lummi island wine tasting nov 8 ’19
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Friday Breads This Week
Whole Wheat Levain – Made with a sourdough starter and fermented overnight in the refrigerator. This long slow process allows the fermentation process to start and the gluten to start developing. The bread is made with the levain, bread flour, and fresh milled whole wheat for a ‘toothy’ crumb, great texture and flavor, and a nice crisp crust. – $5/loaf
Breton – Incorporates the flavors of the french Brittany region. Bread flour and fresh milled buckwheat and rye make for interesting flavor and the salt is sel gris -the grey salt from the region that brings more mineral flavors to this bread. Goes great with meats and cheeses – $5/loaf
Our bakers were fortunate to be in Finland on National Cinnamon Roll day, October 4th. What a great country to have a national day for everyone to eat cinnamon rolls! Something we can at least adopt here! In honor of that trip and cinnamon roll day pastry this week is the Finnish cinnamon roll known as Korvapuusti which translates as either “slapped ears” or “slap in the ear”…
Korvapuusti – Made with a traditional Pulla dough that is not as sweet or enriched as a brioche dough but still has plenty of sugar and butter with the addition of cardamom in the dough itself. Then filled with a butter, sugar, cinnamon filling before being sliced and formed into its unique shape. 2/$5. read more
(breads must be pre-ordered by Wednesday for pickup here at the wine shop at our Friday wine tasting, 4-6pm. Planning a visit to the Island? Email us to get on the mailing list!)
Greywacke
Most simply, Greywacke is a type of sandstone that has a lot of rock grain and fragments in it, kind of a lumpy batter that set up before it was completely stirred. It is often associated with continental shelves, and is believed to have formed by mudslides along the shelf. Greywackes are mostly grey, brown, yellow or black, dull-colored sandy rocks which may occur in thick or thin beds, and bear some similarity to formations of “Chuckanut sandstone” that we seen on our own shores here on Lummi Island.
A few months ago fellow islander and longtime director of Lummi Island Heritage Trust Becca S. was in the wine shop picking up bread and mentioned the term. She informed us that many of the formations in the recently acquired Aiston Preserve are made of greywacke as is much of the southern half of Lummi Island. The formations are about 150 million years old, and underlain by basalt and chert from an ancient sea floor.
She had also learned that greywacke was a major part of the geological structure of New Zealand, and that there was a NZ winery of the same name that made sauvignon blanc and pinot noir, and that maybe we should track it down and get some; maybe it could fit into some Trust activities. Which we did. And which we now have. This weekend for your tasting pleasure we will be pouring the New Zealand Greywacke Pinot Noir. (See tasting notes below). The complex minerality gives the wine a somewhat masculine style, showing dark fruit and nuances of cedar, earth, and smoke. Pretty yummy, don’t miss it!
Mar a Lago Update: The REAL Impeachable Crime
It’s not that the Impeachment charges forming against the Tweetster are not Crimes, because they certainly are. And it’s not that his words and actions have not undermined the high ideals that we want our country to stand for, because they do and they have, 24/7 for the past four years. These are important issues that we must deal with. However, we digress for a moment from those ongoing concerns today to consider the Ominous Existential Context in which all this is happening, i. e. rapidly accelerating Climate Change.
In a recent interview, Senior Brookings Institution and World Resources Institute Fellow Todd Stern discussed the importance of the Paris Climate Accord and global participation in it, pointing out that climate change is an “equal-opportunity destroyer;” not believing in it is not going to save you from it. America’s unilateral withdrawal from the accord signals the rest of the world that the job of fighting climate change falls on them alone. Not only are we not helping, we continue policies that continually Make Things Worse.
The challenge is huge, time is short, and the consequences of failure look Catastrophic. The entire world, which currently gets 80% of its energy from fossil fuels, must work together toward the goal of reducing carbon to net zero by 2050…just thirty years away. If we fail to achieve that goal climate change may reach a tipping point that threatens the ability of the planet to support life at all. But already three years have been lost because of the Tweetster’s Monumental Ignorance, with no sign of change in sight.
Mr. Stern asserts that a united global civilization can do what we need to do, but we have passed the point where marginal progress in the right direction is enough. If we had started in earnest preparing for this future forty years ago when we first became aware of the problem we would have already been where we need to be. Now, after all this time making things worse and worse, “we are at a crisis point where directional progress is no longer enough—speed and scale are everything.”
To accomplish the 2050 goal will require “innovation, integrated policy, and economic commitment, all of which are possible…what is lacking is unified political will around the world.” That would be less difficult and more possible in a post-Tweetster world. Let it be…
Washington Post Tweetster Lie Count to date 13,445 as of 10/10/19
This weekend’s wine tasting
Bocelli Chardonnay ’18 Italy $14
Rich aromas of ripe pear with a hint of banana; plump and silky on the palate with crisp, lingering flavors of lychee and white peach.
Indaba Merlot ’15 South Africa $10
Crafted in a fresh, pure style, this velvety Merlot seduces with aromas and bright, juicy flavors of cherry, dark berry and plum backed by subtle mocha and herbal nuances and a delicate minerality.
Chat Auzias Cabardes Red ’17 France $10
Dark berries with a hint of eucalyptus; medium body with good acidity and notes of raspberry and sweet oak on the lingering finish.
Cana’s Feast Briar Red ’18 Washington $16
Ripe raspberry, boysenberry and cocoa on the nose. Full flavors of cherry, brown sugar, and coffee serve as a base for more subtle mineral and iron nuances. Generous acidity and tannic structure support a long, round finish.
Greywacke Pinot Noir ’16 New Zealand $32
Delicious aromas of juicy blackberries, blueberries and strawberry jam, with suggestions of black olives, cedar and a hint of lavender. Finely structured palate shows red and black fruit with earthy, smoky nuances.
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