"Chez Scriv" - new house wine

My new favourite inexpensive ($10.10!!) big red:

J.J. MCWILLIAMS SHIRAZ/CABERNET

LCBO 16741 750 ml. bottle

Price: $ 10.10

13.3% Alcohol/Vol.
Sugar Content : 2
Made in: South Australia

LCBO Tasting Note:
Medium ruby red colour; big nose of eucalyptus, black currant and vanilla; dry, medium to full bodied, with lots of juicy fruit flavours; spicy notes on the long finish.

My notes: Great, bold full-bodied red. Excellent value. Great with pizza (but then again, so is tap water or beer or milk or juice....hmmm....maybe it's really just pizza I like, more than the wine? No - I love pizza and I love the "big" red wines).

I found that this is one of those wines that greatly benefits from decanting for at least an hour, and/or pouring into the "Eisch" breathable wine glasses that I've mentioned in another blog entry here...

Duffy

Went to the Phoenix on August 2nd to see Duffy (http://www.iamduffy.com/index2.html) with my wife, my two daughters and my brother and his wife. Duffy came onstage without much introduction at 8:30, and pretty much blew us away with her powerful voice, a cross between Lulu ("To Sir with Love" Lulu, that is) and Dusty Springfield and maybe Petula Clark. When you're in a smaller venue like this, you really feel the bass just sort of pounding you in the chest and right down to your hips...very cool. She only has the one cd, so she sang most of it and added a couple of covers and a "b-side" song to flesh out the show. Great 60's vibe to her music. The show was an hour long, but felt way too short, 'cause we were having such fun listening to the music, and also having a few drinks (very civilized place to see a band, the Phoenix!) Duffy looked very cute in her "K-Mart-style" red & white polka-dot skort-suit thing. Can't dance worth a damn, but knows it, and jokes about it...kind of endearing herself to the crowd while doing so. She comes across as very sweet in her limited stage banter. She's new and unpolished at the moment. It'll be interesting to see how her career turns out - will she be the "Dave Clark Five or Herman's Hermits" to Amy Winehouse's Brit-export gold-standard-bearers the Beatles/Stones, or will she just turn out to be a "Freddy and the Dreamers or Peter & Gordon"? Very good show, with many of my very favourite people to share the experience! Then we went on to a bar across the street from Maple Leaf Gardens, where we met even more of my favourite people (Erin and Tracy and Jay and Luke) for some beer and snacks.

