Wannabe Wino

Our fearless leader Lenn of Lenndevours has posted the round-up for WBW #48 Back to Your Roots. You can see the participant list here. Looks like just about 40 participants after Lenn adds the folk who have commented! I have to click through a few more posts, but I've read most of them! It's highly entertaining to see where everyone began their journey with wine, and it appears I wasn't the only one sucking down blue bottles of Schmitt Sohne Riesling!

Thanks for hosting Lenn, and as always, stay tuned, I'll let you know when the theme for next month is up!

Happy Birthday to you! Happy Birthday to you! Happy Birthday dear WBW, happy birthday to you! Today marks the 48th WBW, and thus the 4th birthday of the monthly wine blogging event created by Lenn of Lenndevours. Fittingly, Lenn is hosting this 48th edition of his brainchild and has chosen the theme "Back to your roots." By this, he meant to go back to when you first started drinking wine and pick up one of your first bottles again to re-taste now.

I thought about it, but I didn't want to. Like many others, my journey with alcohol in general started with the bottom of the barrel (no pun intended). I drank free beer (Natty Ice and Milwaukee's Best anyone), wine in a box (Dr. Franz, as we affectionately called it, was a good friend), and vodka out of a $7 handle (mmm, Granite State and Zhenka). I have no desire to go back to any of that, it was foul when I drank it then. So I thought a little longer, and contemplated going back to the first bottle of wine that made me turn away from whatever came in a big format bottle or a cheap box. And that was a bottle of 1999 Schmitt Sohne Riesling. It cost about $5-$6 a bottle at the time, and one of my very dear friends showed up with a case of it one day.

I'd never had a Riesling. I didn't know what Riesling was. But I knew I loved it. And from that day on, I bought wine for the sake of trying new things. I stocked my college mini fridge with random bottles that I picked up at the state-controlled liquor store and went for flights of wine with my friends at the one restaurant with a decent wine selection in town. I stayed mostly in the white wine arena for a while, like many new wine lovers, as it seemed an easier transition and red wine scared me a bit. Now, I also didn't want to go back and drink the Schmitt Sohne again. I've had it fairly recently. Maybe it's me or maybe it's the wine, but it's not what I remember.

Instead, I decided to to search my local stores for a bargain Riesling and go back to the grape and country that started my affair with wine. In that vein, I managed to located a bottle of Lucashof 2007 Pfalz Riesling from Germany. I picked it up at Grape and Bean, a new, to me, wine shop in Old Town Alexandria for $14.50, it clocked in at 11% alcohol by volume, and had a real cork closure.

Surprisingly, I don't drink much Riesling anymore. It could be because I get most of my wine from California and not many CA producers grow Riesling, or it could be because I drink a lot more red wine now than I used to, or it could just be that the stores I frequent don't carry a lot of Riesling (very true, my first shop didn't have a single bottle and the 2nd stop had 3.) But I really should, because each time I open a bottle of Riesling, I'm reminded of why I began to love wine.

The Lucashof showed honey, stone, apricots, lemon, and a beautiful flowery citrus on the nose. I could, as is the case with several wines I've consumed recently, almost smell the acidity, the structure that was going to be in the glass. In the mouth, more honey, peach, lemon, citrus, honey suckle, very dry fruit. It was delightfully light, and almost sprightly in the mouth. It brought back memories of the intrigue I found in my first glass of Riesling, a promise of how good wine could be.

Though of course, part of the experience in drinking my first Riesling was the company in which I drank it. I remember all those days fondly with my best friends from college, lazy days with no responsibility and the only pressing question of the day being what we would do that night. And really, that's what wine and Riesling are to me, a great memory, evoked with every glass. For this WBW, it didn't matter what Riesling I chose, or whether or not it was excellent, good, or just passable, it was the act of pulling out a bottle of Riesling and drinking it with good company, these days, my wonderful husband.

Many thanks to Lenn for the excellent theme, and for keeping WBW going all these years. I look forward to many more years of participating and I am excited to read what others chose for their wine.

Our founder and fearless WBW leader will be hosting WBW on this, the 4th birthday of WBW. Lenn started what can only be described as a phenomenon in the wine blogging world.

