If you are like most of the wine drinking world, you probably regularly drink cabernet sauvignon , pinot noir, chardonnay, sauvignon blanc, zinfandel, syrah, pinot grigio or other readily available varietals. And that’s fine.

But today, I’m going to suggest you spice up your palate by trying wines that are comprised of combinations of grapes blended into a single bottle. In my humble opinion, these blended wines (some call them cuvees or meritages) are superior to single varietals because they offer layers of complex flavors and are usually more supple than those made from one grape variety.

And there are literally thousands of individual grape varieties produced on virtually every continent, including Antarctica, where a wine maker is actually growing riesling. I suppose that gives a whole new meaning to the term: “ice wine.”

Anyway, with so many grapes to choose from, wine makers over the millennia have settled on just a few hundred varietals to use in producing their particular bottlings. Specific geographic regions called appellations have been designated around the world and some governments have even regulated what grapes can be used and identified to denote being from a particular place.

Red Bordeaux, for example, must be made from only a select number of grapes such as cabernet sauvignon, merlot, cabernet franc, petit verdot and malbec that are produced from grapes grown in that specific area of France. Chianti Classico must use at least 70 percent sangiovese with an allowance made for a few other varietals.

And while there are incredibly superb single varietal wines, I’m convinced that those made from combinations are better and more food friendly. Take the wines from the southern Rhone Valley for instance. Growers of Cotes Du Rhone can use of up to 13 different red grapes, and even a couple of white varietals to make up their blend.

Rhone and Rhone-like wines produced in other countries are usually comprised of grenache, syrah and mourvedre – sometimes referred to as “the holy trinity” - and can run the gamut from fruit forward easy drinking brunch type wines to full-bodied and tannic offerings, like Chateauneuf-du-Pape, that pair up wonderfully well with red meat.

[caption id="attachment_1186" align="alignleft" width="225"] Two Really Good Blends


The Aussies have for decades understood the beauty of blending. One of my favorite wines produced by D’Arenberg and known as The Laughing Magpie is comprised of 90 percent shiraz and 10 percent viognier – a white wine.

White blends are worth trying too, offering some of the same complex attributes as their red brethren. In Italy, Soave is a region where the primary white grape –garganega – gains weight and flavor from the addition of chardonnay. In Bordeaux, the classic white wine is comprised of sauvignon blanc and semillon.

In California, a wine must contain 75 percent or more of a grape to be called by that varietal’s name which provides a good bit of latitude for the wine maker to add other grapes to the blend. Ridge Vineyards (my favorite zinfandel producer) almost always blends grapes such as petite sirah, carignane and mourvedre in their vineyard designated reds.

And more and more California cabernet  fans are trying “Bordeaux” style blends or meritages which can soften up and smooth out the sometimes hard tannins found in this famous varietal. Here a couple of my favorite blended wines that make my point pretty effectively.  Give them a try and see.

2013 Tenuta Sant’ Antonio Scaia ($14) This lovely, silky smooth white from the Veneto region of Italy is comprised of 80 percent garganega and 20 percent chardonnay. Ripe apple and citrus flavors are balanced by ample acidity to make this the perfect match to pasta carbonara or Alfredo.

2012 Luma Red Blend ($14) Aged for a year in small oak barrels, this Chilean red is a blend of cabernet sauvignon, syrah and petit verdot. Round and rich with hints of chocolate, ripe plums and spice, this wine is perfect to pair with a roasted pork tenderloin sliced and served with a Dijon mustard, rosemary and crème sauce.

It’s always gratifying to observe the positive effect our contributions make to the community in which we live. On Saturday, February 28th you will have, shall we say, a tasteful opportunity to do just that by attending the third annual Feastivall celebration at Berry Hills Country Club.

Feastivall, of course, is a fundraiser supporting Festivall – the multi-week entertainment event that brings a plethora of top-notch musical talent to the greater Charleston area each summer. Feastivall is a good old fashion beverage throw down pitting wine versus beer in a five-course gourmet meal.

It is, of course, a unique opportunity for that lesser liquid (beer) to share the spotlight with the most food-friendly beverage (wine) man has ever produced.

