vinegal

Normally, I have red hair. Very red hair. But due to a production of "The King and I" I just finished, I am at that awkward stage between the black hair I had for the production and my normal color. This started me thinking about some good in-between reds for the summer months. Because sometimes a white just won't do.

As it gets warmer, I find myself turning away from the Cali Cabs and heavy Merlots that I love in the winter, when their spice is a nice change from all the snow and ice, and looking more towards lighter reds, true roses, and the occasional attempt to put a bottle I love in the refrigerator to see how it tastes cold.

Doesn't work too well with the aforementioned Cabs and Merlots, but a Argentinian Malbec actually tasted quite delicious when served cold. I think lighter-style cabs (from France, or the US Northeast)might work well, but I haven't tried anything yet.

But looking towards some more interesting warm-weather reds, here are some of my favorites, perfect for the barbeque or with a light summer meal:

Chambourcin - in places like Kentucky, Virginia and Ohio, this French-American Hybrid can come off as a little too sweet for most palates, but stick it in the fridge and a whole different range of flavors comes out to play. Cold, the wine is bright and just slightly fruity with a clean, almost effervescent finish. Warm, it's a little richer and sweeter, but still a nice alternative to port for summer desserts.

Rose (with the accent): Without the accent, rose is usually a cheap, overly sweet wine bought in jugs. With the accent, it's a dry, rich wine somewhere between the best sauvignon blance and your favorite Syrah. In fact, Syrah roses are becoming increasingly popular, especially from Australia and South America. One of my favorite Syrah roses is Montes Alpha's Cherub, which features a funky label and bottle that almost hide the sophistication within.
Working in the South, I've found that most Americans have very definite opinions about wines that are pink. They either love them, and expect them to be very sweet, or they hate them because they are too sweet and seem wimpy. The thing to remember is that roses range in color from pale blush pink to a rich almost ruby red, depending on how long the grapeskins were left in the wine during the original fermentation process. And depending on the grapes you start with, yes you can get a very sweet wine like the classic White Zin, or you can find one of the Syrah Roses I mentioned earlier. Actually, you can even find some great White Zins that forgo the extra sugar and just let the grape speak for itself with a lot of zest and flavor. Shenandoah Valley's excellent White Zin is how I figured out I like my Whites with a lot of zest and personality rather than the oaky mellowness of most chardonnays.

Summer is also a great time to try some unusual blends, as many wineries are now experimenting with combining white and red grapes. I found a great blend of Cab and Viogner a year or so ago, but forgot to write down the maker. The hadn't oaked the Cab too long and so the rich fruitiness was very nicely complimented by the zest of the unoaked Viogner.

I had almost forgotten about this journal until someone added me as a friend. Since someone took the trouble to find me, I guess I should take the trouble to write.

I haven't been tasting as much wine since I left my previous employer at the giant liquor store right about the time of my last entry in this journal. Instead, I have been working for a decently sized local vineyard and now function as their trainer when they bring on new folks.

One thing I hate about working in Kentucky though? The sweet wines.
I am very aware that there are many wonderful sweet wines (Hungary's Tokaji, Sauternes from France, Ports in every shape and color)but really, it just makes me sad when the highlight of someones day is a glass of Concord wine.

Now at least it's from a locally produced vineyard and not the folks at Manischewitz (and it was just Passover), but still, this is the kind of wine you can probably make in your refrigerator if you feel like adding a little yeast to an old jar of concord grape jelly. But this is how a lot of people get started into wine. Unfortunately here in Kentucky, this is where a lot of people stay with wine too. I cannot tell you how often I hear people talk about how they buy a bottle of concord for "special occasions" like that great steak dinner they've been getting ready to grill up. Is anyone else's stomach turning? Mine is.

My dear friends will tell you that I am a wine snob, but I admit that freely. My theory is that if you are going to drink sweet wines, you should drink interesting sweet wines. Some of the california muscat wines (Electra) for instance are VERY sweet, but the flavor is so unique that these wines stand up to dinner as well as dessert.

The really scary people though? The ones who claim concord is too dry for them.

