It’s been a good year for Texas wines. The burgeoning wine industry has claimed a growing number of medals in state, regional and international wine competitions. The list includes some well-established wineries, such as Becker Vineyards and McPherson Cellars, as well as some up-and-coming names on the scene: Sunset Vineyards and Georgetown Winery.

The following is not a complete list of award-winners, but a sampling of some of the wines that have taken top honors at various competitions.

• Becker Vineyards 2007 Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve, Wilmeth Vineyard – Best of Show Red Wine (San Antonio Wine Festival)
• Becker Vineyards 2008 Fleur Sauvage – Class Champion and Texas Class Champion (Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo International Wine Competition)
• Becker Vineyards 2008 Barbera, Peter’s Prairie Vineyard – Texas Grand Star (Lone Star International Wine Competition)
• Becker Vineyards 2009 Clementine Late Harvest Viognier, Bingham Family Vineyards – Texas Grand Star (Lone Star International Wine Competition)
• Flat Creek Estate Mistella NV – Top Texas Wine and Texas Class Champion (Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo International Wine Competition)
• Georgetown Winery Lone Star Frost NV – Grand Star (Lone Star International Wine Competition)
• Grape Creek Vineyards 2007 Serendipity – Texas Class Champion (Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo International Wine Competition)
• Grape Creek Vineyards 2009 Viognier, Lost Draw Vineyards – Texas Grand Star (Lone Star International Wine Competition)
• McPherson Cellars 2009 Rosé of Syrah – Grand Star (Lone Star International Wine Competition)
• McPherson Cellars – Reserve Class Champion (Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo International Wine Competition)
• Messina Hof Winery – Best of Herd Award (San Antonio Stock Show and Rodeo)
• Messina Hof 2005 Papa Paulo Port Private Reserve – Texas Grand Star (Lone Star International Wine Competition)
• Messina Hof Winery 2008 Chenin Blanc – People’s Choice Grand Champion White Wine (San Antonio Stock Show and Rodeo)
• Sunset Winery 2005 “Vintner’s Select” Orange Muscat, Newsom Vineyard – Texas Class Champion (Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo International Wine Competition)

Some of these wines are found only at the winery or on the wineries’ websites, but others can be found in wine shops. For a complete list of award-winners, click here.

Strawberry-Basil Martini

Basil and strawberries make for a great pair in this martini.

Strawberry-Basil Martini

1 good-sized strawberry, cut in pieces
4 fresh basil leaves
1 teaspoon simple syrup or agave nectar, or to taste
Vodka, to taste
Strawberries and/or basil leaves, for garnish

Muddle the strawberry, basil leaves and simple syrup in the bottom of a cocktail shaker to mash the strawberry and break up the basil leaves. Add ice and vodka, to taste. Shake until icy. Strain into a chilled martini glass. Garnish with a strawberry and/or a basil leaf.

Makes 1 martini.

Source: John Griffin

Are you tequila obsessed?  Crave learning more about its history, production, and grading?

Gabriel’s Wine & Spirits has partnered with Aldaco’s Mexican Cuisine and Partida Tequila to offer Tequilier Certification.  The class will be held on Saturday, July 31 at Aldaco’s Stone Oak.  For $400, you will spend the day learning in depth about tequila with topics including: types of agave; distillation process; standards of quality; maturation process, and more.  At the end of the class, participants can take an exam. If they pass, they receive a Level One Tequilier Certificate from the Academia Mexicana del Tequila.

According to a press release, this class will be the first offered in Texas.  It also states that only 22 people currently have this certification.

Lunch and tequila tastings are included.  Registration starts at 8:30 a.m., which is followed by class until 12:30 p.m.  Lunch will last one hour and the class will resume until 5:30 p.m.  Make reservations by July 17 by contacting Gabriel’s at sales@GabrielSpirits.com or 210-831-0042.

Aldaco’s Stone Oak
20079 Stone Oak Parkway
San Antonio, TX 78258
http://aldacos-stoneoak.com

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Some people just don’t like to celebrate with roses.

Why not pair your Valentine’s meal with a fine beer?

Brian Tarver, one of only four certified cicerone in Texas (similar to a master sommelier, but with beer instead), has a great list of beers to inspire romance.

