Saturday night we celebrated the (at last!) arrival of warmer temperatures by grilling some sockeye fillets and opening some white wines.
2012 Navarro Pinot Blanc What a sensational example of New World Pinot Blanc! It's got the floral aromatics that I expect with the variety, but also is loaded with white peach fruit in the midpalate and a lovely dry minerality to the finish. It had enough acid to pair well with food and kept the whole package light on the palate.2010 Cowan Cellars Isa Again I followed the winemaker's advice, serving it at cellar temperature after giving it a good decant. It still has that herbal quality to it that I find so fascinating, but now also an orange peel character to the aromatics. This time, we had it on its own without food and it still showed well, even to my two NZ SB-loving guests.
On Monday, we invited our friend Chris over to help her celebrate her
7th anniversary while her husband was out of town. We mesquite smoked some quails stuffed with a cornbread-venison sausage stuffing and opened a couple of different wines.2008 Dom. Duspaquier Vin de Savoie Gamay Much like the last bottle we had of this, but this time we consumed it with the quail and that combination brought out the fruit and made the wine seem more substantial. Another lovely wine from the boys at Selection Massale.
2010 Wind Gap Chardonnay "Yuen" Every bit as good as when we tried it at the winery, it had a lovely sense of fruit (lemon and quince), just a hint of butter and a freshness that comes from no new oak. Medium-light in weight, it went well with the grilled quail.Mark Lipton