lummi island wine tasting december 1 ’17
(note: some photos will enlarge when clicked)
Bread this week
Sonnenblumenbrot – aka Sunflower Seed Bread- made with a pre-ferment that is a complete dough itself. It takes a portion of the flour, water, salt and yeast that ferments overnight before mixing the final dough. The final dough is made with bread flour and freshly milled rye, then loaded up with toasted sunflower seeds and some barley malt syrup for sweetness. – $5/loaf
Honey, Wheat, Lemon & Poppy seeds – Made with a poolish that ferments some of the flour, yeast and water, but none of the salt, overnight. This results in a very active pre-ferment which is mixed the next day with the final ingredients which includes a nice mix of bread flour and fresh milled whole wheat. Some honey, poppy seeds and freshly grated lemon peel round out the flavors in this loaf. A great all around bread – $5/loaf
For pastry this week…
Croissants! – Pastry dough made with flour, milk, butter and sugar and then laminated with more butter before being cut and shaped into traditional french croissants. 2/$5
Touriga Nacional
Portugal has a lot of interesting wines with unusual and difficult to pronounce names. Most of these varietals are peculiar to Portugal and rare in our experience, the best known being Touriga Nacional, a full-bodied Portuguese red wine grape with aging potential similar to Cabernet Sauvignon. It has long been a blending grape in Port, and now is more often seen as a dry red wine which stands very well on its own.
Some people liken it to Napa Cabernet or Australian Shiraz for depth of flavor and tannic structure. It typically shows palate-coating and tooth-staining notes of blueberry, plum, blackberry, bittersweet cocoa, and a touch of mint and violet. Our featured wine this weekend is a particularly pleasing 100% touriga nacional that we think everyone will enjoy.
Bold and lush, Touriga Nacional appeals to all of us who like big fruit-forward red wines. It is often balanced and showing fine, gravelly tannins. When aged in oak, it often delivers aromas of toasted marshmallow, vanilla, nutmeg, cinnamon spice. and red-fruit flavors. Bottom line: it has a certain Bigness that will appeal to some (you know who you are!)
Dark Lord
As we go to press tonight, little Mitchie McConnell is once again the Dark Lord of the Hour. For the last decade he has Proven his Commitment to One-Party Government, through his year-long refusal to consider President Obama’s nominee to fill Antonin Scalia’s vacant seat on the Supreme Court, the consistent use of obscure Senate Rules to allow his party to make momentous National Decisions with a bare majority (when the rules call for a Two-Thirds majority), and his ongoing series of attempts to transfer more and more Wealth from the masses to the .1%.
As 2017 comes to an end, our Editorial Review Board has faced a Quandary: who is More Evil: Count Mar a Lago or Darth McConnell? To be sure we have had many Heated Discussions on the subject. In the final analysis, however, we have come to consider that Evil, like all skills and practices, has several levels of Mastery: Unconscious Incompetence –> Conscious Incompetence –> Conscious Competence –> Unconscious Competence (aka “Mastery”).
All of the Evidence available to us so far suggests that the Trumpster consistently fails to show evidence of any progress whatsoever beyond the Child-Level “unconscious incompetence;” i.e. he has No Idea what he is doing, and he has No Idea he has No Idea. McConnell, on the other hand, has consistently shown that he is completely Aware, Committed, and Dedicated to the Complete Destruction of Representative Government and its Replacement with Private Corporate Control on a Global Scale. Therefore he has earned the unanimous vote of our Editorial Board as Dark Lord of the Year 2017. If you agree, please donate $3 or more to our Lobbying Effort to capture and return him to his Home Swampy Frog Planet. We can only hope that Somehow he is Stopped before he, you know, Spawns and Multiplies…(gulp!)
Mar a Lago Update: One No-Trump
Also as we go to press tonight we offer an uncertain Magnanimous Shrug about our so-called President. Our recent Insights about the Current State of the Nation regard him as a Symptom, not a Cause. Clearly he is not a Politician, but rather a Leading Contestant on some Ultimate Reality TV series. This is His Real Gift: Manipulating Media to stay in the Headlines, to be the Center of Attention, and to convert that Attention into Money and Adulation. In his world, Notoriety is the Essence of Success. Add to that the Comfort of a Four Year Contract as Leading Man-Star…well, we can imagine him humming “Heaven…I’m in Heaven…” as he takes a shower, savors his Chocolate Cake, or Tweets his latest Ad for his Brand.
