Errazuriz “Wild Ferment” Chardonnay 2007
Grape: Chardonnay
Region: Chile, Casablanca Valley
Winemaker: Errazuriz
Price: $20

One of my favorite songs by Mississippi John Hurt is an irreverently cute little ditty called “Funky Butt” that could be a modern hit as a dirty rap song, I think. It’s about what you’d think it’s about, and it features the line “open the window, let the funk go out,” which I can’t believe George Clinton never named an album after.

So what could this possibly have to do with wine? I thought of it in relation to the concept of wild fermentation, which, in essence, turns the phrase on its head:

Open the window, let the funk come in.

I tried Errazuriz’ “Wild Ferment” Chardonnay earlier this summer at a tasting hosted by Artisan Vineyards, a local (to Minneapolis) organization that direct-orders (via shipping or local retailers) rarer wines straight (almost) to consumers.

The guy behind the tasting table described wild fermentation as “open the windows in the barn, let everything in and let nature have her way.” While I don’t think it’s quite that simple or rustic, the process does use the native yeasts that are present on the grapes and in the surrounding air and environment.

Super chemistry nerds might enjoy the article Wild yeasts help create volatile compounds in wine fermentation (with much more detail than I’ll devote here), which references a study done in Spain comparing a pure inoculated (not wild) batch of wine with a batch fermented with a mix of innoculated and wild yeasts. The text reiterates another point the man behind the tasting table made: that wild fermentation is more of a crap-shoot than controlled fermentation, since the winemaker has less control over, and knowledge of, which yeasts will be active in fermentation and what the result might be. One could go off and produce a bad odor, or they could all die off and fail. Furthermore, the results could be different in each barrel.

When it does work, however, the results can be magical, and it works in this Errazuriz Chardonnay. I came across a couple of references to notable wine critics who rated vintages at 90.

My own take is that this wine had an excellent balance of what I like about Chardonnays. And with such divergent qualities and characteristics across the world, that’s a mouthful. There was the expected oak (1o months in French barrels, 17% new), an earthy spice, and light sweetness of ripe fruit. All well pronounced and in balance — I felt like this wine went just a little further in all the right ways. Whether that can be attributed to the fermentation style, I don’t know. (Note: Errazuriz’s Wild Ferment also benefits from malolactic fermentation afterwards, adding creaminess, of course). As a food pairing, it was wonderful with a cold, sweet, ripe nectarine and stood up well with fennel-crusted pork loin roasted with apples, potatoes and red onion.

What the winemaker says:

The winemaker’s notes on this wine read like a story of the vintage, from the scene of its birth — in the Casablanca Valley, 20 miles from the Pacific Ocean, west of Santiago, Chile — to the cool April mornings on which the grapes were picked.

Of the final product, the winemaker writes:

Light straw yellow in colour, our 2007 Wild Ferment Chardonnay is particularly complex on the nose and palate. With good intensity, it delivers notes that range from toast to nuts to aromas that recall tropical fruits such as pineapple and cherimoya.
There’s a light touch of smoke and ash lingering in the background that lead to an outstanding palate that nicely blends crisp acidity with a sweetish sensation. Medium-bodied and creamy on the palate, with flavours that are consistent with the nose. Fresh and elegant, with a delightfully long finish.

What others say:

The wine blog Spirit of Wine gives the 2005 vintage four of five stars in a concise review of color, nose, and palate — including an update after two years of cellaring. (The blogger notes Robert Parker’s review, which gives a drink-by range of 3–5 years.)

Wineaccess and its users rate the 2007 quite highly (90 points, and 4.5 out of 5 stars, respectively) and describe it thusly:

Green-tinged yellow. Strikingly complex aromas of spiced pear, apple, floral honey and smoky lees. Fleshy orchard fruit and orange flavors are given spine by tangy minerals and gain an intriguing herbal quality on the back end. The mineral note lingers on the long, juicy finish.

My advice: buy a bottle or two. Or 12. Note: the winemaker makes a Pinot Noir Wild Ferment, as well.

