Go-To-Wine Tuesday

Nals Margreid Moscato Giallo Secco 2009

Just like most wine drinkers, I’m one who looks for good and affordable wines for daily enjoyment, especially when it’s Tuesday and I’m in the mood for a glass and don’t want to open a pricy Barolo or Brunello. Last night, I was in the mood for something crisp, refreshing and complementary to a light meal. I had a bottle of Nals Margreid Moscato Giallo Secco 2009 and decided to open it.

Although this is a Moscato, there is nothing sweet about this wine. Alto Adige–along with Friuli-Venezia-Giulia (FVG)–produces some of Italy’s finest white wines, made from both native and international grapes. This region formed part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire until 1917, and you will find many Germanic grape varieties here, such as Riesling and Gewurztraminer. The region of Trentino-Alto Adige, Italy’s northernmost region with alpine borders on Austria and Switzerland, benefits from having climate extremes. Part of the area is cold and mountainous, while the other part is Mediterranean-like. Two different geographic areas with primarily different languages spoken, mixed with a blend of cultures, work together to produce incredible unique wine.

The Margreid Moscato Giallo Secco I tasted comes from Nals Margreid, a cooperative of about 100 small growers. The cooperative was formed in 1985 by the merging of The Cellars Nalles (established in 1932) and Magre-Niclara (established in 1954), two well-respected entities, both steeped in tradition. While cooperatives are typical in the Alto Adige (where parcels are often small and at high altitudes in mountainous terrain), this one united some of the best wine growers from the Strada del Vino (wine road) of Alto Adige into something of a “dream team.” Today, 140 growers cultivate a wide range of local varieties in over150 hectares of vineyards for the Nals Margreid Cellar. The wines they produce are representative of the territory, increasingly stylistically defined and technically impeccable—all the result of practicing severe selection in the vineyards.

This bottle was very enjoyable. The wine’s color was pale or light gold, and initially all I got on the nose was stone, flint and clay. With time, I started to get a bit of nutmeg and fresh flowers. The wine is soft on the palate–almost creamy. There is a very slight sweetness that blends really well when the acidity hits. The finish is crisp and tart while the acidity lingers a bit. This is a bone-dry wine that makes a fantastic pre-dinner drink or that would go well with seafood and spicy dishes. I had mine with some Peruvian Ceviche, and it was awesome and a perfect mid-week value wine at under $25.

Three Truths About Wine, Considered and Validated

Some are easier to swallow than others, even if equally valid

Today on the Wine Spectator, Matt Kramer wrote a post called “The Three Truths of Wine,” and I read along finding myself agreeing wholly.

The first truth, Kramer says, is that “All Good Wines Can Age (But Not All Can Transform).” It’s a hard fact, but not all wines transform into something special. I once aged a bottle of Beaujolais nouveau for over three years and let me tell you it was awful. Yes, it aged and yes it transformed, but not into something special. Now, take a bottle of 1997 Flaccianello and let it age for 10+ years and you will have something special. Only about 10% of all wines in current production will be able to transform into greatness.

Truth #2, Kramer asserts is “All Good Wines Work Wonderfully With Any Food That Is Remotely Plausible for Them.” I agree with the truth that all great wines pair wonderfully with any food that makes sense for them. In other words it wouldn’t make sense to pair a Grand Cru White Burgundy with a 28-day-aged T-bone, but pair that with a Grand Cru red Burgundy and you will be in heaven. You do have to use a little common sense, but a great wine is definitely more flexible.

The last truth is a little more personal. Kramer says, “All Wine Drinkers Get in a “Taste Rut.” Having been in retail for over two years now, I have come to see many people ask for the same wines over and over again. Of course, when you find something you like, you should indulge, but it is also important to keep and open mind. The wine world is very expansive and there are many regions that produce fantastic wines that no one knows about. True wine lovers love wine because of the diversity that exists and the experiences that they instill.

Gumbo Recipe, Cultural Heritage, and Wine

Making memories, one meal at a time

Growing up in New Orleans, you get early exposure to many things, and serious food was one of them. My mother is a traditional housewife in a Southern middle-class American family where some of the Creole recipes were passed down from generation to generation, with slight tweaks honing the recipe for particular tastes over the years. But community cookbooks became popular and were sometimes used to fill the gap when these family heirlooms of gastronomic masterpieces were not available. A must in every New Orleans household is River Road Recipes originally published in 1959 by the Junior League of Baton Rouge. Gumbo is not only a culinary necessity when visiting the South, but it also epitomizes a deeper philosophical and cultural state of mind for many who live in the port city that connected America to the world, much like New York, when trade through the Port of New Orleans was booming. If there’s a dish that defines NOLA, it’s gumbo.

There are many variations to this, but today I would like to share the JLBR’s Seafood Gumbo recipe and discuss what to pair:

Seafood Gumbo

2 pounds shrimp

1/2 pint oysters

1 can/container fresh crabmeat (picked and shelled)

2 tablespoons oil

2 tablespoons flour

3 cups okra, chopped OR 1 tablespoon filé

2 onions, chopped

2 tablespoons oil

1 can tomatoes

2 quarts water

1 bay leaf

1 teaspoon salt

3 pods garlic (optional)

Red pepper (optional)

Peel shrimp uncooked and devein. Make a dark roux of flour and oil. Add shrimp, oysters and crabmeat to this for a few minutes stirring constantly. Set aside. Smother okra and onions in oil. Add tomatoes when okra is nearly cooked. Then add water, bay leaf, garlic, salt and pepper. Add shrimp and roux to this. Cover and cook slowly for 30 minutes.

If you don’t use okra, add gumbo filé after turning off heat.

Serve with rice. Serves 6 to 8.

