Wine Lab Wine Dinner Blog

Wine Lab Wine Dinner Blog:

On March 31st, my girlfriend and I went to the Wine Lab in Blacksburg for a three-course wine dinner. Since we know the Wine Lab has a great selection of wine and a good menu, it was an easy choice for a wine dinner out. When we got there, we started by going over the menu trying to figure out what we wanted to eat for each course. After we had that in mind, we started looking over the wine list to see what might pair up with the food items we picked out. 

    Our first course involved the baked brie and a glass of the Remhoogte Honeybunch Chenin Blanc. The wine on its own had a slightly savory and buttery nose that gave hints of oak. Also present from the nose were notes of tropical fruits and some herbaceous notes, possibly something along the lines of thyme. On the palate, the wine was a nice balance between savory and sweet. The tropical fruit hints from the nose were still present and became a slightly more clear pineapple type note. The wine ended with a slightly dry and savory finish. The thyme notes from the nose were also present in the back of the palate. When I tried this wine before trying some of the brie, the wine brought out the cheese more so than the topping that was with the brie. The wine also had the effect of making the bread we tried the brie with stand out a little more while eating. When I tried the wine after having a bite of the brie, the food amped up the fruit flavors of the wine more than the savory flavors I had found when trying the wine on its own. The wine seemed to also make the aftertaste from the cheese a much creamier flavor and it really extended how long the cheese flavors would hang around in my mouth. Overall, these two items went well together. Drinking the wine after taking a bite of food really emphasized the richness of the cheese and the fruity notes of the wine. I don't think either of these items really overpowered the other, they tended to complement each other nicely and bring out something new in the other. 

Figure 1: Me with the First Course

    For our second course, we split a charcuterie board consisting of Ibeico Chorizo, Speck, and Finnocchina Salami paired with a Vermont Honey Truffle Goat Cheese, An aged Manchego, and a Woodbine cheese. The board also came with a variety of other small items, but those were the main parts of the board. To go with this second course, I got the Vina Galana Tempranillo. On its own, this wine had very nice jammy notes that featured raspberries and some other types of berries on the nose. There were also hints of cedar, plum, and sage present before a slight spice could be found. On the palate, this wine kept the plummy and jammy notes upfront before shifting to a dry, tannic finish where the cedar and sage notes rounded off the palate. There were too many combinations of meat, cheese, and other toppings to keep track of, but in general, when I would sample this wine before having some of the food, it tended to bring out the flavors of the cheese over everything else. One of the things that I noted was that when I would eat the aged Manchego after taking a sip of the wine, it would bring out some of the funkier aged notes of the cheese. When I started sampling the wine after eating some of the food, one of the things that I quickly noted was that the taste of the wine would mix with the aftertaste from whatever meat I was trying and really accentuated the flavor of the meat. The oiliness of the meat also helped bring down some of the tannins and dryness from the wine and brought out more of the cedar and sage notes. Like the first course, neither of these items really overpowered the other, but they did bring out some nice new flavors or effects from each other. 

Figure 2: Me with the Second Course

    For the third course, we got a flourless chocolate cake and I paired it with the Bernard Griffin Syrah Port wine. On the nose, this wine was full of sweet raisiny notes, but I was able to pick up on some brandy notes and some very slight traces of ethanol. On the palate, this wine was much less sweet than the nose had me expecting. The wine was still sweet, but just not to the level I was thinking it would be. The raisiny notes were still present on the palate, but there were now flavors of plums and raspberries that I was also able to pick out. The wine finished with some slight tannins. When I tried this wine before having a bite of food, the wine made the cake much more creamy and it took away some of the fruit flavors that came from the cake's toppings. Instead, the wine greatly intensified the chocolate flavors of the cake. When I tried the wine after having a bite of the cake, I found that the wine's flavors and the chocolatey aftertaste of the cake blended really nicely with each other. Unlike drinking the wine before the cake, it lowered the amount of chocolate flavor I was able to pick up on. The fruit from the topping, especially the blueberries, was much more intense tasting after having a sip of the wine. Like the other two courses, this wine paired really nicely with the food and neither really overpowered the other. Drinking the wine after having some of the food brought out some really interesting notes from the wine and eating some of the food after the wine brought out some really nice flavors from the cake. They both complimented each other really well. My Girlfriend and I forgot to get pictures with the third course the night we had the dinner so we went back the following weekend and ordered the exact same things so we could get out photos so that's why the seating and outfit are slightly different. 

