Sunday was Gloria’s birthday and she asked that we head up north of Durango to the mountains and “check out” some of those places we so regularly drive by without ever stopping. Of course, that also meant a favorite wine with bread and cheese along side. One of Gloria’s favorite wines, if not her favorite, is a German Riesling Auslese. The really good ones are not cheap.

The Schmitges 2005 Erdener Pralat Riesling Auslese was $72.00 for a 500 ml bottle. It was a wonderful Auslese and when paired with a good ciabatta from a local bakery, some cambozola cheese and the alpine setting, we found ourselves close to heaven, especially when sitting by ourselves in a mountan meadow above 10,000′.

The wine itself is sweet, which is a noted characteristic of any auslese, but it was balanced perfectly with enough acidity for a smooth mouth feel. Plenty of exotic fruit on the palate. This wine works well for an informal outing such as ours, an opener with soft cheeses for a get together with friends, or as a dessert wine. If you are not one to enjoy a sweet wine, then I recommend that you try a good German reisling auslese. I suspect that you will be pleasantly surprised.

Great company, great surroundings, a really nice wine on a Sunday afternoon. Happy Birthday Gloria.

During our recent Lake Powell trip, July 27 through July 30, we sampled 3 different white wines for a refreshing change of pace. Despite my earlier post about Gloria and I almost always drinking red wine, even in the heat of a Lake Powell summer, we were anxious to try something different. Besides, I owed Kelly a post or two and I was beginning to feel guilty for not having posted anything new for quite awhile. Our original plan was to pair 3 different white wines with our camp meals, write tasting notes, and to photograph those white wines with our meals all neatly layed out at our campsite and against the scenic backdrop of the Lake Powell canyon country. However, the weather changed those plans quickly as we found ourselves regularly running for the tent to get out of evening thunderstorms or hurrying through dinner in anticipation of those thunderstorms as the sky darkened every evening.

We still drank the wine; we just didn’t take the photos.

The weather changed quickly from a benign sky highlighting a beautiful salmon colored distant canyon mesa to a developing thunderstorm to a downright dark and forbidding skyline before the cloudburst.

We had carefully packed and kept on ice a 2004 Sancerre Les Boncandes, a 2005 Sancerre Viellef Vignes and a 2004 Domaines Schumberger Gewurztraminer “Fleur” from Alsace. I did keep the empty bottles in our recycling pile so I could take some pictures when I got home, but by the time I got them home, they were the worst for wear and tear and did not make good photographs.

So, what did we eat? That first night we had escargot, sauteed in olive oil and garlic, to which we added a bleu cheese sauce, and then wilted fresh spinach over the top. We served that with a chewy French bread. We then charcoal grilled ribeye steaks and asparagus. I served a 2005 Tarrica Cabernet Sauvignon from Paso Robles with the steak, but that is a subject for another time. The second night, I charcoal grilled marinated shrimp (soy sauce/hot sauce/ginger/garlic/honey based marinade) and served the shrimp with an Asian slaw. The third night we had smoked chinook salmon with a homemade pasta salad.

Now that I’ve told you what we ate and what wines we drank, here’s the challenge.

I want you to pair these wines with the meals, excluding the grilled steak from the pairings. Be candid and please don’t hesitate to make your own recommendations - I didn’t say they were all necessarliy good or paired well with anything. Although, in fact, I have to say, that all three whites were very good. The 2004 Sancerre Les Boncandes is everything a Sancerre should be, the 2005 Sancerre Viellef Vignes is a personal favorite, and the 2004 Domaines Schumberger Gewuztraminer Fleur was what one would expect from an Alsace gewuztraminer, although personally I did not care for the “flowery” finish - but that is probably a characteristic of that particular wine. I’ll let Gloria do the research and report back.

And, maybe for fun, pair a wine, any wine, with the photos. Just imagine yourself camping at Lake Powell, laying back in a fold out lounge chair and watching the changing weather and landscape.

We are going to do that again this coming weekend!