TNs -- DortaFest IV: Cork Protocol

Berserkers,

Board members and native Torontonians Mike Grammer, Jay Shampur and myself ventured off into the United States to do our part to help along the Free Trade negotiations between the US and Canada by enabling the free exchange of wines between Americans and Canadians. Our long weekend included a two day stay at fellow board member Humberto Dorta’s in Saegertown, Pennsylvania for our fourth DortaFest followed by a special visit to Cleveland, Ohio for fellow board member Loren Sonkin’s 60th birthday celebration.

The weekend began with a drive across the Queenston bridge into Buffalo, New York and a stop at our favorite wine store, Premier Wines, to pick up some goodies we just can’t find here in Canada. I scored with a couple of Barolo Chinatos and a liter of Chartreuse V.E.P. Then it was off to Saegertown and Humberto’s beautiful homestead where he, his daughter Eden and fellow board member Nick Christie who had driven up from North Carolina were waiting for us. After greetings and settling in and making dinner plans, it was off to the wines:

BOLLINGER 2005 LA GRANDE ANNEE ROSE CHAMPAGNE — Pale salmon color. Biscuit flavors and surprisingly deep rancio notes I only have ever found previously in 1997 Champagnes. Finishes with light cranberry, watermelon and strawberry flavors which alleviate my fears that this might just be a yeast shake. Really well done.

DOMAINE HUET 2011 VOUVRAY LE HAUT-LIEU SEC – Very light lemon blossom aromas that are misleading, as this has huge lemon and spice flavors. A very juicy palate far outweighs the nose. The power took me by surprise.

CHATEAU SUDUIRAUT 1975 SAUTERNES – This was treacle brown in color, buckwheat honey and smoke on the nose, and grilled tropical fruit on the palate. Gorgeous stuff.

POMMERY 2002 CUVEE LOUISE CHAMPAGNE – Very rich and powerful champagne. Chock full of baked apples, biscuit, and rich rancio. Berto called this young and brash while Mike said it finishes like a cider. I’m with him on that.

With our appetites properly whetted, we then made our way to Cannon’s Chophouse for dinner. The restaurant is a mainstay of the Meadville area and was packed with families on a busy Friday night starting their weekends. We brought some more wines to open here.

TRIMBACH 2001 RESERVE PERSONNELLE PINOT GRIS – This bottle was unfortunately off from previous ones we’ve had. The trademark crystalline body and highly perceptible flavors were done in by some corkiness when first opened. This blew off in the glass and then the smoke, honey and Crenshaw melon came out. Unfortunately, this was clearly lacking some freshness which had an undeniable negative effect. Sadness.

CAYUSE 2012 PETITE SYRAH – From the Cailloux Vineyard in Walla Walla Valley. My first ever Washington wine. A saline nose and very smooth texture to the wine’s body. Rich red fruit. Has a little bit of a hot entry but then pulls back to allow the salinity and fruit through. Finish is a little short. Overall, really well balanced wine. Not as overwhelming as a Cali Syrah but more structured and flavorful than a Niagara one. This was excellent with my chicken gumbo soup but didn’t go well with my medium-rare lamb chops.

RIDGE 1994 CALIFORNIA GEYSERVILLE – A blend of 68% Zinfandel, 20% Carignan, 8% Petite Syrah and 4% Mataro. Strong nail polish nose. Super smooth texture. Huge black cherry and plum flavors. Tobacco and dill accents. Long finish. Humberto says its’ erfect. Still quite powerful if missing a bit of freshness, this clashed a bit with the food but went lovely with a few specific things like the calamari.

CONCHA Y TORO DON MELCHOR 2005 CABERNET SAUVIGNON – The flagship wine of this Chilean winery done in a Super Tuscan style. Strong lacquer nose. Hugely powerful red fruit flavors with a bit of a hot finish. This was flavorful and really powerful. Maybe even bigger than a Cali Cab Sauv. This was just great with the lamb.

