Thirsty Thursday: Il Poggione, Brunello di Montalcino, Riserva, Italy 2006

Posted on May 29, 2014 by waywardwine

This Thirsty Thursday, Wayward Wine splurges and satisfies its Europhilia with a bottle from Italy.  Box Chianti this ain’t.  No, within Tuscany, within Chianti, within Brunello di Montalcino, within Il Poggione’s 309 acres, sits a single vineyard called Vigna Paganelli.

That orange nub is this hill of Montalcino

That orange nub is this hill of Montalcino.

These grapes sit over 1,000 feet above sea level, in the hottest, driest, most windswept spot in Tuscany.  Brunello regulations are extremely strict. Barrel aging must last at least 2 years, bottling 4 months.  Only 100% Sangiovese makes up its wines.  At least usually.  2008’s Brunellopoli saw some cheating, imprisonment, and bans in the US.  This is what happens to one of Italy’s most expensive wines.

But tonight is for Il Poggione.  Five generations deep, Il Poggione was one of the original founding members of Brunello.  While I meticulously excavated an Etruscan kiln a few miles north, 2006’s grapes were ripening in their single vineyard.

Enraptured audience.

Enraptured audience.

That summer was warm and dry, especially in Montalcino.  2006’s hand harvest was ideal enough that Il Poggione decided to make a Riserva (they rarely do).  So eight years on, how is it?

Porn.

Porn.

Appearance: Although clear, this looks a deep ruby with a narrow, clearish garnet rim.

Aromas: Borderline enveloping aromas of violet and cherry liquor, maraschino, basil leaf, and pine nut draw my mind back to that dusty summer.

Palate: This feels serious and austere, like our ceramics specialist.  Dryness, high toned acids, ripped tannins, and warm alcohol all hide beneath a fairly robust body of fruit.

Flavors: Ponounced intensity dry cedar wood planks and dried herb frame lean tart cherry.  Red apple skin tannins lead to a lean but long finish of mineral and lavender.

Conclusions: Il Poggione’s 2006 Riserva is very very very good, hell, outstanding (5 of 5).  This wine manages to balance extremes of structure with ample fruit, spice, and intricate complexity.

The only problem with it is context. Try as I might to pretend, I’m not in Italy with it and a fabulous plate of wild boar ragu on rough, hand-cut pasta, dusted with Parmigiana, watching sun drenched tourists amble by.  All that tannin and acid begs I feed my stripped, starved palate protein to revive it.

But the problem is me. This wine is classic.

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Memorial Day Home Brew: Lite American Lager

Posted on May 26, 2014 by waywardwine

Nothing. I say nothing is more American than pouring a glass of Lite American Lager that you made from scratch.  Yes, lager may have been born in Central Europe.  Yes, it was really Canada that modernized it.  Yes, it killed American micro-brewing for the last half century with the watery, numbing fury of a frat party.

Whatever! This sunny Memorial Day, we enjoy our lager (and freedom).  The ingredients were as standard and patriotic as possible: American 2 row barley (half Oregon organic and half Midwestern), flaked American corn, flaked American rice, and lager yeast (from…Modello Mexico…close enough).  No extracts, no bs.

Tracys Light American Lager Memorial Day

Feel the pride.

Really, my brewster wife did all the work, I merely drank, cheer-led, and lifted heavy stuff.  Lager turns out to be extremely difficult.  Ales take a few weeks to make.  But she had to bottle it early, rushing its rest and bottle-conditioning time.  It should have sat on yeasts for months.

But a few extra bottles have slept for three months now. Have they grown up?

Appearance: It has a lightly hazy, straw color. A constant fine pearl of bubbles form a well-retained centimeter thick white head.

Aromas: Medium minus intense aromas of fresh yellow corn, chamomile honey, white bread, and apple hardly overwhelm.

Palate: Off dry sweetness leads to bright apple acidity, a mildly grainy bitterness, minor alcohol, and a light but round body. Effervescence keeps it lively.

Flavors: Medium intense flavors of honey-drizzled white bread, chamomile tea, and apple skin last for a mild but surprisingly medium plus length.

