Brew Hops & Wine Stops

I was recently honored with the privilege of sampling a top-secret experimental batch of beer from a fairly well-known brewery. Unfortunately, I cannot say which brewery or even the state they reside; I can, however, give a full tasting description of the style. The style was a bière de garde, a very uncommon style with me only ever having two others: Two Brothers Domaine DuPage and Brewery Ommegang Scythe and Sickle, both available at select ABCs. 

Bières de garde, literally translating beers to keep, originated in the farmhouse houses of northern France centuries ago. They were brewed at the peak times for harvesting the malts and hops and were kept until the climate was too harsh for new growth. It is a rugged style with depth and complexity that takes many flavors from the terroir of the region. Ranging in color from golden to amber to light brown, it imparts a faint malt sweetness with a medium hop balance. The major characteristic is a funky, musty, cellar-like taste and aroma imbued by the very basements they where they were brewed.

This particular bière de garde was amped up with lactobacilli and pediocci anaerobic bacteria and aged on cherrywood spirals. The bacteria are lactic acid producing bacteria that thrive in a low oxygen environment and feed off the sugars in beer, giving it a sour taste. Many sour styles, including Berliner weisses, lambics, Flanders red ales and witbiers, incorporate one or both strains, which range from mildly tart to lip-puckering after the product is finished. The lactic acid sourness is one of my favorite flavors in beer. This beer came in a plain 12-ounce bottle with an unmarked gray crown. It is the third attempt at the style according to the person who gave it to me. 

Appearance

I am serving directly from my temperature-controlled beer fridge at 55 degrees into my Spaten Franziskaner weissbier hefeweizen glass. It pours a nice cloudy orange-brown hue with no head.

Smell

The sourness is prevalent with hints of apple cider vinegar, cherry wood and very mild candied fruits. 

Taste

Good, not super sour, flashes of the wood with a lime juice bite followed by a faint apple cider vinegar finish. There is also a slight wheat beer presence and very little carbonation in the mouthfeel. A tang gets me right in the middle of my tongue with each sip and there is a little astringency from the wood.

This is definitely not like the other two bières de garde I had, but the sourness was right up my alley. I hope this beer gets to be a future limited release by the brewery so others can enjoy it. It almost reminds me of a toned down Duchesse De Bourgogne, a Flanders red ale with heavy, woody apple cider vinegar notes. All of these styles may not be for beginner beer drinkers with fledgling palates because of the atypical flavors and pertinent sourness; it is better to work your way up to it. Both the Domaine DuPage and Scythe and Sickle are very nice examples of the style. My dream would be to travel to Nord-Pas-de-Calais on the French side of Flanders and enjoy a brew made in a centuries-old barn.     

Adam Shugan, ABC Fine Wine & Spirits beer consultant - Gainesville

Follow me on Twitter @abcbeeradams

It was something that those of us in the wine business should never do, and I was guilty. I was attending a series of seminars, master classes, tastings and dinners in South Australia before heading out to visit some of the regions. On my last evening in Adelaide I attended a gathering, along with several hundred other wine experts from around the world. Australia was putting its best foot forward and free-pouring a wide selection of hundreds of its best wines. There were several stations of the most delicious food on hand. Owners, winemakers and sales people were there to meet with us, talk about their wines, and of course pour copiously. I met many fine and interesting folk – wine people are generally a passionate and friendly bunch – and in the course of the evening I was guilty of overindulging slightly. Somehow I ended up at a bar drinking beer with the band who entertained us that night – a folky roots group somewhat akin to Mumford and Sons (though they didn't want to hear that).

The next morning was the grand wine tasting. About 200 wineries were in attendance, ready and waiting to pour wine in the largest wine forum ever undertaken in Australia, and there I was, not – shall I say – at my best. Quickly I did something else that wine tasters should not do. I downed two or three espressos. After picking on some food and tasting a few wines I began to feel fine.

It was at this point that I approached a table of wines from Howard Vineyard and asked to taste. The pourer was a friendly guy named Tom Northcott who I soon learned was the executive winemaker at the winery. As soon as I tasted, my senses jerked to attention. I was immediately drawn to the purity of the fruit and the finesse of the wines. They had an elegance that was right up my alley and I was hooked.

Howard Vineyard is a family-owned winery in Adelaide Hills producing estate-grown wines. The land was purchased in the late 1990s and the brand was established in 2005. There are two well-situated vineyards with northwest-facing slopes which offer good exposure to the sun, and red loam soils which provide good drainage as well as a mineral structure to the wines. The Nairne vineyard is ideal for cool climate reds and the Schoenthal vineyard, being at a higher elevation, is used for whites and Pinot Noir.