Attendees will have the opportunity to vote on the best accompaniment (wine or beer) for each of the five courses prepared by executive chef at Berry Hills and Culinary Institute of America (CIA) graduate Paco Aceves. Paco will be assisted by fellow CIA graduate and Buzz Foods Services corporate chef, Paul Smith.

The event will begin at 6 p.m. with a wine and beer aperitif bar where guests can sip, mingle and bid on items at the silent auction which will include works and performances by local artists, restaurant packages, travel opportunities, including a stay in Italy and more.

The evening will also feature performances by local artists and will be hosted by Mountain Stage’s Larry Groce. Guests will enjoy five courses, each paired with a craft beer selected by my mis-guided pal and fellow columnist Rich Ireland. Of course, yours truly will pick the wines.

Here’s the menu along with our wine and beer pairings:

First course Seafood terrine, smoked tomato aspic Wine: 2013 Albert Bichot Chablis Domaine Long-Depaquit - France Beer: Ayinger Urweisse

Second course Roasted winter beet salad, artisan goat cheese, micro lettuce and candied pistachio, blood orange vinaigrette Wine: 2011 Treana White Wine - California Beer: Saison 1558, Brasserie du Bocq, Belgium
Third course Venison sausage, parsnip puree, micro bull’s blood Wine: 2012 Luma Carmenere Reserva - Chile Beer: Westmalle Dubbel, Brouwerij Westmalle (Trappist), Belgium
Fourth course Stout braised beef short rib, wild mushroom risotto, reduction sauce (crudité vegetables) Wine: 2010 Medlock-Ames Red Blend – Napa Valley Beer: Celebrator Doppelbock, Brauerei Aying, Germany
Fifth course Toasted coconut meringue and warm winter fruits, spice cake, curried hazelnuts, port ganache Wine: 2011 NXNW Late Harvest Riesling – Washington State Beer: Samuel Smith’s Organic Chocolate Stout, Samuel Smith’s Old Brewery, United Kingdom
After each course, guests will vote for the beverage pairing they like best. By the end of the night, one will emerge the winner. I suppose the beer nuts, buoyed by their 3-2 upset win last year, are feeling their oats… or hops …and think they actually have a chance of besting the fruit of the vine once more.

Ain’t gonna happen, Rich! Swill versus swell, sackcloth versus silk, gruel versus elixir- you get the picture. So plan on joining us for a good cause and an evening of fun, food and your favorite beverage.

Tickets are $110 per person and are partially tax deductible. Get your tickets by going to:  http://festivallcharleston.com/ or by calling  304-470-0489.

One of the few benefits of being a long–in-the-tooth wine lover is you probably have squirreled away a few bottles over the years that are finally coming of age. Yes, it can be a sublime experience when you uncork that special wine you’ve allowed to mature for a decade or two in your cellar.

Conversely, the experience can be supremely disappointing and unpleasant when the wine from that coveted bottle smells like dirty socks and tastes like spoiled buttermilk.

Over the years, I have experienced both the ecstasy of sipping liquid silk, and the agony of having to discard a wine that is “over the hill.” If you would like to lay down a few bottles for future enjoyment, there are some important issues to consider.

It may come as a surprise, but the vast majority of wines on the market today are meant to be consumed now, or within a couple of years. In fact, around 95 percent of all wine is ready to be consumed right off the shelf. So what wines can you safely put away for future sipping?

First and foremost, you’ll want to collect wines that have the best chance of morphing into something more pleasurable as they age. That means buying red wines such as Bordeaux, California cabernet sauvignon or other sturdy reds like Chateauneuf Du Pape or Barolo and Brunello Di Montalcino from Italy. Whites such as chardonnay from Burgundy, late harvest sweet wines like Sauternes from France and riesling from Germany can also improve with age.

[caption id="attachment_1199" align="alignleft" width="300"] Barolo has great aging potential


The next important step is to determine which vintage years are touted as being the best for long-term aging. You can read periodicals such as The Wine Spectator or the Wine Advocate or go online and search for vintage rating information.