Conclusions: Since the goal was a Coors Lite clone, this is pretty close.  Its light weight, fizz, tartness, and tidy refreshment are dead on.  Sure more rest time would have wiped away that fruity apple flavor (acetaldehyde: a fault).  Either way, it raises my flag this Memorial Day.  Well done wife.

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Memorial Day: 1997 Archery Summit, Pinot Noir, Oregon

Posted on May 22, 2014 by waywardwine

If Memorial Day is about remembrance, I can think of no better memorial to America’s dead than opening an old bottle of our own.  Militant sacrifice created the world we live in. Tonight’s wine would not have existed without them.  So let’s turn to the past…

1997 saw my sophomore year in high school.  Girls still confused me.  MMMbop, Backstreet Boys, and Spice Girl pop had usurped Grunge’s musical devolution (at least we still had the Smashing Pumpkins? Bush? Foo Fighters? Come on! Anybody?).

Hanson

Who needs hearing?

Meanwhile, something far more relevant was happening: grapes.  Willamette Valley weather in Oregon had challenged growers.  Grape yields broke records, but rain marred the harvest.  Most wines turned out light, acidic, pale, and not worth cellaring.

However, Archery Summit, founded just a few years before, was experimenting.  After a rough season, they fermented and bottled their Pinot Noir clone PNP-40 without blending others in.

In the winery’s caves, faced with a line up of 95, 98, 99, and 2000, somehow I kept returning to it.  So much so, that I woke the next morning with a bottle in my car.  The last thing I remember was starting that evening’s second course.

Empty.

Empty.

Sane and sober, I returned to it.  So how does high school taste?

Appearance: It looks a clear, deep garnet, like the brick on a Victorian building.

Aromas: Moderate aromas of dried pomegranate, fruit leather, white rose, and a mild tobacco waft up.  Nowhere to go but still enticing.

Palate: This is dry, with mouthwatering but now mild, soft acids. Medium, dewy soft tannins turn to dry, sifted flour.  The medium alcohol sits there: present but unobtrusive, like its medium body.

Flavors: Up front, red apple skin and pomegranate fruit waft up and then melt, step back, thin into a light homemade cigarette paper, with rice.  These with some fruit fragments last for a long time.

Conclusions: This wine is mellow, old, a bit cranky but fully committed to isolated retirement: how I imagine Sean Connery is doing these days.  It is far from dead, actually still very good (4 of 5).  If anything, in this moment, right now, it probably tastes more balanced and complex than upon bottling.

If only one could ever buy it.

Nevertheless, this Memorial Day, drink American.  Open something special, something old, something that transports you and makes you thankful to have the chance to.  Freedom never tasted so fine.

 

 

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Adios Madrid! Egyptian Temples. Royal Palaces. Fine People.

Posted on May 19, 2014 by waywardwine

Our EU Austerity Drinking Tour continues this Monday back in Madrid.  Alcohol intake remains on hold until Tracy feels better.  After culture-packed Toledo, we wake up sober in our shed on top of a deck.

Madrid Shed

Madrid Shed

It is humble but warm and cheap.  Lovely crêpes wait for us in our host’s kitchen (which taste better than those in Bordeaux).  It may be winter, but the sun shines, so we decide to hike the city.

Tucked in a park hides the ancient Egyptian Temple of Debod.

AaronTempleDebodIt feels alien here, but familiar.  Like mini-temples at the MET or in Berlin, Debod was saved block by block before the Aswan Dam created a lake out of the desert.

Past chubby columns, the cultural dislocation gets weirder inside…

RomanAugustusDebodTempleDepicted above is the Roman Emperor Augustus.  My geeky Roman Archaeological heart flutters.

But Debod’s temple doesn’t belong in Madrid, or anywhere.  Augustus seems out of place as well.  But we feel affinity for them.  We too are foreigners in Madrid: out of our time and place.

Through the trees, we spot the Royal Palace.

Hard to miss really.

Hard to miss really.

Not drinking for a few days saved us money.  So we head over to tour the palace.

The complex sprawls, empty, tidy, and blue: like a statue of an elephant.  We strain to imagine these courtyards filled with multicolored troops on parade or red cardinals in religious procession.

However, inside, increasingly ornate rooms flow into each other.

Rococo splended-ness.

