Bringing Paris to the Valley

Silicon Valley is full of entrepreneurial spirit, and that means as much for our taste buds as it does for mobile, cloud, and i-things! Meet Josh, founder of Paris Wine Co., who tonight shared some unique boutique French wines.

Le Clos had indescribable mineral and earth tones, with an herbal quality that gave it a nice complexity. Pouilly-Fume Spring began with a sweet nectar bouquet, and surprised us with smoky and full mineral flavours. Saumur, in contrast, was stoney with a crispness displaying nice acidity - I imagine a perfect pairing with jumbo prawns and oysters. We also tried a unique Priorat, which Josh described as unique due to its more Burgundian earthy style. We tasted elegant barnyard ...

... if that makes any sense.

It's often unpredictable when flying flavours across the world - Josh carried the expression of these wines to Mountain View in true Silicon Valley style.

July Bordeaux tasting at K&L

Celebrating Summer Solstice!

There's something about Summer that makes everyone happy - full of energy! Grapes growing, flowers blooming, the sun is up longer. As the longest day of the year, my fiancée and I found the perfect wine - it was as bright and vibrant as the day - the Flowers 2007 Chardonnay. Its golden hues glimmered to the sunset, flavours of vanilla and honeysuckle lingered through light apricot tones. Super yummy with the ginger spiced button mushrooms, tandoori and tinga chicken and roasted sprouts. People admire flowers for their beauty, and life when it is bright, as with this wine, which reminds me of a really cool new cliché I came across today - whether the glass is half empty or half full, there is clearly more room for wine!

Dark Chocolate

After a glass of a rich red, and a nice full meal, I think the best finale to a dinner with red wine is dark chocolate. Every restaurant should have it on their list in some form or another!

the right time to open a bottle

Some wines are meant to be age, and then there are those that are excellent while young. We can be technical and analyze the tannins, structure and complexity, when in reality, a lot of wines are perfect at the time we decide to open them - because we and our company chose to have it at that moment.

With girls night tongiht, we had 2 bottles of Napa Cabs - a gourmet night of Tartine Country bread, spanakopita, French onion soup, Four barrels coffee rubbed steak, garlicky oven roasted asparagus, paired with our Flora Springs 2006 Cabs, and heavenly chocolate almond ganache raspberry tart. Contrasting flavours that balanced each other in harmony.

The Cabs were as sweet as we experienced in the winery tasting room, fun and lively! They continued to evolve through our 4 plus hour dinner, blossoming to richer flavours.

When do you open your wine? the question, we pondered this evening - and it really is - whenever we and our company are in the mood for that bottle that moment.

Drinking Local

Wine Wednesday at Google tonight was ZAP.

ZAP?

All I knew was that I was going to a Zin tasting, so I thought ZAP meant Zin-At-Play or Zinfully-Abundant-with-Pepper, you know, one of those fancy words they use to describe wine. I googled the word later, and found - (a) "to destroy"; (b) "a sudden event that makes a dramatic impact"; (c) "Zinfandel Advocate & Producers". I think it's (d) All of the above!

The best part about ZAP is that it's local - the vineyards, winemaker, people pouring at the event. That means we meet the people behind the wine. (I haven't met the Google founders yet, but Google's local, so I will someday!)

Here's are my notes of some highlights:


Ravenswood
This is a story of a man who reinvented himself - an immunology researcher turned winemaker, now the Godfather of Zin. Joel Peterson had a degree in microbiology and was off to find a cure to cancer, when he stumbled upon, could it be, the powerful Zinfandel! He began making wine in a little garage (don't all great ideas come from the garage! Google did too.) which has grown to become the industry leading winery.

Joel served 2 single vineyards, the Big Rock first - a Burgundian-like wine of earthy berry tones, and then Old Hill - characterized by Sonoma dark cherries and woody spice. The experience of these wines were more than the wines themselves - Joel's passion intensified the fire in these wines.

Ridge
My favourite wine by Ridge tonight was their Carmichael. It had just the right balance of rich dark berry, ripe plum, subtle cigar, well-rounded tannins, it was perfect.

Rock Wall
Jammy! That's what you'll find from this winery, both in their wine and personality! Rock Wall shared several varietals, all with their unique strong personalities. Rockpile (minerally), Monte Rosso (honey) Jesse's Vineyard (everything you can think of - voluptuous boysenberry, spice, porcini), just to name a few.

Robert Biale Vineyards
A family owned winery with Italian heritage, it's no coincidence that one of Biale's most notable wines is the Monte Rosso, a mountaintop vineyard with red earth. (Monte Rosso is also a mountain of Veneto, Italy.) I liked the Zin for its fine spice and earth properties that interlace with the berry-like fruit. It was a joy to meet Bob as well!

Google Vineyards
If only! Google's sampler of the evening, and the hit co-star to the wines, their Korean beef fall-off-the-bone short ribs! The most tender I've had to memory, and I went back for more wine just so I could have more ribs... or was it the other way around...

Malbec on Marvelous Monday!

Mah-velous! That's my new word for Mondays. Marvelous Monday! with exclamation mark to be precise, the fresh start of a week when we set our intentions for whatever we want to make happen during the week. Yes, it may be hard to wake up a bit earlier than on a Saturday/Sunday, and go through traffic (if you live in California), and perhaps face that boss or client of yours. At the same time, it's rewarding to dive into projects, refreshed from the weekend, and set the tone and dream big - what can I make happen today? What can I make happen this week? What do I want to create for next weekend?