Mexico - Mayan Riviera

We’ve just returned from a wonderful vacation (with my sister-in-law, her husband and their two great kids) to the Riu Palace – Riviera Maya http://www.riu.com/index.php.
We left Toronto on Sunday afternoon, June 22nd, having been picked up by a h-u-g-e white Lincoln Navigator stretch limo (seems the original limo we had booked was not available so they substituted this one, which made our nephew Mackenzie really happy!).
Good (i.e. uneventful) flight to Cancun airport, where we were met by the shuttle bus to take us to the resort, approximately an hour away…ice-cold Corona beer offered for sale and accepted on the bus! Arrived at resort around midnight, had a quick look around and another drink, then to sleep.
Monday – had a fabulous breakfast in the main buffet restaurant (including champagne and orange juice for some). This restaurant is open for breakfast and for dinner, not lunch, when another one opens up from 10:30 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. to handle the mid-day meals and snacks. Met our Sunquest rep in the lobby bar area for an information session at 10:30 a.m., and had a few tropical cocktails, causing Brian and me a little buzz before lunch! Then it was down to the beach, where we had some good fun swimming around behind some sort of man-made breaker-barriers. Saw lots of fish, including a 5’ barracuda which the kids in particular were very excited to see! (*Note: Brian and I were also quite entertained - by the extremely rare “Triple B” that day…beer, boobs and barracudas! Some of the attractive young women down by the ocean seemed to have “forgotten” their bikini tops, or perhaps the poor creatures could only afford to pay for half of their swimming attire and were absolutely not shy about this possible oversight). Had a late lunch, around 3:00 p.m. at “Chili’s” restaurant near the pool and ocean portion of the resort. Fran and the kids painted some very nice and colourful ceramics on the beach. We hung out at the pool, including the famous (infamous?) swim-up bar where some of us (Annette & Fran in particular) were slipping off the barstools much to the delight of the kids. Kids caught some small lizards near the main lawn/courtyard area ("catch-and-release"). We watched a decent live band doing lots of old covers of soft-rock tunes in the main “Piazza”-type courtyard in the evening. A bit cooler in the evenings thankfully as the days, as you can imagine in Mexico in the summer, are very hot.
Tuesday – Buffet breakfast at 9:00 a.m. *Note to self and anyone else going to sun destinations: reminder - buy lots of sunscreen here in Canada, not there – we were forced to buy an additional container for $25.00 when we ran out of our identical $8.00 stuff we had brought from home! Fran & I walked over to a shopping area about a mile away, where we bought the “premium” sunscreen, and a new bathing suit for me, as the one I took with us to Mexico and hadn’t worn for a very long time seemed to have “shrunk” when I put it on and had some minor difficulty in doing up the waist-band area?!? We sat for a while in the very air-conditioned Starbucks there and had a lovely cappuccino. Spent a while at the lobby bar at the resot in the afternoon as well as some more time in the pool and ocean, where the kids were again delighted to find lots of fish, little crabs and lizards, etc. Excellent dinner at “Agave”, the Mexican restaurant.
Wednesday – left the resort at 7:30 a.m.!! to go to our first excursion. A 90-minute bus-ride to Cancun, where we boarded a large catamaran sailboat. After a nice 60- minute boat-ride (including lots of beer) we all jumped out to do some supervised snorkeling, and saw quite a large number of beautiful fish that were right there with us – sort of like swimming in an aquarium! Molly was a tiny bit “freaked out” to see another barracuda right beneath her!! Back on the boat to the island where the dolphin adventure portion of the day was to be held. Had a pretty good buffet lunch on the island, including (surprise) more beer! Then at around 2:15 p.m. it was into the water with our group of 12 people, for a very interesting close-up time with the dolphins. We were able to touch them and get a little ride from them. Another very relaxing boat-ride back to Cancun on a very sunny, breezy afternoon with – yes – more beer. Bus back to the resort, then dinner at the buffet restaurant, which had their weekly Mexican-food theme that night – very good! An incredible lightning show was provided by nature, and we had an early night, exhausted from the day’s events.
Thursday – Buffet breakfast, then down to the pool/beach area. Not there too long when the rains came – very powerful rain, with lightning and thunder. Spent some time at the lobby bar and in our rooms this day… Dinner was at the Japanese restaurant, which was also very nice (Brian was feeling a bit queasy this day, and unfortunately couldn’t really enjoy this much-anticipated meal).
Friday – left the resort at 8:25 a.m. for our second and final excursion, this time to the Mayan village of Coba. A 45-minute bus ride to our first “technical stop” (bathroom break, leg-stretching, and smoking for those that still do that) then on to the Mayan ruins site. Very knowledgeable guide Adriana led us on a 2 km. walk through the “jungle” past a couple of interesting Mayan structures to the highest Mayan pyramid in the area. Molly, Annette and Brian all walked up the entire 120 steps to the summit of the pyramid, which is 130 metres up. The rest of us ‘punked out’ and only managed about a third of that climb before deciding that we had a pretty good feel for what it was like to climb these things! Very hot 2 km. walk/hike back to the bus, then off to a restaurant where lunch was served. Surprisingly good lunch featuring our choice of Mayan chicken, or beef fajitas or pork with rice and tortillas (oh…and beer). Bussed to a little Mayan village. Still approximately 3 million Mayans live in this part of Mexico, much like our Inuit up north, I think. We were allowed in to "Ermelinda’s" place - a very modest series of thatched huts, where they also had lime trees, orange trees, papaya, and squash growing. Extremely poor-looking existence, although they do have electricity, and even a little television set. They are very traditional still, however, and the husbands go out to work and the women work at home raising 10 kids like Ermelinda did, and looking after the “gardens” and chickens, etc. All of her children are now married and gone except one. We did see about ten little kids who popped by, and one of her grandchildren, a very cute happy little girl of around two years of age. They have also (so far) been able to maintain their own Mayan language in addition to most of them also knowing how to speak Spanish. (I think our guide said that out of the 3 million Mayans, 780,000 still spoke only Mayan). Very sobering place to have seen. Back on the bus to go to see a Cenote (a large natural limestone sinkhole filled with fresh underground waters). Lots of people went in for a refreshing swim. Along the brief walk into the Cenote, we watched how the Mayans “harvested” some particular tree-sap for chewing gum, which Mr. Adams (of Chiclets gum fame) sort of discovered here, then had the bright idea to add sugar and flavouring to market it to the world! Back to the resort for dinner.
Saturday – food, pool, lunch again - All good! Then more pool, ocean, beer, etc. Dinner at Chili’s then watched the nightly "mini-Vegas-style" stage show near the main courtyard with some of our vacation-friends from Montreal.
Sunday- breakfast, pool, ocean, lunch, shuttle to airport, flight home, at Pearson at 2:00 a.m., home three a.m., sleep 4:22 a.m. Terrific holiday!

