Well, yes its hard to really go wrong. Well-cooked food and decent wine always have a place together. We talk a lot about the combinations of the two, and there's many different ways they can play off of each other. Good combinations sometimes make the wine sing, sometimes make the food sing, and sometimes can amplify the flavors of both at the same time. I don't want to take a stand as to which is better, they're all good in their own way.
But, sometimes you happen on a combination that really, really works in its own individual way.
Food - Pan-seared Opah, lightly salt and peppered over mashed sweet potatoes (Yes. I mean sweet potatoes, with the golden colored flesh, considerably sweeter than normal potatoes, but very different from the orange flesh colored yams) with chopped garlic, smoked paprika, olive oil, and touch of butter to finish.
Wine - Brewer-Clifton Santa Rita Hills Chardonnay
This combination was one of the great ones. The dish amplified and celebrated all the subtleties of this wine. Almost like a gentlemen ballroom dancer twirling around and showing off his beautiful dance partner. The wine dominated the show, but afterward left you fresh and prepared for the next bite. Each bite of food was like tasting this dish for the first time.
Getting wine and food to dance together so well is tough. Usually you end of with a good combination, everybody knows the steps, but the guy is slightly plodding or the women isn't picking up on all the cues. But, every now and then you end up with a partnership that not just works well together, but seems to really understand each other.
29 November 2010
19 November 2010
30 years old...Ha, still a baby.
Sierra Nevada has been releasing a series of 30th Anniversary beers this year.
All have been very good, but I have to give it to them for the most recent release.
This is a big brewery. While they still fall into the micro-brew category, Sierra is pumping out a lot fermented grains these days. I've always enjoyed the beers. The Pale Ale is a good, clean, and piney hopped ale, which can be argued, created the American IPA style. When you get this big it gets that much harder to keep the quality level high. Sierra has. But that's not what this post is all about.
What I'm, slowly, getting at is Sierra's willingness to still take some pretty big chances. The 30th Anniversary series has been crafted, with the help of other well-known beer brewers in the industry, by taking some big chances with the final beer. For a big brewer, this can backfire pretty quick if experimental beers you create don't deliver.
Well, the last release of this series delivers. A blend of oak-aged Bigfoot barleywine, Celebration, and Pale Ale thrown all together with a few more dry hops. This could easily be a complete disaster of a beer. Fortunately, it is delicious. It needs some time to open up, and would probably benefit from 6-12 months aging, as the different parts are still noticeable. But this brewski is intriguing, constantly evolving in the glass, and obviously a style that you don't get to drink every day.
Sierra Nevada - Congratulations on having the testicular fortitude to blend a bunch of stuff together that could have been downright horrible, and the blending skill to know that this would come out as a damn fine beer.
All have been very good, but I have to give it to them for the most recent release.
This is a big brewery. While they still fall into the micro-brew category, Sierra is pumping out a lot fermented grains these days. I've always enjoyed the beers. The Pale Ale is a good, clean, and piney hopped ale, which can be argued, created the American IPA style. When you get this big it gets that much harder to keep the quality level high. Sierra has. But that's not what this post is all about.
What I'm, slowly, getting at is Sierra's willingness to still take some pretty big chances. The 30th Anniversary series has been crafted, with the help of other well-known beer brewers in the industry, by taking some big chances with the final beer. For a big brewer, this can backfire pretty quick if experimental beers you create don't deliver.
Well, the last release of this series delivers. A blend of oak-aged Bigfoot barleywine, Celebration, and Pale Ale thrown all together with a few more dry hops. This could easily be a complete disaster of a beer. Fortunately, it is delicious. It needs some time to open up, and would probably benefit from 6-12 months aging, as the different parts are still noticeable. But this brewski is intriguing, constantly evolving in the glass, and obviously a style that you don't get to drink every day.
Sierra Nevada - Congratulations on having the testicular fortitude to blend a bunch of stuff together that could have been downright horrible, and the blending skill to know that this would come out as a damn fine beer.
15 November 2010
What really makes wine great?
In the last couple weeks I have had the pleasure of having a number of very memorable experiences surrounding wine.