I was working out at the winery one weekend when a couple came in. They had driven all the way out to see us (we are kindof in the back of beyond) and were understandable(almost) upset that none of our wines were fruit wines. They agreed to try the concord,but spat it back out almost immediately asking why I was giving them a dry wine. I politely explained that the Concord was the sweetest wine we made, to which they huffily responded, "Well, it's too dry for US" before storming out the door, stopping by the main desk to complain to our poor manager about the "terrible" quality of our wines.
I do understand that it must be disappointing to drive all that way and not find anything you like, but perhaps, before you drive all that way, you should do some research into what kind of wines the winery produces before you come out here and are disappointed.

For example, I went on a wine tour with my mother and a friend from high school a few summers ago. I meticulously plotted out 5-7 wineries that sounded interesting. However, once we started tasting, Mom and Drew discovered they really didn't care for Pinot Noir, which was a feature at most of the wineries (we were in Oregon's Willamette Valley). Knowing that, we started sending out scouting parties into the wineries before we bothered to go inside. One of our best finds was a little Winery hidden at the end of a long and very winding road called Torii Mor. Granted they do specialize in Pinot Noir, but they have a varied and DELICIOUS assortment of other wines including the one we ended up buying: a late harvest Gewurztraminer. Sweet? yup, but oh, so good.


To sum it up: if you like it sweet, that's great, just keep looking for something other than the jug in the back of you pantry. You never know what you might find

You Are Chardonnay

Fresh, spirited, and classic - you have many facets to your personality. You can be sweet and light. Or deep and complex. You have a little bit of something to offer everyone... no wonder you're so popular. Approachable and never smug, you are easy to get to know (and love!). Deep down you are: Dependable and modest Your partying style: Understated and polite Your company is enjoyed best with: Cold or wild meat

I tried this twice and got Merlot the other time. Personality analysis is pretty good, but their food pairing needs work. I would never put Pinot (which another friend got) with Stinky cheeses (I save that for cabs and syrahs) and I certainly wouldn't put merlot with pizza when there are so many good Sangioveses and Montepulcianos to eat with it.

Hello again, and sorry for the delay. Holidays in retail and the completion of my first year of Graduate school tend to leave me with little time to talk wine.

But here is a pattern I'm noticing:

People are refusing to sample if they don't see something they recognize.

This disturbs me. The whole point of a sample bar is not to confirm what you know you already like, it's to find something new to like, or to narrow down what you don't like.

If you say you hate reds, I won't believe you. This mostly stems from a dislike of the California Cabernet style (dry, heavy tannins and huge oak flavors). So if this is you, give some of the more fruity reds a chance: Syrah, Cote du Rhones, Beaujolais, maybe even a French Merlot or two. Just because you didn't like it in one bottle does not mean you won't like it in another.

And this is why I consider my job important. Because wine is a medium in constant flux, it is important to encourage people to taste and consider what they are tasting, so that they can determine what it really is they don't like, and what qualities they do like.

So go forth and taste!

Happy Beaujolais Nouveau day!!!


Yes it is the official start to the grape bottling season. Every third thursday in November, the winemakers of Beaujolais (part of the Bourgoune region) release their first wines, the "Beaujolais Nouveau." On this day througout france and anywhere else in the world you can get together a few friends, there is great celebration and lots of drinking.

Beaujolais is not a wine to be savored. To be drunk at its best, it should be gone before January. Some years, like 2000 can be savored the next year, but as a general rule, get only as much as you can drink between now and new years.

Fortunately, BN goes with everything. I like taking it home for thanksgiving, because it's a wine most non-wine drinkers enjoy. Very fruity, no tannins, not dry at all, this is a wine to be tossed back rather than sipped at. For my own private BN day celebration, I'm drinking my BN with kraft mac and cheese. Perhaps tomorrow I'll have a steak, or pasta, or just ice cream, or a burger and BN will go with it.

It's a very refreshing wine, and actually tastes better slightly chilled. For those of you planning thanksgiving dinners, this is the wine to have out before dinner. It's light and will go with whatever appetizers you have planned. Plus the alcohol content (unlike in some reds) is relatively light, so great aunt Norna won't be completely sloshed before the time comes for her to say grace.

Beaujolais is made from the Gamay grape, the only other red allowed in a Burgundy blend besides Pinot Noir, and only if the wine is made in the Beaujolais region. Yes, the French are crazy. Some Beaujolais are made in the US under the name Beaujolais Gamay, but they tend to be heavier with occasionally some oak. Not the same as the light, delightful wine I have in front of me tonight.

