Drink This Now! Lesson 1 Blog

 

Name: Côte du Rhône

Producer: Domaine Grand Veneur

Variety: Rhône

Country of Origin: France

Region: Rhône Valley, Southern France

Vintage: 2019

Price: $19.95

Review of the Wine: Wine Enthusiast: "Sourced from a plot just a stone's throw from Châteauneuf-du-Pape, Les Champauvins is consistently one of the best Côtes-du-Rhône bottlings available. Heady aromas of lilac and crushed white pepper introduce a palate that's powerful yet pure in fruit, packed with flavors of candied raspberry and strawberry leather. Delicate and dusty in tannins, it finishes long on streaks of salt and anise. Lovely young, the wine should improve through 2029 at least."

My Review:

This week, I completed the Lesson 1 assignment in the Drink this Now! textbook. The lesson involves opening a red wine (I chose the Domaine Grand Veneur Cote du Rhone from the list), tasting it immediately, two hours later with cheese and meat, then trying it again the next day. I chose asiago cheese as my "hard Italian cheese" and calabrese salami as my "spicy meat."

First, you open the wine and try immediately. It was dark red, probably the darkest wine I have ever seen. It almost looked like black ink to me. It smelled very strong and somewhat tart. I could definitely smell the bite before I even tasted it. It was so tannic that I could have almost described it as "mouth-puckering" but it didn't quite go that far. It did make my mouth feel very dry and had a bit of a strong finish. I definitely did not like this wine, and was not super excited to continue with this assignment at this point. It had an almost leathery taste to me, with dark chocolate flavors because of how bitter I thought it was.

Second, you leave the cork off for at least two hours to allow the wine to "open up" and oxygenate. When I smelled it the second time, it did seem like it was going to be less aggressive. However, upon actually tasting it, I only could detect a slight difference. The difference was there, it was more fruity and somehow more flavorful despite having less of a harsh flavor. But I still did not like how tannic it was or the strong aftertaste. The dark chocolate flavor faded a bit but it was still prominent. I thought it tasted more plummy and had a bit of a licorice taste with some level of a black coffee aftertaste.

Third, you try the wine with the cheese. I must say that I definitely liked the wine better with the cheese. However, I didn't actually like the cheese that much, so it was only marginally better. However, the more I tried it (around my fourth taste of the two flavors together) I started to appreciate the nuances of both flavors. The fat in the cheese balanced very well with the wine, and since there was something else in my mouth, the wine didn't seem as dry to me. It felt more fruity and jammy, and I started to notice that it tasted like raisins or a fig newton.  The flavor of the wine came out more because I wasn't as focused on the uncomfortable dryness of its mouthfeel.

Fourth, you try it with the meat. This was my favorite so far. The meat paired perfectly with the wine, which I wasn't expecting. I thought that since the meat was dry and had lots of spices it wouldn't help me attain the distraction from the tannins that the cheese allowed. However, it actually was better than the cheese. It made the wine taste different than it did with the cheese. I tasted more of a berry taste when it was paired with the cheese, but with the meat it was more earthy. It had a thicker taste but because of the slight grease of the meat, the tannins actually were complimented in a great way. The meat itself actually tasted better with the wine to me. The wine had an oregano and dried herb taste with the salami, possibly because they both had the same herb flavors and when paired, those came out even more.

After this, I tried the meat and the cheese together with the wine, even though it wasn't mentioned in the book. I definitely did not like them all three together, but I thought that the meat and cheese alone paired quite nicely, and I would definitely eat them together on a cracker. But the three tastes together clashed just enough that it made all three of them taste worse, or perhaps just distracting.

The next day, the wine was the most toned-down that it had been the whole time, but I still thought it was too strong. I thought it was still too dry for my taste, though I was able to appreciate the cherry and raspberry flavors a bit more. It was not better than when it was paired with the meat or cheese, but this is the best it tasted on its own. Even though Wine Folly says that there are hints of lavender in this wine, I never tasted those soft flavors. I did taste more and more berry as time went on, except with the meat when I tasted more of the spices in the flavors.

The lesson was overall very interesting, because I didn't realize the extent that food and time can change the taste of a wine, usually for the better.