No, the Real Danger continues to lie with the Corporatists, whose greatest achievement in the past thirty years has been the complete elimination of the Progressive Income Tax. For those of you too young to remember, the concept behind the Progressive Income Tax was Equality of Burden. If your income is low, each additional dollar you earn is essential to meet Basic Necessities. But if you are Wealthy, each additional dollar buys goods and services that most consider “luxuries.” The importance of the idea of Progressive Taxation is that it was largely based on an Ethical Premise: that the highest dollar earned is more important to someone who is poor than it is to someone who is rich. And therefore, the concept of “Equal Burden” of taxation requires that people should pay progressively Higher Tax Rates on progressively higher incomes.
Essentially that reasoning all went away during the Reagan years, replaced by the notion that the Nation could not afford to Pamper the Poor. If Progressive Taxation had been a kind of Economic Lifeboat launched as part of the New Deal, Reaganomics basically said, “if you can’t afford a ticket, get out and swim.” For Mitch McConnell and his Merry Band, nothing has changed since then. As one top-hatted Gentleman in Industrial Revolution London said to a Colleague as he pointed out the Squalor all around them, “There’s a Great Deal of Money to be made here!”
This week’s wine tasting
Chateau Lamothe Bordeaux Blanc ’16 France $15
Bright and engaging, with fresh grapefruit and Meyer lemon pulp notes backed by a flash of straw on the open-knit finish. Sémillon, Sauvignon Blanc and Muscadelle.
Chateau Buisson-Redon Bordeaux ’14 France $11
Red fruit and cherry notes on the nose, with elegant soft tannins, and good backbone from the
Cab Franc; pleasant cinnamon and nutmeg aromas; medium-bodied and structured with round, warm fruit and a velvety finish.
Bocelli Sangiovese ’14 Italy $14
Bright,, lush, and appealing; deliciously ripe and smoky, with notes of marasca cherry, granite, and rhubarb compote. Finish is long and dry, with admirable acidity that makes the palate taut and pleasing.
Airfield Estate Merlot ’14 Washington $14
Slightly muted nose with dill, red cherry and raspberry, and flavors of red cherry, pomegranate, dill and milk chocolate. Easy, silky texture with good balance.
Quinta de Pinto Riserva ’13 Portugal $22
A lovely Touriga Nacional, laced with violets and wonderful aromatics that combine with its fine structure, balance and elegant mid-palate for a very pleasing whole. Fresh and lively, with a hint of eucalyptus on the finish: a great food wine!
lummi island wine tasting nov 24 ’17
Reminder: Closed Thanksgiving Weekend
Like many of you we are away for the Thanksgiving Holiday. The wine shop will be closed both Friday and Saturday. We will reopen as usual Next Weekend, and Janice will be in touch about bread orders this Sunday for pickup next Friday, Dec 1.
In the meantime we wish you a warm and relaxing Holiday!
lummi island wine tasting nov 17 ’17
(note: some photos will enlarge when clicked)
Bread this week
Something a bit different this week to help everyone get ready for Thanksgiving—a selection of dinner rolls, 6 rolls per order, 2 each of three different kinds. Pick them up on Friday, throw in the freezer, straight into the oven frozen just before dinner and have delicious fresh rolls for Thanksgiving without the work!!!
Septieme Rolls – Made with mostly bread flour and a bit of fresh milled whole wheat, mixed and fermented overnight in the refrigerator results in crusty roll on the outside with a soft, fragrant crumb on the inside.
Petite Polenta Boules – Made with bread flour, polenta, milk and a bit of brown sugar for sweetness, then loaded up with pumpkin seeds for a bit of crunch.
Cranberry Walnut Rolls – Made with bread flour, milk, brown sugar and eggs. Then loaded up with toasted walnuts and dried cranberries.
Two rolls of each flavor per order for $5; all orders come with 2 each of the three flavors.
Thanksgiving Week Schedule
History has shown that Islanders have Plans for Thanksgiving Week that do not involve coming to their neighborhood wine shop. And we are among them, off to Oregon for a family dinner, while Janice our dutiful Baker will be cooking dinner at home for a Crowd. Therefore, please note that the wine shop will closed both Friday and Saturday Thanksgiving weekend. We will reopen the following weekend, December 1-2 (OMD! December?…already??!) for our regular hours. We wish all of you a safe, warm, and congenial Holiday, and look forward to seeing you in two weeks!
Madeira
Madeira wine has been around for a long time. It was poured at the signing of the Declaration of Independence in 1776, was so widely available that it often perfumed ladies’ handkerchiefs, and was known as the “Milk of the Old” for its restorative properties. It comes from the island of the same name in the mid-Atlantic, a shipping crossroads in the 18th and 19th centuries. Since ocean voyages of the day were often very long, it was not uncommon for wines to spoil from heating and oxidation. Madeira, it turns out, thrived on changes in temperature, developing appealing nuances of flavor when heated and showed no change in flavor with oxidation.
