Wine Words and Beer Notes

Happy Summer! Seasonal Selections

June 1, 2015 by Sarah

The sun is shining (hopefully!) and friends are gathering. So, what wine to select? Consider the context. Taste is dependent on the surroundings, mood and food on the plate.

I like to think about the wine on my table or at an event as another invited guest. A party is more pleasant when all the people gathering have some sort of rapport and coalesce with harmony. So, what might some convivial company look like?

Hot sun + low alcohol wine = joy. Why? Because then the wine becomes a refreshing beverage rather than a sleep inducing, hang-over inviting cocktail.

Summer fruits and cured meats + a trocken Riesling will highlight the floral musky qualities of the fruit and bring out the savory flavors of the meats.

Meat and seafood paella + an unoaked Tempranillo or Monastrell (for reds) or a Viura or unoaked Chardonnay (if you prefer whites) to complement the sweetness of rice and the salty richness of the meat and fish.

Watermelon, feta and mint salad + a dry rose or aromatic, dry white like Muscatel would be excellent to bring out the sweet savor of the salad!

We’d love to hear about your food and wine pairings! Share it on Twitter (@wine_ecng)

June Recipe and Wine Pairing: Fig & Arugula Salad with Pistachio Pesto; paired with Holloran Dry Riesling, Willamette Valley, Oregon 2011

Salad Ingredients:

2 big handfuls of arugula
8-10 figs, sliced into halves or quarters
½ avocado, cubed
1 ball of Burrata or Mozzarella, torn
a few splashes of balsamic (reduce in a saucepan to thicken)
drizzle of olive oil
sea salt & freshly ground pepper
Pistachio Pesto: (this makes extra):

⅓ cup toasted pistachios (reserve a few to top the salad)
1 big handful of basil leaves
juice of ½ a small lemon
sea salt & freshly ground pepper
¼ – ⅓ cup olive oil
Make pesto by pulsing the toasted pistachios in a food processor. Then add basil, lemon, salt & pepper. Pulse again, then add the olive oil and pulse. Taste and adjust salt content.

Arrange the arugula, sliced figs, avocado, and cheese on a plate. Drizzle with olive oil and balsamic. Sprinkle with salt and pepper.

Dollop pesto and gently toss. Crush extra pistachios and sprinkle them on top.

Salad recipe from: loveandlemons.com

The Farmer and the CEO?

April 15, 2015 by Sarah

Wine made in the vineyard

You may have read some of the headlines about wines that tested positive for excessive arsenic. If not, a quick google search will turn up lots of results. My point is not to discuss the merits or truth of the claim, but rather to explore the alternative to those big, industrial wineries who may or may not know why arsenic is turning up in their wine. Since April is the month for Earth Day, let’s take a closer look at makers of wine who also actually work in the vineyards.

The French have a term for it—vigneron—which refers to a person who grows the grapes and makes the wine. This kind of connection with the land is almost unheard of in big corporate wineries. But, if we believe—as so many wineries say—that wine is made in the vineyard, then winemakers and perhaps winery owners should spend time there.

One of the alternatives to a vigneron is a négociant—the French word for a wine merchant who assembles the product of smaller growers and winemakers and sells the result.

A third way to make wine is perhaps the most common among the new California cohort of winemakers. Winemakers take out long term leases on vineyards, hire vineyard managers whose farming practices align with their own vision for the wine and planet, and visit the vineyards regularly to stay attuned with the growing season and soil health. Dirty & Rowdy is an excellent example of this approach. See this month’s featured wine for details.

The corporate model most commonly practiced is to purchase the land, hire a site manager, and employ migrant labor to routinely apply fertilizers and pesticides. Nowadays, drones are utilized to photograph vineyards and generate data to be analyzed by distant winemakers at corporate headquarters—hardly a boots-on-the- ground or grape-in-the-mouth familiarity with the land, vines, and vintage.

Our Earth Day proposal is to drink wine made by people who get their fingers in the dirt and whose children or pets are safe to roam in the vineyards! Our selection is chock-full of Earth Day friendly wines. So drink to your health and to the health of the planet!

“My only regret in life is that I didn’t drink more wine.” ― Ernest Hemingway

We’d love to hear what you are drinking right now! Share it on Twitter (@wine_ecng)

Why drink “natural” wine? The best ones have exceptional flavor, complexity, and surprise. They cause a reaction and carry you away to their place of origin. Lower sulfur addition is another reason to love “naked” wines. Sulfur can act like a seal, keeping the wine safe from microbial alteration. To eliminate it, or use very little of it (sulfur in wine is allowed up to 350 parts per million; natural-wine people only use up to 35ppm) the vineyard work must be impeccable and the cellar work, hypervigilant. The resulting beverage can sometimes have a slight acetic tang or a hint of funk. Fans aren’t bothered by these quirks, technically called “flaws,” and the wines are hugely popular across the globe. As with organic food, the demand is greater than the supply.