This is the wine I recommend to people who come in looking for a red because their doctor's told them to. Usually they aren't big wine drinkers and are just looking for something with enough sugar to make it palatable. Fear not, Beaujolais is your grape. Year-round you can find Beaujolais and Beaujolais-villages which are usually higher quality, but not as hyped as the beaujolais-nouveau. Still they are fruity and food friendly, as well as non-wine-drinker friendly.

So before your next holiday meeting, be it with family, friends or at work, grab a bottle of this wonderful wine and see how much happier november and december can be.

Enjoy!

I am noticing a problem with some of my customers. In the last few weeks, I have heard more anti-french slurs on wine and cheese than I have in the last six years. granted, the Quaker college and relatively liberal hometown are probably to blame for this. But when a customer comes to me and demands why we don't "Take out all that damn french wine and put in some good american wine" I must confess to shock. My reply was simply, "we like the french wine." And I left it at that. Then this weekend on the tasting, four people came to complain that we only were featuring French brie and once again someone told me that we should stop selling "the french crap" and feature brie from the "good ol' us of a" No, seriously, she used those words.


I admit to being pretty apolitcal. But I simply don't understand the rationale behind blaming an inanimate food product for the supposed failings of its homecountry. No, I didn't understand the "freedom fries" furor a few years ago either.

France is obviously not the only producer of wine, or of good cheese. But to try and completely eliminate all things french from your life because they didn't agree with our president a few years ago means that you are severely limiting your options in the wine and cheese department. A huge amount of the imported cheeses come from france and the folks in wisconsin have never quite caught up. Sure there are great farmhouse cheeses from around the country, but if you don't live within a certain radiace of the farms themselves, you loose the opportunity for the cheese. Same goes for small wineries, some of which do amazing work. The French just have a great exportation system in place that allows those of us in the US who choose to buy their products a huge variety to choose from. I often find myself telling people that the great feta they just tried isn't greek, it's french. And they're completely gobsmacked. It's hard to get the good feta from greece, not to mention their wines, but the french have a special ability it seems to collect people who know the secrets to all these international delicacies, and then they get them packaged for the american market (artisinal cheeses don't travel well).

The french are here to stay. Don't buy their products if you insist, but good luck finding a good "brie" from the Us.

Halloween leads to interesting things, even when it's on a weekday.
Most notably: We had to refuse Jesus because the devil didn't have his ID.

Now on to wine.

Riesling. This is in my opinion one of the most misunderstood wines in this country. It is interpreted as sweet, a dessert wine even and so cannot possibly have anything to give to a good meal.

And then there are the inevitably people who are convinced that the only kind of riesling is the one they like. It's great that you know what you like, but please, when I'm handing you a riesling from Germany which happens to be a little dry, don't tell me,"It can't be a REAL german riesling. It's not sweet enough." And when I tell you that I spent four months in Germany and tasted rieslings from all over the country, don't look at me patronizingly and tell me that I couldn't possibly have been paying close enough attention to the subtlties. Too bad I couldn't shove last December's Wine Spectator (a popular magazine for wine lovers) into his hands and tell him not to come back until he could name three different rieslings. That's generally considered rude. Ah well.

One of the things that I love about a riesling is that it can conform to anything without losing its integrity. You can blend the grape, but you can't age it in certain casks to give it a different taste like you can with a chardonnay. A riesling is dependant on the soil it grows in for taste and flavor. And even when you do blend it, it still tastes like riesling, with something else added. And no matter what you pair it with, from cheese to popcorn to even steak and lamb, there is a riesling that will compliment the meal. Throw the old notion of "red with meat, white with fish" out the window.

There is also more to riesling than what you can find in your local bottle of Schmitt-Sohne. They do to some extent showcase the classic types of riesling:
Kabinett - Off-dry
Spatlese - Sweet (late-harvest)
Auslese - pretty sweet

But there isn't really a sense of individuality to them. All drinkable, not remarkable.

There are two other kinds of rieslings, but these are usually very expensive and more along the sweet and sour road.

Berenauslese - REALLY sweet with a slightly tart aftertaste.
Trockenberenauslese - Closer to syrup with a tangy sweet and sour taste.

