It Came From Down South

It was last Friday at The Establishent met up with the regulars for what was suppose to be a bottle or two but we ended the night with another triple play.
It was recomended by the establishments over enthusiastic future somelier guy who reckons that we would enjoy this. Couldn't make out the lable as it was all in latin and as you would guess i'm still grasping with the english language. Anyways the colour was a deep purple with a nose of musk and sandalwood which reminded my buddy that it was time to pay his respects to his ancestors at the altars back home. To sum it up it was typically South African with earthiness, mushrooms, short,oakey, no fruit, minerally, tannic acidic and ends like a juice. It reminded me of intermission wine between 2 sad piano concertos. And to make the day sadder it was RM300 a bottle. Enough said.

We had to have something else to make up for the first and we again visited the vineyards of the southern hemisphere and had the Alkoomi Jarrah Frankland River Shiraz 2001 (RM216, again not cheap) which was full of plums and berries, very fruity lots of tannins. Medium bodied and lenght. Will probably get better in a few years time but it was not going to make up for the first bottle. STRIKE TWO!




The establishment was definetly not happening for us so we got out of there for a late dinner at Prego's of the usual pasta, risotto and duck (write about that another time). The wine that accompanied dinner was a Bruno Giacosa Nebbiolo d'Alba 2004 (back to familiar territory), it started out tight but after a while it was a lovely wine with cherries, a hint of strawberries, tar and licorice. Feels like silk in the mouth. Nice acidity, balance and finish. Had to pay unrealistic restaurant mark ups for a basic Giacosa but at least it made up for the earlier rough rides.