Day Drinking Wine

The warm weather this past week inspired me to heed a recent suggestion that I review a greater variety of wines. So, whiners, here is some variety, and I'm not even mad about it. This week's wine is a 2010 bottle of Orvieto Classico. While studying abroad I went to Orvieto, an amazing hill-top town known for it's delicious white wine. Orvieto is a short train ride away from Rome and offers a great escape from the city heat. Life doesn't get much better than sitting outside in the shade, drinking cold white wine, and crushing a massive plate of linguini with white clam sauce. 

This particular bottle is made by an Italian company called "Ruffino." In Rome I used to buy bottles of this wine for 3-5 Euros and it made for some fantastic nights and brutal mornings. As you can guess, this wine is easy to drink. But if the wine is not chilled and served near room temperature you're in for a rude surprise. Absolutely disgusting. Along the same lines, if you open a bottle of this wine and stick it in the fridge for a few days the flavor is gone within 24 hours. 
 
That said, when served ice cold, this wine is not half bad. I am not a huge white wine person so maybe this bottle is "actually" pretty good. This wine has a DOC designation (governing grape varieties, permitted yields, alcohol levels, aging specifications, etc.) and is just a click below the highest designation, DOCG. For this bottle's price, taste, and the memories I associate with it....


Grade: 6/10
Cost: $11

Mystery Wine

This week's wine is bit of a mystery although I am in high spirits (no pun intended). The Apple Store replaced my sticky keyboard and track pad for FREE so my blogging fingers are in prime condition. It also feels like summer outside today, or what would be a typical Spring day in Italy.

Everything about this Merlot wine is elusive -- from the label to the website, there simply isn't any information. This is a bold statement to make, but not even a quick Google is able to track down this bottle. My conclusion is that this undiscovered wine could possibly be worth millions of dollars. Or it could be so bad that no one cares to mention it. I liked it, at least.

As the label states this wine is a Merlot. Merlot grapes are commonly used as a "blending grape" meaning that they are added to other grape varieties too enhance/modify flavor during the wine making process. Or you can drink Merlot as it comes, and that's what I think is going on here.

Also here, is my roommate, Raz. He's eating a plate of grilled chicken over a bed of lettuce and topped off with some humus. Sounds good right?

Back to the wine -- it is advertised as a "Montepulciano" that comes from Tuscany. And in fact, the wine maker's website lists their address just south of Florence, which is most certainly Tuscany.  Interestingly enough, though, the wine maker's website does not list this particular bottle as one of its' products. Are they ashamed? Did they forget about this bottle? What year was it made? Is this even wine? Who knows. But it was delicious.

Grade: 8/10

Price: $20

A Trip to Sardegna

Before starting every new blog post I quickly search Google for the wine I'm drinking. I do this to make sure I don't say anything totally off-base and end up sounding foolish. After all, you rely on my wine reviews. Normally I don't share the results of my search with you because they aren't in the editorial voice I use for this blog. And here, my fellow Whiners, is why:

"I grabbed this bottle made from the Cannonau grape thinking I was trying a "new grape" only to find out it is another name for the Garnacha or Grenache grape. Oh well, it was a decent wine made on the island of Sardinia. It pours like a Pinot Noir with a light--even pale cherry hue but it doesn't smell like Pinot at all. This wine is serious with a heavy bouquet of herbal, and dark ripe berries and plums. In the mouth it is lively with pepper and hints of spice with lively tannins."  

I won't source this quote out of respect for the fellow wine blogger who wrote it, even though a Google search will land you directly on his blog. Just saying. Anyways, the portion of this quote in boldface is exactly why this blog is called "Whining in the Bronx." And so tonight we do in fact have a bottle of wine made form the Cannonau grape and it is awesome.

I have never had a bottle of wine made form the Cannonau grape, nevertheless a bottle from the Italian island of Sardinia. So I did a little research on this bottle and am happy I did -- I know only two things about Sardinia: it is supposedly one of the most beautiful places on Earth, and the island is riddled with criminals hiding from the law (historically, if you're kidnapped in Italy you'll probably end up in Sardinia). Now back to the wine. This bottle is a regional DOC that covers the entire island. The Cannonau grape is simply a Sardinian name for France's Grenache grape and Spain's Garnacha. Same grape, different names.

This bottle is designated "Riserva" which means that the wine is guaranteed to have a minimum alcoholic strength of 13%. And considering this bottle cost about $11, you get 1% of alcoholic content per volume for every $1 you spend. Like that math? Don't expect more. 

  

Name: Cannonau Di Sardegna

Price: $11

Rating: 8/10

Local Flavor -- Dominick's Merlot

This week's wine is local - sort of. I bought this big bottle of Dominick's Merlot from Mt. Carmel Wines (...as always). As the name and label suggests this is Dominick's DOC house wine. House wines with a DOC designation are rather low on the an Italian wine scale but that's not to say that house wine is bad. House wines are produced from the variety of grape local to the "house." This could be a restaurant's "house" or an actual family home. So depending on where the "house" is located, the wine can actually be very good. It's like the difference between BBQ in Texas and BBQ in Minnesota; it just depends on where you are.

