Today gets an extra post because I will not be posting on Friday - Monday and maybe Tuesday. The reason I will not be posting on those days is the reason why I had to get those shorts (see Hot Save from the Coals) and pick up a bottle of wine today.
Where I come from whenever you go to visit someone who is hosting an event like a party, or you are just going to be visiting for a day or two, you always bring a gift. This weekend I'm off to visit a friend and I needed a gift. Not having any really good ideas come to mind, I called up Mom asking her what she thought I should get as a gift. She knows my friend likes wine so she said to try an iced wine. Now my Mom hates alcohol more than me. It's not the drinking of it per se but the taste that she hates, so for her to recommend anything alcoholic must mean the drink is amazing. She said she couldn't taste the alcohol in it even though it is wine. Her description of it was "the berries are frozen and the bottle was thin". With that I went to the local wine store, Sunsinger.
Let me tell you about wine. It's made from grapes, tastes nothing like Juicy Juice, and it was used in Jesus' greatest miracle which was when he made it taste good at the wedding. That was the extent of my knowledge before going to Sunsinger today. I'm pretty good at looking clueless and right away a lady came up to help me. And she told me all about iced wine.
Iced wine is made from white grapes. You cannot call it iced wine if it's not made with white grapes. So sometimes you'll hear of frozen wine which is made from red grapes. Her seriousness about this point was amusing. Like blood was going to be spilt if we should not name it according to the rules. The white grapes in iced wine were picked from the vine when they were frozen. This makes the iced wine more expensive than most because there is a risk involved. The grape grower could potentially lose his crop because the grapes may spoil before it gets cold enough for them to freeze. So there are two other varieties (whose names I cannot pronounce) that use white grapes that are only partially frozen. I was thinking like how a grape would be after a frost. These other two varieties can be less expensive. At this point I asked if there was any difference in the taste. She said not really, but the texture is different. For the partially frozen grape wines, the texture is similar to whole milk. It sort of feels like a coating in your mouth. The texture for the iced wine is like skim milk and is "much more delicate" (wine lovers are great with fancy adjectives). Iced wines are categorized as dessert wines. This would explain why my Mom liked it so much.
The best iced wine comes from Germany, but they also carried bottles from Austria, Canada, France and Italy. I found the prices ranged from about $20 to about $130 for what I considered to be a very small bottle. And Mom was right, most of the bottles were very thin. They had two from Germany, a $23 and a $99. So I picked up the $23 bottle. At the checkout line I asked the lady what am I supposed to eat with this wine to bring out the taste. Specifically I asked what flavor of ice-cream would be best. She said oh no, you shouldn't eat ice-cream with this. Ice-cream will make your mouth too cold and then you won't be able to taste the wine properly. Instead you should eat pastries, or cake. After my frown I think for my benefit she said I could even eat chocolate cake if I wanted. That made me happier.
I'm curious to find how it's going to taste. But in any event I'm still quite happy with my Mott's.
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