For dinner, we had some Fried Green Tomatoes and Fried Calamari as our starters:


I followed this with a bowl of the house Chicken Gumbo Soup:

For our mains we got the Lamb Chops and the Ahi Tuna:


After that delicious meal, we got a couple of desserts to go and then headed back to Berto’s for a couple of nightcaps:

DIDIER DAGUENAU 2006 SILEX POUILLY-FUME – This insanely good barrel fermented and aged French Sauvignon Blanc is far more than a cut above the rest. A smoky nose leads into a palate of baked grapefruit and fresh gooseberry and passion fruit flavors. There’s herbaciousness here but it’s smoothed out by the oak and serves as an accent to the silky wine and not the main player. Structurally, easily as good as a Dog Point or Greywacke Sauvignon Blanc from New Zealand and then kicked up levels higher in finesse. Amazing wine.

EGON MULLER 2016 SCHARZHOFBERGER KABINETT – Lots of petrol and lemon-lime on the nose along with high acidity and a ton of herbaciousness. At first, I thought I had left some Silex in my glass and they were blending so I finished my glass, rinsed it out with water, and had another pour. Same thing. This is the only time I’ve gotten an herbacious note from a German Riesling and I’ve gotta be honest, it was so fascinating it literally has me thinking about blending my own NZ SB and German Riesling Kabinett together just to see if I can match this. Absolutely delicious and eye-opening for me. Might be really hard to go back to a regular German Riesling after this.

JOSEPH MAGNUS TRIPLE CASK FINISHED STRAIGHT BOURBON WHISKEY – This Bourbon whiskey is finished in Oloroso and Pedro Ximenez sherry and Cognac casks. No age statement but Internet says it’s rumored to be 8 to 9 years of age. Rich brown color in the glass, deeper and more vibrant than the translucent dark brown or regular bourbons. Sweet fruit immediately hits on first sip followed by typical caramel corn flavors. A bit of a hard bite on the finish. This seems really young with the casking being used to smooth out the edges that long aging would and should normally do. Flavors are great, the casking seems to benefit bourbon even better than it does Scotch whisky. I’d love to see this with a lot more age on it. And I’d really love to see more cask finished Bourbons. It is overdue that the stuff be given the same prestige treatment as Scotch.

And that amazing lineup concluded the first day of DortaFest IV. One sleep later and we’d crack open some more bottles.

The next day began with Cognac for breakfast. Berto and I got into a conversation about Cognac and he opened up and shared a sample from me he acquired out of a hand-written 50 ml sample of:

TESSERON LOT 52 XO PERFECTION COGNAC – a Grande Champagne blend of Colombard and Ugni Blanc Cognac. This was incredibly smooth with deep rich rancio caramel and toffee flavors lifted by high acidity and fresh citrus notes that actually made the Cognac refreshing. Tangy and supple. A superb Cognac.

We hit the road for breakfast in the market and then went and did some grocery shopping for dinner as well as stop by the ice cream shack down the road from Bertos which I love and picked up four different flavors of ice cream to take out. Then we headed back for some cooking and some more wine.

KRUG GRAND CUVEE BRUT 164EME EDITION – This is a 2008 vintage base Krug but is composed of an actual blend of 127 wines with reserve wines from 11 different vintages dating as far back as 27 years per the Internet and it was just superb. Liquid crystalline body, high acidity, crisp green apple and unripe pineapple flavors. Extremely fresh. I loved this. I love Cristal and think every other Champagne is a pretender but this one had me thinking that maybe Krug is the real deal and everyone else the pretender. It’s be really hard to choose between the two. Just amazing.

HEITZ 1987 CABERNET SAUVIGNON – Bottle label says it was bottled in 1991. I was expecting this to be a lot bigger and was pleasantly surprised with a medium-light body that was redolent with red fruit flavor, softened tannins, and a touch of spice. Has aged superbly. Tastes like it was bottled 27 months ago, not 27 years. A great red wine.

DOMAINE JOSEPH MAYROT 1995 VOLNAY SANTENOTS – Our only Burgundy of the weekend, this was smokey and had high acidity but was leaning far too much towards mushroom and shallot vinegar for my liking. The fruit was pretty much gone though some strawberry was detectable. On the plus side, the body was silky with smoothed out tannins. Nick noted that it was much better in a Burgundy glass. A bit of a disappointment. Not pictured.