I recently invited my chef friend (who cooks at Duplex in Minneapolis) over for some summer evening grilling and a glass or two of wine. I had bought a dozen giant white shrimp, a bottle of Spanish white wine, a baguette and some asparagus with no real idea how I would cook them, aside from a vague desire to use Spanish pimentón, or smoked paprika. I invited the right guy over, because while I bought the ingredients, he took over the kitchen prep, grilling, and plating, turning a mere meal into a thing of tasty beauty.

In the meantime, I came up with an idea for cocktails — albariño martinis — that is either an abomination or a creative breakthrough. (I’ll let you decide.) To explain the inspiration, I swear I taste a bit of green olive at the end of a mouthful of Martin Codax albariño — a brininess or salinity that I’ve noted in other albariños. While in Galicia in northwestern Spain, I heard it more eloquently described as a lingering taste of the sea spray carried off the estuaries by the ocean breeze and onto the vineyards. Or something like that.

Always looking for a way to ruin good wine, I thought, “martinis!” We made two, actually: the first, made with gin and wine, is akin to the classic dirty. The second is sweeter, made with vodka and Galician aguardiente, or “firewater” — some tasty liqueurs I stumbled upon in Cambados, Spain last year. (Good luck finding the regional aguardiente, especially albariño-infused with actual grapes inside. If you do, please let me know where.)

You can prepare this in any order, but I suggest having a martini while you cook. It just helps.

Albariño martini (gin, dry)

1 part not-too-expensive albariño wine
2 parts good gin
2 or more martini olives
a few drops of olive juice

Half-fill a martini shaker with ice cubes. Add the gin and wine, cover and shake vigorously until well-mixed and chilled (about 10–15 seconds). Turn the shaker straight upside-down and strain the liquid into a martini glass until almost full. With clean hands, grab the olives from the jar, add to the glass, then splash the remaining olive juice from your fingers into the glass. (You can add more juice to taste afterwards.) Serve and drink up!

It’s not quite your standard dirty martini. The wine basically replaces the vermouth and adds a floral sweetness to the fume of the gin, an effect you can manage either way by adding less or more wine. (I wouldn’t go any further than a 1-to-1 ratio of wine to gin, however. It is a martini, for god’s sake.)

Albariño martini (vodka, sweet)

2-3 parts good vodka
1 part aguardiente liqueur (uvas albariñas)
2-3 grapes (preferably albariño, soaked in the liqueur)

Follow mixing, shaking and pouring instructions above

Grilled shrimp with pimentón, pesto and asparagus

(serves four unless you all want more than 3 shrimp)

12 raw giant shrimp, peeled and deveined
1 teaspoon pimentón (smoked paprika)
3 tablespoons olive oil
1/4 teaspoon sea salt

1 cup garlic/basil pesto (buy or make yourself — get yer own recipe)
1/2 pound fresh asparagus, bottom half or third cut off
1 baguette
1 lemon, cut into eighths

Combine the shrimp, half the olive oil, and the pimentón in a bowl. Mix carefully and marinate for 15 minutes. (Or the time it takes to make a martini and heat the grill to medium-high heat.)

Cut the baguette, at an angle, into 12 one-inch round segments, as for bruschetta.

On a plate, drizzle half the remaining olive oil on the asparagus. Sprinkle with half the sea salt.

When the grill is ready, cook the asparagus in a grill pan for ten minutes, turning occasionally.

After five minutes, place the baguette slices on the grill to toast. Turn once.

Remove both from heat (but keep warm) and place the shrimp on the grill, sprinkle with remaining sea salt, and cook for 2 minutes, then flip and cook for 2 more minute, or until pink.

To plate: Place two pieces of toast; drizzle one with remaining oil, spread the other with pesto. Place shrimp over toast, spread with a bit more pesto. Top with asparagus and garnish with lemon wedge, to squeeze.

Note: this is excellent with albariño wine (or Portuguese whites) not mixed hard liquor, of course.

Luccarreli Salice Salentino 2008
Winemaker: Terre di Sava
Region: Apuila (or Puglia)
Grape: Negroamaro, Malvasia Nera
Alcohol content: 13%
Price: $12

I googled “Salice Salentino” and found this article by Alan Boehmer, who asks rhetorically if this is “the world’s greatest value wine?” He certainly thinks so, and while I think the pool of candidates is too full to crown any one, my taste this 2008 offering tells me it’s very near the top of the list.