Figure 3: Me with the Third Course

Winery Visit Blog - Wilson Creek Winery

Winery Visit Blog - Wilson Creek Winery:

Figure 1: The Wilson Creek Clubhouse

    On March 8th, my girlfriend and I visited Wilson Creek Winery in Temecula, California for a private tour with the head winemaker, Gus. Since they were bottling at the winery that day, we had to wait until Gus was free to give us a tour. While we waited we stopped in the tasting room to start sampling some wines while we were there. We had enough time to taste two wines before Gus was ready to start our tour. We got ourselves some tasting cards and started looking over their tasting menu. One of the first wines that caught my eye was the white cabernet they had on the menu. It caught my eye because it was a white wine made from 100% Cabernet Sauvignon. On the nose, this wine had notes of strawberries and peaches along with some notes of melon. It was much different than I would have expected, even though it was a white made with Cabernet. On the palate, this wine was delicately sweet with more notes of peaches and some slight floral notes. 

Figure 2: The Wilson Creek Tasting Room

    The second wine I sampled before our tour was their Cabernet and Zinfandel blend. This wine was recommended by one of the employees in the tasting room, so I decided to try it out. On the nose, this wine was full of tobacco and pepper notes with some slight jammy notes that followed. On the palate, this wine was dry and tannic upfront with some notes that reminded me of pepper jam, and sweet tobacco. The jammy notes from the nose faded away on the palate. While we were doing our tasting, Gus let us know he was ready for the tour so we headed over to the bottling area to meet him. 

Figure 3: A Picture of Me With the Cab Zin

    We started our tour with Gus in the bottling area by talking about the machine they use to bottle the wine. It was a big assembly line-style machine that did everything from depositing the wine in the bottle to corking and foiling the wine. It was interesting to learn about all of the things that needed to be done to make sure the wine was bottled properly. One of the things that were really interesting to me was hearing about how they vacuum out the air from the bottles so there is minimal oxygen interaction with the wine. Before the tour, I wasn't sure if they just sealed the bottle with the cork and left some oxygen in or not, but it makes sense that they would vacuum out the air. We then saw where the corks and foils were added to the bottles and where they come out of the assembly line. After it came out of the assembly line, we got to see where all of the bottles come out of the bottling machine and get moved around on a conveyor belt where the people working in the bottling line move the bottles into cases. 

Figure 4: The Shipping Container They Bottle in

Figure 5: The Bottling Machine

    After we finished up in the bottling area, we moved outside to see the fermentation tanks they use for all of their wines. We got to look at tanks that they keep both inside and outside. The outside tanks were covered in what looked like some foam insulation to help modulate the temperature. The tanks themselves were tall stainless steel tanks with temperature control sleeves they can use to keep the wine at whatever temperature they want it to be at. We got to look inside one of these tanks and see some of the different valves they use to pump in and drain the wine. One of the interesting ones was that they have valves at two different heights so they can drain the skins separately from the wine. They had a few different locations of tanks to hold all of the wine they make and we got to see how the tanks themselves are cleaned. Gus had wanted to show us a tank that still needed to be cleaned up, but we weren't able to find a tank. He wanted to show us the tartaric acid that builds up on the sides of the tank, but he just showed us the cleaning system instead. Each of the tanks has a sprinkler-type thing on top of it that they use to spray out the tanks. After we finished talking about the wine tanks, we moved on to the barrel room to talk about some of the barrels they age their wine in.

 

Figure 6: The Outside Wine Tanks

Figure 7: The Inside Wine Tanks

    In the barrel room, Gus gave us the rundown of all the wines they age in there, mainly the reds they make and chardonnays. They don't age the other white wines they make at the winery, but they do age almost all of the reds. While we were in the barrel room, we also talked a little bit about the different barrels they use for aging, mainly the different wines they age in French Oak and American Oak. One of the things we spent quite a bit of time talking about was how much wine they would lose during the aging process. Gus talked about how they would open up the different barrels every three months or so to check on the wine and fill the barrels up. They would use other barrels of the same batch of wine to fill up other barrels to limit the amount of oxygen that gets to interact with the wine. After we spent some time in the barrel warehouse, we moved back outside to check out the vineyards. 