This Marvelous Monday! I was inspired in my lil'finance role within a large silicon valley organization to connect everyone in the world through technology... and wine and food...

My bf and I landed this evening at Evvia, our favourite go-to spot, where we ordered their must have lamb, grilled artichoke skewers, and grilled whole branzino. For wine, Chris had a Spanish Temperanillo, Numanthaia Termes Toro 08, that was nicely structured, balanced, with dark fruit and warm spice tones. Since I've read so much about Malbecs lately, I opted for a glass. The wine label described it to be from the high altitudes of Argentina. For a young wine, it had a full expression of ripe plum, dried fig and tobacco. Very food friendly with our grilled dishes! Personally, I preferred the Temperanillo (Toro) (and so did Chris) for its deeper structure, but together, they were a palate adventure. This was a full Mah-velous Monday! with set intentions, delicious flavours, and happy spirits, all paving the way to the week ahead. Who knows what that may look like, we can just enjoy things the way they are!

J'ai mal... Malbec. Je m'ameliore

As much as I'm under the weather and thus feel that I shouldn't have any wine (does alcohol weaken the immune system?), I'm still very curious about wine. What wine can I discover today? Would the Vitamin C from the beverage more than compensate for the alcohol properties as my cure to recovery? Ok, maybe I'll just use my imagination tonight. :)

I saw a Wine Spectator (WS) article that featured Argentina's Malbec. Malbec! I've never thought much about Malbec except that it's a red and usually a full red. What's deeper? Accordingly to the WS, Paul Hobbs (famous Californian winemaker who consults for Argentinian wineries) describes Malbec to taste of boysenberry and blueberry with supple tannins. It seems to have been discovered as an Argentinian varietal while Hobbs was consulting for Catena winery to make Cabs and Chardonnay, when Hobbs came across some old vines and decided to experiment with them. He brought out the Malbec as a surprise during a press tasting and when it was well received, the seed was planted for the varietal!

Since I have the luxury, I decided to do a bit more research. Malbec is originally the dominant grape of Cahors in France. In Cahors, this wine was blended with Tannat, also a very tannic grape. I recall a Cahors wine I had years ago, which was a very full, inky, dark berry flavoured wine, and I had no idea that it was Malbec!

Malbec is also commonly blended in Bordeaux wines, where it would be <10% of the blend. The grape is blended in for its colour, texture, tannin and acidity.

So Malbec's roots are from France! It was brought to Argentina in the 1800's by a French agriculturalist, and was not given much attention until Catena and Hobbs came to play, and it has only recently taken more spotlight in wine glasses. (Of course, the boom, as WS describes it, is also attributed to the low cost of production due to Argentina's economic turmoil and resulting devaluation of the pesos, and the US market's growing demand for value priced high quality wine.)

What can I take away from all this learning? As quality has dramatically improved the past decade, Argentinian wines are excellent to try for a medium to full red with dark berry and plum flavours, some tobacco, maybe even some chocolate. Very approachable wines that can be tasted young, and pair well with meaty dishes and roasted root vegetables (sounds like a winter wine!). The appellation to try is that of Mendoza, the country's largest appellation.

Speaking of Argentina and food, I hear that the best pairing would be Asado - Slow roasted Argentinian beef. Argentinian beef is known to taste "beefier" than other beef, as they are grass-fed and free roaming. More to dream about. :D

I'm definitely on the road to recovery :)

2012

Happy 2012! I can't believe 5 full days have passed! I've felt so much anticipation for 2012 (since I knew it was going to be awesome) when all of a sudden... I caught a bug. How can all these exciting things around the world happen around me when I've just lost my voice and physical energy!

Feeling lost before I could even go anywhere, I started to think about what makes me feel alive, so as not to pass another minute thinking I'm doing something as mundane as "getting better".

I <3 Wine! (Did anybody not know that already?) Did you know that I <3 everything about wine? Everything from the taste, aromas, and feel, the gorgeous red or sparkling tones, to learning the history of wine, where different grapes originated, how wine has evolved, terroir, and everyone's favourite wine memories!

Something else I enjoy doing is to write. I like to think, to express, and to tell stories, hopefully ones that make you smile or make your life better or more insightful in some way.

so I've come to the conclusion, that part of the reason why this bug latched onto me was to make me come back to my wine blog!



Speaking of favourite wine memories, my latest is New Year's Eve 2011! I was in Vancouver celebrating with my family. My bro and I had given a very special bottle of wine to our Dad for Christmas, Pahlmeyer's Priorietary Red 2007. Yummm! Pahlmeyer has always been a favourite of mine, and this one is especially highly rated by the judges. 2007 was known to be a phenomenal year for Napa reds for the ideal growing conditions that year presented.

Fast forward to December 31st, 2011, my bro, bf and I had just finished yoga class with one of my favourite teachers. The theme of her class was to open up to what may be - every moment is new, every minute and every day is new, to open to what may come. At 6pm, we got to my dad's place and opened - the wine to decant. An hour later, we began our meal, and the wine had opened beautifully with everything!

My dad's au naturale grilled grass-fed ribeye steaks and homemade morel mushroom sauce went perfectly with the Proprietary Red that opened up to rich dark berries, cassis, and cocoa notes. "Cheers!" we happily clinked our glasses.

Our evening progressed to a buttery finish as we shared some Walkers biscuits and the famous Vancouver Notte's Bon Ton cake, that melted in our mouths for a sweet finish to 2011.

On second thought, this moment is perfect. I may be under the weather right now (and only temporarily so), but my 2012 is full, as my heart is open (as it will always be).