Thus Madeira became the only wine that is deliberately heated in the making, to simulate the effects of the long sailing voyages to the East. After fermentation the wines are fortified to 17-20% alcohol content, stored in “estufas” heated to 45 degrees C for at least 3 months, then cooled slowly to rest for several years. Bottom line: it travels well, stores well, and can stay fresh for years even after opening!
Madeira is made from various combinations of six local grape varietals, chiefly Tinta Negra Mole, a cross of pinot noir and grenache. Depending on the grapes used, it is classified into four levels of sweetness: Dry (Seco), Medium Dry (Meio Seco), Medium Sweet (Meio Doce) and Sweet (Doce). These terms refer to both the levels of residual sugar (which varies according to varietal), and also to other nuances of flavor, acidity, and balance. As a result, the sweetness designation does not necessarily predict one’s experience of “sweetness” of any particular bottle. Sweet or dry, it is a comfort on long, dark evenings. This weekend we are pouring a 5-year Reserva Madeira, a nice finish for your Holiday dinner.
Mar a Lago Update: Lost in Translation
The First Thing to go was Civility. That became clear very soon after the ’92 election, when Rush Limbaugh began his daily mean-spirited rantings about “dope-smoking” President-elect Bill Clinton and wife “Queen Hillary.” It was hateful and slanderous, and it broke all the Rules about Civil Dialogue. That was twenty-five years ago, and it has only gotten Worse. Now we live in a deeply polarized Society with a Congress that is Unwilling or Unable to negotiate across party lines on Anything. And to a large degree ordinary citizens have also become barricaded in the Prisons of our own Beliefs, and most “News” has been replaced by Commentary and Interpretation.
The Surprising Polarities that emerged right here on Lummi Island over the past several months regarding a pretty inconsequential proposal to establish a bit of local Autonomy by forming a Parks & Recreation District demonstrate the challenges of community dialogue anywhere these days. The standing joke defines our Island as “an Argument Surrounded by Water.” And that’s just in our one tiny community with (as far as we know) No Russian Social Media Intervention. The Takeaway seems to be that every community may have developed its very own Blend of Distrust and Fear that Someone wants to Take our Stuff, Invade our Privacy, or in any number of ways Thumb their Noses at the Values we hold Dear.
We have all developed the habit of Translating What Someone Says into What We Think We Heard Them Say. There is an ongoing process of Translation in any conversation which is deeply affected by our Fears and Expectations, making many conversations into adjoining monologues rather than Dialogue. As Richard Nixon once said, “I know you think you believe you understand what you thought I said, but I am not sure you realize that what you heard is exactly what I meant.” To this day No One has Any Idea what that meant. Like more and more of our Political Discussions, Much is irretrievably Lost in Translation.
This week’s wine tasting
Kiona Red Mountain Riesling ’16
From 40-yr old vines on Red Mountain, off-dry style with well-developed bright fruit, pronounced minerality, and crisp acidity.
Sanguineti Cannonau de Sardegna ’15 Italy $12
This cannonau– a Sardinian varietal known elsewhere as grenache– offers dry and dusty aromas and flavors of cherry, pomegranate and plum that leave lingering, crisp, earthy and briny flavors that beg for food.
Jordanov Red ’15 Macedonia $11
Cab, merlot, and vranec from limestone and sandy soils; shows notes of blueberry and densely concentrated fruit with a dusty, rich, long minerally finish of cherry and cherry pit. read more
Tres Picos Garnacha ’14 Spain 92pts $15
Heady, exotically perfumed bouquet of ripe berries and incense, with a smoky minerality and spice. Vibrant flavors of raspberry liqueur and cherry-cola show power, depth and finesse with velvety tannins.
Henriques Full Rich 5 yr Madeira
Dark gold with strong aromas and flavors of ripe fruit, with caramel, floral and spice flavors that turn toward tobacco and walnut on the finish. Mellow and very rich on the palate; ideal as an after dinner drink.
lummi island wine tasting november 10 ’17
(note: some photos will enlarge when clicked)
Bread this week
Barley & Rye w/ Pumpkin Seeds – Fermented overnight with a levain then mixed with a nice mix of bread flour and fresh milled rye, barley and whole wheat flours. Some buttermilk makes for a tender crumb, honey for sweetness and toasted pumpkin seeds add to the flavor and texture. A really flavorful artisan loaf – $5/loaf
Kamut Levain – Kamut, also known as khorasan wheat, is an ancient grain that has more protein than conventional wheat. Some people who can’t tolerate wheat find kamut to be more digestible. The bread is also made with a levain that is fermented overnight before being mixed with bread flour and fresh milled whole kamut flour. It has a nutty, rich flavor and makes a golden color loaf. A great all around bread – $5/loaf
And for pastry, a rich and delicious treat…
Chocolate Babka Rolls – A sweet pastry dough full of eggs, butter and sugar, rolled and spread with a chocolate filling, rolled up and cut into individual rolls that are placed in baking forms for baking and then brushed with sugar syrup after baking. I’ve heard some people say they hide these to keep them all to theirselves. As always, quantities are limited, be sure to get your order in early – 2/$5
Montreal Murals
Saint-Laurent Boulevard, aka “the Main,” has for centuries been Montreal’s primary artery, splitting the city in two. It has also characterized Montreal’s inviting culture of art, food, and expression. Since 2000 it has become a unique expression of cultural, gastronomical and social avant-garde.