Figure 8: The First Wall of Barrels in the Storeroom

Figure 9: An Upclose View of a Syrah Barrel

    In the vineyards, we started talking about the vines and some of the daily upkeep they need for the vines. We started by talking about how old the vines were. We found out they were planted roughly 70 years ago. We talked about some of the water needs of each of the vines and the irrigation system they have in place. It was really surprising to hear that they use about 8 gallons of water each day just to keep one plant watered. That was really interesting to me because one of the first things I think of when I think of southern California, I think about the water drought that has been a big deal for the state. We also talked about some of the ways they keep insects off of the plants like using pesticides. Another one of interesting things Gus mentioned was that they have owl boxes dotted around the vineyard to keep some of the smaller birds and rodents away from the grapes. While we were talking in the vineyard, I asked about the equipment they use to crush the grapes right after harvest. Gus told us that the equipment was packed away by the side of the building and that they usually only bring it out when they have to process the grapes after they're harvested. He said that when the grapes are harvested, he will come in before the sun rises in the morning to make sure they get all the grapes processed before the sun has a chance to affect them. After the grapes are turned into juice, they get the juice is transferred to the vats for fermentation. After we were done in the vineyard, we finished up our tour and headed back to the main area of the winery. 

Figure 10: The View of the Vines from the Winery Clubhouse

Figure 11: An Owl Box Overlooking the Vines

    We finished up back in the tasting room before they were ready to close where I tried their Pinot Grigio. This was the first of the 2022 harvests that they had bottled and ready to taste. On the nose of this wine, I got notes of crisp apples and citrus followed by some light floral notes. There were some hints of honey at the end. On the palate, I got upfront floral notes that were followed by a dry apple finish. This wine was a nice low acidity wine to end our tour with. 

Figure 12: A Picture of Me with the Pinot Grigio

Tasting - Altisima Winery Muscat

 Name: Altisima Winery Muscat

Variety: 100% Muscat

Region: Temecula, California

Country: United States

Vintage Year: 2021

Price: $29.99

Winemaker Notes: This semi-sweet white is delicately refreshing with notes of cantaloupe, green tea, and honey with a soft elegant finish. 

Wine Folly Notes:

Muscat Blanc: pg. 138 - I definitely get the orange blossom notes and I can see the mandarin orange as well. There may be a hint of something I could see as honeysuckle, but it seems I can't say that I picked up on the lemons they mentioned, but this particular muscat does like the winery says, taste like freshly brewed green tea. 

My Review: Like the notes from the winemaker said, this wine smells like green tea, freshly brewed green tea. On the nose of this wine, there are pleasant aromas of green tea and ginseng along with some faint orange blossom aromas. There is also a hint of jasmine present. On the palate of this wine, the wine presents plenty of sweet notes right off the bat, with some acid following. The wine itself also has a nice rich mouthfeel to it. Just like on the nose, this wine tastes like fresh green tea with some orange blossom mixed in. It starts off tasting like green tea, morphs into orange blossom, and rounds back off as green tea again. Overall, this wine is an extremely interesting wine that brings forward flavors I would have not thought usually accompany wines. 

I did not sample this wine with any food. 

Tasting - Wilson Creek White Cabernet

  Name: Wilson Creek White Cabernet

Variety: 100% Cabernet Sauvignon

Region: Temecula, California

Country: United States

Vintage Year: Non-Vintage

Price: $29.99

Winemaker Notes: A Wilson Creek favorite! A true "white" wine that is slightly sweet with big aromas of strawberry, melon, and peach. Notes of red fruits and light florals make this wine incredibly refreshing. Serve slightly chilled and enjoy every sip.

Wine Folly Notes:

Cabernet Savignon: pg. 88 - Since this wine is usually made into a full-bodied red wine and this version was made into white wine, a lot of these notes don't really apply. Of the common notes for this wine, I could see some of the graphite notes coming through along with a slight dryness that could come from cedar, but it is hard to tell. The other fruit notes mentioned don't really come through. 