This month, Lenn has chosen the theme "Back to Your Roots." He's asking us to choose a wine from the beginning of our wine journey and taste it again. Perhaps even your first bottle of wine. You can read all the details here, and make sure to send Lenn your entry by August 13.

My first bottle of wine? No thanks. I drank junk in college. Stuff that came in a box, and not an even remotely ok wine in a box, gross wine in a box. Or giant bottles of whatever was the absolute rock-bottomed priced wine. However, the first wine that ever made me sit up and take notice was a 1999 Schmitt Sohne Riesling Auslese. At the time, I thought it was great and an excellent value...I could afford it on a college student budget. I drank it by the case for years. And then they seemed to stop making it and I was left with the Kabinett, which, truth be told, is not great. I don't want to go back and drink that, although it was fine until about the 2002 vintage.

So I'm going to have to put a little more thought into this assignment.

I have to admit, Wine Blogging Wednesday almost slipped my mind this month. With the holiday weekend here in the US and being on vacation last week for it, my thoughts were elsewhere. As we were driving home from work last night I was talking about how I needed to drink a sample wine I had received a few weeks ago and I was making plans for that when it suddenly occurred to me that WBW was here!

This month, our hosts of the nearly 4 year old (wow, congrats Lenn on starting such a wine blog phenomenon) WBW are Erin and Michelle of Grape Juice. They have picked a very different theme, which has pretty much given us free reign on what to drink, so long as it relates to the letter "S." The theme is "Brought to you by the letter "S."" That sorta makes me want to start singing "C is for cookie and that's good enough for me!"

For this one again, yay!, I was able to dive back into my own wine collection (phew, helps with the wine budget) to get a wine that was easily suitable for this theme.

I chose the 2005 Sonoma County Sky Saddle Syrah. Is that enough esses for you? :) I purchased this wine from WineQ for $25.99 (free shipping cause I spent more than $35), it had a real cork closure, and clocked in at 15.2% alcohol by volume. Sky Saddle is a completely organic and/or biodynamic winery and also uses oak barrels from a sustainable forest. I've had their Zinfandel before and had nothing but raves for it, so I was very excited to try more of what they had to offer.

My first note on this wine is that it needs to be decanted. On first pour/taste, the wine was tight and it definitely needed some time to aerate. Now, an hour or so later, the wine had opened beautifully.

The nose showed berries, plums, spice, red fruit, earth, oak, cream, violets, and white pepper. It was quite a nose once it was allowed to open up. Full of aroma and layer after layer of different scents. I'm sure if I kept sniffing it I would have gotten more, but as usual when I have my nose buried in a glass, Matt was almost through his 2nd glass and I haven't even tasted mine yet.

In the mouth I found tart red raspberries, zingy blackberries, plums, other red fruits, earth, vanilla, berries and cream, pepper. The wine was still a bit tight and tannic. This one could definitely hang out for several more years in my cellar, or else, decant for at least 2 hours before you serve it.

Overall, another great offering from Sky Saddle. I look forward to trying the Cabernet Sauvignon I have hanging around!

Many thanks to Michelle and Erin for the theme and for hosting this month!

I've been remiss in letting you know that Dr. Debs of Good Wine Under $20 has posted her round up of White Wine Varietals from WBW #46. You can check out all the details here, but the quick breakdown was that 43 bloggers participated and nearly everyone liked their wine. So get out there and try some Rhone whites for the summer!


Second, the next WBW has been announced! Our hosts this month are Erin and Michelle of Grape Juice and they have chose the theme "Brought to you by the letter "S."" By that they want you to choose any wine in the world directly associated with the letter "S." So choose a South African Sauvignon Blanc, or a Seghesio Sonoma Sangiovese, or whatever your heart desires so long as the appellation or the grape or the producer, or something else directly related to the wine starts with "S." Find all the details here.

And finally, the current biggest event in the wine blog world is the Wine Bloggers Conference! Hosted by Open Wine Consortium and Zephyr Wine Adventures, this promises to be the event to meet and greet and learn with all your fellow wine bloggers. The event will occur in October in Sonoma County, lots of good wine will be poured and I for one am very excited to meet the folks that I've been interacting with for almost 2 years now! (Crossing my fingers, it looks about 90% odds that I will be there!)