Value? I paid $12 for this wine after tasting it (and 41 other wines!) at an Artisan Vineyards event. My notes from the tasting are only three check marks, double-underlined. I had already been through the whites and I was feeling, well, enthusiastic.

Salice Salentino is a small DOC in the larger Apulia (or Puglia) region, in the heel of the boot that is southeast Italy. The winemaker Terre di Sava takes its name from its home town of Sava, east of the coastal city of Taranto (which is outside the DOC). Their 2007 Salice Salentino is among a handful of Terre di Sava’s awarded wines, earning a bronze medal at the Decanter World Wine Awards in 2009.

This red wine is made from a blend of  Negroamaro (primarily) and Malvasia Nera grapes. I found it to be full-bodied, with an inky red, almost purple, color. The tart cherry on the front of the tongue gave way to soft tannins, some bitterness like unsweetened cocoa, and finally a finish of heat and menthol, believe it or not.

The winemaker’s own notes (Google translated from Italian) describe it as: “brilliant ruby red color with garnet hues, an intense aroma, fruity with hints of cherry and plum, spicy with hints of Mediterranean herbs. Bodied, quite structured, with a pleasant freshness in the aftertaste, ready to drink.”

It did quite well with the pizza, and the sweet Italian-sausage marinara of a later pie brought the fruit out even more.

Apparently Trader Joe’s does (or did) stock a $5 bottle, and I’d love to try it. Snooth lists thousands of Salice Salentinos ranging from $4 to $25, with one over $50 and another over $90.

If the vast majority of these “value-priced” wines are as good as this one, I’ll be buying more. Not sure how well-kept this secret is, but, “Ssh.”

Before our trip to Portugal and northwestern Spain, I knew there was port — you know, the sweet, plummy dessert wine — and that there was a town it was named for, and that the town was not called “Port,” but “Porto” (but not Oporto, in Portuguese, I didn’t know that).

I knew very little about the Douro River until we walked the three blocks downhill from the Hotel da Bolsa to the riverside into the heart of the UNESCO world heritage site, where the stacks of old-world apartments overlook the water like an urban cliff-face — where old women in house dresses stood watching from French balconies hung with laundry, like they’d lived there their whole lives and were amused, if not befuddled, to see it had become the most prime real estate in town. Which was probably true.

We sat down at a sidewalk table at a riverside restaurant, and the first thing we were offered was white port, “to start.” I didn’t know there was white port, but it seemed the natural thing to do. It proved a perfect aperitif — cold, sweet but drier than expected. We drank it neat out of the half-sized-wine-glass port glasses, but our waiter noted that it also makes a great cocktail, mixed with tonic.

It wasn’t until I got home that I tried to make one, only to find that white port is not very common stateside, at least in my Midwestern city. (Twin cities locals: After much searching, I have seen it at France 44 and the Wine Thief in St. Paul.)

The concept is simple, but a Google search turned up two distinct strains of tonic-based cocktail: white port with lemon and white port with mint. (Both are below) The mint recipe (again, so simple) I based off of a post from the website For the Love of Port, recounting how the Chairman of Taylor Fladgate made cocktails for the FTLOP crew. (We actually ran into the guy who runs this site, at a Douro Valley vineyard, during our trip — if there’s a better American port site, please send it.)

They recommend dry white port — Taylor’s Chip Dry, Fonseca Siroco — but I made mine out of what seemed the only bottle in town, Warre’s, and I made a few adjustments to the recipe.

In short, this is a great summertime drink, along the lines of a vodka tonic, with a little more flavor and a little less kick. (For more kick, add a splash of vodka.)

White port lemon tonic

A glass full of ice cubes
1 part white port
1 part tonic water
generous squeeze of fresh lemon wedge

White port and mint

FTLOP recommends 5–8 fresh mint leaves beneath a glass of ice cubes, filled with a mix of port and tonic at your discretion. I took it further, mixing a very light simple mint  syrup:

Syrup:
Muddle (crush) a half-dozen fresh mint leaves in a cup of near-boiling water.
Add a bit of sugar, if desired, and let dissolve.
Let cool.

Cocktail:
Fill a glass with ice over a half-dozen muddled fresh mint leaves.
Add one part white port.
Add a tablespoon of the chilled mint syrup.
Add another part tonic.
Top with a spring of mint (too look cool, see photo).