(compare this with last week’s Leonard Cohen mural...)
There are currently over a hundred of these murals along or near the Boulevard, punctuating block after block of shops, cafes, bistros, and boutiques with bold, incongruous, sometimes puzzling, sometimes profound imagery.
The Really Nourishing Takeway here is that Community Art like this can make any wall, any neighborhood, any Corner or any Block into Something Unique and Special…!
Tator Talk
We returned from our two weeks away to find Tator still holding her own– alert, good appetite, defending her Territory against Ulee the Barbarian. She is again able to take our daily mile-or-so walk down along Legoe Bay and back, and doesn’t seem to tire. She is having a little more trouble going up stairs than before, but we think that will pass as she weans from her meds.
Given how she was two months ago, not able to stand up or walk on her own, we are relieved and grateful that she is doing so well. We have all our paws crossed hoping she continues on this healing path. We all like to make Dog Happy whenever we can…!
Mar a Lago Update: Science and Opinion
At my recent 50th class reunion, I had an enjoyable but troubling dinner conversation with a classmate about politics. He and his wife are Trump Supporters, while Pat and I are Trump Resisters. So some serious Polarities. At some point the conversation turned to Climate Change, and my friend asserted that there were valid arguments that “Climate has Always been Changing,” with the implication that our current changing climate is as likely Random Chance as due to Human Burning of Fossil Fuels.
While I think we achieved some degree of rapprochement around a general disgust, disdain, and disappointment with Political Players of both parties, Acceptance of the Reality of Anthropogenic (human-caused) Climate Change seemed a Bridge Too Far for them. And that is Troubling.
That which we call the Scientific Method generally holds that at any moment in time the “Truth” is the Best Answer human inquiry has been able to come up with to date on whatever subject. Science is never finished or complete. However, it is Content to accept the Best Conclusion available at any point in time about any particular issue. In the case of Climate Change, for over forty years mathematical Climate System Models have observed the relationships among fossil fuel consumption, concentrations of CO2 and other “greenhouse gases,” ocean currents, atmospheric and oceanic temperatures and salinity, winds, rainfall and wind patterns, polar ice melting, flooding, high wind events, and so on. With each year’s new data, models are updated.
These kinds of models cannot predict particular weather events in particular places on particular days. However, they have become increasingly accurate in predicting Trends: more heat overall means higher temperatures, higher winds, more evaporation and rainfall, desertification in some areas and flooding in others, more forest fires, and so on. These are Not Opinions. Scientific Conclusions provide us with the our Most Informed Guess about what will happen if we do X, or Y, or Z. “Most Informed” means “taking Everything we know into Consideration.” It’s not Opinion. It’s What’s Left after all the other Conflicting Opinions have been shown NOT to be true. Another way of saying this is: if 97% if the World’s Scientists agree on something, that makes it As True as anything can possibly be, and we ignore Warnings at our Peril!
This week’s wine tasting
Domaine de l’Amauve La Daurèle, Côtes du Rhône Villages Séguret ’16 France $17
Grenache blanc, clairette, viognier, & ugni blanc; expressive nose of white fruits, mirabelle plum, and acacia honey; soft on the palate with lively citrus flavors…very Food Versatile!
La Rocaliere Tavel Rose ’16 France $14
Scents of dark berries, cherry, and licorice, with a floral accent. Firm and structured, displaying cherry and floral pastille flavors and a hint of bitter herbs, finishing with good power and length.
Quinta des Aves Noctua Syrah ’14 Spain $15
Bright cherry red with purple hints. Deep and long-lasting aroma of red fruits and crisp, spicy strawberry; soft and fruity, silky and long on the finish.
Brunelli Apricale ’16 Italy $14
Sangiovese Grosso with a little Merlot and Cab Franc; Fruity and persistent nose of wild berries and spice. Soft and balanced with fine tannins this Sant’Antimo Rosso works well with any meal!
Syncline Subduction Red ’15 Washington $18
Syrah dominant Rhone blend; perfumed aromas of fresh blue and purple fruit, spice, and herbs lead to rich fruit flavors and a plush texture that persists effortlessly through the finish. Delightful!
2072 Granger Way
