WineLife365

Archive for March, 2010

Even if your understanding of the French language begins with “Bon jour” and ends with “Au revoir”, it shouldn’t intimidate or prevent you from trying wines from the Mecca of the entire wine universe – France!  Grapes have been growing in France for over 2000 years and the soil and climate conditions serve as the perfect incubator for all sorts of well-known and not so well-known grapes.  Zen lies between the 40^th and 50^th parallels north, where the climate ranges from burr cold to chaffed thighs rubbing together in a pair of jeans on a summer day hot.  One of my personal favorite wine stomping grounds in France is the Languedoc.

The Languedoc is one of the most exciting wine regions in the entire wine world.  Why?  Because it’s a region that possesses hundreds of small producers making awesome wines ranging in all colors and styles.  But the really cool thing about wines from the Languedoc is that most of these tiny producers still make wine in the Old World way, which allows these wines to showcase their distinctive characteristics and gives them a true sense of home.  And the best of all – you can experience many of these unique and wonderful wines for less than 15 US dollars.

Here are a few Languedoc killer values that I’ve been just plain old gaga over since first tasting them a little while back.

2008 Le Jade Picpoul de Pinet (<$10 US) – This white wine gem wallops a dynamite grapefruit, lime and pineapple acidic charge from start to its glorious, zesty finish.  It’s extremely food-friendly and has the chops to stand up to anything from bacon-wrapped scallops over Southwestern seasoned mixed vegetables to a melted Manchego cheese and Italian Sopressata quesadilla!  I speak from experience on these two.

2008 Cave de Pomerols Picpoul de Pinet HB (<$10 US) – This is another white treasure from the Languedoc.  All I can tell you is that this or the Le Jade are normally sitting in my refrigerator at all times.  For less than 10 bucks a bottle (in most parts of the US), both of these wines are outstanding values.

 2004 Château La Clotte-Fontane “Cremailh” (<$13 US) – This is a new discovery for me.  This red wine consists of 60% Syrah and 40% Grenache grapes.  It has just the perfect amount of weight and richness to it at the very first sip and the prominent red fruit (raspberry) flavors are outstanding.  But the big draw for me about this wine is its spices.  It packs an awesome punch of interesting sweet and peppery notes from start to its long finish.  If that’s not enough to grab you, how about this – the owners of this winery enjoy bullfighting in their free time.  That’s reason enough to give this red a shot.

All three of these Languedoc offerings are tops in my value book and will go terrific with a variety of different types of food.  So don’t get hung up on what you may not understand on these and other French labels, and discover the great juice that’s inside!

To learn more about wines from the Languedoc, check out Ryan O’Connell’s website called Love That Languedoc.

You know exactly what I’m talking about people: Wines that are, well…just ok, but you’ll drink them ‘cause there’s nothing offensive or bad about them, or maybe there’s nothing better in your house at the moment.  As you’re drinking it, you’re fantasizing about your taste buds being curled up nice and cozy with something other than what’s been planted squarely in front of you.  Such was case with my experience with the 2008 Alamos Cabernet Sauvignon from Mendoza, Argentina.  This Cab retails in most places for about $10.  Let me first say, if you’re interested in trying a solid Argentinean Torrontes for under $10, the peeps at Alamos make a pretty good one!  This was the very reason why I decided to give their 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon a whirl.  Unfortunately, nothing really popped out of the glass to give my palate a workout.  Although it was not offensive, it just tasted a bit tired and dull.  It was just OK.

On that note, I give the 2008 Alamos Cabernet Sauvignon 2 Stars out 4.  Do yourself a favor and grab a bottle of their Torrontes – It’s much better than “OK”!

If you love good food, great wine, and a place where you can just sit back and enjoy both in a relaxing setting – then the Nantucket Wine Festival is the perfect destination!

Nantucket Island is known for its natural beauty, stunning architecture, cosmopolitan fare, and, of course, its 19th century role as a whaling community.  But on May 19^th – May 23^rd all attention will be on the 14th Annual Nantucket Wine Festival.  This is one of the premier food and wine events in the country, and I have been lucky enough to receive two tickets from the event promoters to give away to WineLife365 fans for the Grand Tasting on Sunday, May 23rd!  I had the great opportunity of attending this event a couple years ago, and I’m excited for others to experience it as well. 

Interested in going?  It’s pretty easy – just make a guess on the total number of wine closures in our “Estimation Station” shown below.  That’s it! 

