monkey 1

monkey 1
Needing a glass or After a glass?

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Macon Villages "Grand Elevage"

Also known as Chardonnay from Burgundy.  

  One sip is enough to tell me that this isn't from California (at least what I can usually afford from California) and definitely not Australian even if I couldn't read the label, which I can and this one doesn't even have that many French words in it.

Curiosity about French wines is a good reason to start refreshing all those years in Jr High/High School French from back in the time when dinosaurs roamed the earth.

Way back when I first started to drink some wine here and there I liked Chardonnays.  Flash forward to  a couple of decades later when I returned to drinking wine I discovered I didn't like Chardonnays.   What happened in the intervening 20 years?  What happened was I drank French Chardonnays when I first started drinking - there wasn't much to choose from from California (at least at prices I was paying - somethings are consistent across decades).  20 years later there were more inexpensive Chardonnays available and they were not the type I remembered loving.   I ultimately learned there was a difference between wine regions (duh!), in many cases a big difference.  This was one of those cases. 

I tend to love more French Chardonnays and Chablis than Californian or Australian within the same price range.   I have tasted some $60 California Chardonnays which I have loved but unless they are selling for $20 or under I won't be having more than a taste.  That said I do have one squirreled away that might be making its appearance here before the summer ends.  It was a sale price I could not refuse.   But I digress.

Back to the Macon.  Another very light colored wine.  A floral nose with flowers I can't identify other than knowing it smells more flowery than citrusy -  another improvement over the basic 'yummmmmmm.'  Crisp.  Refreshing.  Tastes more citrusy than it smells.    It seemed to have more body last night than it does tonight.  It has a screw top so it couldn't have had THAT much oxidation but a little bit went a long way to giving it a more tartly acidic edge on the second day.

Works more as an aperitif for me than an accompaniment with the random accompaniments that came after another long hot sweating workday: a romaine, onion and pickle salad with ranch dressing and a handful of grated romano cheese.   You can tell it's been a very long time since I was a dedicated foodie.  Today's food choice was a peanut butter sandwich an hour ago.  I don't think that counts so it is aperitif night tonight.  The Auxerrois from the other night also had a screw top.  MMMMMM That Auxerrois was sublime both days.  Maybe I will have to break down and get some more before I swill my way through my already cellared whites.

I have to get back to opening up my older wines.  I was trying to alternate more recent acquisitions against the archeological ones which really have to be opened, drunk or tossed creating new cellar space to repeat this fun next summer with all new whites or maybe just chilled light reds.   I already miss my reds.

Monday, July 18, 2011

Adelsheim Vineyards 2009 Auxerrois

I don't know how it is pronounced but it is a wonderful light white.



In the glass, it is nearly colorless.  The nose is of peaches?  And some other nice things.  Really nice.

First sips: slightly peachy but not sweet.  Light with nice finish, a short finish.  Some write ups list this as a great wine with oysters.  I don't happen to have oysters handy.  A fast dinner after a day at work, on my feet, in very bad to nearly nonexistent AC during 90F July day... fast, light and late dinner: 1 chicken-feta-spinach sausage with yellow mustard on a hotdog bun.  The wine worked well with something as pedestrian as that.

The peach was no longer on the tongue.  It tasted more 'winey.'  It tasted a little fuller with food, with a longer finish.


There are some press type notes here .  Lovely, lovely wine.

Saturday, July 16, 2011

Vin des Chanoines

Last summer I drank reds all summer long. This summer it has been whites with 1 foray into a chilled light red.  At least so far. 

Some of the local wine merchants are really pushing Roses.  Some of the Roses were even half decent and not just tasting like a 'tweener.'  Tweener defined as not a red and and not a white, something inbetween and tasting like the worst of that.  I will have some Rose notes eventually...but I might have to be desperate and out of whites.

Back to the lovely red.  Great at cellar temperature in cooler seasons or with a little chill in summer heat.


 Now the label on this particular Italian wine used to be wonderfully arty which the artist donated to the Institute to use on its bottles.  Alas, when he died that right to use the labels became prohibitively expensive.  The wine label is more prosaic but the wine inside is still lovely, lively and light.  Actually, with the slight chill a buttery-ness is more pronounced.

Even though this link refers to an earlier vintage it gives a little more information of this delightful wine.  I have had previous vintages and they were all good, good enough to keep buying the later vintages. 

Let's get this out of the way now.  I am just learning about wine.  I do not have the list of approved wine terminologies infront of me nor do I understand what most of them mean at this point.  Frankly, describing the wine as 'buttery' is an improvement over just saying 'yummmm.'

But back to the whites.  So far this summer I have been swilling through my motley assortment of whites.  Hopefully
I won't run out of my supply of dusty, forgotten or ignored whites which  have accumulated over the past few years until the summer ends.

Of the soldiers already swilled, I just wish I had thought to take pictures of their labels before I finished them but I had no plans to replenish them no matter how much I ended up enjoying them.   I might have to rethink that if the heat of summer outlasts my archeological stash.