That's right folks, it's that time of the month again, WBW! This month, our gracious host is the wonderful Dr. Debs of Good Wine Under $20. She has set us to the task of picking a wine made from any White Rhone Varietal from anywhere in the world. This left the field wide open for wine from almost anywhere since Rhone varietals are being planted in lots of different places, and it gave a choice of many different grape varieties, Grenache Blanc, Marsanne, Rousanne...

With the task in mind, I went straight to my basement, where many CA Viogniers live. If I had not been traveling for work all last week, I would have been a little more ambitious and tried to compare one of the CA examples to one from the actual Rhone, but alas, it was not to be. Instead, in keeping with the regular theme of Dr. Deb's blog, I decided to shoot for a wine that under $20!

I chose the 2006 Hannah Nicole Viognier. I purchased this wine from WineQ, it cost me $15.99 (free shipping!), and clocked in at a hefty 15% alcohol by volume. I was a bit thrown off by this high of an alcohol level in a white wine, but in general I don't have problem with high alcohol in wine so long as the wine remains balanced, as this one did.

On first sniff, I had to laugh. We had a Syrah that had been fermented on Viognier grape skins (complicated, huh?) the other night, and the Hannah Nicole smelled exactly like the Syrah. My nose was all confused having a white wine that smelled exactly like the red we had consumed the night before!

After my initial confusion passed, I found the wine to be very floral. It showed great strong aromas of honeysuckle, pears, and peaches, topped off with a creamy vanilla note. In the mouth the wine was crisp, which I didn't really expect since it had been aged in new and old oak. The flavors I found were grapefruit, peach, pears, and some other citrus.

The wine was tingly and tart on the front of the palate, while the oak seemed to have given it a creamy feel mid-palate. Overall, I thought this wine was very refreshing, which is not a characteristic I usually associate with an oaked white wine, but I was pleasantly surprised. This was definitely a good value for the $15.99 price I paid for it.

Now, I know Dr. Debs was trying to get us to see the wonderful qualities of White Rhone Varietals for the summer, but I'm already a convert! One of my favorite pairings last years was a Roussanne with fresh crab legs. Though I will highly recommend that you follow her lead and toss a few White Rhone grapes into your drinking line up for the summer!

Many thanks to Dr. Debs for hosting this month, and as usual, I will let you know when the round-up is posted and what next month's theme is!

I've been getting some email lately about contests that I think might interest my readers.

The first comes from the blog Wine for Newbies. Andre is hosting a quiz on his blog with several prizes, including a food and wine pairing kit, and some cool coasters. All you need to do is pop on over and answer his questions about wine and send him your response before June 8! Here's the link to the quiz. Best of luck!

I also heard from Emily of Marx Foods yesterday. She contacted me because of my post about not having any salmon for a wine I was drinking! Her company is holding a summer salmon recipe contest and the prize is 15 pounds of wild caught salmon(shipped to you in 3 5lb shipments throughout the summer)! You can head on over to Marx Foods to submit your recipe by June 20.

And finally, a reminder. WBW #46 is next Wednesday! I failed to mention it earlier, but the good Dr. Debs over at Good Wine Under $20 is our host this month and she has chosen White Rhone Varietals as our theme. The twist is that the wine can come from anywhere in the world so long as it is made with a traditional Rhone white grape...so your Marsanne, Roussane, Viognier, etc. .....you can read all the details over at her WBW post. I'm excited for this one, as it's the first WBW since I hosted where I can just head on down to my basement and pluck a bottle from my shelves!

It's that time of month again, WBW! The event really crept up on me this month, I was down to the wire, just heading out to pick up my bottle yesterday afternoon. Our host for this month is Tim of WineCast, who is pulling double duty this go around as he was also the host for the 2nd WBC, which also crept up on me and I didn't get around to finishing the book for this time. As always, the host is responsible for picking the theme for WBW, the brainchild of Lenn of Lenndevours, and posting the round-up after the event. Tim has chosen Old World Riesling for this month, asking us to pick up any bottle of Riesling from Germany, Austria, Alsace....and a couple of other places.