‘La Cueille’ Vin du Bugey-Cerdon
Grape: Gamay
Region: France, Savoie
Winemaker: Patrick Bottex
Price: $20

Translated as “the pick” from French, ‘La Cueille’ is the name of a sweet, spritzer-like rosé from the Savoy region in Eastern France. I bet this is a wine that could please a wide range of folks, from wine enthusiasts to white zinfandel fans to my mother, who gets red-faced and giggly after half a wine cooler.

CellarTracker reviews pegged this as a picnic, patio, dessert (think strawberry shortcake) or Thanksgiving wine. (One compared it to a liquid jolly rancher… favorably.) I found it fun all around, delicious with a more integrated flavor than the few other rosés sparklers I’ve had.

The L.A. Times says:

“Ever so slightly sweet, it makes a delightful party wine… Vin du Bugey-Cerdon is an unusual non-vintage sparkling red wine from the Savoie in eastern France. A blend of 80% Gamay with 20% Poulsard (a local grape), Patrick Bottex’s ‘La Cueille’ is a deep rose in color with a lovely taste of wild strawberries. Ever so slightly sweet, it makes a delightful aperitif, or party wine. And with just 8% alcohol in it, you can feel free to open a bottle for an afternoon dessert fest. Perfect for garden parties. Pair it with strawberry shortcake, cookies and even soft, ripe cheeses.”

What we learned…

The gamay grape — one of the most widely planted in France — was outlawed in its native Burgundy by royal decree in the late 14th century because it competed with the pinot noir grape. It produces wines that are generally more affordable than that more regal cousin. The red grape produces white juice, thus the full name Gamay Noir a Jus Blanc. The grapes produce a fruity wine that is best drunk young — its fruity or floral bouquets can include banana, bubblegum, cotton candy, coconut, vanilla and toast. It is the grape of Beaujolais. (Source: tasting-wine.com: “A Short History of the Gamay Grape.”)

Wine web resource:

The wine search engine vinopedia.com’s wine regions pages can take you from the level of country (France) to a particular bottle (2006 Louis Dressner Vin du Bugey-Cerdon Méthode Ancestrale) in a few clicks of the mouse. Find general info on regions and subregions like grapes used, a list of producers, and individual wines organized by price, rating and value. Cool.

Finca Las Moras Malbec 2008
Grape: Malbec
Region: Argentina, San Juan, Tulum Valley
Winemaker: Finca Las Moras
Price: $3.99 ($39.99/case) on sale, average $6

I don’t recommend polishing off a whole bottle of wine (even over the course of a long evening — not unheard of, I know) any more than I condone eating the four extra pieces of bacon left over from a meal preparation. That said, in the following instance, I have no regrets.

I have thought about establishing an Onologist’s wine-rating system based on how much of the bottle is left after the tasting: lowest ratings for those that go down the drain, highest for an empty bottle, and various levels in between. I won’t do this for a few reasons, chief of which is that I am not (yet?) a good enough taster. (It’s better to learn something…) But right up there is that I really don’t very often down a whole bottle, especially now that The Wife is off the juice for nine-plus months. Really.

I couldn’t pass up a case of Las Moras wines at $3.33 per bottle (the case price) from Wine Street in Bloomington. (The sale price is good through Sat., Jan. 16, 2010.) Produced by the International Wine and Spirit Competition’s 2008 Argentinean producer of the year, it’s a good wine for that price. I’ve had a few malbecs, but I was surprised again at the body of the wine: the heavy, halfway-to-port liquid creeps back down the glass and really carries the flavor well.

I thought I smelled some rosemary before drinking, and the flavor was dark fruit and berries with an earthy bite that I didn’t expect (and I thought at first might be unintended, even bad) but that I ended up enjoying. After an hour and a meal of ravioli with sautéed spinach and crumbled (ahem) bacon, that “earthy bite” became a rounder, beefy flavor that I couldn’t get enough of. Four hours later, it had earned my highest ranking. (Which I don’t award very often. Really.)

