Merry Christmas, Happy New Year!

We're enjoying the lazy down-time in between the two holidays. Daryl is working half days, and the weather has been mild enough that the kids can get out to ride their bikes in the afternoons. We haven't done too much wine drinking lately, save for the usual glass at dinner.

Christmas dinner was excellent. We visited some friends, who prepared a wonderful feast. We drank sparkling wine from California--hand-carried from their trip to Napa. For dinner, we brought a Santa Barbara Chardonnay and a Pinot Noir. Good eating, good drinking, and wonderful company!

We opened a bottle of Garnacha (Grenache) from the Carinena region of Spain: 2002 Vino Tinto Castillo de Monseran. Very nice, and a great bargain at $8. We're enjoying it with dinner this week.

Daryl promised to pick up some Prosecco for New Year's Eve. Cheers!

Our Weekly Wrap-Up

What can we say? It's the holidays--busy, busy. Another round of The Crud is going through our house, too, which always puts a damper on wine tasting and other amusing activities. Kath is trying to come up with entertaining things for the kids to do over vacation that do not involve eight hours in front of the television, and Daryl is pushing through the final round of office Christmas parties (Chili cook-offs! Pizza buffets! Sugar, sugar and more sugar!).

We're still drinking our cheaper stuff. After Thanksgiving, our cellar is somewhat depleted; the remaining bottles are either too fancy for ordinary nights or possess some sort of sentimental value that prohibits their opening. We'll probably head to Trader Joe's this weekend to get another affordable case.

We opened a red table wine from our 2005 trip to Prince Edward Island. Ummm...not the greatest wine but not the worst. Very strong--grapey, peppery. One glass was enough, so it sits in our fridge for now. We also tried Kendall-Jackson 2002 Vintner's Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon. Now that is a good bottle! A well-crafted, delicious cab. Daryl picked this one up, and he's pretty sure he paid well under $20. Nice choice!

We've been asked to bring the wine for Christmas dinner: turkey and all the trimmings. We're unsure what to pick up: a Pinot Noir? Chardonnay (but not an oaky one)? That'll be something fun to look for in the next week.

Cheers!

Disappointed

We hate when we open a bad bottle! On Saturday, we were in the mood for a white, and we dug deep into the cellar to find a Pinot Grigio from Ohio. We had tried this back in June at the Ohio Wine Fest, and obviously enjoyed it, as we purchased a bottle.

The top of the cork was damp and discolored. Uh oh. We uncorked it, and the entire cork was discolored, moist and crumbling. It reeked of vinegar. Ugh.

The wine didn't smell bad, and we hoped that it had somehow survived. Nope. It was very, very acidic. That one went down the drain. Too bad--this was a wine from the Lake Erie region of the state, and we haven't seen it in local shops.

Last night we opened Nobilo 2005 Marlborough Savignon Blanc. As always, it was delightful--lots of citrus and peach.

We took a picture of the cork, as we had never seen one this bad. Don't know if its poor condition is obvious in the above shot.