1999 CHATEAU MUSAR – Michael and Jay found this at Premier and Jay purchased a bottle after failing to fight off temptation. I did fight it off mightily… and I regretted it the moment I tasted this amazing wine. Super perfume of lacquered plum, silky smooth body, and ripe sour cherry. All perfectly balanced. And I mean PERFECT. As in, when you look up the overused wine term “balanced” in the wine encyclopedia, you will see a picture of this bottle. This had to fight off some mighty worthy contenders in the Heitz and the Ridge but eventually ran away with the WOTN and wine of the entire weekend award.

CHATEAU D’YQUEM 2008 SAUTERNES – My reward from Berto for the Beer Can Chicken and Panzanella Salad dinner I made was this beauty. Bright translucent yellow gold in teh glass. Tropical fruit on the nose with plenty of botrytis glycerin to tingle. Carmael, dreid tropical fruit, honey, smoke, and burnt sugar flavors meld into a liqueur like finish with a touch of heat. Long finish. Long live Yquem.

So why exactly did I deserve this treat? Behold. Over breakfast we decided on what we wanted to do for dinner. I offered to make some Beer Can Chicken, one of my own personal specialties, along with a Panzanella Salad. For the Beer Can Chicken, I made a homemade rub from Berto’s spice cabinet and used a Chocolate Cherry Stout in the beer cans to steam the insides of the chicken. These came out perfectly on the grill. I would’ve loved to have had some wood chips to smoke but the guys loved the chicken as it was and felt that smoke flavoring might’ve actually ruined the chicken. I’m a BBQ fanatic so I disagree but I’ll take the compliment.

The accompaniment was my take on Panzanella Salad which included field greens, cucumbers, red onions, avocado, and fresh grown tomatoes from Berto’s friend Karen’s garden which were unbelievable. I dressed these with fresh herbs, white wine vinegar, salt and olive oil. I topped them with homemade garlic croutons.

Thus concluded DortaFest IV as we would head out the next day to Loren’s 60th birthday bash in Cleveland, Ohio. I’ll have a report up later on the festivities.

Please give more detail on the cooking of the beer can chicken.

Sure. I purchased two whole chickens from the local supermarket, removed the wrapped up gizzards and neck, rinsed with fresh tap water to clean, drained and set aside.

Then I made a dry rub using smoked paprika, crushed chilis, garlic powder, chili powder, dried herbs, and salt. I spread this rub underneath the chicken skin on the breast and leg meat, inside the cavity, and then all over the outside of the chicken including the backside and the wings.

For the beer cans, I simply drained two standard size soda cans, rinsed the outside of them with fresh tap water, and poured half a bottle of UNCHILLED (very important) craft cherry chocolate stout in each. Then I placed the chickens on top of the cans using the legs to balance them as sort of a tripod. The chickens had a much wider cavity than I expected and almost fully enveloped the cans. Usually they fit on from 1/2 to 3/4 of a can. This is why you see them in the pic above seemingly standing upright on their own.

I then placed the chickens on the left side of Berto’s 4 burner grill with an oblong baking pan underneath to catch the escaping juices and chicken fat and turned on the two right side burners to medium heat. I then slowly let the chickens roast for 4 hours, turning the heat to low halfway through the cooking process as well as rotating the chickens every once in a while.

The science behind this is that the beer inside the cans heats up and steams the inside of the chicken making the breast meat tender and moist. However, some of the liquid condenses inside the cavity and falls back into the can bringing delicious chicken and seasoning flavor back with it. Whatever is not collected by the cans is caught by the cookie sheet.

Once the chickens were done, I brought them back inside. I drained the collected juice and fat from the pan into a saucepot and then poured the contents of both cans into the same pot and brought to the boil. I thickened with cornstarch and kicked it up a little with the addition of some maple syrup and white wine vinegar to taste to make a jus gravy on the side. No other seasonings added, trust me, it had more than enough already.

