by Julian Schultz
julian@oxfordwineroom.com
Sleep
comes slowly these lonely nights and sweet slumber is short. So at 2 a.m. I’m
beginning this wine column in an unorthodox fashion: I am listening to the
beautiful, soul-stirring music from the motion picture, “The Hours,”
composer Phillip Glass, starring Nicole Kidman, Meryl Streep and Julianne Moore:
one hour of the most emotive melodies among the many in the albums I own. I must
have played it 25 times since it came early this week.
Ah, Julian, ever the romantic, sentimental, emotional person…I am
opening an album of photographs to try to recapture the glory of yesterdays
past, to try to bid the time of youth return. Yes, well I know that once upon a
time never comes again and that for youth there is no encore. But…just
but…perhaps…just maybe…vestiges of hallowed moments will live again in
memory.
As
I turn the pages and muse on the faces and places that Lillian and I have known,
I am stopped at the picture of Lillian and me…in summer formal clothes, our
hands entwined. We were on the veranda at the Mt. Washington Hotel in Bretton
Woods’ White Mountains of New Hampshire. Handsome and young we were then.
For
many years we would twice spend a week there during the summer months. We
enjoyed to ambience of this rambling stately old wooden hotel, nestled among the
tree-laden graceful rolling hills, waking mornings early to observe the jocund
day standing tiptoe on the misty mountaintops.
We
enjoyed delicious dinners with fine wines and we ballroom danced before, during
and after our dinners. We would always, somewhat embarrassedly, acknowledge the
appreciative applause from other guests. We had ballroom danced in the many
countries where we had traveled and always evoked plaudits of praise. Yes, we
were envied as graceful and elegant dancers doing a variety of dance routines.
These sweet thoughts now remembered, such wealth brings, that I would not
change my state with kings. Lillian is gone now…gone to that far away
destination from which no traveler returns, but the memories live and are
vibrant…bittersweet though they are.
I beg you, as I reread what I have written: Please forgive an old man’s
sentimentality.
Which brings me to a wine story; the locale is the Green Mountains of
Vermont, the adjoining state.
“Help!” Frou-frou Finnegan again was pleading a favor: “The only
wines available here are wine coolers, Paul Masson carafes, Gallo generics and a
limited choice of Robert Mondavi and Montevina wines.”
Would I select a variety of wines for her group’s three-weeks July
vacation, their roughing it at remote wilderness lodges in Vermont’s Green
Mountains? And would I suggest matchups with food simply prepared, consistent
with camp life, with outdoor living? And, please, to suggest only red wines
because the few whites they cared to drink were available at the village.
She continued: “No lofty gourmet cuisine here, no starchy British
gentility-in-the-jungle format in formal dress with silver tableware and white
linen. We’ll be living freely, exuberantly…au naturel ”–
“What! In the buff – like in a …in a nudie colony?” I stammered,
shocked.
She laughed, “No, no, Silly. I mean casually, back to nature, with sky
and earth, lake and forest, shrubs and stones, birds and berries; away from
uncivilized society, eating and living down and dirty, as it were.”
“Well,” I said dubiously, “I think you’re thinking ho-hum
hamburgers, hot dogs, charred chicken, fried fish, seared steaks, potted
porcupine, quail quenelles, chipmunk casseroles, roasted rabbit and skunk stews;
these merit pedestrian wines. I don’t know enough plonky wines to suggest.”
I threw my arms up in despair.
“Oh, come on, Julian!” She remonstrated with me: “How many times
have I heard say, ‘A book of verses underneath the bough, a jug of wine, a
loaf of bread, and thou beside me…were Paradise enow!’ Forgive the truncated
Omar Khayyam quatrain. Or when you were less poetic, you would say: ‘Simple
crusted bread, piquant Cheddar cheese and complex mature wine are food fit for
gods?’ I’m sure our camp cooking offers more, so give the best wines your
best shot.”
I insisted that to relieve their boredom with 21 days of primitive
eating, I would recommend some gourmet dishes, even if simply prepared.
Frou-frou and three women friends had attended my wine appreciation
classes at Doherty High School’s Night Life program some 20 years ago. They
and their husbands later became a wine tasting club. Frou-frou kept in touch
with me for wine suggestions when they weren’t tasting the wines I was writing
about.
She said the nearest village was some 10 miles, had a population of about
2000, a post office/cafeteria/superette that pumped gasoline and sold spirits,
beer, wine coolers, blush wines, Gallo and Masson generic wines and a limited
variety of decent California wines, primarily Robert Mondavi and Montevina; a
barber/hairdresser shop, a bank, a wife doctor/husband dentist, a pharmacist who
doubled as undertaker, and a three-room country school.
