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Monthly Archive for May, 2008
This week for our Cabernet Sauvignon wine tasting, we had our largest group of people and our biggest selection of wine. Regions represented were California, Chile, France, Italy, South Africa, and Australia. We had a difficult time finding any wines outside the $8-$13 range.
For the evening, our hobo bag theme was lackluster blockbusters, or blockblunders, or just plain crappy box office hits: Titanic, Wild Wild West, Speed 2, Men in Black, Armageddon, The Phantom Menace, Waterworld, and Pearl Harbor.
We discovered that in general, Cabernet was a lighter, fruitier red wine, and ranged from extremely dry to nearly dessert wine sweet. In several wines, the alcohol taste came through rather obnoxiously.
Last place went to a $14 bottle of Avalon from Sonoma, California, 2004. In a near-tie for last place was a $9 bottle of Bolla from Italy, 2006. A few weeks ago, Bolla won first place for Chianti.
A $13 1-liter box of French Rabbit from France got second place. It was very sweet and light, but easy to drink and approachable. It had flavors of honey and strawberry.
When we pulled the first place winner out of the brown paper bag, the room was full of gasps and groans as we learned that it was Yellow Tail, Australia, 2007, $6.50. Much to our dismay, its rich christmas-like flavors of vanilla, licorice and cloves earned it the highest score we have given to any of the twenty-seven bottles we have tasted so far.
For dinner I made Emeril’s recipe for ratatouille as well as sage roasted potatoes. David made a dessert with poached meringue floated on a martini glass of custard and garnished with a wafer of caramel.
If we learned anything that night, it’s that consuming food at unnatural speeds and set to music is hysterical.
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- Casa Lapostolle, Chile, $14
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- Bolla, Italy, 2006, $9
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- Justin, Paso Robles CA, 2004, $33
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- French Rabbit, Orange France, 2004, $13/1L
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- Our hobo bags, used to hide the labels.
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- Yellow Tail, Southeastern Australia, 2007, $6.50, the unexpected winner of the pack
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- Avalon, Sonoma CA, 2004, $14
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- Lindemans, South Africa, 2004, $9
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- Yalumba, Southern Australia, 2004, $13
Am I that boring? This happens when you fall asleep at my house. Your photo shows up on my blog and/or Facebook.
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With Washington DC’s Bike to Work Day today, it has gotten me thinking about why it is that so many people in DC drive, and why the traffic is so bad. It’s ironic that a person can ride their bike into and around town far faster and cheaper than in a motored vehicle.
The longer I go without owning a car, the more I realize that personal transportation vehicles are a waste of money and other resources. The gasoline, the maintenance, the time missed from work getting your vehicle repaired, the amount of space they take up, the vehicle payments, etc., all are reasons we have decided to not purchase another car. We are glad we live in a location where that is feasible.
With the increase of gas prices in recent years, most people I know have analyzed bus routes, bicycle commute times, carpooling options, looking for a way to get by without a car. So far, my suburban friends have been unsuccessful.
Developers around the metro area have finally started to see the merits of building residential and commercial within easy walking or very short drives. Today when people search for jobs their search radius has been shrinking. People want to work closer to home.
Despite this push toward greener mobility, there are more and more vehicles on the road all the time, all fighting for valuable parking in downtown DC. The problem with trying to fix this solution, however, is that if you build more parking, that means more people will try to drive because the parking is available. I say the way to solve the traffic congestion in DC is to remove parking. Build a stadium, but let people metro in from their hotels and from their suburban parking lots. Build more office space, but save the money on the expensive underground parking garages. Spend that money on a bike rack or on metro passes.
Street parking is another congestion-creator. People will drive around for blocks and blocks, searching for a free parking space, burning gas and occupying space on the street. If we just had a few public garages, people would know exactly where to go. Remove the street parking in commercial areas, widen the sidewalks, and make people walk that extra two or three blocks. An added benefit to reducing street parking is reducing the second largest hazard to bicyclists: dooring.
I came across an interesting article about the different things that New York City is looking at for easing congestion and for converting streets from the domain of isolated vehicles into true public space. What is DC doing on this front?
Ironically, for Bike to Work Day, I’ll be driving a car for a change.
This past Sunday our wine tasting was Shiraz (also known as Syrah). We went in with low hopes, but came out pleasantly surprised.
All the Shiraz(es?), even the lowest rated, still scored higher than any other class of wine we had before: Chianti, Zinfandel, and Merlot. The biggest surprise was that the box wine (which was classily strapped to the rack on the back of my bike for the trip home) scored the highest! Coming in at an extremely close second was the $45 bottle from Australia.
From my research, it appears that shiraz pairs well with spicy foods such as Mexican, Cajun, and barbecue. So some of our visitors prepared beans and enchiladas. For dessert, David made flan that turned out amazing!
Next week: Cabernet
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- Black Box, Central Coast CA, $22 box (equivalent to $5.50 per bottle)
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- Bridlewood, Central Coast CA, 2003, $35
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- Leasingham, Australia, 2005, $45
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- Tall Horse, South Africa, 2004, $8
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- Our hobo bags, used to disguise the wine
The results are in: Chianti was a bust. And our blind taste tests showed that the $8 bottle of 2000 Bolla Chianti was our favorite, while the $44 bottle of Tenute Marchese Antinori Chianti Classico was barely drinkable. A rather common taste that kept coming up was latex glove. I’m pretty sure that’s not a desirable attribute. Pretty sure.
For dinner we had pizza with homemade crust, fresh buffalo mozzarella cheese, and ridiculous amounts of fresh basil. For dessert David made zabaglione with fresh fruit.
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- Angelicus, 2005, $15
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- Da Vinci, 2005, $22
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- Bolla, 2008, $8: The clear winner! (not to mention the cheapest)
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- Nozzole Chianti Classico, 2004, $28: runner-up for last place
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- Tenute Marchese Antinori Chianti Classico, 2000, $44: The loser and most expensive
I think I like this better than mailing back shredded applications.
Last weekend, we took a break from wines to do beers. We chose stout, sometimes interchanged with porter. We had Irish, oatmeal, imperial and chocolate. No one was able to meet my request to find a milk stout or an oyster stout. Because it was a night of pretty much just frozen pizzas, mashed potatoes deep fried into smiley faces, a few tequila cocktails, Alien, and Walk Hard, we didn’t stick to our rigid whole-number-only rating system. Instead, we only remember that Trader Joe’s has an AMAZING double (or was it triple?) chocolate stout, and that Guinness in a can was the least favorite. But it was beer, so it was drinkable.
So I’m a little late with posting our review of red Zinfandel. About two weeks late.
Zinfandel is grown world-wide, but the vast majority of Zinfandel available in the US is from California. As a matter of fact, we were unable to find anything outside of California to taste. Also difficult to find was any bottle over $20. It pairs well with barbecue and spicy food, so I made Emeril’s vegetarian chili.
We had five bottles, and not one scored well. The more we drank, the more we realized that Zinfandel did not sit well with us. They reminded us of the Argentinean wine from the previous week. The tastes were all tar, petroleum, and dirty socks.
At least the chili was a hit.
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