2002 Moulin St. George

I drank this and wrote notes about it ages ago, but I was too lazy to look up the name of it (I find it hard to remember things in a language that I don’t know). My memory was sparked by seeing that Jeff had reviewed this wine.

This tasted like a very typical Bordeaux to my unrefined palate. It went very well with the steak that I had cooked with some spicy rub on it, so it could hold its own very well. It was very full bodied, but it was not super strong (my wife enjoyed it, and she cannot stand most of the Shiraz that I drink).

If I see this again I will get it. Maybe it will help me get more used to French wine.

2004 Heartland Director’s Cut Shiraz

Winery Page

This wine tastes sensational, full of sugar with a slight tannic edge and a great dark berry taste. I also detect notes of cedar in this one, but this might be left over chips of cedar from my hours in the garage building a planter out of cedar for my Habenero plant.

I did not realize until I scanned the blog that I have reviewed this wine once before. Certainly time away has treated it well, and it was as good as it was last time. Still full of sediment too.

This is the exact kind of win that I want more of. I will be sure to get the 2006 of this as well (I already have the 2005 stocked away too). It is interesting that I have not enjoyed some of the other Heartland wines quite so much, but the world don’t move to the beat of just one drum.

2002 Pretty Sally Cabernet Savignon

Winery Page

I found a good deal on this, and sometimes late at night I want a glass of cheap wine to get me sleepy.

This one has an interesting taste - bright and light without being too metallic. The winery claims that the tannins are well integrated, and I would agree with that. It is light on the alcohol, but does not beat you over the head with this lightness.

After about 30 minutes or so the wine is developing a deeper, sweeter taste. This is a 2002, so perhaps some air will do it good. The rest of the bottle is sitting in the wine fridge with a rubber stopper in it (picked those up in Walla Walla, and they do an awesome job). So I will consume this over the next week or so and see how it develops.

 

2004 Viotollo

Winery Page

Some of my favorite wines are Shiraz grown in Australia from small growers. These little boutique places tend to have interesting flavour and not be shy about making thick unfiltered goodness for me to put in my belly.

The Viotollo went great with the beef that I was cooking. There was a slight tannin structure that you could taste, but this was balanced with a dark, jammy goodness that I love so much. Balancing these flavours is tricky, but the hot climate in Australia seems to make this kind of effect easier to produce.

This bottle tasted fantastic, so I can remember that 3 - 4 years is a great time to drink this stuff. It made a good addition to the meat pies that I was cooking too. I just wish that I had more of this great little wine.

2003 Foggo Old Bush Vine Grenache

Winery Page

This was another random purchase, but one that has worked out quite well. This is a dark, rich grenache that is almost shiraz like in dryness and flavour. The balance of the wine is nigh on perfect, and the colour is a rich red. Unfortunately no purple hue to it, but you cannot have everything.

I am drinking this in anticipation of my experimental lamb loin recipe that is in the oven. If this succeeds then I might get my wife to publish the recipe on her web site some time.

2005 Portteus Zinfandel

Winery Page

You can also read a Review from Jeff for this one. We had a farewell dinner for him when he moved to San Francisco, and he brought this along to drink while we had lamb burgers at Lola.

This Zin had a nice strong flavour, and it went really well with the lamb burger. Zin goes well with lamb, it is true. What was interesting was that as the air got into this one you could really taste it transforming almost in real time. I was quite impressed with that.

I didn’t buy it, but as I recall the price was very reasonable. I recommend anybody who loves a Zin try this out.

2005 Ridge Zinfandel

One of my favorite California growers is Ridge. Their simple label designs are indicative of the simple, truthful wine that they produce. I have never had a bad wine from them, and they seem to be like the Penfolds of California to me.

The 2005 Ridge Zinfandel (I forget specifically which, which is a pity) had a very earthy flavour to it, and it was surprisingly translucent. I was expecting something darker. But it went very well with the lamb stir fry that I had with it. Very spicy overtones as well, which I quite liked.