Wine of the Month (while supplies last):

DIRTY & ROWDY

“Familiar” Mourvèdre, California 2013

Five hundred miles of California in a glass! This wine is an argument in favor of blending different vineyards and appellations for optimal balance. Dirty & Rowdy is owned by two families who travel to remote pockets of California, searching to uncover something special from soil, sun, and soul. “Familiar” is a fresh, medium-bodied wine to pour when friends, family, and food pull you home. Notes of raspberry leaf and stem with tarragon and stone. The “Familiar” should be decanted for 45 minutes for full enjoyment! The grapes (94% Mourvèdre, 6% Petite Sirah) hail from Santa Barbara County, Redwood Valley in Mendocino, and Amador County. 100% Whole Cluster. 270 Cases. Allocated. Price: $34.99.

(Pssst! Mention reading WINE WORDS and we will give you 10% off this wine at the register!)

Shades of Pink

March 15, 2015 by Sarah

A new crop of Rosé wine is arriving

Versatile, crisp and refreshing, the wines from last summer’s harvest are just hitting our shelves. While rosés are great year-round, there is no doubt that the warmer the weather gets, the more appealing a glass of cold rosé becomes.

So why are rosé wines often snubbed? Is it because some think that pink is wimpy, or that all rosés are sweet? Sure, there’s terrible rosé out there—that’s true of most consumer products— but you will find only well-made, artisanal selections on our selves.

To make most rosé wine, red grapes are crushed and left to macerate on their red skins for anywhere from a few hours to a few days—the longer the maceration, the darker the juice. Then the juice is strained from the solids (called “must”) and fermented in tanks or used barrels. Look to ARNOT-ROBERTS ROSÉ for a delicious example.

Another style of rosé, vin gris, is made from the immediate pressing of red skinned grapes without any maceration time. Vin gris is a very pale pink that is usually much lighter than traditionally made rosés. You can’t beat BONNY DOON’S VIN GRIS DE CIGARE as a great local example of the style.

A third method for making rosé is called saignée, and is a by-product of red wine production. When the winemaker wants to increase the color and concentration of a red wine, some of the juice is bled off early in the maceration. This “bled” juice (saignée is derived from the French “to bleed”) is captured and put in tank to ferment as a rosé. Saignée rosés can be extraordinary or lackluster. Luckily, we have the VAUGHN DUFFY ROSÉ as an excellent example of a Pinot Noir rosé made in the saignée method.

“His lips drink water, but his heart drinks wine.” ― E.E. Cummings

We’d love to hear what you are drinking right now! Share it on Twitter (@wine_ecng) or in the shop. Let us know what you’d like to learn more about! We’re happy to research it for the next WINE WORDS.

How “White Zinfandel” Saved Our Vines

Zinfandel’s roots in California go way back, and fortunately we have a lot of old vines to prove it. This may not have been the case but for the accidental marketing success of the saignée rosé called “White Zin.” Easy, sweet, and cheap to make, it clearly had (has?) mass appeal. At a time when lots of old vines were being torn out to plant more fashionable varieties, this wine’s success ensured that Zinfandel grapes had a market. Finally, old-vine red Zinfandel found its fans and older plantings are recognized and valued as viticultural treasures in their own right. (And thankfully classic, crisp, dry rosés also have growing numbers of devotees!)

Wine of the Month – March

March 1, 2015 by Jenny Lovett

Wine of the Month (while supplies last):

Julien Sunier Gamay Noir Morgon, France 2012

This month’s wine comes from a top French growing region classified as “Cru Beaujolais.”
If you love Pinot Noir but have never tried a good Beaujolais, give this wine a chance—I promise you will be hooked. Grown in granitic soils, this Sunier Morgon puts many higher priced Burgundies to shame. The aromatics show fresh black cherry, ripe strawberry, and cranberry along with earthy notes of wet leaves, rose petals and crushed granite. The palate is rich and concentrated, the finish is long and complex.

Price: $31.50

(Pssst! Mention reading WINE WORDS and we will give you 10% off this wine at the register!)

Wine Spotlight – February

February 15, 2015 by Sarah

Wine of the Month (while supplies last):

Forgive me if I use a lot of exclamation points, but I am really excited about Cruse Wine Co.’s 2013 Valdiguié from Rancho Chimiles Vineyard, Napa Valley, California.

This wine is unreal! A mind-bending take on what has become a more common varietal! This is not a carbonic, fruity, Gamay-like version. Cruse pulled all the sensual, silky, seamless, subtle, creamy texture out of the grape while respecting the enticing spice aromatics. This isn’t just that cool-kids-lesser-known-wine-grape wine; it’s knock-your-socks-off good red wine! But here’s the kicker: it was a tiny production to boot and we got the last 1.5 cases. So, get it while you can!
It’s on our shelves for $25.99!