Germany is not the only maker of good rieslings. Austria and Alsace, Frace are both famous for their rieslings. I generally tend to prefer a really dry riesling, especially with food because the crisp texture and taste just makes the food sparkle in your mouth. This is why I like the Alsacian rieslings better (generally) than the German. It's really hard to find a good dry riesling from germany in the US. On the shelves at the store, they're usually crowded out by the sweet rieslings and the Liebfraumilch, which is a riesling blend often mistaken for riesling because it's the only taste most people can identify.
Someone once described Liebfraumilch as the hotdog of wine. You've got a general idea of what's supposed to go into it, but no idea how much is really in there.

I've had better luck with dry rieslings from the US (Washington Hills and Ch. Ste. Michelle both are wonderful) and suprisingly Australia. Terra Barrossa does a really tasty one with clean notes of honey and crisp apple, and it's perfect with an apple cobbler with ice cream. The acidity in the riesling cuts through the milky taste of the ice cream and brings out the apples and cinnamon.

Yeah, I love riesling. I'll even drink the sweet stuff if it's served to me (and some of it is really good). But please, for the sake of my pasted-on smile, read the label of the wine before you start to tell me I don't know what I'm talking about.

For the rest of you, go and enjoy whatever makes you smile. Because that's what truly good wine is supposed to do.

When the refrigerator rattles when I close the door, and the brand new wine rack is filled with half empty bottles, I think this qualifies as too much wine.

Let me explain:

The company I work for has a wine tasting Every day. At the end of the day, the wine that has not been drunk by the customers is essentially trash. We are encouraged to take it home and share it.

This would be great if I had a roommate, boyfriend, or even friendly neighbors where I live, but alas this is not the case.

I just moved to the area for graduate school in music, and haven't had a lot of time between work and classes to really socialize with the people here. Which means that I accumulate a lot of wine. I try to give it away to the people I work with, but there's a reason the store is a liquor store and not a wine store. Most of the people there don't like wine, so it's hard to always find someone to take it off my hands. Unless it's really bad (and there have been some doozies) I generally hate to throw out wine. So it comes home and eventually I drink it or take it to a party. Or something.

This week however, I think I'm going to be throwing out a bottle or two. We're scheduled to taste a french Viogner/chardonnay blend which I love because it's made in the bone-dry heavy on the honeysuckle smell Alsace-style of winemaking. Not necessarily to the Kentucky palate, but still.

The other is a Syrah from california. And it's awful. Even on the website, the winemakers refuse to acknowledge this vintage except to say that their new 05 is so much better than their 03 (which would be what we're tasting). Honestly I thought it tasted like they threw Welches grape juice in an old oak barrell and let it sit there for a few months. Voila! High quality wine! Or not. Ah well

The fun part about tasting is that I am allowed to throw in random wines whenever I like. Just to keep things interesting, I chose an inexpensive french Fumee Blanc with a SCREWCAP. Mostly I did this because the deli gave me a really nice feta to tastes with the wine, and something about Sauvignon Blanc (or Fume Blanc if you're Robert Mondavi) just makes magic with goat cheese. And not suprisingly, this was the wine I sold the most of tonight.

Interesting indeed how the right food makes wine better.

Hello all. Or hello nobody.

My name is Susan and I am a wine addict.

There I've said it. I love everything about wine, and with the possibly exception of the Zinfandel, I love all wines. From champagne to muscat I can find something to enjoy without trying too hard. I read everything I can get my hands on and love finding new vineyards and new grape hybrids. I'm a big fan of the screwcap, the new higher quality box wines and opposed to keeping wine only for special occasions. My misson: To give my customers friendly, affordable and delicious wines that can be drunk everyday.

Not to say that I wouldn't love to find them a bottle for that special occasion, but it's much harder to find that great bottle if I don't know what they drink on a regular basis.

I work behind a daily tasting bar for a liquor store, as the only female on their wine staff. This usually means that I get sent out to smile at the cranky customers while the men on the staff go hide behind the boxes. Most of the time I'm grateful not to be hauling cases of wine all day (that's what I did at my last job and have the screwed up shoulder to prove it). But occasionally, the moment arrives when I would give anything to go hide in the storage room to get away from some of the customers.

So this is my space to talk about wine, people and wine, what I like about wine, and what's new in the world of wine.


Thanks, and enjoy.


Notes from the Vine:

What I'm drinking now:

-Jip Jip Rocks Chardonnay (great crisp taste, good full body and a screwcap! From southeren Australia)

-Domaine de la Mordoree Cote du Rhone (smooth, very light tannins and great fruit. From Tavel, France)