ABC Fine Wine & Spirits is happy to offer two wines from Howard Vineyard:

Clover Shiraz: “The rich palate displays blackberries, olives, white pepper, blueberry and spice, followed by smooth French oak and perfectly balanced tannins. This wine will benefit from careful cellaring and is best decanted thirty minutes prior to serving.” – Winery Notes (Gold Medal from Wine Showcase Magazine)

Picnic Sauvignon Blanc: “Another take on Hills Sauvignon Blanc that treks a clever path towards the more lemon and citrus end of the spectrum but not forgetting its telltale passionfruits and lightly scoped tropical fruit salad elements as well, all cast with lovely tangy acidity and a lift of musk-like spice.” – Tony Love’s Top 100 Wines 2014 (Four Stars)

Both wines are excellent examples of the overwhelming quality to be found in the wines of Australia, as well as irrefutable proof that an under-the-weather taster can still sometimes choose well. Don’t hesitate to try them!

Bill Stobbs, ABC ABC Fine Wine & Spirits wine supervisor

Follow me on Twitter @abcwinebills

This is one of the very first 2014 wines, after Beaujolais Nouveau and couple of Provence rosés, already available. The wine exhibits aromas and flavors of white flowers, ripe citrus and sweet apple, and all the freshness, perfect balance and pure, long finish expected from this best-selling and favorite organic wine!

Château Petit Roubié is family-owned by Floriane and Olivier Azan since 1981 and organically farmed since 1985. The winery is located in the small town of Pinet (population 1,300), which would have been totally unknown to the wine world if it wasn't for the great white wine produced there from the Picpoul grape.

Olivier Azan is a firm believer in organic farming; his Picpoul vineyards have been free of chemicals and synthetic fertilizers for over 26 years. These happy vines are planted on a high plateau overlooking the Mediterranean; happy vines = good wine.

The Picpoul de Pinet from Château Petit Roubié is a pure, honest, well-crafted and exciting wine that gives great pleasure when consumed as aperitif and will enhance any seafood dish, particularly raw oysters. In fact, this area is also famous for some of France's best oysters.

This great wine is an incredible bargain offered at $10.99.

Atanas Nechkov, ABC Fine Wine & Spirits wine supervisor

Follow me on Twitter @abcwineatanas

I found out three months ago, that I was going to South Africa to visit a few wineries and to learn about their wine industry, but with everything else going on that time of year it seemed like a long way away. Well, I’m on the plane right now headed to Johannesburg. This will be the longest flight I’ve ever had (17 or so hours), but with iPad & Ambien in hand, we’ll be there in no time. This is my first trip to this part of the world and I’m very excited to see, smell, listen to and taste all of what South Africa has to offer.

Wines from some of the wonderful wineries we'll be visiting this week.

We are scheduled to visit Paarl, Elgin and of course Stellenbosch while we are there, with stops at Painted Wolf, Edgebaston, Tamboerskloof, Black Pearl, Downes and a couple other wineries. One of the more intriguing visits will be having the opportunity to get in a cage for a little face time with a great white...shark !  The shark part notwithstanding, this trip looks to be scheduled at a very calm pace and will allow us to really learn and enjoy each of our visits.

I will have unlimited Internet access, so anyone who follows me on Twitter will be able to see how it is going down there--join me one my travels there, @abcwinekena. I will also be blogging about the trip in the coming weeks right here, at blog.abcfws.com!

Ken Amendola, ABC Fine Wine & Spirits wine supervisor

The Wine Spectator, Wine Advocate and Wine Enthusiast are all familiar names to American wine lovers. We rely on these publications to help us sort through the seemingly endless choices when trying to select a bottle of wine. An outstanding score from one of these wine reviewers is a near guarantee that the wine will sell out quickly.

If I inform one of our guests that a wine was awarded Tre Bicchieri from Gambero Rosso I usually get that look like I'm speaking a foreign language to them...and I guess I am.

Gambero Rosso is the Italian publishing and training leader in the field of wine and food. Each year Gambero Rosso publishes a wine guide know as Vini d'Italia. For the 2015 edition their experts have managed to taste 45,000 wines from over 2,400 wineries. Rigorous blind tasting and evaluations are made, not by individuals, but by a panel of wine experts. Wines are not given points but instead are awarded one, two or three glasses. This year out of the 45,000 wines tasted there were 423 given the award of Tre Bicchieri (Three Glasses, the top award).

Gambero Rosso as I mentioned is not just a publisher of wine information. For more than 28 years they have supported Italian wineries in their effort to expand internationally. This year the Gambero Rosso Tre Bicchieri World Tour 2015 makes a stop in Miami. The tour has already visited Zurich, Warsaw, Oslo, Copenhagen and Stockholm, as well as New York, Chicago and San Francisco. After Miami, the tour will move on to China in May and then end up in Helsinki this June.

On February 3, the Gambero Rosso Tre Bicchieri World Tour will stop at the Coral Gables Country Club in Miami. I will be attending and proudly pouring one of the elite 423 wines awarded Tre Bicchieri, Giravolta Primitivo di Manduria.

If you are not familiar with Giravolta, it is 100% Primativo from the Puglia region of Italy. It has intense aromas of red berries with cocoa and Asian spices. It has been one of my favorite wines for years and now I can with pride say this wine has Tre Bicchieri. 