Embrace the Unpredictable

February 15, 2015 by Sarah

Wine is alive. It changes all the time!

A bottle of wine may seem fixed and unchanging, but inside there are complex chemical transformations causing constant evolution and change… particularly if the wine is not doused with preservatives.

Tannins, for example, are just one of the molecules that contribute to the changes a wine undergoes. Originating in the stems, seeds and skins, tannins are responsible for the sensation of astringency. A young, tannic wine will leave your mouth feeling dry and puckered, much like a green banana will. Over time and with the right conditions, however, tannins will soften and give way to secondary aromatics like earthiness, nuttiness, and other nuanced expressions. By reacting with the wine’s alcohols and esters, they subdue the flowery, fruity aromas of youth and transform them into more complex, subtle scents that often more deeply express the place where the vines grew.

Transformations like these and countless others are always happening in wine. Wine is not fixed. White wine (one that is well made and not shut down with chemicals) will broaden in flavor and texture over time. The acids will soften and the texture may become more creamy or silky. A red wine’s aromatics may be hidden or shy at the start time. How much time? It is all relative and depends on thousands of tiny factors.

This is to say: wine is inherently unpredictable and ultimately inconsistent when it’s made without loads of technology. So I challenge you to embrace it. Love the changes your wine undergoes. Explore new flavors and ask yourself if it tastes the same today as it did last month. Find the nuance. It is not unlike the subtle changes we undergo as new experiences change the way we see and experience the world.

We’d love to hear what you are drinking right now! Share it on Twitter (@wine_ecng) or in the shop. Let us know what you’d like to learn more about! We’re happy to research it for the next Wine Words. Last month a customer requested glossary terms, which is a great idea. Here is our first installment:

Aeration: Encouraging a wine to interact with oxygen (breathing). Decanting or swirling the wine in a glass are preferred methods for young wines. Ten to thirty minutes can help open a wine up and release aromatics. It can also help when some wines develop certain kinds of off odors that will blow off after air contact. Aeration is not recommended for older red wines (15-plus years), which are more delicate and can lose their remaining fruit aromas during aeration.

Wine of the Month (while supplies last):

Forgive me if I use a lot of exclamation points, but I am really excited about Cruse Wine Co.’s 2013 Valdiguié from Rancho Chimiles Vineyard, Napa Valley, California.

Baby it’s Cold Outside

January 15, 2015 by Sarah

Baby it’s Cold Outside

Which is good for wine!

Here are a few wine storage suggestions:

Heat is an enemy for wine. Temperatures higher than 70° F will age a wine more quickly than what is typically desirable, possibly leading to wine that is “cooked,” resulting in flat aromas and flavors.
Keeping wines in your refrigerator is fine, but it’s not a good bet for the long term: the lack of moisture can eventually dry out corks, which may damage the wine.
More important than achieving a perfect 55°F cellaring temperature is to avoid rapid, extreme, or frequent temperature swings.
Light, especially sunlight, also can be a problem for long-term storage by causing wine to age prematurely.
50% to 80% humidity is considered safe, and placing a pan of water in your storage area can improve conditions.
Bottles are often stored on their sides to keep liquid up against the cork, to prohibit the cork from drying out. It is not always necessary to store this way, but it cannot hurt the wine.

What Wine & Beer Department staff are drinking this month:

Sarah: Señorío de P.Peciña Rioja, Spain 2007. This is what Rioja should be like! Delicate yet concentrated, explosively aromatic, bright and lingering. And the price is unbeatable! $16.99

Jake: Louis-Antoine Luyt, “Pipeño”, Chile 2014. A delicious light, bright red from the oft-overlooked Mission grape. Easy to drink, tasty with or without food, handsome full liter bottle looks good on the table. $16.99

Diane: Domaines Vinet, Clos de la Houssaie Muscadet–Sèvre et Maine, France 2008. This wine showcases how the terms racy and nervy apply to wine. Bright acidity and minerality balanced by creaminess resulting from time sur lies makes you salivate well after the bottle is gone. $14.50

Jacob: Domaine de la Chevalerie “Peu Muleau” Bourgueil, France 2010. Perfect Loire Valley Cabernet Franc—juicy and aromatic with an endless finish. $19.99

We are excited to be nearing our ONE YEAR ANNIVERSARY.

Our thanks to each and every one of our guests for your continued support.

We’d love to hear what you are drinking right now! Share it on Twitter (@wine_ecng) or in the shop. And let us know what you’d like to learn more about! We’re happy to research it for the next Wine Words.

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Happy Summer! Seasonal Selections

The Farmer and the CEO?

Shades of Pink

Wine of the Month – March

Wine Spotlight – February

Embrace the Unpredictable

Baby it’s Cold Outside

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