[Pigging by Wilfrid: April 14, 2008]
All over the place this month.
One inexpensive recommendation, and I'm not the first to make it, is Casa Castillo from Jumilla in southern Spain. It features the popular grape of the region, monastrell, and I just can't keep up with whether monastrell has been shown to be mourvèdre or not.
As almost everyone knows, Jumilla wines are hot-blooded and fruity, but some of them have character too - and when everyone does know the price will surely shoot up. Right now, the 2005 Casa Castillo can be found around town for ten or twelve bucks. It's a dark wine, meaty with black fruits and a smooth, medium finish. Much better than the price, and will be a good summer food wine.
I don't know when I last bought a bottle of pinotage. In fact, I'm hard pressed to remember the last time I bought a South African red. No reason - one simply can't drink everything. A few recent tastes led me to gamble on the Bon Cap from Robertson, which I subsequently noticed is an organic wine. (I bought the 2006 "Bon Cap" label; they also make a pinotage called "The Ruins".)
Prunes, maybe? Smoked bacon, certainly. Around $15, and I'd happily drink it with barbecue, smoked meats, pork belly.
A wine I now see on lists everywhere - Blue Hill Stone Barns, Eighty One (I think) - is the 1990 Chinon, Olga Raffault "Les Picasses". It's a wine built to last, although why there seems to be so much of the 1990 on the New York market I don't know. Flinty, mineral base but with a light, aromatic, fruit overlay. Hard to describe: structured, but at the same time light. Oh, go and try it, and pay up to $50 a bottle. PJ Wines up in Inwood should have it.
And since the sun is finally shining today, it's champagne time. Discovery Wines on Avenue A have added the Jean Lallement "Verzenay" Grand Cru to its selection of small champagne producers. It's imported by Skurnik, and it's enjoyable if not cheap. Sweetish fruit, apple cookies, but the acid to cut it. I think I paid rather more than for the Chartogne-Taillet - last summer's bubbly. Time for a side-by-side comparison, perhaps?