They would consume three different wines each evening with dinner,
Frou-frou said, about three ounces of each of wine for each person. They would
expect a suggested variety of wines from different top-tier producers.
For my efforts, she added, Lillian and I could spend a week with them –
but to bring our own wine, so as not to reduce their nine-ounce pours per
person.
I asked, what was there to do all day? She answered, “The women play
bridge and mah jong, swim and sunbathe; drive to town for food, mail and
newspapers; and share the cooking chores. The men play pinochle and poker, hike
the trails, fish and hunt, swim and sunbathe. The day seems never long
enough.” She added, that one or two evenings during the three weeks they might
have a fancy dinner in St. Albans, 40 miles away.
She nodded when I suggested that periodically they might shop St. Albans
for fine wines and food that I would suggest.
Sounded idyllic to romantic me. Not to practical Lillian: “I can hear
the whirring of dive-bombing mosquitoes; I’ll be scratching from having been
bitten by no-see-‘um blackflies; and who knows what kind of mattresses we’ll
be sleeping on? Hard, lumpy, and musty, I’ll bet.”
She continued, “You may fantasize you’re Henry David Thoreau
cavorting with nature at Walden Pond. No! That’s not for me. And if you think
I’m trotting from the in-house to the outhouse in my undies by light of the
silvery moon – or to the smelly outhouse at high noon when the summer sun
sparkles in the azure blue, you’ve got another think coming!
“So…we…are…not…going.”
I would wait until she sounded less negatively determined, then I would
use my customary entreating, cajoling, pouting, abject look of misery. They
usually succeeded with her.
Studying the wines of the countries and producers shown below that I had
recommended, I was filled with envy. I was determined to taste some of them in
addition to the ones I would bring. It would be worth the isolation and
inconveniences of an isolated wilderness lodge to taste them, some a second
time. ….Yeah! Right on, Julian! So what if I went stumbling, half-slumbering,
to the outhouse in the pitch of night, maybe scented by a startled skunk and
attacked by enraged mosquitoes…?
The wines I recommended could be bought at our local wine shops where I
shop. To name my favorites: Friendly Discount Liquors, Mass. Liquors and
O’Hara’s. The wines, which would need to be transported by designated
members of the group, met the following criteria: aroma intensity, flavor
intensity, body, balance, complexity, finish, aftertaste, price value and
availability. Frou-frou’s group had recently tasted some of the wines I had
initially suggested; I had to pick alternatives.
Fresh shellfish and exotic foods were unavailable at the superette in
town, Frou-frou said, so I shouldn’t suggest white wines for them. I convinced
her to buy such food in St. Albans, said that some of the wines needed certain
cuts of beef, lamb, veal and fowl with the appropriate seasonings.
The red wine representations were from South Africa, Chile, Australia,
New Zealand, The Loire, Bordeaux, Burgundy, Italy, Spain – even Chateau Musar
from Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley – in addition to our West Coast wines. They
would include cabernet sauvignons, pinot noirs, zinfandels, syrahs, petite
sirahs; indigenous grapes of Tuscany and Piedmont from Italy and of Rioja and
Ribera del Duero from Spain.
Space constraints limit my list of recommendations and food pairings.
What follows are my favorites:
Cabernet
Sauvignon: Tobin James “Legand”; Mondavi; Dry Creek; Raymond; Reynolds
(Australia), Chateau Montevina Terra d’Oros; Alexander Valley Vineyards;
Geyser Peak; Baron Herzog, Cousino-Macul (Chile).
Pairings: grilled/broiled steaks; wood-smoked hamburgers; aged cheeses;
grilled grouse; chevre cheese over peppered steak; smoked wild duck/pheasant
with cream and olives sauces; grilled quail with currant jelly; lamb with mint
or rosemary; grilled salmon topped with mustard sauce.
Pinot Noir: Robert Mondavi; Stephen Ross “Ben Naciedo”; Dry Creek;
Oregon
and Washington region bottlings; Mirassou; Burgundies from Cote de Beaune.
Pairings:
broiled/grilled lamb/veal chops; barbecued steaks; grilled trout with tomato
salsa; chicken/beef stews; cheeseburgers; wood-smoked grilled salmon; hearty
cheeses; chicken stew in red wine sauce, onions and mushrooms; roasted quail
stuffed with wild mushrooms in Madeira sauce; lamb stuffed with goat cheese and
herbs.
Merlot:
Dry Creek; Reynolds (Australia); Tobin James; Midnight Cellars.
Zinfandel:
Dry Creek; Robert Mondavi; Montevina Terra d’Oro; Reynolds; Stephen Ross;
Rancho Zabaco “Dancing Bull”.
Syrah/Petite
Sirah/Shiraz: Montevina Terra d’Oro; Hermitage (Australia); Lolonis; Foppiano.