With that in mind, I set out to find my Riesling. If I were writing this post for just a regular post, I'd have titled it "Old World Riesling with a New World Label." I don't normally go in for the eye-catching wine names/labels, and it actually wasn't the reason I purchased this bottle. The owner of my favorite wine shop recommended two bottles to me and said this one was a bit fruitier than the other one, so I went with it because Matt prefers whites that show a lot of fruit.

The wine is a 2007 "Diva" Riesling from Germany. The producer is Gunderloch and it's a Rheinhessen Riesling Spatlese, which means the grapes are "late harvested" by allowing them to ripen for an extra week or more. It's the second level of quality on the scale of Rieslings produced in Germany. The bottle cost me $24.99 at the Winery in Old Town Alexandria, had a screw-cap closure, and clocked in at 9.5% alcohol by volume.

The nose was reserved, but gave up some lemon, peach, tropical fruit, and minerals. In the mouth this wine was fantastic. I can only describe it as delicate fruit flavors that dance over your tongue with an almost prickly feeling for your taste buds. Particularly I found peach, lots of peach, some tropical fruit, and honey all over the palate.

The wine was smooth, and glass by glass just disappeared in our house without a thought. It was drinking so well, and had wonderful acidity and backbone holding it together. It tasted like really delicious candy and would serve very well as a dessert in and of itself. I served it with baked chicken, broccoli, and homemade applesauce, and the food just overpowered the delicate flavors of the wine. I would say serve this as an apertif or a dessert, or perhaps with a very a cheese tray that wouldn't dominate the wine. I highly recommend this bottle, it's one of the best whites we've had recently.

Thanks to Tim for hosting, and I will be sure to alert you to the round-up when it's posted!

Our host for this month's edition of the virtual tasting known as Wine Blogging Wednesday is Tim of Winecast. Tim has chosen a fabulous theme, one of my absolute favorite white wines, Riesling. However, his stipulation is that the wine must come from the "Old World." So choose a Riesling from Germany, Austria, or the Alsace region of France. He'll give you a little leniency if you want to go with Northern Italy, the Czech Republic, or Slovenia too. You can read all the details here.

This month's WBW deadline is May 7. Get shopping and tasting and post your review on May 7 or if you don't have a blog and want to participate send your notes to Tim at "winecast at gmail dot com" with WBW 45 in the subject line.

Our host for this edition of WBW, the brain-child of Lenn of Lenndevous, is Gary Vaynerchuk of Wine Library TV. He chose French Cabernet Franc as theme for this month (ostensibly as a result of his recent trip tasting in France!). You can watch his vlog about the event here, but the jist is pick a French Cabernet Franc and post your link by April 2, 2008 in the comments to the entry on his website.

I'll admit straight up that I sorta cheated on this one. Having been in travel mode since before Gary's theme announcement, I really didn't have much of a chance to pick up a bottle for this month or shop around. I popped into my favorite local shop, The Winery in Old Town Alexandria, and sadly could not come up with a full on Cabernet Franc. So I went with a 25% Cabernet Franc, 70% Merlot, and 5% Cabernet Sauvignon Bordeaux style blend.

The wine is a 2004 Chateau Quercy Saint-Emilion Grand Cru. It clocked in at 13% alcohol by volume, had a real cork closure, and cost me $25.99. This is out of the price range I'm usually willing to spend on unknown wines, but the shop owner highly recommended it, and desperate times call for desperate measures.

On the nose of the wine I found cocoa powder, espresso, strawberry, herbs, and an overall smoky quality. In the mouth the fruit was dusty and smoky. I almost felt like I was drinking cedar grilled cherries and strawberries, but with fresh raspberries and a slightly biting herb bouquet dipped in espresso.

The wine was tannic on the first night, but smoothed considerably on the second. On the second night the wine took on an even smokier quality with more oak and cedar coming through, and the fruit being less dusty or smoky. I believe this one has quite a few years of age left on it.

Many thanks to Gary for hosting WBW this month. I'll be particularly interested to see what form the round-up will take! And as always, barring another other internetless interludes, I will let you know when the round-up is posted and when the May WBW theme is announced!

