Thursday, March 29, 2007

CLINE - Ancient Vines Zinfandel

Monday, March 26, 2007
CLINE
Ancient Vines Zinfandel
Contra Coast County, 2005
Cost: $14.99 / bottle

Would Buy Again

Well, I initially bought this vino to serve with my baked ziti over the weekend. However, my husband (a.k.a. “The Guy”) drank it with his “bestest” college friend, Patricia, the night before my ziti dinner with my family. As a matter of fact, they consumed ALL of my bottles of wine and never went to bed (as well as half a bottle of Limoncello Patricia brought – to partake and/or read up on, visit: http://www.anticadistilleriarusso.com/). I did not mind at all as they had almost five year’s of catching up time to do. I was very happy to have her for dinner and in our company again (please check out her awesome website chronologizing her 3 months in Italy: http://www.pinopower.com/).

On to the amateur wine review: Although I intended to drink this with pasta, I made pizza and felt it was fairly well-paired (I sent The Guy out for another bottle following his overindulgence Friday night). Once again, however, I poured a glass while the pizza baked. I would give it yet another 5 on my 10-scale. Once served with the pizza, I would again apply a 7. Our pizza was just a plain cheese with roasted garlic crushed tomato topping, Sorrento part-skim mozzarella cheese, as well as fresh Parmesean and Pecorino-Reggiano our dear friend Patricia brought with her from an Italian import shop. The wine is “peppery” in taste but its flavor was accentuated with the pizza. I am continuing to enjoy its lingering flavor on the palette as I write here.

As a side note: I drank this wine previously in the fall. I remember thinking how well I thought it might pair at Thanksgiving with the turkey but I never did partake of it at that time (thanks to Uncle Bob’s fabulous “Turley” Zinfandel we had instead).

Cline Cellars
Sonoma, CA
http://www.clinecellars.com/

Merlotsoul

No comments: