Wines to Warm Up Your Spring

It’s been a pretty cold Spring so far in Nova Scotia. I really feel for my Newfoundland friends, who have seen snow recently. We haven’t received snow, it just feels like it. But I have a recipe for Asian pork chops and a brand new white and a brand new red wine to help warm up those chilly evenings.

Once you’ve beat Cancer, a little cold weather doesn’t bother me. I make the best of it with good food and good wine. I found a new marinade for pork chops and it was so good.

I put my centre cut pork chops in an old fashioned roaster. Seasoned with salt and pepper, and I added some of this marinade before cooking. And again just before they were done.

This simple marinade contains brown sugar, balsamic vinegar, soya sauce, sesame oil, garlic, honey, and I added some hoisin sauce. The hoisin is optional. I love it, I feel it adds depth of flavor. I forgot to take a picture once the pork chops were done. I was hungry, LOL and they looked and smelled so good.

I tried 2 new wines this week, first let me tell you about the white wine.

From local winery Benjamin Bridge, my friend Joan bought this bottle of Piquette to our Saturday get together. It’s made in a very unique way. They use upcycled Chardonnay pomace. From their website “The historic Piquette winemaking style adds water to gently pressed grape skins, extracting their full fragrance and flavour potential while providing a lower alcohol beverage (5.0%).” It might be light on alcohol but it was very flavorful with gorgeous citrus notes. And at $17 a bottle, a great value.

The new red I tried, is from Portugal.

I have to be honest, I don’t often head down the aisle featuring wines from Portugal. But I’ll be doing it more often, this wine was so good and such a great value. It’s a blend of 4 grapes. Touriga Nacional, the national grape of Portugal, Pinot Noir, Syrah and Aragonez. I had to look Aragonez up, as I’ve never heard of that grape, but I learned that it’s another name for Tempranillo. This $18 rich velvety wine was a great new find.

You know I like to end my blog with a little cuteness. My rescue kitty Gabriel loves to watch bird and squirrel videos on my laptop. As a matter of fact, when I bought out the laptop to write this blog this morning, Mr. Gabriel jumped up with me, hoping for some home entertainment.

Well that’s it for me for this week. I hope you all have a wonderful week. Till next week, Cheers

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