Goodbye Cold Weather

There won’t be a wine blog for the next two weeks, as I’m leaving this cold weather next Saturday. My sister is treating me to a one week vacation at the Royalton Hicacos in Veradero.

This is our most recent picture, taken with our lifelong friend Wendy over the Christmas holidays. Jackie, Wendy and I have known each other for 55 years. And we are still like family. My sister wants to take me down south before my cancer surgery, and before I get the colostomy bag. We leave next Saturday and come back the following Saturday. I’ll share any new wines I will try and maybe some fun pics as well.

I absolutely love pasta, and my Mom’s favorite is Chicken Fettucine Alfredo. I realized I had never made this dish, only had it in restaurants. Well, last Sunday that all changed, and it was so easy and it turned out so good. I used fresh pasts for my first attempt at Fettucine Alfredo and I used this recipe. I also added some fresh bacon. I mean, bacon compliments most things, especially a creamy cheesy pasta with chicken. Am I right?

Here’s the wine I had with it.

I went Italian. I know I have had this wine before, but it’s been a while, and look at that rich deep color. It’s the Pasqua Romeo & Juliet Rosso, isn’t that a great name for an Italian wine

This is one of those great wines that combines traditional Italian grapes with a traditional Bordeaux varietal. This wine is 40% Merlot, 30% Corvina and 30% Croatina. Both Corvina and Croatina are grapes native to Italy. Appassimento means dried, and the process is quite unique. The Merlot and Corvina grapes, selected and hand harvested with great care, are then left to dry for 1 month into wooden trays in the Fruttaio, a special room used for drying grapes. Thanks to the dry and well ventilated environment where the humidity level is carefully controlled, the grapes loses around 30% of their water content and gain high flavor concentration. Several wine critics have given this wine 91 Points. This wine is only $20 a bottle and is so rich and full-bodied with absolutely no bitterness. It went down pretty easy. 

I have one more new wine to tell you about.

So I saw this wine in the clearance aisle at our liquor store, and thought I would give it a try. I had tried the Cabernet in the past, tried it for the first time last year. Enjoying it while watching a Christmas Hallmark movie of course.

The Cabernet, which was called Jingle was very good so I wanted to try the Holly Red Blend, which is called Holly. Hallmark hasn’t released the grape varietal but in my opinion, there is definitely Cabernet Sauvignon, Zinfandel and some Merlot. It was lush and juicy and I really enjoyed it. If you can find it, it’s on sale now for under $17 a bottle.  

That’s it for me for this week. I’ll touch base in a couple of weeks and hopefully have lots of great pictures from the vacation. This is a picture of our resort.

Till then, Cheers

Darlene