I don't know where the time has gone, but clearly a month of not posting does not accurately reflect the month of wines I've actually tried, including the California Red Wine Tasting I hosted on 23rd February.
We had a full house of 10 people, which I've determined is the maximum number of guests I can comfortably host with everyone having the basics, like a chair :) To eat, we started with cheese and crackers. With six planned wines to get through, I served an appetizer of marinated beef skewers to go with the first three wines, and a simple but tasty pasta dish with sausage and lots of veggies with the second three wines. A final addition of a Rhone-style blend was added towards the end of the evening.
We drank:
We had a full house of 10 people, which I've determined is the maximum number of guests I can comfortably host with everyone having the basics, like a chair :) To eat, we started with cheese and crackers. With six planned wines to get through, I served an appetizer of marinated beef skewers to go with the first three wines, and a simple but tasty pasta dish with sausage and lots of veggies with the second three wines. A final addition of a Rhone-style blend was added towards the end of the evening.
We drank:
- 2003 Hannah Merlot, Sonoma County ($20)
- 2003 Qupe Syrah Central Coast, Santa Ynez Valley
- 2004 Bonny Doon Vineyards Carignane "Ancient Vines", Central Coast
- 2003 Pipestone Mourvedre (£15)
- 2003 Zahtila Zinfandel Laura Zahtila, Sonoma, Dry Creek Valley
- 2003 Peju Province Winery Cabernet Sauvingnon, Napa Valley (£15)
- 2003 Bonny Doon Le Cigare Volant (Rhone-style blend), Central Coast
Nearly all the wines were the 2003 vintage, which although purposeful, was probably not noticed by anyone. We weren't trying to do a detailed comparison tasting between the varietals, but it was more demonstrative of "this is what California can produce" and it doesn't hurt that 2003 was a good year. The wine was well-received, and it was such a nice change of pace for me to be able to have an evening of yummy California wines, nearly all carried over from the U.S. in various suitcases over the past year.
