lummi island wine tasting nov 9 ‘18
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Bread Friday this week
Semolina w/ Fennel & Raisins – A levain bread made with bread flour, semolina and some fresh milled whole wheat. A little butter for a tender crumb and fennel seeds and golden raisins round out the flavors, which pair really well with meats and cheese, but it also makes pretty darn good toast! – $5/loaf
Spelt Levain – Spelt is an ancient wheat grain with a nutty, slightly sweet flavor and less gluten than modern wheat. This bread is made with a levain, or sourdough, traditional bread flour and about 1/3 spelt flour, fresh milled whole spelt and fresh milled whole rye. – $5/loaf
and pastry this week…
Brioche Almond Buns – a delicious brioche dough full of butter, milk, eggs, and sugar, rolled out and spread with a rich almond filling before being rolled up and placed in baking forms and baked. Delish! – 2/$5
Radman Cab
As you all know we have been away for several weeks, and arrived home tonight on the 5:40 ferry. Though closed the last few Saturdays, the shop has been open on Fridays for Bread and Wine Tasting (an old and Wise tradition dating back Thousands of Years and the excuse for many a Human Gathering), and the shelves are getting Bare. Since this weekend marks the Annual Lummi Island Winter Studio Tour (for a long time held the first weekend in December but the weather was so consistently Inhospitable a few years ago it was moved to the second weekend in November.) So our choice was to restock via Distributor with uncertain delivery on Friday, or to shop on the way home. We chose the latter, and as a result four of our wines this weekend are from Oregon.
Most are from Chehalem Cellars or Sineann Winery which we visited yesterday. One hit from Sineann was a wine made by rookie winemaker Lisa of Radman Cellars, a cabernet from Red Mountain that will definitely get your attention.
If you browse through the list below you will notice that the wines are on average more expensive than our usual tasting array. All you need to know is that you will pay the same token tasting fee as usual despite the the superior quality of this tasting. These wines may all be a little more $$ than most of us are comfortable with, but hey, days are getting short, nights are getting cold, and every once in a while a little Gratuitous Self-Indulgence is warmly Fulfilling. So come on by and treat yourself to some of the Greater Comforts of our Civilization!
Mar a Lago Update: Rollerball Revisited
The Really Good News is that the Rag-Tag remnants of the once-proud Democratic Party have gained a two-year Foothold on Existence. That deserves a long overdue exhalation….Aaahhhhhhhhhhh….! Here we are clipped onto the Sheer Cliff of Corporate Obsolescence with cheap carabiners and rotten footholds, Barely Relevant, but still fighting against inevitable Corporate Control with a naive optimism that Justice will ultimately prevail. What we have gained is a “Well, maybe…!” and that is a Major Improvement over where we have been since the Tweetster Coup.
The more sobering news is that there was no Blue Wave, at best maybe a few Blue Ripples. Many Red States remain gerrymandered several percentage points out of reach for Democrats while also successfully and quietly removing many hundreds of thousands of Democratic voters from voter rolls in their states. The important task for the next two years is to restore balance to our electoral process by: 1) gaining control of more State Legislatures before the 2020 Census; and 2) restoring voting rights to millions of Democratic voters illegally deprived of their Constitutional Right to vote by being systematically removed from voter registration rolls.
The Great Enemy remains the consolidation of Global Power into fewer and fewer Corporate, Plutocratic Hands. There have not been nationalistic or moral wars for a very long time now. Rather they have been replaced by a global network of Proxy Wars that transcend national and idealogical borders with a common theme of replacing nation-states with corporate states. The metaphorical blueprint for all of this was brilliantly and presciently laid out in the mid-1970’s film Rollerball. Although the video version of the central philosophical scene of the film is no longer available online, the audio version is available here, where actor John Houseman describes to Populist Star Jonathan (played by James Caan) the Way Things Really Are.
This transcends political parties and even national borders. It is about Supernational Corporate Domination of every aspect of global management. The really scary thing about all of this is that there is so far no evidence that the Bazillionaire Players who are Driving all of this have even the slightest Awareness or Concern for the Fragility of our Planet’s Interdependent Systems or the sustainability of Life itself in an environment dominated by the Quest for Short-term Profit.
This week’s election may be far too little and far too late to make a difference. Or, more hopefully it might provide a Window of Possibility for a Compelling and Desirable Future. An important battle has been won, yes, but while the Orcs and their Dark Lords are still In Power the Age of Humans hangs by a Thread, and at the moment we are our own Worst Enemy.
This week’s wine tasting
Chehalem Three Vineyard Rose ‘17 Oregon 91pts $23
Showcasing strawberry in all its delicious forms, accented by rose petal, gravel and pale spice. A rich palate with bright acid tension lends to subtle notes of pomegranate and dried cherries.
Chahalem Inox Chardonnay ’16 Oregon 90pts $19
Fermented and aged sur lie without oak; delivers rich aromas of white and yellow fruits, with bright crisp notes of citrus zest, honey, apple, and spicy minerality on the long, broad finish.
Sineann Pisa Terrace Pinot Noir ’13 Washington/NewZealand $30
Made in NZ’s Otago region by Sineann winemaker Peter Rosback; full and ripe, with great structure, good natural acidity and subtle, lingering intensity; plum and black cherry flavors are framed by soft tannins and notes of baking spices, dried herbs and fresh earth.
Radman Cellars Cabernet Sauvignon ’15 Washington $40
Fruit sourced from Shaw Vineyards in Red Mountain AVA, wine made at Sineann winery. Deep and dark in color, classic nose of black currant, smooth and lingering palate of pruney black currant, gentle but persistent tannins, and long, smooth finish.
Juggernaut Hillside Cabernet ’15 California $20
Huge, rich, and opulent, with complex flavors of chocolate, coffee, blackberries, cassis, mint, and velvety tannins. New French oak adds notes of vanilla and toast; concentrated, rich, and smooth on the palate.
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