California Cabernet Savignon: pg. 288 - Like before I can pick out some of the notes like cedar and possibly some baking spices, but it is hard to tell since this is a white version of the wine. There are still some fruit notes in the wine, but they don't seem to be close to cherries or blackberries. 

My Review: This is a really interesting wine. The nose is full of tropical fruits, some apple notes, dry grape aromas, and some slight gravely aromas. This wine is an interesting take on cabernet sauvignon. There are also some floral elements I can detect on the nose, but I can't think of any specific florals. On the palate, this wine starts slightly dry with some gravely flavors. It then follows with some semi-sweet notes and a rich mouthfeel in the mid-palate. There are some slight tannins present in the wine, but nowhere near the levels, you would expect from a cabernet. The palate rounds off at the end with some baking spice notes and stone-like flavors. This wine gives an interesting new look at what can be done with one of the most popular grapes in the world. 

I did not sample this wine with any food. 

Wine Dinner Blog

 On March 3rd, 2023, my girlfriend and I took a trip to Zeppoli's Italian Restaurant in Blacksburg to do our three-course wine dinner. We started the night by looking over the wines they had available by the glass and trying to figure out which wines sounded like they would go with the food we were going to get. There weren't many wines available by the glass from this restaurant, they mostly sell wines by the glass or generic house wines. 

Our first course consisted of herbed ricotta spread on top of toasted bread and drizzled with honey. To go with this first course, we selected a 2021 white blend from Montebuena. By itself, this wine has notes of green apples and pineapple on the nose and has carried those apple notes over to the palate. The wine had a good deal of acidity. The wine also had a slightly dry finish. When we started sampling the food and sipping the wine after taking a bite of the food, the acidity from the wine was noticeably lighter, but the fruit notes on the palate were also diminished. Since the ricotta had honey on it, sampling the wine after the honey and ricotta made the wine seem much dryer than it was on its own. When sampling the food after taking a sip of the wine, it seemed that the dryer wine brought out the honey and really accentuated the creaminess of the ricotta. If I had to say one element or the other overpowered either, I would say that the honey and ricotta overpowered the wine due to the extreme sweetness of them together. This means that the food we ordered was far too sweet for the wine. 

The first course of our meal

A picture of me with our first course

For our second course, I got a pasta dish that had both chicken and shrimp together in a creamy tomato sauce. They called the dish shrimp and chicken rose. To go with our main dishes, we both got a glass of the 2019 Malbec from Ménage A Tois. On its own, this wine had plenty of fruit-forward notes on the nose and was slightly smoky and spicy on the palate. The notes I was able to pick out from the nose included sweet, ripe blackberries, jammed or stewed berries, and some slight hints of sweet tobacco. On the palate, this wine dropped the fruit notes in favor of notes of tobacco and light smokiness upfront. There were also plenty of tannic notes present. On the back of the palate, the fruity notes of the wine did carry through after the other upfront flavors had passed. When I sampled this wine after taking a bite of my food, the smoky tobacco notes were much more prevalent, while the fruit notes were much more muted than they were before. When I took a bite of food after sampling the wine, it was a similar story to what happened with the first course, the dryer nature of the wine brought out the creaminess of the sauce the pasta was tossed in. The sweetness levels of each of these pairings were pretty much balanced for this course. For this course, the wine and the dish paired nicely with one another; neither one overpowered the other. 

A picture of me with the second course

Our final course consisted of a chocolate mousse cup paired with a yes-way rose from Cotes de Provenance. The wine for this course had a nose full of strawberries, yellow apples, and pears. The fruit-forward notes from the menu led us to believe the wine would be sweeter than it ended up being. The palate had an immediate dryness to it with more apple flavors. The palate then morphed to have notes of cherries and grapefruits before coming to a dry finish. When I tried the food after taking a sip of the wine, it made the wine taste even drier. It amplified the tannins and buried the fruit flavors. The chocolate taste of the mousse that was left over was intensified, mainly the bitter chocolate flavors. When I sampled the food after taking a sip of the wine, it made the mousse taste like chocolate strawberries and amped up the sweetness of the dessert. In addition to the strawberry notes, there were some possible strawberry and cream notes. It seemed like the sweetness of the desert started to overpower the wine, but the fruit notes of the wine brought it back into balance. Tasting the wine before eating the dessert definitely made the food taste better, but the sweetness definitely overpowered the wine when I tried the wine after the food. 

