Saturday night – Batting .500

Mick and Amy were hosting dinner this past Saturday night.

Mick for the starter did mussels with lobster, bacon, tomato and leeks in a cream sauce and paired this with a 2007 La Crema Chardonnay.

As he poured the wine out he wasn’t happy at seeing a dark yellow almost amber like colour to it.  We tried it and it wasn’t off but it was close as it had a really strong butterscotch/burnt caramel flavour to it.  Mick was very disappoint as he said the last time he had this wine it was really good – light oak, lots of fruit and good acidity.  I asked about reviewing it and we decided it wouldn’t be fair to do as it wasn’t in its prime.  On the upside it was an OK pairing with the mussels and the mussels were excellent.

For the main course Mick did grilled flank steak stuffed with feta, garlic and sundried tomatoes served with a side of oven roasted potatoes.  Mick paired this with a 2002 Robert Mondavi Oakville Cabernet Sauvignon.

We review this wine last summer but it looks time or a different bottle has changed this wine - http://zippysauce.blogspot.com/2011/08/saturday-night-micks-mom-joins-us-for.html

The wine from summer had lots of fruit to be found whereas the bottle we had this Saturday my biggest compliant about was the lack of fruit.  The nose on the wine was a mix of eucalyptus and dark chocolate with some barely detectable fruit notes in the background.  The heat or alcohol was also noticeable on the nose as well.  The fruit was more obvious on the taste as raspberry flavours were there but it was the secondary flavour behind the dominant dark chocolate flavour.  The structure to the wine was the same as the one from summer with soft tannin, good acidity and a lingering finish.  It was very good as a pairing with the stuffed flanked steak.  This wine was very enjoyable but if you have a bottle of it on the rack, I would suggest drinking it sooner than later.

Here is the group rating for the wine – Mick - 89, Mark - 89, Kathy – 89, Amy – 88, Overall – 88.75.

This wine hasn’t been carried by the LCBO in a while but it was at a $60 price point.

Mick’s stuff flanked steak was very good but the center pieces of meat could have been cooked just a tad longer but that is almost to be expect when doing a dish like this as the outside will always cook faster than the inside.

For dessert Amy picked up a Red Velvet cake which was the same dessert we had in the summer when we last had the 2002 Mondavi; I thought that was an amusing coincidence.  

So to sum up - the Chardonnay was a bit of a miss but the Cab was hit so we ended batting .500 for the night on the wines but on the upside both of Mick’s dishes were walk off home runs.

Thanks to Mick and Amy for hosting and already looking forward to next Saturday.

Cheers!

Mark