If having chocolate, pair it with an imperial stout.  These dark beers traditionally have a higher alcohol content to prevent freezing and were made in the style of brewers who supplied the czarist courts.  Tarver recommends North Coast Brewing Company’s Old Rasputin Russian Imperial Stout (9 percent ABV, 75 IBU), which is rated 91 by Chicago’s Beverage Testing Institute and has won a number of gold medals.

Another imperial stout that Tarver recommend is from Samuel Smith (7 percent ABV).  This beer has also earned several gold medals and brewer’s website says that it would also pair well with “espresso, stilton and walnuts, New York cheesecake, steak au poivre, caviar, oysters Rockefeller, [and] chocolate baked Alaska.”

A third imperial stout that Tarver suggests is from Samuel Adams (9.2 percent ABV).  In addition to chocolate desserts, the brewery suggest also pairing it with strong cheeses, rare roast beef, and oysters, which would be a perfect aphrodisiac.

As an extra special gift for a beer lover, Tarver’s choice is Deus Brut des Flandres – a beer that is brewed in Belgium, transported to France, and riddled like Champagne.  The current vintage is 2006 and priced at $31.49 per 750 ml.  At 11.5 percent alcohol, it is a strong beer that he says has a little spiciness and could be divided into two Champagne glasses for toasting your Valentine’s Day.

Tarver’s other suggestions for pairing desserts are Lindemans Framboise, a Belgian Raspberry Lambic, and Young’s Double Chocolate Stout, which is great with a scoop of vanilla ice cream floated on top.

All of these beers are available at the H-E-B’s Alon Market, where Tarver is on staff.

No matter what you choose, these beers will warm your sweetie’s heart.

HEB Alon Market
8503 NW Military Hwy.
San Antonio, TX 78230

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The second PorterFest at Freetail Brewing Company opened on Saturday with five different versions of their Torpor Porter.  Each was made in a five-gallon batch.  Some had flavors added before fermentation, others afterward. All demonstrated how this style of beer can grow and change with the brewer’s imagination

The masala porter had strong notes of cardamom pods and was reminiscent of chai spice.  The vanilla, made with bourbon-soaked vanilla beans, had a subtle fragrance and was pleasant without a sugary taste.  A smoky spiciness accompanied the chipotle, which finished with a soft burn.  Ryan Closner, a Freetail employee, served us the cherry, which is made with juice and tastes like fresh cherries.  Unlike some other major brands of cherry porter, this version tasted nothing like cloying cough syrup.  The coffee porter, true to other versions, tasted like a fizzy coffee; it would have been pleasant to sip this the whole afternoon.

Even though the PorterFest ended on Saturday, the remainder of the batches will be sold until they run out.  Due to small batch size and popularity of the flavors, Sunday is probably the last day you can sample them.  Once they are gone, you can still enjoy their regular-flavored porter, the Torpor.

If porter is not your thing, Freetail currently has the following brews on tap:  Old Bat Rastard, La Rubia, Rye Wit, Freetail Ale, Pail Tail, and One.  On Saturdays and Sunday, they also currently make Witmosas, a refreshing combination of Rye Wit and orange juice.   Owner Scott Metzger joked that it is great for a hangover.

There are still more events to Freetail’s Feb-BREW-ary: La Muerta bottle release, beer dinner, beer and cheese seminar, and “The Battle of the Wits”.  Metzger expects six to seven flavored wits will be competing this year.  There are only 10 seats left for the beer dinner, which is priced at $45 per person, plus tax and gratuity.  This popular event usually sells out so reserve your space early.

For more information on Feb-BREW-ary, please see our Feb. 1st article.

Freetail Brewing Co.
4035 N. Loop 1604 W., Suite 105
San Antonio, TX 78257
www.freetailbrewing.com
(210) 395-4974

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Spec’s Wine, Spirits & Finer Foods is opening a store in San Antonio, in the Live Oak area, according to a spokesperson for company president John Rydman.  Details are still being worked on and more information will be available soon, she said.

The store is at 14623 IH-35, and is about 6 weeks away from opening.

Spec’s is known for its great wine selection as well as other beverages and spirits.

Q. Have you heard the term used that a wine is “asleep”? Is this just another way of saying it has lost flavor, or has it gone bad?

A. When some fine wines hit “adolescence,” they can act like any teenager.  They are no longer youngsters, showing those fresh vibrant flavors, but they haven’t mellowed to maturity either.  That wine might be unpredictable, maybe even “surly,” a word wine expert Jancis Robinson uses. It might close up, too, meaning it loses aroma or fragrance.  Some just say that the wine is “asleep,” or going through its dull period.