As always, they did not fail to impress with this one. Next time I will remember specifically which Zin it is, if only to remind myself of this. It is a pity I did not visit Ridge when I was in Napa.

2004 Heartland Cabernet Sauvignon

Winery Page (2004 not listed here) 

After the success of the Shiraz, I was keen to try out the Cab Sav offering from the same folks.

I have to admit, I was expecting something a bit ‘bigger’. The big new world Cabs tend to have a lot of punch to them, and this one is far more subtle than that. Some people like subtle, and I can appreciate it in some forms, but the danger with being too subtle is that it is not memorable.

I will say that there were no astringent flavors to this wine, and it did not kick me in the head the next day. So it basically had no negatives, but no strong positives either. A wine like this is probably good for table wine at a dinner party, because it would not offend anybody and would go well with good food.

Maybe another year sitting in the fridge will help it out.

2004 Billi Billi Shiraz

I grabbed this on New Years eve to head to a low key party, and I wanted to bring something to sip and drink with some folks. I had some bottles of this stuff from Garagiste, and it seemed like a good opportunity to try it.

As it worked out, Jeff was already done with his drinking and nobody else was looking to get hammered, so I basically was the only one partaking. And as normally happens in these situations, I ended up finishing the bottle off myself (probably drank 3/4 of it). This is not a boast of some magical drinking prowess (most bottles I drink are equivalent to about a six pack, which is not much at all) but rather a setup for an interesting attribute of this wine - drinking the better part of a bottle of it will not yield you a hangover.

In terms of taste, it did have a slightly different (although not bad) flavor compared to other Shiraz that I normally drink. Definitely less ‘jammy’, which is great for some folks. Not sure how aging would affect this stuff, because the tannins were not over the top and it was not very sweet. At the price point I got it (about $15 or so) it is probably not heavily designed to be cellared anyway.

Overall, this is good table wine and not bad stuff to drink at a party. I like having a variety of stuff to drink now and then, and this stuff fits the bill well. 

Butterfly your meat

One of the best things about enjoying wine is finding fantastic food to enjoy with it. Living next door to Jeff & Ray really upped the ante for me in terms of eating and drinking. Sure, I always liked a good feed and a good drink, and I was starting to get into wine, but having two more guys into it as well to bounce ideas off of and have drunken discussions late into the night really made me try many new things. It also helps having a wife who is largely supportive of efforts to make awesome food and drink nice wine.

So recently for some reason I struck upon the idea of butterfly cutting a pork tenderloin into a flatter strip of meat and frying it like a steak. I live in Redmond, WA (basically a suburb of Seattle) and the weather here 75% of the time is depressing, rainy and overcast. Not condusive to grilling. So I have become very good at using a frying pan or oven to cook what I want.

The thing is that it is hard to char nicely in the oven for something like a pork tenderloin, and pan frying it is hard. But when you butterfly it open, you get yourself a nice, think, steak-shaped entity of mean that pan fries well. It also attracts more surface area for spices, which makes for more intense flavour.

So far I have tried this once with a pork tenderloin and twice with a top sirloin cap. Get a sharp knife (my new Shun Elite Santoku works great - thanks Kim!) and slice down the middle of the meat, stopping with the knife above the cutting board at the thickness you want the ’steak’ to be. With a thicker piece of meat you need to repeat on each side a few times until you get something thinner and wider than the original. Don’t worry about the peaks and troughs - this will work in your favour.

Put your rub on (I like the Tom Douglas rubs) with any other spices (like powdered garlic and onion) and rub it in. Now put in a stainless pan with some olive oil at medium heat, and cook until browned each side (normally about 5 minutes a side). Put in the oven at 500 to adjust for doneness.

I highly recommend making a pan sauce as well. After you take the meat out of the pan, add 1/2 a cup of red wine to the pan while it is still on the heat. The wine will help pull the stuff on the pan out and mix with it. Add some cream and simmer a little bit, and put into a bowl. Dipping the meat into this will be heaven. The 2004 Heartland Cab Sav made a great wine for a reduction sauce.