Veni, Vidi, Vino

-- I Came, I Saw, I Drank Some Good Wine

Two weeks ago, at my previous wine class I tried the following wines (all red)

• 2001 Malbec - Pedro del Castillo (Argentia, very nice, and Ian, I hope you are getting well soon)
• 2000 Domaine Duloquet Anjou (a French cabernet)
• 2003 Georges Dubceuf Beaujolais (gamay noir grape)*

*spelling is optional, right?

I did not like the cabernet, but the others were great.

I bought a bottle of Louis Jadot 2002 Beaujolais and had it that weekend with the brother and sister in law who hooked us up with the wine classes. We had it with some big fat hamburgers and homemade pasta salad. It was somewhat tart and had a sort of blackberry taste to me and we all enjoyed it

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Last night, we went for our final class in the introductory series, which covered sparkling wine. Note that ONLY sparkling wine made in a very specific part of France can be called Champagne. Oh, those French people.

Ted started off with The Paris 1976 testing. Oh, Google it. It bored me.

We learned words like riddling (turning and tilting a bottle to work the yeast toward the top so that it can be removed) and that wine that says "in THIS bottle" on the label is different from wine fermented "in THE bottle". The latter is a subtle hint that your sparkling wine was fermented in a huuuuuuuuuge bottle. AKA, a vat with a cover.

One or more of the following grapes is used:

• chardonnay
• pinot noir
• pinot meunier

Most sparkling wine is "nonvintage" which means you won't see a year on the bottle. But enough of the dry stuff (haha), I have to tell you about Ted.

Ted, as you may recall, teaches the classes and last time he had a brand new haircut. This time Ted was sporting a bit of razor stubble, perhaps 3 days worth, and I have to say it worked for me. He gave us little bits of advice such as the fact that you don't want to leave the bottle unattended once you pull the cage off because the carbonation inside could pop the cork, and of course be careful where you point that thang, "do not let it encounter someone's face". (My brother in law quietly proposed a 30 second cork rule to me. Deal.)

By the way, if you pop the cork carefully (hold a towel over it and ease it out) and the champagne still slops all over out of the bottle you probably didn't chill it enough, according to Ted. He went on to say that his favorite wine to drink is sparkling wine because it is fizzy and gets you "tiddlier" faster. I don't think you can use that word on a Scrabble board. Ted was pretty much lit up like a Christmas tree by the end of class but it worked on him.

One woman (the friend of a woman who always takes off her damn shoes, which drives me crazy, I can't stand either one of them) asked how you "should" make mimosas (I hate people who fawn over people and want to know the "right" way to make something as easy as a damn mimosa. Put the OJ in a glass and add champagne. A little, a lot, suit yourself. Sheesh!) Ted's reply ("In big batches") was rather funny and didn't comment on what a stupid question she had asked. He's a good guy.

Here's something to keep in mind. Wines tend to be dry or sweet, and sparkling wines are no exception. There are words used to indicate the relative sweetness of a wine... Naturel, Brut, and Extra Dry. Just to mess with the minds of people like me, Extra Dry actually means it is sweet. Go figure. Another hint from Ted is that the cheaper the sparkling wine is, the sweeter it probably is.

Here are the wines we tried:

• Gruet Winery, Brut, from Albuquerque New Mexico. How about that? It was very "classic" and dry and crisp. Exactly what you think of when you think of "champagne"
• L'Hereu de Raventos i Blanc, Cava .... a spanish wine. Sort of fuzzy-ish like a peach texture. Different. I liked it, my brother in law, not so much.
• Henkell ... a riesling.. very sweet...so of course it said Trocken on the label which means Dry, which means sweet. Got it? Me neither, but Ted said to tell people to try this if you don't think you like sparkling wine.

I also learned that you really CAN eat the nasty rind on a piece of Brie. As if. It's the mold, peeps. But we did have a nice Brie from the Champagne area of France. It was called Chaource. The goat's milk cheese for the evening was called Unie Kaas, and it was from Holland. Both were great.

Don't forget, always use the tall skinny flutes if you can. Champagne that is all bubbled out is not your friend. But I am. Ex-specially if you share a bottle of wine with me.

PS. More about ICE WINE... holy crap... it is so expensive. Ted showed me one that was $100, for a bottle smaller than the bottles of Pepsi in the average vending machines. There was a $20 one but I'm not sure it would be worthwhile to try.

Cheers!