Archive | August, 2009

Some Whites We All Can Love: Bourgogne and Bordeaux Blanc

21 Aug

Short posts, short posts.  That’s what law school–and reality–will do to you!

A few posts earlier I rhapsodized about a mesmerizing Meursault I had at Mission Wines.  For some reason I’ve been on a big Burgundy bent for the past couple of months (which probably has its genesis in my trip to Berkeley and the delicious basic Bourgogne I drank there), and more recently I’ve been interested in white wines–specifically, chardonnay.

To celebrate my friend Justin’s arrival in DC from Austin by way of the Pacific Northwest, I am cooking a simple dinner of turkey burgers with guacamole and fries.  I thought that a chardonnay would be a good match for this meal, which is why I took Patrick Deaner of The Wine Specialist’s advice and purchased the 2006 Rully chardonnay from Pierre Andre.  A “Grand Vin de Bourgogne,” it was reasonably priced at $21.99.
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Thoughts: DC and LA / Cremant d’Alsace / Beauty / God / Life

17 Aug

I am in a certain mood right now that defies exact transcription into words.  Surely you’ve been in those moods before–everyone has, if they’ve cared enough to notice.  Perhaps I could define the parameters of that mood by listing some of the songs I’ve been listening to this early morning, this not altogether-unpleasant warm and humid DC early morning.  For instance, on the lighter side I’ve been listening to Oscar Peterson, in his Big 4 incarnation (“You Look Good to Me”) and supporting the “Montreux Kings”–Eldridge, Gillespie, Terry–trio of horns (“(There Is) No Greater Love”).  Charles Mingus (“II B.S.”) has verve but also a dark foreboding to it, something menacing that feels right right about now.  Nick Drake and Elliot Smith.  I haven’t decided on my old standby, Van Morrison.  It doesn’t seem like a Van Morrison type of morning.

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I have been incredibly fortunate.  I think that this could be assumed just by the very fact that I even have a wine blog.  At the same time, it is a truth of life that there are struggles, disappointments, and tragedies.

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Another Reason Why I’ll Miss LA

4 Aug

A while back I wrote that there wasn’t a sauvignon blanc that I liked.  How much has changed!  Now sauv blanc is, if not my favorite, one of my favorite white wines.

Now my white grape whipping-boy is chardonnay.  I could swear that I’ve not met a chardonnay that I’ve liked, though that’s not technically true.  Quite a few years ago I had a delicious Carneros chardonnay from V. Sattui at their St. Helena tasting room–so delicious, in fact, that it was priced above my budget.

Not that I ever wanted to dislike chardonnay, what with sentimental memories of Remy from The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles drinking the wine with wonderful abandon.  But more recent memories of horrible cheap chard from the I-House at Berkeley (where 1.5 L bottles of it were kept above room temperature for God knows how long) and horrible, more expensive chard wiped out any affinity I might have had for this most noble of grapes.

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