Joel, of Wine Life Today has posted the round-up from what may shake out as one of my favorite WBW themes in the past year or so since I've been participating in WBW. Now, of course, I loved my own theme of Petite Sirah, but I really enjoyed the challenge of thinking about what a wine means to me and why for this WBW. You can read all the details of the round up here, and be sure to click through and read the personal stories that came along with this month's WBW.


I also wanted to point your attention to El Bloggo Torcido, where once again the Twisted Folks at Twisted Oak are hosting a contest. You may recall this one from last year, the premise is that the readers get the opportunity to write the back label for one of Twisted Oak's wine bottles! This year it's for Ruben's Blend, the details of which you can find here. The deadline is soon, March 18, so pull out those pens and get cracking. Now, I played in this contest last year, and submitted a lovely ditty about a drunkard Miss Muffet and an abused spider....I'm wracking my brain to come up with something even Twisteder, since I wasn't quite there last year ;)

First off, a hearty congratulations to our host for this month, Joel, of Wine Life Today. He and his wife welcomed a brand new baby girl to their family last Thursday, so I can only imagine how hectic things are in their house at the moment! But wine life lover that he is, Joel is pushing forward as our host for this month!

WBW was created well over three years ago now, by Lenn of Lenndevours. The idea is that once a month, bloggers and often non bloggers will come together around a wine theme and all drink a bottle that matches the theme criteria and post about it. Every month is hosted by a different blog, whose owner picks the theme and will do a round up of the posts after the event is over.

This month, Joel set us to an interesting and thought provoking theme for me. He asked us to pick a wine that is a comfort wine for us. Something that we love to drink, that lets us relax, and perhaps invokes something in us that makes the wine and experience special.

The theme required a bit of thought on my part. I love wine. All of it, even the bottles that aren't particularly memorable, or are even bad. I love the ritual of wine, of slicing off the foil, pulling the cork, sniffing the bottle, and pouring the first glass. Having a glass of wine with my dinner is part of of my life, and I often think my meal is not complete without that glass of wine to complement it, and more importantly, to take that glass and finish it as I settle in for the evening before heading to bed. See, we don't spend much time at home in the evening. Our day begins well before we leave the house at 5 til 7 and we don't often return until 7pm or later. By the time I get dinner on the table and we sit down, it's often 8pm or later.

Wine is an almost daily part of our lives, so picking just one that is a comfort wine, that lets us relax, is hard to do. It could literally be any wine in my cellar.

I finally thought, well, what wine evokes good memories for me, puts a smile on my face, and almost always puts me in a good mood? And when I asked myself that, it wasn't a single wine, but a kind of wine.

Zinfandel. Zinfandel was the first red wine I fell head over heels for. It never fails to entice me with its berries and cream, spice, vanilla, jam, or juice. And it holds a special place in my heart, as the first time I ever had Zinfandel was on our honeymoon in Sonoma. The first Zinfandel I ever had was was from David Coffaro, a winery I hope to return to this spring. That one is long gone, so I thought about another winery from our honeymoon, and from a more recent trip, that also brings an instant smile to my mind.

And that wine comes from Nelson Family Vineyards and is their 2005 Estate Zinfandel. Nelson Vineyards is a great little family run winery where you are more than likely to run into a family member pouring wines in the tasting room. On our honeymoon, we were driving back from Mendocino and Matt said I could pick one winery to stop at that day (it was supposed to be a non-wine day, which it was until that point!). I don't know what drew me to Nelson, but I quickly put on my blinker and turned down the road leading up to the tasting room. We walked up to the tasting room to find a very enthusiastic winery dog, and the winemaker, Chris Nelson, pouring the wine. I instantly loved the Orange Muscat, and signed us up for the wine club. We have subsequently returned to Nelson Family Vineyards to participate in their Barn Blending Party, where we had an excellent time playing winemaker for the day!

So the wine cost us $18.40 in a club shipment, had a real cork closure, and clocked in at 15.7% alcohol by volume. I don't so much think the point of this WBW is the tasting notes on the wine, but more the way the wine makes you feel, and why it helps you unwind. But I won't pass up the opportunity to give you tasting notes! The nose showed fresh berries, spice, and vanilla. It was really juicy. In the mouth dark juicy berries dominated, with more notes of vanilla and allspice. The wine is very approachable now, smooth, juicy, and drinking wonderfully.