The winemaker states that the “desert climate produces a soft, medium to full bodied wine with a ripe red fruit flavour and an elegant touch of smoke and vanilla from its contact with wood” and recommends food matches of red roasted meat, “asado” (or, um, “red roasted meat’ in Spanish) and pasta dishes with tomato sauce. The Finca Las Moras website even includes recipes but doesn’t mention fried bacon. Hmm.

Note: I also bought the viognier (which I liked even better than the malbec) and the bonarda. I passed on the sauvignon blanc.

Before I get into a few of our favorite sparkling wines and timely champagne recommendations from the New York Times, let me share a tasting trick that is sure to impress this New Year’s Eve.

Of all the complicated practices employed in the rating of wine, perhaps the most arcane is the BSI scale, used to measure the quality of sparkling wines.

Standing for “bubbles per square inch” (what other indicator would that acronym represent?), BSI is simply a count of the concentration of bubbles in your bubbly — the more and the smaller, the better. And while the proven practice goes back hundreds of years, it’s an easy test anyone can perform to impress the guests at a wedding, the sommelier at an expensive restaurant, or, of course, your New Year’s Eve guests.

Here’s how:

1. Estimate (or measure with a ruler, if possible) the height and diameter of the empty glass, preferably a flute, before the sparkling wine is poured. Multiply the two numbers.

2. As soon as the wine is poured, take a deep breath and quickly raise the glass to your nose, inserting the tip of the nose as far into the glass as possible until you can feel the tickle of the bubbles.

3. Count the bubbles — out loud for best effect — for five seconds.

4. Multiply the bubble count by the factor from step one (the size of the glass).

5. If the resulting BSI is high enough (see table), say, “Ah, that’s a [BSI result],” and take a triumphant sip.

6. If the resulting BSI is low (see table), give a short, “Hmm,” so as not to offend, or, if possible, send the bottle back.

A couple of notes:

— If the nose is inserted quickly enough and far enough into the glass, it may actually collect the foaming bubbles at the top of the glass. This is good. In this case, remove the bubble-covered nose quickly and ask a friend, your date or the sommelier to count the bubbles for you — this actually produces a more accurate BSI count.

— Do not inhale. While experienced wine drinkers understandably have an instinctual desire to smell the wine, resist. It will induce sneezing, and you don’t want to make a fool of yourself.

— — — —

I’ve only tasted a few good Champagnes, but one is enough to see the truth at heart of this satire: the more, the smaller, the merrier.

And furthermore, scientists recently discovered that the bubbles actually carry much of the flavor of the wine.

And this year, there’s some good news in the bad news (the economy), as Eric Asimov outlines some good Champagnes under $40 in his New York Times blog The Pour, as well as his related column, Wines of the Times. (My first taste of Taittinger at a wedding a few years ago forever opened my eyes; it makes Asimov’s list.)

And for even tighter budgets, there are good non-Champagne sparkling wines to be had for less than $20.

Our household favorite is the Baumard Carte Turquoise Cremant De Loire ($20 at Zipp’s Liquor), which Wine Enthusiast called “A rich, complex blend of Chenin Blanc and Cabernet Franc made by one of the top producers in Anjou. The ripe fruits have kept their freshness, leaving a generous but crisp wine, with a delicate, elegant mousse.”

Louis Bouillot Perle de Vigne “Grande Réserve” Brut, which I believe we bought at Haskell’s for $10–$12 during their sale a year ago.

Also try a Prosecco, like the Sommariva Prosecco di Conegliano Brut (Cork Dork, $13) pictured above. From CellarTracker reviews: “Classic fresh pear, spice flavors with fine bubbles. Very gentle (brut) sweetness. A very nice Prosecco.”

At the bottom of the price range, you can’t do much better than Cristalino Brut Cava from Spain, a favorite of Jack Who Likes Real Wine. You can find it at many places for as little as $7.

Happy New Year, and remember: it’s not the only time of the year to drink sparkling wine.

Casa Solar Tempranillo 2007
Grape: Tempranillo (Tinta Roriz)
Region: Spain
Winemaker: Cosecheros y Criadores
Price: $16 (3 liter box)

Casa Solar is the red wine that was served at our wedding, which should tell you something. Either I’m a terminal fool when it comes to wines palatable for grand occasions, or (my preference): this wine, despite the price, passes the taste test.