Paul Quaglini, ABC Fine Wine & Spirits wine supervisor 

Follow me on Twitter @abcwinepaulq

In December, Cigar Aficionado released its list of the top 25 cigars of 2014. Number 9 on the list was the Monte by Montecristo Jacopo. We added this cigar to our lineup after the 2013 IPCPR show and it hit the shelves late in 2013 but never seemed to get a lot of hype or attention. Now, with a 93 rating from Cigar Aficionado and making it into their top 10, this stick certainly deserves a much closer look!

Let’s take look at the basics. We’ve got a 6 1/8" x 54 ring box pressed torpedo. The wrapper is not the Connecticut shade wrapper you usually see on a Montecristo. This one is Ecuador Habano, and I know just by looking at it that it's going to have a much fuller taste than the normal Montecristo. This smoke also has a double binder: Dominican Olor and Nicaraguan Corojo. That is definitely going to step up the flavor profile from the mild strength we expect from a Montecristo. The filler is Dominican, but what we have here is Altadis USA retooling some of their landmark blends for today’s cigar market. A great example of this was seen several years ago by Altadis USA with their introduction of the Romeo by Romeo line, creating an outstanding new blend that made it up to number 3 on Cigar Aficionado top cigar list! 

So I take off the cello too look at this beauty. It’s a smooth and silky wrapper with an aroma of cocoa and nuts with a bit of hay and dry leaves. It almost reminds me of an autumn day aroma. Has a nice cold draw of cocoa and nuts. The construction of this cigar is outstanding….just the right feel and very consistent. I put torch to cigar and the first thing I notice is the great draw, nice and open with just the right amount of resistance. The flavor is very toasty--a hint of nuts and cocoa and just a bit of spice coming through from that Nicaraguan binder. It is not overly complex but is highly enjoyable. There is no predominant flavor pushing through, but it is just complex enough to make all the subtle flavors work together in unison. This cigar is mellow and smooth and a real joy to smoke. The cigar burned absolutely perfect and never needed a touch up. The smoke never got hot and essentially remained cool right to the end. I paired this cigar with a nice glass of Port on a cool evening; it was a great match. 

So what are my final thoughts on this cigar? As much as I enjoyed the smoke it left me somewhat confused. It was very smooth, it burned perfectly, and I smoked it all the way to the end since it was so smooth. Perhaps with a 93 rating I was waiting for that blockbuster flavor to come out and give me that WOW factor. That WOW factor never did appear but yet this was really a nice smoke and I would definitely smoke it again. Sometimes you don’t need the WOW factor when everything else just works so well. I recommend trying this cigar--it is definitely worth it! 

Steve Mungeer, ABC Fine Wine & Spirits Gourmet Supervisor/Certified Retail Tobacconist

Follow me on Twitter @abccigarmungo

I'm ruined. I have spent too long in the world of double digit ABV beers. Occasionally I tone it down and enjoy a 9.4% Lagunitas Hairy Eyeball or a 9.8% Mission Dark Seas, but that's about as passive as I'll go. There's something about beers once they cross that 10% line. They always just have this affect of filling you up. It's like the difference between eating a single 4-oz patty burger and a 16-oz NY strip steak. You don't need sides or appetizers or really anything if you don't want to regret it the next day.

Regardless of the style, there always seem to be this aftertaste of syrupy sweetness that I am absolutely in love with. Surprisingly enough, I don't eat sweets or chocolate. But I will surely drink them. I am constantly raving about Weyerbacher, who are known specifically for big giant beers.Blithering Idiot and Insanity (both barleywines) sit at 11.1%, and Tiny (Belgian-style imperial stout) is 11.8%. Then I managed to get Victory V-Twelve into the store, an obvious 12% quad.

And those are still low in comparison to some.

The Goose Island Bourbon County beers are prime examples. One 12-oz bottle of the Brand Stout (at 14.2%) is enough to make anyone say, "That's all I need tonight." Then of course there's the North Coast Old Stock Ale Cellar Reserve. At a paltry 15.2%, it's the most deliciously sweet beer I've ever had--a hint of fruit up front, with a rich, malty goodness in the middle, finished with maple syrup. My mouth felt coated in that syrupy sweet feeling I mentioned earlier. As it warmed to room temperature, it proceeded to taste like a sweeter version of a nice brandy. That's the kind of beer that you only need one of and you are done for the night.

There are plenty of breweries that are always going to more extreme levels, BrewDog and Mikkeller are some examples looking at plenty of 18%, 20% and higher ABV brews. I haven't had the opportunity to try some of those more extreme beers, but I certainly have them on my to-do list. But for now, I'll enjoy any and all barleywines, imperial stouts and Belgian quads I can acquire, like this fascinating blonde ale from France: a 13% called Belzebuth. It has the same finish as the rest of them, and as far as I'm concerned, that can never be a bad thing.

James Day, ABC Fine Wine & Spirits beer consultant - North Port

Follow me on Twitter @abcbeerjamesd