Can you guarantee an Aha! wine experience?

An old friend of mine recently asked me to help suggest some wines for him to try.  Not so much a wine drinker, but a bit of a foodie, he recently tried a wine that actually lived up to the hype he’d been hearing about great wines.  All the clichés about layers and tannins and fruit and chocolate, yadda, yadda, yadda, finally made sense to him in this wine.  Could I suggest others that might elicit the same Aha! experience? 

Oh, of course I can give you some recommendations!   Immediately my mind went to the great wines that I’ve had over the years.  Then I gave myself pause and reminded myself he didn’t ask for simply “great” wines (that’s easy), he asked for “Aha!” wines.  Wines that make you think.  So I started reminiscing about wines that shaped my palate over the years…

The first time I ever actually liked the taste of any wine at all was in the car riding through some beautiful wooded areas in Arkansas with my college boyfriend.  I had tried the cheap white zin the night before and didn’t like it at all, but now suddenly the swig out of the bottle in those gorgeous surroundings tasted like apple cider.  I didn’t know wines could taste like something else…

Fast forward to the Pride Mountain Cab Franc that Ben and I had on one of our early anniversaries at the since-closed Sardine Rouge French restaurant.  Recommended by the server, we were floored by the intensity, the richness, the dark fruit, leather, and tobacco in this wine.  In our next trip to Napa we made tour and tasting reservations at Pride and ended up on their mailing list and to this day we usually have a about a case of Pride wines in our cellar (focusing on Cab Franc and their awesome Merlot).   We still seek out Cab Francs but very few have the body and structure of Pride.

Other memorable data points in our wine history were the first “expensive” bottles we ever bought, early in our education.  On two separate visits to Napa, these moments both occurred in the Robert Mondavi winery’s Reserve room.  The first one was the Tokalon I-Block Fume Blanc which sold for about $45 a bottle.  At that time we had never spent that much on a bottle before, but after learning about the small parcel of famous vineyard that the grapes came from and tasting the completely different flavors than we were used to, we were sold. A year later in that same winery, we tasted the 1985 Mondavi Reserve Cabernet.  That was our first bottle with age on it.  It was soft and velvety, with subtle power, elegant tannins, and dark fruit. $175.  OMG. 

Back in the late nineties when the brand new PF Chang’s was the hip place to be, we hanging out there on a Saturday afternoon.  Our bartender was mediocre and the wine list wasn’t speaking to us.  But another bartender, JJ, stepped in and asked us if we’d seen the Captain’s List.  Now we were intrigued.  The list contained several high-end California wines, but personally JJ liked and suggested the Chateau Simard, a left bank Bordeaux.  I think at that time it was a 1988 vintage.  About 10 years old.  We hadn’t had a lot of old world wines at that time and this one was earthy, barnyard-y, with tons of green pepper and mushroom.  We were hooked.  JJ became our go-to guy for a while.  In fact we followed him to no less than half a dozen different establishments over the years.  Although I don’t know where he is now, I’m sure we’ll run into to him soon enough.  But the best thing about that day is that we met Don Rhodes, the managing partner of the Austin PF Chang’s. A big friendly guy missing a finger with a huge talent for managing restaurants and an even bigger enthusiasm for food and wine.  We drank a lot of big bottles with Don and his crew over those years.  Mostly California cab and Champagne.  During that time we first had Dom, Salon, Billecart Salmon, Bolli Grand Annee and RD, and an amazing sparkler out of Sonoma by Iron Horse – the 1991 LD.  We bought all we could find of that little gem.  Unfortunately the dotcom bust and our move to California and put an end to that display of excess, but we made some great friends, had some incredible wine experiences, and today in my cellar sits a bottle of Chateau Simard.  I’ll think of Don and JJ when we drink it.

In the early 2000’s, a simple little red that changed our wine drinking trajectory was the Icardi Barbera that another great bartender, Don, poured us at the now-defunct Mezzaluna restaurant downtown.  He told us, if you don’t like it I’ll just sell it by the glass.  We bought the bottle and kept coming back for new Italian suggestions.  He never brought us a bottle we didn’t like.  And all were new styles and flavors for us.  We then followed Don and the restaurant manager, Jerry, over to Siena where we became regular bar rats.  Jerry favored Italians and bubbles and we had some incredible Italian reds and Champagnes over that year, including a Dal Forno Amarone (more on that later).  We’ve been Italian red fans ever since. 