A picture of me with our last course

A picture of my girlfriend with our first wine

Drink This Now - Lesson 2

 Drink This Now Lesson 2:

For this experiment, my girlfriend and I got a viognier and a zinfandel from California

White Wine Sinff-a-rama:

Shot Glass: I don't get many notes from the wine in the shot glass. I can smell a faint fruity/vegetal note, but I can't put my finger on it. There is maybe a slight grapey character, but it's really hard to tell. 

Rocks Glass: Right off the bat, I can smell more of the wine from this glass. I can now smell gravel or stone-like aromas coming from the wine with some vegetal notes backing it up. There isn't as much fruit from this glass as I was expecting. 

Water Glass: The fruit notes have now been turned up while the stoney notes have been turned down slightly. I think I can smell some ripe tropical fruits mixed with some green apples, but they are faint. Overall the wine is much less pungent in this glass. 

Flared Smaller Wine Glass: Now the aromas of the wine are striking a balance between the stone-like characteristics and the fruity characteristics I was finding before. The grapey smell from the shot glass is also brought back into the fold but is now supplemented with what seems like ripe pineapples. The stone is still toned down from the level it was at in the rocks glass, but it is still noticeably present. 

Flared Larger Wine Glass: With this glass, the pineapple notes now take center stage and the stone notes are right there to follow. With this new glass, since I can get more of the wine coating the sides of the glass, I can even pick up on how much acidity it seems like the wine has just from smelling it. 

White Wine Drinking Time:

Shot Glass: Upon giving this wine another sniff, I find myself having a hard time picking out any aromas from the wine after having sniffed the wine from the other glasses. Upon tasting it out of this glass, the wine itself tasted just like lemon juice mixed with water. I was able to pick up on the acidity of the wine, but not any of the other notes I was able to pick up on from sniffing the other glasses. 

Flared Smaller Wine Glass: On the nose the second time around, I am able to pick up on the pineapple notes I picked up the first time as well as the stone notes. Just like the shot glass, smelling this wine after the flared large wine glass seems to have slightly muted the nose from the first time I smelled from this glass. Upon tasting the wine, I am able to pick up on the acidity that I found in the shot glass instantly, but there is now more flavor mixed in with the lemon I was picking up on before. I'm able to pick out notes of green apples and stones. There may be some other vegetal notes present, but they are a little hard to pick out. 

Flared Larger Wine Glass: On the nose this time around, the stone aromas have taken center stage and are backed up by some vegetal notes that are somewhat musty. The ripe pineapple still comes out, but it has receded slightly. Upon tasting the wine, the acidity is still present but at levels that are much lower than any of the other glasses so far. In this glass, the wine has become much more savory The same lemon flavors from the previous glasses are still present, but you have to go searching to find them. After tasting it a couple times, the pineapple shows up again on the palate. 

Red Wine Siff-a-rama:

Shot Glass: When sniffing from the shot glass, much like for the white wine, there aren't many notes that I can easily pick out. I am able to smell some notes that smell vaguely of baking spices but there isn't much else I can pick up on. 

Rocks Glass: Upon sniffing the wine from this glass, I can narrow down the general baking spices I found in the shot glass to something along the lines of cinnamon. I can also pick up on some slight jammy notes that remind me of either blackberries or raspberries. 

Water Glass: Right off the bat when smelling this wine it is noticeably sweeter smelling than the rocks glass. From this glass, the wine smells like either a blackberry jelly or glaze. The cinnamon and baking spices are still slightly present, but the major smell I'm getting is the jammy fruit. 

Flared Smaller Wine Glass: When smelling the wine out of this glass, the fruit notes come out in full force again, but they are much less jammy this time. The sweetness is turned down but there are still some jammy notes present. The baking spices are back and more upfront than the water glass. 

Flared Larger Wine Glass: Out of this glass, the sweet and jammy characteristics are back more so than the raw blackberry smell. The cinnamon and baking spices are still present in this glass, but I think they've again taken a step back compared to the jammy smells. 