Massive bottle of Dominick's wine

The result is usually a young (new) wine that is very drinkable and served in copious amounts. Hence this big (and cheap) bottle from Dominick's. The variety of grape used here is "Piave Merlot" and probably one of the more confusing wine names. "Piave" is a DOC wine of the Veneto Region, located in Northeast Italy. To give you an idea, Venice is in the Veneto region.

My Grade: 8/10

Price: $10

After reading Steph's blog I figured that it would be appropriate for me to mention that I intern at AOL video, a floor up from Steph and the Brand Marketing Team. It's funny -- my internship consists of advising websites and blogs on how to integrate video onto their site to enhance user engagement and monetize video/page views -- but I haven't embedded any video on my own blog yet!

So, here is a video from the AOL library with instructions on how to open a bottle of wine. The guy in the video is pretty lame, I know. Maybe I'll pull intern rank and talk to someone about getting better wine videos. If anyone wants to pull video from the AOL library it's incredibly easy -- just ask me! And hey, if your blog somehow records a few million page views a month, maybe I'll be talking to you from my desk in the office about monetizing your blog.

*Disclaimer: my boss would fire me on the spot if he saw how low below the fold this video is. Ideally, videos should be placed above the fold to increase engagement. But I'm pulling editorial rank here. 

Back to France

Although I stated early on that I would stick mostly to Italian wines, I am not doing a great job. But I have a great excuse this week -- I went to a BYOB French Bistro this weekend called La Sirene. The place holds about 25 people and serves amazing French-American food. No, I wasn't there with my roommates, although they wanted to go pretty badly. My girlfriend was back in town. I'm starting to see a correlation between the wine I drink and the company I keep.

Now on to the wine: Chateau Ste. Michelle Merlot from 2008. My girlfriend Chloe took this picture at the restaurant and you can still see the label pretty clearly. After a few bottles of red wine, dinner, and dessert, nothing was very clear. But this is a good picture nonetheless and brings me to a good point: always take a quick picture of a bottle you like. Chances are you will not remember the name, and shopping by label is incredibly easy.

The wine maker says that they "craft this wine to be [their] complex yet approachable Merlot. The wine offers aromas of black cherry, leather and spice with layers of rich dark red fruit flavors. A touch of Syrah adds a jammy fruit character." Another hilarious description of wine.

Here's what you need to know about this wine: it is made from primarily Merlot grapes in Washington State (not exactly France), has a solid 13.5% alcohol content, and is a very "approachable" wine. Most complaints that people have about red wine (bitterness, sweetness, intensity, price, etc.) cannot possibly be claimed about this wine. As a result, this Merlot is very drinkable, but lacks any distinguishing factors separating it from other Merlot wines. Even so, it is a great wine at a great price. And it's Frenchy.

Cost: $15 

Paul's grade: 8/10

Perfect 10

This week's wine is a 2008 Cantina Zaccagnini Il Vino Dal Tralcetto Montepulciano D'Abruzzo. Super fancy name for a super cheap wine (only $16 bucks!).  This bottle of wine is probably my favorite of all time because it is cheap, has an amazing taste, and is a legitimate Italian wine.

Montepulciano D'Abruzzo is, as the name implies, is made from Montepulciano grapes in the Abruzzo region of Italy. The region is designated DOC, which means that the wine's grapes are limited to a rather specific region within Italy -- and this region happens to be awesome. The land is mostly clay and benefits from salty breezes coming off of the Adriatic Sea. These aspects of the region result in a mildly salty wine that leaves your mouth with a slightly acidic taste. One caveat, though: a Montepulciano D'Abruzzo can contain up to 15% Sangiovese grapes and still bear the DOC designation. 

When I first bought this wine from Mt. Carmel the owner of the store told me that people have been buying this wine by the CASE. I was a little surprised by this at first -- there are certainly other "legitimate" wines from the region that are highly regarded. But one sip of this wine and it's easy to see why people are buying it by the case. Clearly I enjoyed it...the bottle is empty.  

Name: 2008 Cantina Zaccagnini Il Vino Dal Tralcetto Montepulciano D'Abruzzo 

Paul's Rating: 10/10

Cost: $16

   

White Wine Wildcard

This week’s wine is a Kendall Jackson Vintner’s Reserve from 2009. I normally like to focus on Italian wines but this white Chardonnay is pretty dope and goes well with pizza. And…my girlfriend was in town and she prefers white wine so there you go.

I don’t know a ton about this wine or it’s production. But I do know that Chardonnay is a green-skinned grape and originated in France. The grape can be grown in California, though, which is where this particular wine comes from. The wine maker claims that the wine is made in “small oak barrels” handcrafted by the goddess of wine but considering this wine’s popularity, availability, and otherwise non-distinguishing characteristics, I picture this Chardonnay being made in giant metal vats.

But hey – it tastes good, is very drinkable, and doesn’t feel heavy in your stomach.

Paul’s grade: 8/10

Girlfriend’s grade: 9/10

Cost: $16 from Mt. Carmel