My first impression came at the somewhat-blind tasting during which we tested food and drink for the reception. Tempranillo is my then-fiancé’s favorite red, and the wine’s ample dark red fruit, hint of vanilla (3 months in American oak) and tiny bit of spice was a hit with everyone at the table.

At $20 a bottle through the caterers, Casa Solar is also a testament to the racket that is getting married. Which is why, more than two years later, I was of two minds to find it for $5–$8 a bottle or, better yet, in a 3-liter box for $16.

We all know it’s advisable to drink one or two glasses of wine a day, and the box serves that purpose well. First “opened” on Thanksgiving, it was as fresh in mid-December when I “poured” the last glass. At $4 a bottle (by volume), that’s a good everyday wine.

And that’s just what this is: — an everyday wine, but one that also passes muster at a wedding reception, where, for the guests, it had that greatest of all wine traits: it was free.

Notes: This wine needs to breath a bit after it comes out of the box. And the spout of the boxed wine leaves a good heavy drop to drip after pouring, so be careful.

Note: Casa Solar has white and rosé versions, as well.

Evel Branco, white Douro win

Evel Branco
Grapes: malvazia fina, conzelinho, gouveio, moscatel
Region: Portugal, Douro
Winemaker: Real Companhia Velha
Price: $12.99

We were seated at the small sidewalk table outside the tiny, family-run restaurant next to the grill, where the cook was flipping the fish and sausages that would soon be our lunch. We were drinking white table wine from the small pitcher brought by the server, trying to decipher the chalkboard menu, before we heard our first non-Portuguese words.

We’d gotten this far (me, my wife, her brother and his wife) through an exchange of smiles and hand gestures, but luckily, a man at the next table noticed our complete lack of Portuguese and helped us order two seafood dishes. Then, like a gracious guide, he turned to the table wine.

Don’t even drink that, he told us; he would order us a better bottle of the local white. “That’s wine without grapes,” he said.

Fresh from arrival at the airport north of Porto, Portugal, we had stopped for lunch in Vila do Conde (pronounced “Vila du Co-day,” I think, according to Wikipedia) where the Ave River meets the Atlantic. A dark, wooden, high-masted boat was docked in the small harbor, which is lined with grassy parks and colorful buildings with the ubiquitous red-tiled roofs. Beyond, the highway climbs the long, steady hills on either side of the river, all of it overlooked by the monumental Convent of Santa Clara.

Harborside, Vila do Conde

Our savior’s name was Pascal. He had grown up in the region and now owned a 43-foot boat himself. He worked in textiles and traveled to the U.S., especially New York, for business.

His flippant dismissal of the table wine should not be taken as disdain, but rather his desire that we taste the truly good wines of the Douro region, or at least one. He ordered us a bottle of Evel Branco (white).

“This is wine,” he said, and oh was he right. Its floral nose and complex, medium-bodied flavor made the table wine taste like water (sans grapes, just like he said…). It was perfect for both the mid-day sun and the fish dishes Pascal helped us order — thick, cod-like fillets with onions, dark olives, hard-boiled eggs and soft potatoes, all swimming in olive oil, was the favorite. (We were headed north to Galicia in Spain, which is renowned for its seafood, and this was an excellent start.)

Our table wine had been a vinho verde, the young, uncomplicated wines we’d expected to find in Portugal. (Gazela, one of the lightly carbonated wines popular in the states, was for sale in all the gas stations.) Not to put down those wines, but the Evel was something much different.

According to tasting notes from Real Companhia Velha, Evel is “produced in the famous vineyards of Real Vinicola, at Quinta do Casal da Granja located in the Alijó district.” And talk about wine with grapes — the white is a blend of four grapes: malvazia fina, conzelinho, gouveio and moscatel. “Very complex with intense floral and white fruit aromas,” state the notes. “On the palate this medium bodied wine is presented with a good balancing acidity and flavours of peaches and melon.”

That sounds about right.

I bought the last four bottles of Evel white (and one red) at the tail end of Surdyk’s wine sale recently, and we served a bottle with grilled shrimp soon after. My friend the cook (who plated beautifully our attempt to replicate Portuguese/Galician wine and cuisine; recipes coming soon, I promise) said he was “almost taken aback” by the huge nose on this wine. All agreed it was a good balance of several aspects — crisp, fruity, acidic and earthy all together, in succession on the palette. To compare, the Martin Codax albariño we opened afterwards was a step back in body and complexity (until we made martinis out of it. But that’s another story.)