Once you’ve decided on a likely age worthy vintage, read up on the specific wines and what critics are reporting about them. Oftentimes, you’ll see a lot of attention directed at the “superstar” wines such as Chateau Lafite Rothschild from Bordeaux or Opus One from Napa.

But unless you’re a Russian oligarch or a dotcom billionaire, you’ll want to avoid these “trophy” wines and concentrate on ones that share the same zip code or geographic area and are more reasonably priced.

Next, make sure you buy at least three bottles of a particular wine. This will allow you to open a bottle every five or so years to make sure the wine is making “forward” progress. I’ve had the unfortunate experience of finding out that I waited too long to assess the bottle, and the wine had passed its prime.

Storing the wine properly is an absolutely critical issue. You don’t have to buy one of those expensive wine storage closets, but you should age the wine in a dark, vibration and odor-free area where the temperature doesn’t vary more than 10 degrees from summer to winter, and where the humidity is pretty high – around 70 percent.

Get yourself one of those temperature and humidity gauges and check out your designated area to make sure it’s appropriate. If you absolutely want to be sure the storage system is ideal, you can buy temperature-controlled wine cabinets for as little as $300 or as much as several thousand.

If you do the things I‘ve mentioned above, you may be able to experience in a decade or two what I had the pleasure of enjoying at Christmas dinner. That magical night, I opened a 1997 Barolo from the Piedmont region of northern Italy to accompany the traditional bone-in rib roast. Magnificent!

My love of just about all things palatable includes, of course, a wide and varied cuisine. I embrace just about every morsel grown, produced and/or cooked by indigenous peoples from all over this globe. I am particularly fond of locally grown or raised food.

The term locavore has entered the lexicon in the past decade to define organized groups that encourage growing, producing and then providing local products to the restaurants, markets and people living nearby. This locavore movement also extends to beverages produced locally which include wineries, distilleries and craft breweries.

And this is a movement with enough room for both vegans and carnivores!

Supporting locally produced edibles has caught on just about everywhere in the US and is being embraced in communities around West Virginia too. Most counties and some towns in our state have established local farmers markets, and many restaurants are purchasing and then featuring these locally grown and produced foods on their menus. For a listing of a local farmers market near you, go to http://wvfarmers.org/.

But there are several other organizations involved in the movement. I am board member of “The Collaborative for the 21st Century Appalachia” that has (thankfully) been co-named “WVFARM2U.” FARM2U actively promotes cultural and culinary tourism in large measure to connect the people involved such as farmers, restaurateurs, tourism promoters and the general public.

As an example, one of our website pages (www.farm2u.org) has a listing of “destination dining” restaurants in West Virginia that use locally produced food. These establishments were nominated through a FARM2U survey of people who had exceptional dining experiences. A panel of culinary experts then selected the eventual destination dining restaurants.

But you may recognize the FARM2U organization by one of the state’s signature culinary events – the annual Cast Iron Cook Off. The Cook Off is an event where everyone -from culinary students to chefs, to farmers, to local business people- participates in an Appalachian cooking competition focused on preparing local foods and using traditional cast iron cookware.

[caption id="attachment_1205" align="alignleft" width="160"] Ridge Lytton Springs


Here are a few other organizations in the state that make it their goal to bring locally produced foods to your table. Check out the facebook page for the WV Food and Farm Coalition for information on Community Supported Agriculture Program (CSA) organizations. CSA’s put people who want to use local farm-grown products together with farmers that grow them. These farmers provide various locally produced foods for a subscription price.

Two CSA’s were featured in a recent Sunday Gazette-Mail article by Dawn Nolan focusing on the good work being done by the Wild Ramp and Gritts Farm CSA's. My family has participated in the Fish Hawk Acres CSA run by Chef Dale Hawkins. If you’re interested, check out Fish Hawk Acres’ facebook page for information on how to subscribe.

We also receive regular local food shipments from the Monroe Farm Market (www.localfoodmarketplace.com/monroe/) This farmer coop, located in beautiful Monroe County, provides a variety of seasonal fruits and vegetables as well locally raised and butchered meat. We enjoyed a delicious leg of lamb from the Monroe Farm Market on Easter Sunday.