We use the term “fine wine” here because these are generally purchased for a good bit of money, then cellared until they are mature — that case of 2000 Bordeaux you bought, for example. In the process of maturing from young and vibrant to older and full of character, it might pass through a dull phase.

So, back to that teenaged wine.  What’s a poor parent – meaning you, the wine bottle’s owner – to do?  How can you know when a fine wine has reached this stage, especially if you have only one bottle? It’s not as though you can uncork it for a test, decide “yup, it’s surly” and close it up again until its temper improves.

We asked our resident wine guy, Cecil Flentge, to share his views on this matter.  Basically, there’s not much to do, unless you happen to have a case — or even three or four bottles of this vintage in your cellar, he says.  If you have several bottles and opened another bottle of the same wine, same vintage some months before and it tasted fine, and the next bottle you open is dull, you may have a sleeping wine. So, let that third bottle lie awhile.

What if that wine isn’t really asleep? “There are so many other little variables that could be happening to that wine. I worry that it might be corked (affected by a chemical compound which causes loss of flavor and a bad taste) or oxidized,” says Flentge. Again, the only way to know is to give it another year or so (if you have another bottle) and see what happens.  If it is a winemaker you trust, and the word about the vintage in the wine press has been good, give it a chance.

Also, keep your ears open around wine aficionados and you might hear words like, “Yes, that such and such Chateau Petrus is drinking very well right now.” Again, the wine isn’t drinking any more than it’s sleeping.  This is just code for people who A) read this in Decanter, or B) want you to know that they have cases of the stuff and have been sampling it all along so as to announce its drinkability at just the right moment.  Or, it may be C) they just happen to know what they’re talking about.

In our society these days, we tend to buy single bottles and consume them quickly after their purchase. Winemakers know this and it does influence the kind of product they sell.  In fact, the whole matter of wine going through a “dumb” stage was probably far more an issue in years gone by than it is now. In days gone by, the gentry who could afford fine wine would lay in many cases, keeping it in the cellar until it was deemed ready to drink.  If a bottle was opened too soon, and it appeared to be asleep, then they might make a mental note (or chew out their personal cellar master) to leave that vintage alone for another year or two.

For the rest of us, the question is mostly academic — but possibly good information to keep in a dusty corner of your brain, should your wealthy aunt die and leave you her wine cellar.

Looking for a cooling cocktail to enjoy on these last days of summer? Try a Ginger Rogers, named after the famous dancer. It was originally served at Social Hollywood in Los Angeles and created by mixologist Jason Lara.

Ginger Rogers

1 whole strawberry, sliced
5 pieces of clementine
2 ounces Campari
3 ounces of orange juice
Splash of 7UP
Powdered ginger

Muddle the strawberry and fresh clementine.  Add ice and pour Campari, orange juice, and a splash of 7UP into a cocktail shaker.  Sprinkle a pinch of powdered ginger on top of the ingredients.  Shake well and strain onto the rocks in a highball glass.  Garnish with a pansy and serve.

From Campari.

Shake ingredients with ice, and strain into a cocktail glass.  Garnish with a lemon twist and a fresh basil leaf.

So a restaurant owner says, “I offered the Sauvignon Blanc, but she said she didn’t like grapefruit.”

“Well, some of the Sauvignon Blanc from New Zealand and other places does have a grapefruit taste at the end.  I guess she just doesn’t like that flavor.”

“No, she said she knew that they put grapefruit in it. I told her no, but she was not going to believe me.”

This is really a common misconception.  I have been asked in many wine classes to describe the flavor of a Riesling and my answer might go like this, “There is certainly the classic aroma of green apple that you find in most Riesling wines.  Then a hint of under-ripe peach, maybe cinnamon-nutmeg, with an almost sea salt finish.”

That is when a lot of them look at me as if I just gave verbal instructions on how to solve a Rubik’s Cube.  Some of them say, “How do you know this stuff?” and my stock reply is that I have been drinking a lot of wine for a very long time.

Then there will be a few brave souls that speak out.  “I definitely get the apple and I understand the sea salt thingy, but I do not get the other.  I guess my palate isn’t that good.”

I then try to encourage them to give themselves time to develop this attention to detail, because my palate is probably no better than theirs.