I paid $12.50 for the Evel Branco during the Surdyk’s sale, and even less — 8 euros — at the table in Vila do Conde. I’ve seen it elsewhere in the Twin Cities; we’ve adopted it as a favorite wine for food and giving away (though I should have bought a whole case before the sun was setting on the sale. Lesson learned, yet again.) Do yourself a favor and find a bottle.

I’ve tasted a few grüners recently — the Austrian whites that seem to be the “in” wine this summer (UPDATE: in a follow-up to his July tasting of grüners, Eric Asimov noted that grüners were the “next big thing” five years ago. I’ll let you know what this summer’s hot white was in 2014)  but until the Berger we packed into our cooler for the 5-hour drive to Ely, MN, I hadn’t found  one that came in a fat, 1-liter bottle topped off with a beercap.

It was my kind of wine bottle.

I dreamed of sipping it slowly like a giant beer from the comfort of my Yucatecan hammock, but the weather wasn’t cooperating. Better yet, I shared it with my mom and my sister, who speaks some German and confirmed that grüner means green, or something close to it — probably referencing the youth of many of the wines.

Most grüner veltliners (the full name) are young, crisp wines with a light-to-medium sweetness. The Berger, as I said, was drier and tasted like green apple. The ones I’ve seen have run $10–$20 (if that). That said, I’ve only tasted a handful, and their style is not only limited to my above description.

By coincidence, and thanks to the curiosity of a 12-year-old boy and his grandfather, we drank the wine with a dozen fresh crayfish tails, netted, boiled, peeled and sautéed in butter. An arduous process worth the experience, if not the effort — they are not so easy to catch and yield very little meat.

That odd pairing wasn’t the end (or the best) of our Ely fine dining. My wife and I stayed at the Blue Heron Bed and Breakfast which serves a family-style morning meal (of course) and a $35, five-course meal (on Saturdays anyway; email for the menu) by reservation, for guests and non-guests alike.

Ely is not a center for haute cuisine, but the dishes at the Blue Heron were like gourmet food plated with Midwestern style: fresh, tender walleye beside wild rice and broccoli; and tournedos steak with a twice-baked potato. The “palette cleanser” of lemon sorbet before the main dish was a nice, tasty touch, and the dessert was fabulous: crepes with lemon sauce and raspberry Chambord and molten chocolate cake with caramel sauce. (There was also blueberry crème brulee.)

What does this have to do with wine? A bottle of Mark West pinot noir ($32) was good and got better as the meal, evening and weekend wore on (I swigged the last of it on Sunday morning as we packed. About 9 a.m.) They had more than a dozen wines on the list, including an organic cabernet sauvignon I wish we had tried, or at least written down the name of.

In all, the Blue Heron was a relaxing change from fire grate dinners and hanging your pack from a tree. It’s not cheap, but I would recommend it, both for food and lodging.

On the way home, we stopped for dinner at Nokomis on the Lake, which we discovered during a North Shore trip last summer. Halfway along the scenic drive between Duluth and Two Harbors, this restaurant and wine bar plates beautiful dishes and has a sizable wine list to pair them with. (There’s even a wine shop, but it was closed on Sunday, of course. “I could let you in there, if you want to look around,” said the host. “I could even sell you a bottle, but I’d have to open it.”)

What a shame that would have been. We didn’t open a bottle, but we did try three wines — another pinot noir, a Graziano Zinfandel with a well-balanced load of flavor, and a glass of Geisen sauvignon blanc, another of our favorite whites, especially for summer. Served good and cold, it has an immediate taste of grapefruit and other citrus with just enough sweetness (for a dry wine) and not too much acidity, as we’ve found in some New Zealand whites. It was perfect with the mozzarella arugula salad.

Check out the menu or upcoming events like the Aug. 19 taste of Duluth Superior, in which chef Sean Lewis will participate (note: not at the restaurant) or just stop at the lakeside patio or dining room.

We’ve been twice, and we haven’t been disappointed.

(Pictured: the butternut squash ravioli at Nokomis)