And there goes my last bottle of Zinfandel from Nelson Family Vineyards. We are getting a new club shipment in April, so I will look forward to more wines from one of my favorite small family producers. I only wish the barn party this year coincided with Easter again!

Many thanks to Joel for hosting, and I look forward to what everyone decided to open for the WBW. As always, I will post a link to the round up when it's posted!

Our host for this month is Joel, formerly of Vivi's Wine Journal fame, but currently of Wine Life Today and OpenWine Consortium fame. Not to mention he's got a new baby on the way within a few weeks! Talk about a busy guy.

Anyway, he's come up with a new twist for this month: Comfort Wines. Your task? Simply pick any wine you love to unwind to and tell us about why it's a comfort wine for you on March 5! This one will be a bit difficult for me...I don't really return to the same bottle over and over again. So I'll think on this one for the next few days to figure out what to drink!

All the details are over here on the Wine Life Today blog.

Also, don't forget that the new WBW logo contest is still ongoing. Details here.

Open That Bottle Night is tomorrow! So dust off that bottle you've been hanging onto and drink it tomorrow night (or day or morning, whatever your inclination)! You can find more details here.

And, one more reminder, the Wine Book Club's first "meeting" on Vino Italiano is next week, Feb. 26....so get reading. Details here. I'm getting there. I'm over 300 pages in, and the real meat of the book is 385...the rest is sort of an appendix, so if I can mange 85 more pages in the next few days, I'm golden!

Andrew over at Spittoon has posted his round-up for WBW #42 Just Seven Words. Apparently he was trying to rival me in how fast one could get a round up posted! ;)

So head on over and check it out, lots of participants and interesting takes on the assignment, plus, Andrew is not sharing what wines people drank, just their seven words, so you will have to click through to discover what wine the words represent! Thanks again to Andrew for hosting this month!

Also, just a quick reminder that the contest to design a logo for WBW is still on going, with several great prizes now available for the winner. Stop by Wine Blogging Wednesday for all the details!

As always, I'll let you know as soon I know what the next theme will be!

Wine: 2005 Carpineto Dogajolo Dry Red Table Wine
Cost: About $12 at The Winery
Alcohol Content:13%
Closure: Real cork
Locale: Tuscany, Italy
Blend: 80% Sangiovese, 20% Cabernet Sauvignon

Many thanks to Andrew of Spittoon who is hosting this iteration of WBW, with the theme "Just Seven Words." Andrew asked us to choose an Italian red, any Italian red, and put our tasting notes into just 7 words that are grammatically correct.

My 7 words:

Riding horses through eucalyptus and berry fields.

Reminder #1: WBW #42 Just 7 Words is coming up this Wednesday! So get your red Italian wine and your editing pencil ready, and be creative! I drank my bottle the other night, and I think I have crafted 7 words that capture pretty well what the wine is like.

Reminder #2: WBC #1 (Wine Book Club) arrives in the blogosphere on Tuesday, February 26. The book is Vino Italiano and it is a long one, so if you haven't started reading, get cracking! I am not very far along, but am making progress every day, so hopefully I will make it through by that date!

And finally, the 2nd poll of Wannabe Wino readers has closed. The question this time was "How many bottles of wine do you keep around?" The slight winner, with 8 votes and 23% of the vote goes to 40-100 bottles, with 0-15 coming in a close second with 7 votes and 20% of the vote. Apparently, quite a few winos read the blog, with 6 of you voting for "Please don't make me count, I don't have that many fingers and toes." 34 people total voted in this poll. Personally, we have between 150-200 bottles on hand in the Wannabe Wino house at any given time. That number dwindles drastically in the summer when wine clubs can't ship because of the weather, but we try to make up the difference with local vineyard and wine shop purchases!

I'm going to stick up another poll over in the sidebar, this time on what country's wine do you drink most frequently. As always, I'm very interested to see where my readers fall, and I thank you for participating!

Back a few months ago, along with the announcement of the new Wine Blogging Wednesday website, Lenn of Lenndevours mentioned that in the near future, a contest to create a new logo for WBW would be occurring.

