Episode 103: Wine Travels Take us to Portugal, Where We Find Some Exceedingly Grill-Friendly Wines

Like it or not, we're sliding into the last few months of 2021, and you know what that means; holidays.  The piles of traditional foods demand a versatile wine, and we found one in Tom Mortimer's Le Cadeau Pinot Noir. I his episode we get super wine geek-y from yeast, to carbonic maceration to suffering vines. Of course, we laugh a lot too-  Cheers!  

Julie sand Gina have been on the road a lot this summer, and collected some fabulous wine and cocktail intel along the way.  Leave it to Gina to find a wine tasting room after discovering good wine is made in that beautiful state- from the noble grapes we all know so well. She also found a sweet place to sample some wines in Telluride. Julie found the coolest bar in the Midwest when she went home to KC for her BFF's wedding.  While Julie couldn't transport that experience back home, Gina had some Colorado wines shipped in, and we get to try them (including a Pet Nat which leaked in shipping but survived, nonetheless). Join us for a fun recap.

A bit of a cynic, I never gave a whole lot of credence to glassware intended for specific grape varieties. But this incredible experience with Maximilian Riedel made me a believer.  No exaggeration- the difference between glasses when trying the same wine was mind blowing. The fact that global warming is now impacting the shape of the bowls is another staggering fact we learned in this episode.   

We wrap up our grilling series with a slab of ribs and some good ol' American wines. We revisit the first clever label we remember from the 90's, 7 Deadly Zins- which is, as we remember, a decent value that is perfectly suitable for Barbeque sauce slathered goodness.  And what grilling podcast with American wines would be complete without a cabernet sauvignon- namely Ancient Peaks cab from Paso Robles.    

Despite what some might think, port is not the only outstanding wine export from Portugal. The country has a vast, diverse wine region and it's where we travel to next as an extension of our traveling through the glass series. We're also looping in the summer grilling series because- as it turns out- these wines are GREAT for grilled goods. In this oceanfront country, it's more about grilling fish and we taste-test a popular white blend called Vinho Verde. Portugal is also famous for its black pork and cured meats which pair particularly well with the county's rustic red blends that use both noble and indigenous grapes. It's a delicious, beautiful country. Join us as we explore.  

In honor of  rosé month, we continue making converts of the un-initiated to join in our love of the most appropriate shade of wine for hot weather.  This time, Morning Edition host John Davis is our hapless victim- dragged in from the hallway- to try a beautiful Argentinian rosé of Pinot Noir. 

We kick off our summer grilling series in the world headquarters of beef with Argentinian wines. Drink like a Gaucho (Argentinian cowboy) as you tend your backyard asado (grill).  We found some decent value wines in the bunch, too!  

With labels as cool as this, one might wonder if the wine in the bottle can deliver on the promise of the crushed velvet-covered passion pit one imagines their taste buds frolicking upon once it's in your mouth.  Well, it does.  And the winemaker is among the coolest we've met.  Rock on, Mr. Page!  

When one thinks of wine from Canada, most people immediately think of the well-marketed and delicious ice wine which stormed south about the time Generation X started learning about wine. But here to dispel any illusion that our northern neighbor is a one trick pony, is Martin's Lane Winery.  They're producing shockingly good, world class Riesling and Pinot Noir in the British Columbian Okanagan Valley. In this episode we talk with winemaker Shane Munn about these incredible wines, the valley's deep namesake lake and the microclimate it creates.  We also wonder about climate change speculators gobbling up real estate for ensure a foothold in the future of wine.    

We've talked about wine in a can before, but now that summer is sizzling, the beverage marketing people have gone full tilt with weird stuff in a can. One cannot turn a corner in a grocery store without being visually assaulted by sassy marketing on slim cans with pinkish hued graphics promising low calories, lots of flavor, and a little booze-from lemonade rosé blends to straight up cocktails to alcoholic kombucha. One of the joys of having a wine podcast is that people will send the occasional unsolicited sample. Gina has been compiling an assortment and so, here we are taking the bullet for you, dear listener, as we try through the lot of odd offerings (except for the one kombucha that blew up).