As someone obsessed with food and wine, I understand the passion and commitment it takes to produce a product you wish to share with those in your local circle. We need to encourage our restaurants and markets to use our home-grown food – along with wine and other beverages (even beer) produced here in West By Golly.

Here is a wine that will (and did) marry exquisitely with a Monroe County boned, butter flied and grilled leg of lamb.

2009 Ridge Lytton Springs ($38) - This blend of 71 percent zinfandel (along with petite sirah, carignane and mataro) is the flagship product from my favorite zinfandel producer. With aromas of teaberry mint, this complex, layered, blackberry and cola flavored wine is full, rich and nicely balanced. It paired superbly with our marinated and grilled leg of lamb.

Charleston’s newest restaurant – The Block – is an epicurean’s dream come true with a deliciously enticing menu and a wine list that is extensive and well thought out. I had heard good things for years about the wine and food at The Block’s sister restaurant- Wine Valley - located in a shopping mall in Winfield, but I had never taken the time to drive to Putnam County to taste for myself.

 The wine list at the Block does feature some of the usual suspects such as steak house cabernets and big rich chardonnays, but what sets this establishment apart from any other restaurant in the state (except perhaps The Greenbrier) is the focus on wines that are really meant to be enjoyed with the eclectic menu of small plates and full entrees.

Take, for example (as I did) the sampler appetizer that featured Marcona almonds, a crab cake, a  quinoa-feta salad dollop, thinly sliced Genoa salami and Tzatziki (yogurt and cucumber dip) accompanied by toasted pita wedges.  Talk about your opportunity to experiment with a whole host of wines!

I chose Bisci Verdicchio from around the commune of Matelica in the Italian state of Marche. The verdicchio grown and vinted in this part of Italy is much superior to the wine made from the same grape grown closer to the Adriatic Sea. Those wines can be light and almost tasteless. The Matelica region is further inland and in a less fertile area which forces the verdicchio vines to work harder, and the resulting wine to be fuller and richer.

The fact that owner Desislav (Des) Baklarov even found this verdicchio is testament to his impressive wine curiosity and knowledge. And, at $8 for a six-ounce glass, the wine is very reasonably priced. With almost 300 wines by the bottle to choose from and about 50 of them available by the glass, you will find wines from just about every major region on the planet. I know I did.

[caption id="attachment_1215" align="alignleft" width="225"] Owner Des Baklarov at The Block


Perusing the wine list, I almost fell out of my seat when I spied a Spanish red that is extremely hard to find locally and which was the perfect match for the meal I later chose. Most normal people select the menu item before looking for a wine to pair with it.  Not yours truly.  I look for a wine first and then figure out what I am going to eat.

The 2012 Alto Moncayo Veraton Garnacha is a brooding, full-bodied, fruit-forward wine that Des decanted for me into a lovely crystal carafe. This old vine Grenache is grown and produced near the town of Borja in northeastern Spain. I chose the “French Pork Chop” to accompany the wine.  This tender, perfectly seasoned and grilled chop was just the entrée I needed to accompany this full-bodied red wine.  After about 15 minutes and for the next hour, the wine opened up beautifully and alas, like all good wines, the last sip was the best

Hey, but I wasn’t finished.  I could not resist choosing from among the many excellent selections of late-harvest and after dinner wines offered at The Block.  Eventually, I chose an Alvear Amontillado Sherry. For those of you unfamiliar with anything but Harvey’s Bristol Crème, this lovely, caramel and nutty flavored, slightly sweet wine will open your palate to a whole new appreciation of Sherry. The wine list also boasts a number of ports and other late harvest wines to put a nice cap to your meal at the Block.

For a new restaurant opened for just two days prior to my visit, I was shocked at the quality of the food and, particularly, the depth and breadth of the very impressive wine list.  Visit The Block at the Corner of Capitol and Quarrier Streets in downtown Charleston.  If you love good wine and food, you might try a sip off the old Block!