This is famous wine connoissuer, Snutie Rothchilde Gregoir III, here to educate the riffraff about fine wine.
Touch not a corkscrew until you have contacted me at my website www.winesnob.com. But the unwashed masses are content with a screw cap or, God forbid, wine in a box! Excuse me while I crook my pinkie.
We will begin with the Poi Ball Creek Cuvee of Chardonnay and Merlot ($76), grown on the slippery slopes of Waipio Valley. Fertilized by the natural droppings of wild pigs and mongooses, it has hints of taro and burnt rubber, with traces of coconut husk and banana peels. Soothing the palette with a delicate broccoli aroma, with a finish hinting of stale cottage cheese and green beans. An exquisite wine.
A frequent visitor by private jet to the Big Island, Cracker Barrel Winery owner, Sir Bradley Monicle IV, just hosted an elegant pairing dinner, (pairing is having some grinds and washing it down with wine). Fine wine from the Keaau Valley was paired with sheep dip from Pahoa.
The posh affair was held at the exclusive Old A Pavilion, the admission was $250 with a mere $50 a taste for the wine.
Flights (meaning 3 glasses of wines gulped down one right after another) of the finest wines, some grown inside Halemaumau Crater, were served.
A moment of uncontrolled laughter erupted when Archibald Fleecebottom III mistook a 1947 Valdamere Brut for a 1948 Valdamere Brut. The guffaws at his mistake continued for 10 minutes. Oh, my poor abdomen, but I digress.
Wine expert, Cynthia Soqueville, of Ocean View, sent in her wine picks for 2019. She recommends the ‘18 Red Mountain Burgundy, Carlo Rasty winemaker, ($5). She says it flings itself from the glass with gusto and a kind of “grapey taste.” She also recommends the ‘19 Galloping Sauterne ($6.50 gallon size). It has a good finish, or did she say you can hardly finish it?
But the favored wine of the season is the lively, well-rounded, perky, limey, lychee, avacadoey, orangey, potatoey, leafy, honeysuckle, hernia-inducing, bold, sparkling Muskrat Muscatel! ($350). Good with chicken, fish, lau lau, Spam, or burnt hamburgers, a real scene-stealer at any BBQ.
It is flying off the shelves because people are running into stores and demanding that it be taken off the shelves and poured out on the sidewalk.
Melding fruitiness and unbearable sourness, celebrating the dry, acrid, geothermal soil of Lower Puna, is the luscious and overbearing crapiola grape. The wine it produces is exuberant and lazy, with layers of bologna and citrus, the ever popular, Crapiola Cabernet ($21). Wine Magazine gives it a rating of 10 on a scale of 100. Wine lovers say, “Crapiola lives up to its name.”
The fact is, you should drink any darn wine you like with any food you eat. If you want to drink a red Cabernet with a tuna sandwich or a white Chardonnay with a big juicy steak, go ahead, up to you.
Here’s some advice from an expert on the subject, don’t start drinking in the first place. Have a soda.
Dennis Gregory writes a bimonthly column for West Hawaii Today. His email is makewavess@yahoo.com. Don’t miss his Aloha Show on Hawaii Speaks Out, Mondays and Tuesdays, channel 54 at 8:25 p.m. and Wednesday and Thursdays, channel 53, at 7:55 p.m.