Wine Notes: Girls Night Out

Last night the hubby was a gent and watched the kiddos so I could have a girls' night out. I squeezed into my one pair of jeans that fit now, put on some lip gloss, kissed the babies goodnight and gleefully headed out for a long-awaited night of freedom...perhaps a little too gleefully. Nine long months of sobriety did have it's one plus: no hangovers. Oy vey!

The destination was Veritas Wine Bar on Florida Avenue. I'm a huge wine bar fan and am glad that DC is getting more of them. Really, do we need another Irish bar or sports bar selling the same Miller Lite in a bottle and greasy buffalo wings? No. But could we use a place where you can taste something like 70 different wines and sample dozens of different cheeses? Yes!

We started with the Paraiso 2006 St. Lucia Highlands Pinot Noir which was a scrumptous balance of fruit and spice, heft and velvet. If you Google the wine you'll find all sorts of tasting notes that tout the "rich cherry/plum fruit accented by nuances of nutmeg, pepper, smoke, and vanilla" flavors. I've been drinking wine for a while and like to think of myself as fairly knowledgeable about the stuff, but when it comes to describing the taste of the wine I'll often think of it as if it were a woman. For example, the Paraiso pinot would be a sexy brunette with nice curves. She'd wear knee-high boots and always reveal a good bit of cleavage but you'd always think she was classy.

The next wine was the Worthy Sophia's Cuvee (the 2003 I think). As the cuvee in its name would suggest, it's a lovely blend of cabernet sauvignon, cabernet franc, merlot and petit verdot. This might be one of my favorite wines at the moment. I had it for the first time at Sonoma (where Veritas' general manager, Mick, used to work) and get excited every time I see it at a liquor store or on a wine list. Supposedly the grapes come from lots where Napa cult wines are grown. Rich, dense, lush and bold, this wine would be a buxom blues singer in a deep purple dress - earthy, sensual and dark.


In other random "wine news" that I've run across the last few days:

• The 30-something gagillionaire Google founders are getting into the wine business. Seems that one of the Google founders is going to be investing in Mebus Estate winery in New Zealand. Remind me to make a fortune in the tech industry so I can buy a vineyard and lead a charmed life of wine making.
• The Australian wine, Penfolds, holds special "recorking clinics". If you happen to be the lucky owner of any of their wines 15 years and older, you could attend one of these clinics -- in New York or Chicago, or if you're lucky enough - in several cities in Australia. The article I read in Gourmet about this made the company sound pretty damn cool. The "ultimate in after sales service" -- or as we'd say at the agency, the ultimate in creating brand loyalists -- Penfolds experts will uncork your vintage wine, taste it and either deem it okay or not okay. If it's good, they'll top the bottle off, re-cork it and bless it with a special seal. If it's not okay, there is still the silver lining that the owner gets to drink the bottle and doesn't have to worry 'should I cellar for another five years or just drink it now'.