Well that time is now! All the details are available here, but suffice it to say, be creative, and submit your entry by March 31, 2008.

We will bid a found adieu to our old logo, which has served WBW well for 41 iterations.

Just think, your new logo could live on in hundreds of blogs, several times a month for many years! Get cracking!

The newest edition of WBW has been announced, and this one will take some explaining! (Or perhaps not so much explaining.) Our host for the month is the Wine Scribbler from across the pond, at Spittoon.

Andrew has asked us to pick any Italian red wine. This is not the challenge. The challenge comes in the seven words. In that he wants us to describe the wine in just seven words for our WBW entry. The caveat is that the note has to make sense, be mostly grammatically correct, and preferably contain punctuation.

All the details (or lack thereof) can be found here on Spittoon. The deadline this month to get your note in is February 13. See you then!

Jack and Joanne have the WBW round-up posted over on Fork and Bottle! Looks like around 43 participants this time, and a ton of wines to read about, as many people tasted two or more Friuli wines for this WBW.

Head on over to Fork and Bottle to see what everyone tasted this month, and watch out for the next WBW announcement which will be coming from Spittoon.

Jack and Joanne of Fork and Bottle are our kind hosts for this edition of WBW, the brainchild of Lenn of Lenndevours. The task they set us to for this month was to find a white wine from Friuli, any white we wanted. Though they suggested that we spend $18 or above or else we might be disappointed in the wine we chose.

This was a difficult assignment for me. I checked our usual local haunts and had not luck. Three or four stores, and I didn't turn up a single bottle! I was getting desperate when we went to my parents' in CT for the holiday. Fortunately, I accompanied my dad to his local wine store, and there on the shelf was one single bottle of white from Friuli! (There was a red to, but that didn't fit this WBW!)

The wine I finally found was a Livio Felluga 2005 Tocai Friulano. I purchased it at MV Wine and Spirit in Madison, CT, it cost $27, had a real cork closure and clocked in at 13% alcohol by volume.

First impression: I can smell the floral bouquet across the room. After I buried my nose in the glass (as is my habit, much to both the delight and chagrin of Matt...delight because it means I drink less of the bottle, chagrin because I chide him for drinking more than his share!) I found peach, tropical fruit, almonds, and apple. The flavors were a bit bitter. In the mouth I got flavors of pear, peach, apple, tropical fruits, almonds, and spicy white pepper.

I would describe this wine as lively in the mouth. It was refreshing and fun, and very nicely done. I served it with Roz's Zuppa Toscana, and it was actually a really tasty match with the slightly creamy flavors of the soup. It did really well cutting through the soup and reviving the palate. My only reservation is the price tag. It's more than I'm willing to pay for an unknown bottle, but both Matt and I really enjoyed what was in the bottle, Matt wants to get it again! Though I have no idea where to find it around here, so that will have to wait.

And a bonus! We went out to dinner last night at the Sonoma Restaurant and Wine Bar in DC and they actually had several bottles of Friuli wine on the menu. I suppose that's one of the great things about WBW, it causes me to keep my eye out for new things. I never would have even noticed "Friuli" before this WBW because I knew nothing about the region. So true to my nature as an inquisitive wine blogger, I had to jump at the chance to taste at least one. The restaurant offered tasting sized pours of one of the Friulis, $5 for 3 ounces....which I must say, was a VERY generous 3 ounces!

The wine was a 2006 Di Lenardo Vineyards "Toh" Tocai Friulano. You could purchase the whole bottle for $35 if you wanted. In the glass, I noted the golden straw color of this wine, something I also noted about the Livio. On the nose I found lemon, herbs, almond, passion fruit, and peach. In the mouth there was lemon, almond, tropical fruit, and peach. Overally, the dominating flavor and aroma in this wine was peach. The wine wasn't nearly as lively in the mouth as the Livio, but it was still quite tasty.

I enjoyed my foray into Friuli and I will definitely keep looking for more bottles from the area in the future. It also helped me gain a new grape variety as I had never had a Tocai Friulano before! Thanks to Jack and Joanne for hosting, and I look forward to the round-up!