Miscellaneous
wines: Pinotage (South Africa); Barbaresco, Brunello di Montalcino,
Montepulciano d’Abruzzo, Chianti Classico (Italy); Vega Sindoa, Teofilo Reyes,
any Ribera de Duero and Rioja Alta (Spain); any wines of Victor Hugo and
Midnight Cellars – all of them personal fail-safe favorites; Victor Hugo
Opulence (meritage blend); Moulin-á-Vent and Morgan (Beaujolais); Cote Rotie
and other Rhone wines.
I suggested to Frou-frou that they live a little and drink slightly more
than nine ounces, that they sip extra wines with crusted bread and Cheddar
cheese as they lazed by the lake on dreamy, sun bright afternoons while they
listened to the warm sweet breezes gently kiss the trees, and the melodies of
Chopin Nocturnes and Etudes pleasingly soft in their ears.
Finally I summoned true grit and tried again to persuade Lillian that for
part of our summer vacation we rough it in the forest with Frou-frou and
friends, that we forgo a week at a plush Catskills hotel resort where we would
frolic bug free in the sun, feast on three gourmet meals every day, enjoy
ballroom dancing and live entertainment every evening.
Always conciliatory and giving, Lillian said we’d try it for a few
days, then we would see.
It rained all next day, the lodge was damp and chilly, the night was
cold, and the wind howled through the trees; visiting the three-holer outhouses
in the moon- and starless sky was forbidding and foreboding.
That evening members of Frou-frou’s group entertained one another in
the lodge’s function room with jokes and humorous anecdotes – some funny,
some dismal.
Frou-frou, laughing continually before the punch line, told this one: She
called it, “The Golden Corkscrew”:
“Two preachers – one Methodist the other Baptist – were ardent wine
lovers. They drank together often, and happily sought to outdo each other with
wine, glassware, bottle openers and epicurean accompaniments.
“The Baptist minister enjoyed a triumphant moment when he produced an
ancient corkscrew of pure gold with an impressive imperial seal; after that, he
brought it whenever they shared a bottle or two.
“One day, however, the bottle opener was nowhere to be seen, and the
inevitable question was asked concerning its whereabouts.
“ ‘My heart is heavy,’ explained the Baptist, ‘for I do believe a
member of my congregation has stolen it.’
“The Methodist was shocked, and remained silent for a time. Finally he
spoke. ‘I think I can help you,’ he said. ‘This Sunday, when you deliver a
sermon speak of The Ten Commandments. And, when you come to the commandment
‘Thou Shalt Not Steal’ – give it a great deal of emphasis. Who knows?
Perhaps the person who took your golden corkscrew will see fit to return it.’
“When next they met, the Baptist minister had his corkscrew. ‘I see
my suggestion worked,’ smiled the Methodist.
“ ‘Not exactly,’ explained his Baptist friend. ‘I took your
advice and devoted my sermon entirely to the Ten Commandments. But then I got to
‘Thou Shalt Not Commit Adultery’…and suddenly remembered where I left my
corkscrew.’ ”
Frou-frou was laughing hilariously, slapping those sitting close to her
on the back. “Isn’t that a real gasser!” she exclaimed.
Lillian, never into jokes of any nature, winced with disapproval and
whispered to me, “That does it. No way can I spend a week of this.”
But she agreed that we would give it another day’s try. The weather was
no better, the jokes even worse.
When I paraphrased from Shakespeare’s “As You Like it,” that we
needed no wilderness vacation exempt from the public haunt; found no tongues in
trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones…and that there was no
good in anything here and that we would change it for ourselves, Lillian smiled
sweetly and suggested we begin packing to leave the next morning.
After breakfast of the third the day, we bade Frou-frou and friends adieu.
We went to the Raleigh hotel in the Catskills, were entertained by Rodney
Dangerfield, Anthony Newly, Jo Stafford and Gordon McRae, Sergio Franchi, Jerry
Orbach, a Latin music dance duo who demonstrated the steps of the tango, meringué
and samba. The food was gourmet and generous; seconds were encouraged and were
avidly accepted.
And
all was well with the world and the Schultz’s.
Wine
Pick: Midnight Cellars Cabernet Sauvignon 1999, $20.99. Complex for so
relatively a young age; fruit loaded with berries; some cedar, balanced with
mint and black pepper and nuances of tar and licorice; rich, full-bodied;
softened with addition of Merlot. World class cab caliber!
Wine
Pick: New around these parts: Tobin James “Made in the Shade” Merlot,
$16.99; loaded with blackberry and plum flavors, beautifully balanced with fruit
acids and soft tannin; soft velvety swallow and extended aftertaste.
Email Comments to Julian at:
julian@oxfordwineroom.com