Wine Unfiltered

Happy Summer Solstice Celebration! How will you celebrate? More than likely, most people will be partying today with father ties and golf clubs and bbq chef hats and crude macaroni drawings. But I want to remember mama earth for a second. 

It is the official start of summer my friends. The real one. Not the memorial one. As Summer Solstice is the longest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere, that means we will be losing around a minute of light after today, so hurry up and get summering! To most that means outdoors, kids finished with school, summer sun, blue pools, sandy beach and friends and family.

But there is also tradition: Stonehenge, Celtic green, sunwheels, and Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream…

What would Puck pair on this Midsummer masterpiece? I would suspect something impish. My guess? The Viñedo de Los Vientos Estival 2007:  A surprising Chardonnay, Gewürztraminer and Muscato Blanco blend. Deep summer gold, with a floral nose and succulent agave nectar. Nice acidity, tart without pucker (no pun intended), dry and rich, but clean. Lastly, it has a bright sparkling minerality to just confuse you a little bit further. A wine of opposites, playful, Puckish if you will, and something one would drink if you could jump into a garden picnic scene in an Italian tapestry pillow.

And what would a 21st century broad like me pick? Probably the same thing. But I also would pick something that reminds me of my backyard as a kid in the hot, humid Long Island summer sun. The Hess Allomi Vineyard Sauvignon Blanc 2007 : Vibrant and filled with lemongrass nose. Minerality, wet poolside stone, white grapefruit. Sour tropical fruits and green bamboo with tons of acidity. I was personally shocked to smell how much this smelled like the wet stones by our pool growing up. This time I would pair with ice cold shellfish, a diving board and the Solstice sun.

Let’s begin.