That crew at Siena also introduced us to our favorite port.  There we learned about colheitas and were spoiled by trying the 1963 Porta Rocha colheita. In oak for 20 years before bottling, it has a crazy amount of layers.  You can pick it up, swirl it, smell it, and set it back down and be satisfied.  But drinking it is even better.  Toffee, caramel, maple, pumpkin pie spice.  We later got to try the 1937 Porta Rocha however I prefer the ’63 – the ’37 lost a little complexity.  It’s pretty hard to find the ’63 now.  Only one bottle left in our stash, waiting to be opened at the right time with the right people.

Speaking of Dal Forno, Ben actually had that one first.  When we were in the process of moving to L.A. in 2001, he had the 1994 Dal Forno Valpolicella at a restaurant called Ca’ del Sol in Universal City with his sister.  He was so enamored by it that when I came out, we sought it out again.  We affectionately call it the “orgasm wine”.  It ruined us for all other Valpo’s since normally Valpo is a simpler table wine, but Dal Forno did it in a way that was big, deep, and dark with intense fruit.  We learned later (in our private winery tour of Dal Forno in 2009) that the intensity comes from drying a portion of the grapes (and after 2002 they dried all of them), similar to an Amarone.  We tried the Dal Forno Amarone once at Siena as well – it was like drinking dried black cherries.  That was back when Dal Forno was still somewhat affordable (about $70 for the Valpo), they have since taken on a bit of a cult status and the bottle of Valpo we bought set us back about $175.  Most recently we had the new 2004 vintage at a tasting.  It’s tight and needs time, but I still find it to be beautiful.  Dal Forno is not for the meek. 

More recently we were sitting out on the patio at the Four Seasons overlooking Town Lake, I think it was a birthday or similar occasion, and we decided on a quite expensive bottle of grower Champagne by Philipponnat.   The som, Mark Sayer, came out to pour the bottle.  We had had the Philipponnat product before, but this was the Clos Des Goisses.  It was highly reminiscent of Krug with a yeasty, mushroomy quality.  I’m a Champagne hound and this is my new favorite…when I splurge.  I guess in the meantime I’ll keep drinking the Lacombe, which is our recent affordable find. 

There are so many more memorable bottles over the years of which I won’t bore you with more long descriptions (the Dolce at the restaurant in Tahoe, the Silver Oak we drank out of Dixie cups by a stream near Yosemite, the Barolo in the family tasting room in Piedmont with the owner’s wife who spoke only Italian…)

As I think about the different wines that really spoke to me over the years and shaped my palate, I’ve noticed two things.  First and most importantly, each was not just a wine, it was part of an experience.  Sometimes the wine might have sparked the experience, and sometimes the experience enhanced the wine, but nevertheless there is a story behind the wine. Secondly, they were all learning experiences that built on one another.  I couldn’t have picked up a great bottle 15 years ago and appreciated the quality of it.  It took talking about wine, reading about wine, learning about regions and varietals, and most of all tasting different wines to get a frame of reference. 

So how do you recommend an Aha! wine?  I don’t think it can be engineered.  But I do think you can prepare yourself for it to happen.  First – drink wine and pay attention.  Try wines that are classic expressions of the varietals and learn the basic flavors and vocabulary.  I find it’s easier to appreciate the complexity when you have words to describe it (other than “smooth”).  Secondly, don’t limit yourself to what you think you like.  Try it all.  You never know which one is going to knock your socks off.  Thirdly, have fun with it.  Wine can be serious business, but it’s meant to be shared.  The best bottles I’ve ever had have been with people I enjoy.  Sometimes it’s a romantic dinner with my husband, and sometimes it’s a rowdy wine tasting with friends, both old friends or people I’ve just met.  And we’ve met some of our best friends and favorite people over wine. 

I can’t guarantee that my list will match your list.  In fact, I can guarantee it won’t.  But by keeping and open mind and an open heart, everyone can come up with a list of their own Aha! wines and moments to accompany them.  Good luck and have fun!