 72nd Pennsylvania Monument, where Pickett’s Charge took place, and which is said to be the turning point of the Civil War.

Metrose is very fun. This is not a sweet, 1980s-style pink wine. The salmon-y pink color is luscious, and it’s a blend of 80 percent Pinot Noir and 20 percent Chambourcin. While it bathes the mouth in strawberries, it has a touch of cinnamon and a semi-dry finish. Open one bottle for a nice sipper, and pair a second bottle with charcuterie, grilled sausage, summer salads, and strawberries.

The horse on the label is Metro Meteor, a Belmont and Saratoga racer who retired to a career in painting abstracts. Every bottle sold makes a donation to the New Vocations Racehorse Adoption program—another reason to buy two bottles of this wine. 

Thanks so much, Chris, for this opportunity to explore new territory (or terroir.) I'm looking forward to learning about and visiting more Pennsylvania wineries. 

Wine Pick of the Week: April 5, 2015

Adams County Winery Turning Point NV (Pennsylvania)

Ahhh. It’s been a long, busy weekend, and I was looking forward to a nice “Wine Pick of the Week.”

This fits the bill, and I’m really enjoying it. Another winner from Adams County Winery, this one from their Historic Gettysburg Collection,  the blend of estate Chambourcin and Cabernet Sauvignon hits the nose with spice (black peppery) then plum-my blackberry. It does nearly the same thing on the palate: spice, blackberry, plummm… finishing with cherry. It’s dry in the center of the tongue, surrounded by fruit along the sides.

I made another quick pasta dish tonight with tomato basil sauce and mild Italian sausage, adding a bit of grated Pecorino Romano. This turned up the spice, heat and plum in the wine—not in a bad way at all. The wine’s dry finish wasn’t nearly as dry with food. I didn’t have the right chocolate for dessert, but Turning Point would be good with a dark chocolate, semi-sweet, even possibly chocolate with raspberries.  In other food pairings, I would say grilled pork, spare ribs, hamburger. Not a fish wine.