Humphrey Wine Club

Upon reflection, it still is pretty rough, but we see a grand future for it...  We kind of feel we just go a mouthful of tannins, but as it got a little more air after sitting on the table for awhile they softened a bit, certainly enough to give some clues as to what's underneath.  We're pretty certain we found cherries in there and probably the same on the nose.  We really think this would benefit from spending some time in the back of the cellar, probably closer to 5 years.  We don't really cellar for posterity, but we may tuck one of these away, especially since it's the first time (we're pretty certain, anyway) that we've had an Aglianico.

We did pair it up with a beef dinner A Daring Kitchen Article, and would do so again in 5 years time, we expect.

This also helped us on our quest A Century Project Qualifying Grape to join the Wine Century Club The Century Project Introduction.

We cracked this open to share with a Moo Shu A Daring Kitchen Article dish and although we enjoyed the wine, probably not the best match up we could have found - perhaps a slower cooked big hunk of pork better.

A really big nose straight off the bat (we kind of want to say earthy, but that's perhaps not quite right - what's earthy, but not so earthy?), but that mellowed the longer the cork was out of the bottle.  Really well balanced, smooth even, with no change from start to finish in the mouth.  A bit of those sweeter spices going on, cinnamon or clove, but not a lot.

If you really want a good Bordeaux this probably will get you there, but if you just want a good wine you'll definitely be happy with this.

We brought this out for one of our Daring Kitchen challenges - chicken consommé A Daring Kitchen Article - and we think it worked out ok.  There's a slight sweetness that sort of offset the slight heat from the chilli.

There's a bit of crispness to the finish as the sweetness fades.  Pale in color it looks like something we'd enjoy in the sun on the deck, but it's a bit more than that with a flowery nose, the sweet and the crisp.  Consommé probably not the best match ever, but good enough to suggest a chicken dish should work. But the sweet / heat match also suggests something Thai, perhaps?

Fairly light in color, perhaps a bit greenish if you look really hard. A sort of toast nose at first look that got a little stronger as it warmed up.  Buttery from start to finish but with a nice amount of acidity up front.  There's fruit in there, but that buttery texture is what stands out.

Gone before we knew it strongly suggests it agrees with both our palettes!

In looking for something to pair up with our Curry A Daring Kitchen Article dish we were stumped.  We found a couple of good maybes, but alas they'd already been enjoyed.  We admit this was wishful thinking from a pairing point of view, but we were expecting something new and fun.

They call the grape Aragonez, but as far as I can tell it's a Tempranillo.  We've had a couple of those lately(ish), but not through the club. 

There's also a good bit of Syrah in there which probably explains the gentle tannins that sort of kind of hang around for the whole mouthful.  Other than that, it's a pretty gentle wine, perhaps even a quaffing rather than with a meal wine?  Ultimately, it didn't upset our dinner although I don't think I can say it improved it.

Definitely citrus right at the front, but it mellowed as the wine warmed a bit perhaps more melony flavors coming through.

It would not be hard to grab another bottle and sit out in the sun, perhaps with some chips and dip!

Our currently only Rosé (well, not anymore) in the 'cellar' joined us for dinner at Bonsoirée A Date Night Article.

Is it fair to be scared of Rosés?  Probably not.  Are we?  Yeah, a little.  Even though we enjoyed this it would be hard for us to grab a bottle off the shelf without the 'coaching' of our Nice Wine Man.  And he did a great job!

Made from grapes you would normally expect big things from it might be hard to place this bottle in the fridge prior to consumption.  We probably prefered it more while at its coolest, but certainly didn't not like it at its warmest - we nearly always decline the wine bucket to give the wine a chance to show some changes (sometimes this backfires a little...).

We still saw the full fruit flavors of it's warmer cousins but in a more mellow fashion and from a much much much paler wine.  It's kind of fun to get the tannins come across in a chilled, almost pink lemonade colored wine. We ate our non-meat courses with this wine and think we made the right decision.

We were challenged with 'whipping up' a Cassoulet A Daring Kitchen Article.  Long before (like weeks) we were at the eating part of the project we thought we should pull something from our French collection.  This one won based on tasting notes suggesting it plays nice with duck confit (one of the many components to this dish).  We have nothing to complain about.

A quite rich wine, deep purple in color and a good bit of acid hanging around.  It didn't change much from start to finish with blackberry, perhaps, being the fruit flavor most prominent to us.  A dish that is high on the total fat content scale (which probably helps make it taste so yummy!) probably needs a bigger, tougher sort of wine.  Château Rose is not super big, but the acid helps out a bit with the fattiness. 

It would be interesting to try this with something a little (lot?) less fatty, but even though it would still be a nice drop it probably won't pair up quite as nicely as with our Cassoulet.