First, I recently spent an evening in Las Vegas at a Wine Spectator event. Almost all the famous names from Cali. where present and many from Australia and South America (theme was the New World Wine Event, if you hadn't figured this out yet). We walked around a grand ballroom and tasted many wines priced into the stratosphere. I personally relish these types of opportunities, as there is simply no other way to experience these wines other than an event like this, simply because of the prices. Many of these wine where great, many where good, and just as many where insanely over priced, but all where spare-no-expense juice. Incidentally, the wine of the night, for me, was the 1999 Catena Zapata Cabernet from Argentina. (A certain somebody would be very happy to know the winery is based in Mendoza)
Second, I spent a couple days in Sonoma wine country. We visited a couple wineries. Those in attendance can attest to the beautiful wines being made a Truet-Hurst in Dry Creek Valley. We then spent two evenings dining in Santa Rosa. With both meals we drank our fair share of wines. Never wasting time drinking the same bottle twice, we got to experience many wonderful wines in a setting these beverages where crafted to be drank in.
So what's the point you are asking?
While it is a necessary (and very enjoyable) experience to get to events like the one in LV, the most memorable are those when wine is part of the experience, not just the experience itself. Enjoying a great meal and great wine with loved ones is what makes wine the experience it should be.
A week after the these memorable dinners in Santa Rosa, I was at another event and one of the wines we drank at dinner was being poured. Corison Napa Cabernet 2002. Always a very good producer, these wines typically add a considerable amount of dimension with 5-10yrs of bottle age. My opinion of Corison 2002 at dinner in Santa Rosa was very high. Wonderfully defined, complex, and still holding on to the density that makes Napa Cab. great. At the later tasting, this wine was good. All the components where there, but not setting the world on fire...not truly memorable.
I think my conclusion is we can't separate the quality of the wine from the experience of drinking it. Nor should we. While this may certainly frustrate many producers, as they obviously can only control the quality of wine, not the quality of our loved ones, if you enjoy a wine, than it must be a good wine...regardless of what anyone says, as they didn't have the chance to experience that wine exactly the same way you did.
I tasted many wines in LV that, technically, are far superior to wines drank at the above dinners. But, at the end of day, the wines drank at dinner gave considerably more pleasure than even the greatest of the great wines being poured at the Spectator event. Think that drives the producer of a $300 Cabernet crazy?
First, I recently spent an evening in Las Vegas at a Wine Spectator event. Almost all the famous names from Cali. where present and many from Australia and South America (theme was the New World Wine Event, if you hadn't figured this out yet). We walked around a grand ballroom and tasted many wines priced into the stratosphere. I personally relish these types of opportunities, as there is simply no other way to experience these wines other than an event like this, simply because of the prices. Many of these wine where great, many where good, and just as many where insanely over priced, but all where spare-no-expense juice. Incidentally, the wine of the night, for me, was the 1999 Catena Zapata Cabernet from Argentina. (A certain somebody would be very happy to know the winery is based in Mendoza)
Second, I spent a couple days in Sonoma wine country. We visited a couple wineries. Those in attendance can attest to the beautiful wines being made a Truet-Hurst in Dry Creek Valley. We then spent two evenings dining in Santa Rosa. With both meals we drank our fair share of wines. Never wasting time drinking the same bottle twice, we got to experience many wonderful wines in a setting these beverages where crafted to be drank in.
So what's the point you are asking?
While it is a necessary (and very enjoyable) experience to get to events like the one in LV, the most memorable are those when wine is part of the experience, not just the experience itself. Enjoying a great meal and great wine with loved ones is what makes wine the experience it should be.
A week after the these memorable dinners in Santa Rosa, I was at another event and one of the wines we drank at dinner was being poured. Corison Napa Cabernet 2002. Always a very good producer, these wines typically add a considerable amount of dimension with 5-10yrs of bottle age. My opinion of Corison 2002 at dinner in Santa Rosa was very high. Wonderfully defined, complex, and still holding on to the density that makes Napa Cab. great. At the later tasting, this wine was good. All the components where there, but not setting the world on fire...not truly memorable.
I think my conclusion is we can't separate the quality of the wine from the experience of drinking it. Nor should we. While this may certainly frustrate many producers, as they obviously can only control the quality of wine, not the quality of our loved ones, if you enjoy a wine, than it must be a good wine...regardless of what anyone says, as they didn't have the chance to experience that wine exactly the same way you did.
I tasted many wines in LV that, technically, are far superior to wines drank at the above dinners. But, at the end of day, the wines drank at dinner gave considerably more pleasure than even the greatest of the great wines being poured at the Spectator event. Think that drives the producer of a $300 Cabernet crazy?
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