Some adjustments or further explanation: The roux can be a coppery to a dark brown color depending on taste and how long you cook it down – but do not let it burn under any circumstances – keep stirring. The onions are usually white and the pepper is usually cayenne pepper. Make sure to use a deep pot. In addition, adding whole blue crab is a more rustic touch to the recipe. Remove the hard top shell from the crabs (reserving for stuffed crabs or for shellfish stock), and break each crab in two down the middle. Remove the claws. Add to the stock.

I spoke with Chris Deas, IWM VP and our marketing extraordinaire, about what pairs best with gumbo. Chris spent time down there in his younger days and has affection for all things New Orleans, especially the food.

“Good question. Abita would be the first pick,” he said. Founded in 1986, Abita is a brewery located in Abita Springs about 30 miles north of New Orleans. Their line of regular and seasonal brews is a go-to for most locals. Their amber is always a nice pick, whether having a crawfish boil or enjoying some finer Southern fare.

Chris continued, “For wine and with spice the immediate thought would be Riesling, like the one from Marcel Deiss. Another thought would be a Champagne with some weight like the Laherte Rosé Saignée–unusual wine, cool story on how it is made.” This Champagne is made more like a red Burgundy and the color comes from Pinot Noir that is macerated on the skins, rather than the addition of still Pinot Noir or Pinot Meunier wine like 99% of the other Rosé Champagne on the market. What makes this wine even more unique is that it is a Rosé de Saignée made with 100% Pinot Meunier, which comes from plots situated in “Les Beaudiers.” This is a masculine and full-bodied example of Champagne, with lots of concentration and prominent berry and spice notes.

For a heartier gumbo pairing Chris suggested, “A red with some weight and low acidity could work as well. Think Rhone or even the Chateau Maris Syrah – just be careful on the spice-to-alcohol ratio if you go this route.”

Putting the Passito First

Why Sweet Wines Deserve to Be A Part of The Entrée and Not Just Dessert

If there is any single most misleading dogma of modern wine, it’s that sweet wines are only for dessert. Some wine drinkers would even stoop so low as to say sweet wines, as a group, are bad wines. However it came to be, many self-described wine connoisseurs have a knee-jerk reaction to residual sugar in a wine, and it keeps them closed off from wonderful experiences. I find this kind of simple thinking hysterical. And there are people out there who would agree with my sentiment.

A recent Bloomberg Businessweek article by John Mariani lays it out even in its title: “Serve Sweet Wines with Peking Duck, Octopus, Stinking Cheeses” The article confronts restaurateurs and foodies, people who probably never thought of pairing sweet wines with their entrees and salads. To quote Daniel Johnnes of Dinex Group in New York, “The term dessert wine is a taboo today… I direct my sommeliers not to list sweet wines as ‘dessert wines.’” This kind of thinking illustrates exactly how demonized dessert wines have become in the current market.

As the article points out, if you look back at the history of wine, you’ll see that a hundred years ago sweetness appeared in varying degrees for nearly all wines, so vino was customarily built neither dry nor bone dry. As research has lead to a better understanding of what fermenting yeasts need to thrive and as winemaking technology has advanced, winemakers have found more direct means to ensure fermentations eat up all the sugars in the grape must and can thus choose to craft the dry or bone-dry wines the public demands. The commonplace is that greater dryness in a wine makes for more complex wines that’re better for food pairing, yet the shift in methods might have become an over-correction. Today we are losing the connection with acceptable degrees of sweetness in table wines, and that has left wine drinkers with too few options.

I’m beginning to discover for myself how wonderful sweet wines can be. A recent experience that truly blew me away was drinking a bottle of Paolo Bea 2003 Sagrantino di Montefalco Passito. I haven’t been able to get this wine off my mind’s palate and I keep tasting its delicious cherry. It’s what I imagine rubies to taste like. In fact I almost prefer the passito (sweet) Sagrantino to Paolo Bea’s traditional Sagrantino di Montefalco Secco. And following the advice journalist John Mariani provided, I can see how this would go beautifully with braised short ribs or a filet topped with Gorgonzola.

The opportunity for pairing amazing sweet wines with amazing entrées is out there, it just requires a change in attitude by the wine-lover. So the next opportunity you have, pull your Sommelier aside and put him or her to the test on the sweet wines list. Make a point of asking for a pairing with a salad or main dish and see where he/she takes you. You will be surprised at what you find.

Go-To-Wine Tuesday

Cascina Barbatella Noè 2006

Having the opportunity to taste a white wine with a little bit of maturity is a special thing indeed. Most whites produced these days are meant to be consumed young, usually one or two years from the vintage for maximum vibrancy and freshness. While these wines are great when new, they don’t have the guts to stand the test of time.

This past weekend I had a great experience with a five-year-old white from Piemonte, Cascina Barbatella Noè 2006. It’s made of a fifty-fifty split of Cortese (the grape of Gavi wines) and Sauvignon Blanc, and prior to opening the bottle, I wasn’t sure what to expect because these two grapes don’t generally age well in the bottle. To my delight, I found the wine to be a beautiful golden yellow, a hue indicating some signs of age. The nose was very complex, slightly nutty and loaded with concentrated fruit flavor. This wine was in excellent shape!

To be quite honest, it was football Sunday and the only thing I could pair this wine with were crinkle-cut kettle chips with some sour cream and onion dip. Let me tell you it was awesome! The freshness of the wine cleansed the palate of the tangy sour cream, while the herbaceousness of the Sauvignon complemented that of the dip. Before I knew it, a bottle of wine and a bag of chips were gone, and the Giants had lost one of their most important games of the season.

The Cascina Barbatella Noè , though, was a sure winner.

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