How to enter: 

1. The contest starts now and is only open to WineLife365 Facebook Fans.  So, if you want to play, you’ve gotta be a fan!
2. Place your guess in the Comment area of this post on the Fan Page.  Please limit to 2 guesses.
3. This contest will close at 11:59pm ET on March 31^st.

The first person in the comment stream (on the Fan Page) that guesses the right number will win the 2 tickets for the Grand Tasting on Sunday, May 23rd*.  If nobody guesses the exact number, the person who had the closest guess, without going over, wins the tickets. 

I will announce the correct number and the lucky winner on April 1^st.   

Good luck and happy guessing! 

Container is 19 in. tall with a 5 in. diameter opening.

* Please note:  Travel arrangements are not included.

No matter how hard we try to protect them, care for them, and keep them out of harm’s way – one wine experience that we can all relate to is broken wine glasses.  I bet you thought I was going to talk about children!  It’s an inevitable fact of physics that sooner or later, if you drink wine, you’re gonna break a glass, or two, or three along the way.  What else can be said about this well documented occurrence other than:  “Shit happens!”  And for some, it happens a lot!

Photo Courtesy of Gonzo Gastronomy

My favorite blogging pal, Katie Pizzuto from Gonzo Gastronomy, recently experienced one of these wine glass moments and was kind enough to share it.  Here’s Katie’s story!

There is a pain to be felt in this life unlike any other.  It is pain that is colorblind, that does not discriminate sexually, and that will cut you down at the knees whether you are 40 or 80. In fact, I have given drug-free childbirth, have had teeth extracted and have even gotten 18 stitches across my thigh with nothing but a little poorly-distributed anesthesia from a pimple-faced, fucknut anesthesiologist to abate the pain, and still I describe those memories with less recollection of pain than I do…say…a broken wine glass. Not just any wine glass, but a $35 wine glass. And not just a $35 wine glass, but a $35 wine glass I was given. The sound of that glass hitting a glass table…hitting a wood floor…hell, hitting just about everything other than the ceiling…is enough to make a grown woman cry (and inevitably console herself with freshly poured wine, in a $3 glass).

I have…ugh, I mean had…only 2 expensive wine glasses in my home, both samples sent to me from the manufacturers for experimentation/review. My home has never seen the likes of $10 glasses much less $35 glasses because the people residing in said home are not merely accident prone, but accident friendly—one of them an 11-year-old boy who has already seen the inside of an emergency room 3 times. Throw into the mix 2 cats with a penchant for jumping up into your lap at the least opportune moment and you have what I lovingly call a cluster fuck of chaos. Welcoming not one, but two expensive glasses into the home was done with a whole lot of trepidation and distant early warning like, “please don’t ever wash these glasses, I’ll take care of it…please don’t ever try to put these glasses away in their boxes, I’ll do that…please don’t ever sneeze, belch or fart near them, I’ll…oh, that’s enough I guess.” I looked at these as delicate flowers, to be taken out only when a moment really called for them, never left at the mercy of even a strong breeze.

So there it sat, a lovely Eisch breathable glass, gracing my living room table with its belly full of syrah. The lights had been dimmed, it was 9:30 and the boy was saying good night. But “saying good night” is relative in my house. It comes with several verses of an Eminem or Iron Maiden song, a few righteous “kills” with his laser tag machine gun, and usually, if dinner was good, a giggle-accompanied fart while he kisses his dad. As he kisses me goodnight, he turns so quickly with his machine gun that he comes within centimeters of knocking over the glass. “Jesus!” I scream. “Would you please watch where you are going?! You nearly knocked over my glass! Do you have $35 to spare if you break it? No, I didn’t think so.” There, I thought, I let him have it! He bounds up the stairs to brush his teeth, the hubby heads outside for a cigarette and I decide, with my program paused, that I’ve gotta see a man about a horse. I never got that expression, but whatever. I gently move the blanket off of me, get off the couch, take two steps towards the bathroom, and CRASH. I froze. The kid came bounding back down the steps. The husband came back wincing. The cats began lapping up the syrah, getting their buzz on despite the chards of glass in their tongues. OK, I made that last part up. I carefully remove my bare feet from ground zero and stare at the disaster I’ve left in my wake. And what does the kid do? That kid that I just chided to be more careful? That kid that had maybe $3 in his piggy bank? In that golden-moment opportunity, where he could’ve thrown everything I had just said back in my face, he chose, instead, to wrap his arms around my waist and console his grieving mother. “I’m sorry, mom,” he said, and then farted one more time for good measure as he bound back up the stairs.

Thanks Katie! 

Eisch, if you happen to be reading this tragically beautiful story – could you please help my friend out and send her some new glasses?