Red Wine Drinking Time:

Shot Glass: When smelling the wine from this again, there isn't anything new present on the nose. Upon tasting it from this glass, the wine is extremely tannic with some slight acidity. I am able to pick up on some fruit flavors, but it's hard to discern what kind of fruit I'm tasting. 

Flared Smaller Wine Glass: The nose of the wine from this glass is pretty much the same as before. There might be a hint of more acidity from the wine on the nose, but that could be a result of this wine following the shot glass in the tasting order. Upon tasting this wine, I am hit with a wave of tannins and some slight acidity. The fruity and jammy notes I found earlier in the nose don't seem to be as present on the palate. 

Flared Larger Wine Glass: On the nose, like before, sweet and jammy aromas are present. There may be a new hint of tannic aromas to the wine, but they are very slight. Upon tasting this wine from the large glass, the illusion of the sweet flavors disappears and I'm met with a tannic taste cushioned by some slight fruit flavors. Some slight acid follows all of these flavors out the door as they leave the palate. 

Warmed Red Experiment: Upon smelling the wine from the smaller flared glass it smells pretty much the same as it did before. I smell the slight jammy notes along with the overwhelming smell of fresh blackberries and baking spices. The newly warmed large wine glass still has some of the sweet notes that set it apart from the other glass, but it has a new focus on the baking spices with a slightly musty note that has come along. Upon giving it another smell, the wine has some more jammy notes present than before, but there is still a slight must note. When tasting the wine from the smaller flared glass, the notes remain identical. there is a wave of tannin followed by slight acid. There are slight fruit notes present, but they are not easily discernable. When tasting from the warmed-up large glass, the tannins are almost nonexistent. The lack of tannins allows the wine to open up and show off the fruit flavors that I was able to pick up on from the nose but not taste in the other glasses. There is still some acid present, but the wine's blackberry notes are able to shine. 

A picture of me warming my wine while deep in thought

Tasting - Southern Belle Jumilla Red Wine

 Name: Southern Belle Jumilla Red Wine

Variety: Monastrell and Syrah (percentages not listed)

Region: Murcia

Country: Spain

Vintage Year: 2020

Price: $20.95

Winemaker Notes: The very first bourbon-barrel-aged wine, this lucky Spanish red gets to spend its time in uber-popular and sought-after Van Winkle barrels. The subtle notes of the bourbon barrels harmoniously balance the wine's fruit and spice throughout a nuanced, silky finish. With a label designed by the famous James Jean, this bottle will make an impressive gift for wine connoisseurs. Medium deep opaque purple color with a dark red rim. Initial aromas of redolent of blackberry and blueberry with underlying hints of red fruits give way to pleasing complex elements of vanilla and toffee. Soft, big, yet elegant mouth feel, rich, full body, density, superb balance and grip, lead to long, long finish, carrying intense ripe fruit and complex flavors. Soft, supple, dramatic, sexy wine with a compelling yummy factor that screams “drink me.”

Wine Folly Notes:

Syrah: pg. 172 - I can smell notes of the plums and tobacco the most of any of these descriptors. The blueberries are also present on the nose, but they seem to take a step backward compared to the other notes listed. I can find hints of green peppercorn or something similarly spice-like. Since this wine is a bourbon barrel-aged wine, most of these notes give way to the dry oaky flavors, but the peppercorn notes stick around. 

Monastrell: pg. 133 - I can get the blackberry notes on the nose and some slight cocoa notes along with the tobacco mentioned above. I can't say that I found any of the roasted meats that they mention as common notes for these types of wines. The black pepper is there, but it is hard to distinguish from the green pepper mentioned for syrah. 

Southern Spain Monastrell: pg. 282 - I can smell the rich blueberry aromas they mentioned along with the subtle black pepper notes. I'm not sure if I can pick out the violet they mentioned. There are also subtle hints of smoke present. 

My Review: On the nose, this wine is full of rich dark fruit notes that remind me of stewed blueberries or blackberries, along with some light smoky, and peppery notes. I can smell a dryness from the wine I assume is in no small part due to the bourbon barrel that housed this wine. The rich dark notes give way to light and floral notes. On the palate, this wine is upfront with its dry oak-forward flavor profile. The oaky notes stick around on the palate before giving way to the dark fruit notes present at the back of the palate. This wine leaves off with a dry mouthfeel. 

I did not sample this wine with any food.