If you intend to make real barbecue, you should be adding a smoke box with soaked wood chips of your choice to add smoked flavor to your chicken. You should also be cooking a lot lower and longer, more around 200 -225 degrees Celsius and for 6 - 8 hours. At that point, you wouldn’t even really need a knife to cut the chicken, you could just pull pieces away right off the can. As mentioned, the guys liked it just fine as it was.

thanks for the report/notes. very cool mix of wines. looking forward to reading about Loren’s birthday celebration in Cleveland and the wines you guys had then – happy 60th, Loren!

I’ll post the notes about Loren’s 60th in a separate thread–if one isn’t up already. I didn’t take completely formal notes for my only night of Weekend at Berto’s, but I add my sincere thanks to him—and Eden—for welcoming us once again into their home (I was off Saturday morning to see Nola in Dayton before spending the night with friends Andrea and Dave in Cleveland) and for generously contributing almost all of the wines we tried.

2005 Bollinger Grand Annee Rose

Suave and smooth, some light red fruit and unripe watermelon sense. Good, with lengthy bubbles, a nice drink

2011 Huet Le Haut Lieu Sec

Lime and floral in nuzzie and on the tongue, still quite young, tart and crisp texture, this is still jumpy and I’d leave any you have for a couple more years.

2002 Pommery Cuvee Louise Brut

Nutty aromatics here, gives way to a fairly cider-like appley attack with a tinge of popcorn. That cider connotation is something I’ve had with my few previous Pommerys and I have to confess this isn’t my fave Champers

1994 Ridge Geyserville

Pretty cocoa and violets to sniff, and a bit later, a little turpentine-y funky too? Loam perhaps? This is OK, some red fruit sticking around and has some acidity, but missing presence at first. But…voila! With the food and some air time, this definitely comes alive and turns into a very classic Geezer. Amazing to say this, you might want to decant this for an hour if you have one.

2001 Trimbach Reserve Personnelle Pinot Gris

Thanks to Tran for catching the full label on this one. Starts off very funky nose indeed–not quite Lysol to go with plenty of floral character. Very pretty first taste–precise, with a sweet lime edge around tropical fruit, but the fresh kind. I find this still kind of youthful and another example of why I should have stocked up on more 2001 Alsatian.

2005 Concha Y Toro Don Melchor

This was my request from Berto’s cellar, as I hadn’t had a Don Melchor in a little while. Nice bouquet with plum, sweet blackberry and coffee. Yu-uhm. I sometimes think of this as the Chilean Margaux and this fits the bill–fine balance, length and “fragrancy” dans la bouche, with liveliness galore. Lovelylicious.

2012 Cayuse Cailloux Syrah

I was pretty sure Tran hadn’t had a Cayuse and picked this out more or less for him to try. Smoky, motor oil a bit, deep red cherry. It’s a Cayuse all right—bold and just-bridled brash palate, full of vibrant red fruit. I think I do agree with Tran that the finish was a tiny bit short, but this is a full-throttle wine.

Once we got back to Berto’s we opened a couple more things. I didn’t taste the 1975 Sud as it had been open for 2 weeks

2006 Didier Dagueneau Silex

Also figured Tran hadn’t had one of these and I was curious to try an aged version. This has some beeswax still on the nose along with a stony/flinty notion. To taste, it’s a bit of an odd duck, with a sort of collared greens element inside lemon and apple, as well as some gooseberry nips. A touch saline on the finish, I liked it but didn’t love it. I think for me, I do prefer my Silex younger.

2016 Egon Muller Scharzhofberger Kabinett Ries

I brought this for Nick, just to have him tell me “Mike, Mike, Mike—how could you open this so young??”. Well, I brought his glass to him unannounced and he immediately sat up and took notice. That’s because this, as young as it is, is super-explosive wine. Almost lemon candy nose, with hints of steel here and there, this blazes through on the palate with piercing yellow fruit and lemon pie. Tinges of grapefruit complete a super-toddler but compelling bottle of wine. Own some if you can.

I’m really happy to hear that the 99 Musar showed well.

Mike

Thanks Tran, I will give this a go on my weberQ