My wine drinking habits tend to fall into a rut rather easily. Making an occasional jaunt to Charlotte has been refreshing as far as finding different wines. Although I still gravitate towards the same types of wine, not shopping in the same place week after week makes me a bit more adventurous.
My go-to wine shop is a little weak when it comes to South American wines. I’ve worked my way through most of what they have, so I tend to ignore it except for the occasional bottle of malbec. Thus, I was excited to discover this wine at Winestore in Charlotte (I'll have more to say about this place later).
Urban Uco Torrontés 2008, ($8.99, Winestores)
Torrontés is a native to Argentina and seems to be gaining respect in the wine world. South America has amazing potential for winemaking, and it's nice to drink a native wine versus something made to satisfy the palates of foreigners.
The nose on this wine is wildly tropical with notes of melon and peach. There's more of the same in the mouth with pronounced banana and a refreshing mineral finish. A crisp acidity holds it all together.
It also showed wonderfully with our dinner. I was on my A-game this night, so I have to share some pictures.
Heirloom tomato salads with red onion, basil and goat cheese
Spicy scallops and roasted-garlic pasta
I did the pasta for this dish a little differently than my normal garlic pasta and it worked out pretty well. I roasted a head of garlic first. Then I made a slurry of two tablespoons of melted butter, one tablespoon of olive oil, the garlic, the juice of a lemon and salt/pepper. I tossed the cooked pasta with the slurry and a generous amount of chopped flat-leaf parsley.
It was not bad at all.
3 comments:
Urban -- Argentina --- Shakespeare??
You got my interest perked, so I had to check out the thunder show so I even know how to pronounce this grape.
http://tv.winelibrary.com/2008/01/02/torrontes-the-white-wine-of-argentina-on-display-episode-382/
notice the Iowa plug
thanks for the post, hope I’m jacked to find some.
mrT
Those dishes look amazing. I'm in a cooking rut now. Need to re-connect with cooking. My wife is sensitive to many of the staples I learned to cook with including onions in their totality, and anything but the most minute dash or garlic. Seafood with the exception of whitefish is off the menu, as is most beef and all pork. It makes for a depressing cooking experience! So I need to veer off more into veggies, salads, and other pasta choices. Did I mention that breads tend to be banned too? Sigh.
mrT,
Thanks for sharing the Gary V. I guess I'm slightly behind the curve. Not surprising. He's right about it being a great white wine for bold, spicy food.
LBC,
Cooking without onions and garlic? I'm not sure I could pull that off. I'm willing to bet my neighbors call me "the garlic guy."
Thanks for the comments.
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