They scoff at this, but I continue by saying, “When was the last time you sniffed some nutmeg?”  Generally, it has been a long time, if ever.

“So if you are not familiar with the aroma, how could you identify it?  Do not be so hard on yourself. Smell an orange, an apple, a mango, a lemon and a lime.  Then go to a wine with the tools you need.”

It is about then that someone, perceiving me to be the gentle curmudgeon that I am, asks the question:  “They don’t really put that stuff in the wine, do they?”

No, they don’t.  They used to in wine coolers, now called Arbor Mist, but in regular wines it is just grape juice.  The many flavors that come through that grape juice are tweaked and tempered by the heat of the sun on the skin of the grape as it matured in central Germany.  Also by the minerals and fog of that valley in California or the French oak barrel it is aged in or the type of yeast that is used in fermentation.  All of these things change grape juice into a wonderful mosaic of tastes that we are not familiar with day to day.

So our brain tries to take the input from our nose and our tongue and give us an answer to the question, “What does this taste like?”  It can only answer with things we have already taught our brain to recognize.  Like apples, peaches, and cinnamon.  If someone says it reminds them of Australian Pepperbush, you probably would not know what he or she is talking about.  But if that person said it had a slight green peppercorn flavor, you might know.

“Yes, now, class, everyone go out and smell and taste things.” It doesn’t have to be that odd.  Next time you are eating and drinking different items, pay attention to what they smell and taste like, develop your brain’s library of tastes.

And honest, they don’t add grapefruit.

So we are all ready for a long weekend to reflect on the many good things that our nation’s independence brings us every day.  A chance to talk with the young’ns and explain the history of the United States of America.  These are excellent things to do on the Independence Day weekend and maybe more often than once a year.

But any talk of our shared history will eventually get to food, and since we are in the great state of Texas we will talk about grilling.  Ah, that is also a worthy subject, but a hot one!

So what can we sip while we grill when even the native Texans are saying, “It is a might warm.”  Oh, the many choices we have!

First, cold water.  Not only a great drink, but it really caught you off guard, didn’t it?  Never forget that water is your friend, particularly when the thermometer hits the triple digits.

Then there is beer, well known to quench a thirst, well-loved throughout the world.  In the heat you might want to lean toward the lagers, pilsners, even lights, because they are better tasting when a real cold beer is needed.

However, right now I want to remind you to enjoy some wine in the summertime.  There are many white wines, rosé wines, and even red wines that do well chilled.  Plus they give you so much when matching food and beverage.

Rosé wines are probably the most misunderstood wines for a steamy day.  They have a fresh fruit, crisp, and vibrant flavor that will match hotdogs, roast chicken, and a big slab of baby backs any day.  Try some of the inexpensive Spanish wines or some of the new crop of rosé wines from Argentina and Chile.  They are made from many different grapes like shiraz, cabernet sauvignon and malbec.

Well, now that we have mentioned malbec, let us talk about the red wines you can get cold.  Malbec is a new one to try, but the stand-bys are pinot noir, beaujolais and grenache/garnacha.  This can be a flavor-changing process.  All red wines should be served at least cool, but chilling them down to 50 degrees will make most reds taste flat, or one-dimensional.  The few listed above can still be quite pleasant a cooler temperatures — different from how they would be at a dinner in an air-conditioned room, but still flavorful and refreshing.

Now we get to the white wines, the main event.  There are so many that work well that I think it would be better to list one to avoid.  Big, luscious, long-oak-aged chardonnays.  If you get those too cold, they just taste like grill wood.  Save that type of wine for a different setting.  But the slightly effervescent, crisp, light vinho verde wines of Portugal are just wonderful as pool juice or grilling accessories!

Then the many rieslings of the world, from rich German to more mineral dry ones from Australia or the Finger Lakes region of New York are a welcome cleanser for your palate.

New Zealand sauvignon blanc.  Yeah, I know, what took me so long to get to them?  These are fruity and lemon-lime tart, a perfect foil to a spicy pepper and fruit mélange basted chicken.  But do not overlook the sauvignon blancs from South Africa and South America, they will muscle in between bites of smoked pork tenderloin with the best of them.

But what is a celebration without sparkling wine?  Whether it is Spanish cava, Italian prosecco, German Sekt, French Champagne, or Australian/Californian/South African sparkling wines, bubbles make it a party!

No matter which one you choose, toast the people who made it happen in 1776.