Wannabe Wino

I've discovered the flaw in hosting a holiday meal when there are only two people who live in the house regularly: leftovers that never end. I did not notice this when I was a kid, for a few reasons. One, my family all lives in the same area of the same state and thus the host usually ends up only making the main meat dish and maybe a few small things. The cousins, aunts, grammas, etc., bring everything else. And when they leave, they clearly want to take their dish home, so they take it with whatever leftovers are in it. Two, there were 4 people to eat the leftovers. And finally, my mother clearly knew better than I how much turkey any given group could eat at a time.

That said, we still have a ton of leftovers. We've eaten turkey almost every night since Thanksgiving and had it in sandwiches for lunch. We're turkeyed out. However, not one to want to waste anything, I made turkey soup out of the rest of the turkey.

And that's what I paired with a Bottle of Hanna Winery Bismark Moutain Vineyard 2000 Noir. We picked this bottle up for $30 at Hanna when we were out in Sonoma. Cork closure, 14.5% alcohol by volume, this wine is a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Merlot and Petit Verdot.

I actually remembered to decant this bottle, and I had it out for about 40 minutes before drinking the first glass. I'm really glad I decanted it. I could still smell alcohol on the nose even after that time. So I put my glass to the side and let it air a bit more. When I went back to it, the alcohol scent was gone and I got cherries, herbs and spices. However, this was by no means a big fruity wine. It was also not sweet, it weighs in at 0.03% residual sugar. It was smooth in the mouth, with a long lasting finish, but the finish was not as smooth as I would have liked. This usually retails for $50.00 a bottle, but was on sale for $30.00 the day we bought it. We have another bottle and I will keep that around for a while. I think the finish should mellow with a little more aging.