Rococo splended-ness.

No photos were allowed, but postcards lack that sense of “Oh gods! The guard will see me! Quickly!” Luckily, few tourists were here, so security relaxed.

The floor-to-ceiling room made entirely out of glazed tile was most impressive.

Luckily they don't get earthquakes.

Luckily they don’t get earthquakes.

Nothing here screams Spanish.  The Royal Palace showcased a Spain in step with the trends of Renaissance, Baroque, and Rococo Europe.  The royal’s apotheocary showed an extreme level of early modern interest in science and the wider world.  However, we find a uniquely Spanish Catholicism in the private altars.

Calm and collected.

Calm and collected.

After the many shiny and pointy things in the armory (where they delete my photos), we stroll through this city.  Like the palace, Madrid looks generically European: the capital of any nationalist, imperial center.  It impresses us but lacks Barcelona’s flair or Toledo’s amalgam of ancient or modern.

Crazy Important Square

Crazy Important Square

Maybe over 110 days of travel have jaded us.  Nevertheless, Madrid feels beautiful, yet orderly, sprawling, yet intimate.  We end up in a park peppered by romantic couples.  At its far end we even find a miniature copy of England’s Crystal Palace:

Crystal Palace

Queen Victoria?

Dark creeps in and we hike home.  Starving, we order our first pizza in four months.  The Columbian immigrants making our Italian cheese pizza discuss how life is better in Spain.  At least in Madrid the recession doesn’t bite as hard.  They laugh that we lived in California and speak such crap Spanish.

Finally home, our hosts surprise us with fabulous tortilla patatas, and, knowing we like our drink, crack a few cans of their favorite beer (a malty, decently high alcohol ale and eggy potatoes make for heaven).  Embarrassed, stuffed, and exhausted we crawl back to our deck shed and sleep.

We merely scratched Madrid’s surface.  Like so much of our trip, we dip a toe in, taste the place, then move on.  Like Debod’s columns, we are unfinished.

UnifinishedColumns We don’t belong here, but by being here, we get closer to completion, or at least our next destination.

 

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Heat Wave Salve: Pine Ridge, Forefront, Pinot Gris, Willamette Valley, Oregon 2011

Posted on May 15, 2014 by waywardwine

This Thirsty Thursday needs to cool it.  My car thermometer claimed it hit 93F today…in Oregon…in May!  My black, leather seat and I are now one.  We’ve already exchanged vows.  Slightly worse, my family had to evacuate their home: raging fires swept through Southern California today (ok…that’s far worse).

They’re fine.  But we could all use a drink.

Tonight I turn to a native Pinot Gris produced by Pine Ridge.  They call this line “Forefront” (I’m sure that sounded brave during marketing meetings…”Oh, now what. We’re Californian.  Hey! Let’s make Pinot Gris in Oregon! That cutting-edge sense of adventure will appeal to our Caucasian male, desk-job slave, marketing demographic of 30 to 50 year olds. Genius!  Now let’s be indecisive and slap an austere, slick, yet generic label with four fonts on it”).

Brave

Brave

Sarcasm aside, Pine Ridge makes good wine for little money.  This Willamette Valley Pinot Gris from 2011 costs under $13.

The stuff in the bottle is legit.  Nighttime hand-harvested and sorted grapes were pressed immediately into stainless tanks, where they fermented without any malolactic or oak interference.  What we have here is pure Pinot Gris.

Appearance: It looks clear, like icy lemonade, with minor legs.

Aromas: It smells present but not intense.  Imagine slightly briny sea salt sprinkled on fresh mint leaf, with lemon juice and light honey.

Palate: At first I think I’m drinking a pillow. Then it feels blissfully dry, acids cling to my gums, and a fine dollop of warm alcohol follows (thanks late Indian Summer), leading to a medium body.

Flavors: Honeydew melon and white pear lead.  But then lean lemon juice and white pepper cut in.  It wraps up with a slightly fizzy, flinty finish. Mouthwatering. Long.

Pine Ridge’s Forefront is very good (4 of 5) quality.  It’s long length saves an otherwise quiet start.  The fact they trusted the fruit and fermented a dry, clean gris is commendable.  So when you’re baking, chill down with this.

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