Napa comes to me...

So a couple hundred Napa Valley wine producers invaded Manhattan (and New Jersey but a minor, really minor detail), wined us and…yep just wined us, but I was certainly impressed. Here’s a list of some of my favorites:

Freemark Abbey’s 2007 Viognier was pretty nice, I loved the papaya coming from both the palate and nose, and I really appreciated the slight effervescence. This is a wine I’m really looking forward to on warm summer days.

Mi Sueño Winery pulled off a really great Pinot Noir with a lot of fruit, spice, and earthiness, from Russian river valley. Wait that’s in Sonoma county, well deal with it, the winemaker and I hit it off and he gave me a nice tasting.

Shafer’s 2006 One Point Five Cabernet Sauvignon had some eucalyptus, and black cherries that, I was really happy find out, weren’t insanely ripe, soft ripe tannins, all in all a really elegant wine. I really enjoyed this…the price is worth it.

I was very happy to taste a good (more than good actually) organically grown AND produced 2007 Sauvignon Blanc from Elizabeth Spencer Wines, acid wasn’t as high as your tradition French Sauvignon Blanc, and the tropical fruit on the palate was nice and delicate.

Another wine with attractive tropical fruit was the 2007 Sauvignon Blanc from Cliff Lede Vineyards; this is a wonderful wine to have alone.

Diversifying your palate...

So there was no better way for me to begin this past weekend than with 12 bottles of wine, some new friends, and good conversation. Earlier on Friday afternoon my friend, Aaron, told me to meet him at his job at 8, but moments later I suggested meeting him at his apartment because I was planning on driving in, parking is just a hassle near his job. However, a couple seconds later he advises me not to drive in…he was bringing home 12 bottles of wine to taste. Just imagine the smile on my face when I read that text message!

After meeting up with him later that evening and excited at the idea of seeing the bottles he chose for the night, I found out that I wasn’t allowed to see them. He was staging a blind tasting for a group of five. Honestly, with twelve bottles wine and only five people I thought to myself it must be some sort of social and/or behavioral experiment. So we arrive at his apartment and he locks himself in the kitchen to prepare for the tasting, taking each bottle and disguising them in a bag so as not to recognize what we’re drinking. Meanwhile, some of his friends begin to stroll in…the tasting begins, finally!

First some ground rules; everyone was given a sheet of paper and a pen to rank the wine he or she was drinking from 1-10, 1 being sewer water, 10 being liquid nirvana. However, as the evening progressed, the conversation started veering towards the flavors in the wine and their regional origins. The rankings were suddenly paired with the terms Old World (France, Italy, Spain, Germany, Portugal) or New World (Americas, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand). I was proud to find out, at the end of the evening, that of the last 6 bottles we began playing this game, I had figured out 5 correctly.

I’m not going to go through each bottle but I will say that throughout the evening I was craving some BBQ ribs and surprisingly the one bottle we had which would have been a great match was a 2006 Merlot from Bogle Vineyards, it was a wine that was intense in fruit, and the tannin level wasn’t too high, making it great if you like your BBQ a bit on the spicy side. Another surprising fact was how everyone rated the most expensive bottle of the bunch among the lowest, but by no means was it thought to be a poor bottle of wine…the wine? 2004 Chateau Smith Haut Lafite. What was the worst bottle of the evening? Hands down it was the 2006 Cabernet Sauvignon from Bald Eagle, there was no acid to pair with the ripeness of the fruit.

The concept of Friday nights tasting was brilliant. Not only was it a fantastic alternative to going out and spending an insane amount of money on a couple beers and cocktails, but it allowed for people who didn’t have a background in wine to appreciate the different flavors that are available from around the world. It’s really difficult for someone to train their palate if their only glass of wine is on Friday nights with dinner. It’s not necessary to spend $40+ dollars on one bottle of wine every week. You can divide that money among 3-4 good bottles of wine that you can sip on for the following week to ten days. Just imagine, in a month, rather than having 4 bottles you can expose your palate to 12-16 bottles. Now that’s diversifying!

In Chang I Trust...

Yes I know, I’m a trained chef, butcher, and a pork aficionado but this past weekend was the first time that I had set foot into a David Chang establishment. Shame on me! Nevertheless, I must let you know that the hype I’ve been hearing about him was worth it. First off the steamed pork buns, yes this is old news for you, but wow! From a culinary point of view it was absolutely phenomenal, everything in that dish was seasoned superbly. I used to buy the prepared steam’em-yourself-pork-buns from your local Asian market, which merely satisfied my appetite. But the Momofuku Noodle Bar steamed pork bun is out of this world! With your run of the mill, DIY bun from the market the bread is insipid and doughy, but with the Chang innovation it was warm, light, fluffy, and semi-sweet. The slow roasted pork stuffed inside was deliciously seasoned, the accompanying sauce hit the major pleasure points on your palate; sweet, sour, salty, and spicy. Honestly, my dining partner, Jessica, was lucky I didn’t fly across the table in sea gull fashion and snatch the rest of her bun right out of her hand!

The next course was a test of my manhood, the bowl of Momofuku ramen. The dish had a generous amount of crispy shredded pork, wonderfully seasoned pork belly, an extraordinarily liberal pinch of sliced scallions, a charitable weight in noodles, and a fantastic, poached egg which once stirred into the quart of broth created a beautifully viscous soup.

The meal did have a down-side to it, the “7” spice potato chips, bluntly said, they weren’t tasty. They just didn’t seem to hold on to the “7” spices. The chips were however fried to a perfectly golden hue with a memorable crispness.

On my next visit I have to try the shitake steamed buns, and hopefully they’ll have the bowl of pork belly ramen

Big Apple Wine Expo...thank God for the Apple Ice Wine!

I must say that I was somewhat disappointed by this years New York Wine Expo. It was held in the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center, in Manhattan. Now having been to this convention center in the past I was stunned by how small it was of an event. It was held in what, I believe, was the smallest room, in a remote corner of the convention center. I attended with a couple friends, Aaron and Danielle. Danielle, having attended the one in Boston in previous years, informed me that the Big Apple version just wasn't up to par. I also didn't enjoy the speed tasting by one of the exhibitors, I was wondering if at some point he was going to simply mix all the wines together in a fish bowl and hand out straws, with the company logo on it of course. However, there were a couple highlights, such as Neige Apple Ice Wine, it was really light on the palate with a really entertaining effervesence, not cloying or syrupy in anyway, yet its apple flavors remained quite intense. A really nice dessert wine worth keeping chilled in the fridge. The other noteworthy stop was for Port, the Graham's 20 Year Old Tawny Port tasting to end my day was quite nice. I was still tasting it as I walked out of the convention center! I hope next year they'll upgrade to a bigger room with more exhibitors and more patience.