Wine & Cheese Reception
Riesling [pic] – Hard to remember exactly which one this was (twas the first of the evening after all, I’ll try to ask tomorrow [confirmed, regular Riesling]) I think it was of the semi-dry / semi-sweet variety as I don’t recall it having the harsh flavor and finish that a dry Riesling does but I also don’t remember it being super sweet either (and there are plenty of those around here, yeay me). Given the discussions about having it with Thanksgiving dinner I’d say it was your fairly standard middle-of-the-road Riesling if not a bit on the sweet side of the fence.
Pinot Grigio [pic] – No. Although I’ve pretty much never been a fan of any Pinot ever, so there ya go.
Cabernet Sauvignon [pic] – I liked this one a lot, although others didn’t seem to nearly as much. Was definitely well representative of the Bordeaux style. Was supposed to be “dry” and to a certain degree it was, but for a Cab Sauv no where near the levels of dryness I’ve experienced in the past. Oak added interesting characteristics; was difficult to determine the type of oak, which on a later tour they revealed they reuse the (mostly American Oak with some French Oak) Port barrels for their other reds which would explain it.
Cabernet Franc [pic] – This one went over quite well with everyone, and was the server’s favorite, although I think I liked the other Cab better actually. Lately I’ve really been favoring the more complex reds. This one was smoother especially on the finish. I didn’t experience the supposed very quick finish but that’s ok as I prefer my reds to stick around for a little while. Same oak characteristics, but perhaps slightly more subdued.
Tasting Flights
Before starting these we ordered: Italian Meat & Cheese Plate – Assorted Italian meats, domestic and imported cheeses. I was able to take tasting notes at the time for these (for all the others I threw together a blog draft at the end of the evening)
Texas Hold ‘Em White [pic] – Ok, not impressed. Had the typical Chardonnay “bite” and had some pseudo-Grigio type flavors going on. Cool, I’m definitely getting some good experience under my belt to pull from; now that I’ve looked at the label I was pretty much right on with my guess as to what was in it and the ratios. And the 5% Gewurzt explains the extra slight bit of spiciness it had.
Mama Rosa Rosé [pic] -Just had to try this due to the name. Figured it would be your typical rosé and it pretty much was. Basically had your standard White Zinfandel type flavor. Nothing too remarkable.
Sweet Chardonnay – This one was interesting and I really wanted to try it and I’m glad I did. It was very similar to a late harvest Riesling but it had the distinct Chardonnay flavors. Thankfully there wasn’t too much of that “bite” like in the Texas Hold ‘Em, but still enough of a different flavor to make it though the sweetness and certainly identify itself as a unique product.
Ebony Ports of Call [pic] -Now this I’ve had before and have always loved it. A bottle does not last very long at all in my house. I think I’ve even made it through some in the past and other folks didn’t even get a chance to try it 
Simply awesome.
2005 Paulo Shiraz [pic] – I was very interested to see how the Paulo treatment would affect a shiraz. I’m still trying to think of a good way to describe the unique flavor this possessed. I’m rather familiar with Shiraz after many a Friday Night Fights with them, but this definitely stood out as something different, and for me that wasn’t necessarily a good thing. I suppose perhaps it could be that their style and my tastes differ that much, or perhaps I was in a much sweeter state of mind, but I just wasn’t fully feeling this one. Or it simply could have been the alcohol content, it was a 13.5% Not way off the charts by any means, but certainly not an eight or nine either. Maybe the closest thing to describing that flavor would be “minerality” but not like any previous minerality experiences I’ve had, this had more of an earthyness to it.
Private Reserve Reflections – Similar to the Shiraz, but since this is actually a blend of three other reds (and no shiraz at all) it had a flavor all to its own of course. But primarily I’m referring to the reappearance of the unique minerality/earthy flavor. Although in this one it’s much more subdued. I think due to the lesser “mystery flavor” I enjoyed it more than the Shiraz but I still didn’t think I’d be getting any for dinner like I was thinking before I tried it.
2004 Tawny Port [pic] – Ah the Tawny. I’ve been meaning to try this one for a long time now. I try not to fall victim to gratuitous marketing practices but that stained-glass (printed) label has taunted me from the shelf many a time. So finally I got to try some and what I came up with was “you know that slightly burnt crust that forms at the edge of a freshly baked cherry cobbler, yeah it’s like that” but totally in a good way 
This had a good level of sweetness to it too. Starting to approach almost too much but still safely under the threshold, just how I like it.
Solera Sherry [pic] -Take the Tawny and bump it up yet another notch. The server wasn’t kidding when he said “if you like the Tawny you’ll definitely like this.” This had a very strong “burnt cherry cobbler” taste (still in a good way) and a very strong dark cherry finish. I found that taking small sips really allowed the finish to take its full effect. At the time I wrote down “very fortified” (which was my shorthand way of saying you could definitely sense the high alcohol content and very bold flavors), but get this, they actually don’t add any Brandy or other spirits to any of their Ports or other “fortified” style wines. Due to their use of 100% locally grown Lenoir grapes (I got to stand amongst them) this allows them to achieve a 26° Brix at harvest and still have 10% residual sugar left over at the end! And then of course there is the whole 18% alcohol thing
Trick Or Treat
Barrel Reserve Shiraz [pic] (paired with carmelized onion goat cheese tartlet) – This was pretty good, didn’t seem to have the “funky” flavors that the earlier ones from the flights had. I really need to figure out what’s up with that as I still don’t believe it’s solely due just to alcohol content alone. I was a bit wary of this edible as me and goat cheese don’t tend to get along very well, it’s the bitterness that is always off-putting. For the majority of the time this was actually ok, especially since the pastry it was contained within was somewhat “spank-o-pita” (the greek spinach thing, I just like calling it that) in nature. I forgot about the onions initially and then ended up pulling out a long strand, that was funny. But of course once I got towards the middle the cheese ratio really picked up and there were a couple bites I had to struggle through; but just getting a bit more pastry shell with those bites worked ok.
Merrill’s Vineyard Angel [pic] [actual product] (paired with skewered candied apple slice) – As expected this was a very sweet adventure, and I quite enjoyed it. Also as expected there were those who couldn’t quite handle it. If it was starting to get into the sweet overload range for me then that’s gunna happen for some folks. I’m now even more intrigued by exactly what the difference is between Merrill’s products and all the regular stuff. I hope to do some further research on this tomorrow as well (basically just seems to be where it’s produced, one vineyard or the other; and the soil/altitude/weather differences tend to make one better than the other for certain varietals).
Papa Paulo Port [pic] (paired with Papa Paulo Port truffle s’mores) – AWESOME, I was really looking forward to this. The only thing I was a bit worried about is the always ambiguous use of the word ‘truffle’, especially so when dealing with both chocolate and a somewhat gourmet environment. I didn’t detect any strange flavors so I’m gunna call this one as just straight-up chocolate, particularly since there was basically no explanation about the chocolate part of the do-it-mostly-yourself smores (they had to roast the marshmallows for you, oh noes fire!) other than the fact that it was an available component. The port itself was very good as always, and of course since it’s very detectibly used in the chocolate they went quite well together. Oh, and did I mention I won the random drawing for a bottle of this stuff? Heck yeah I did; I’ll try to post a picture of the hand-signed bottle with custom Trick Or Treat label later.
BEHOLD!
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Posted by TheWierdingWay 