Eisch Breathable Wine Glasses!

Recently purchased some of these great lead-free crystal wine glasses, and can now report without hesitation that they really do work! They eliminate the need for long breathing periods after pouring your red wine into carafes. Just pour into your glass and wait a few minutes, and the wine tastes like it has been "opening up" in a carafe for an hour or so! It has made our $10 "house wine" (Cawarrah Shiraz/Cabernet blend) taste much more interesting, and we can detect lots more interesting fruity notes, etc. when giving it the little pre-drinking sniff... They happen to be on sale at 20% off at Epicure 1900 Mississauga Road and Dundas St. West in Mississauga. They're not cheap, but they really seem to make a difference.

http://www.eisch.de/eng/website/news/breathable_glass/index.php

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20070905.wldecanter05/EmailBNStory/lifeFoodWine/home

L'unita Restaurant

Last night we went to this new (to me) restaurant called L'unita at Avenue Road and Davenport in Toronto. We had made a reservation for our party of eight a few weeks ago, and arrived on time for the 8:15 scheduled time. We had to wait just-a-bit-too-long at the bar for our table to be vacated and re-set for us. However, after that wobbly start (which one of the very pleasant young women staffers apologized nicely for, but didn't offer any other more tangible compensation, like some complementary apppetizers or desserts, etc.) our dining experience was absolutely excellent! The room itself is a wonderfully comfortable space with exposed brick walls, large hanging mirrors and colourful posters. The noise level was just right - loud enough to feel like lots of fun was being had, but not overbearingly deafening, and not so loud as to stop our own lively conversations. We had lots of very tasty Italian red wine, soft and delicious bread with olive oil and breadsticks and olives as well as some not-too-garlicy romaine salads to start. The entrees were outstanding. Mine was short ribs...exceptionally tender and perfectly flavoured. I also sampled some nicely-cooked fries, some al dente asparagus, as well as some tasty fingerling potatoes to go along with my ribs. The portions here are very generous, unlike some other "better" restaurants where you really do enjoy the food, but are left hungry for more due to the tiny servings, often too-artfully displayed on the plate. Other choices at our table were a nice-looking cornish hen (I think!), a great striploin steak, some wonderful lamb dishes and a "really good" lobster risotto. The service was just right as well - not stuffy or snobby at all. just friendly and knowledgeable and attentive without being "in-your-face"...always a tricky balance, but done well at this place. Desserts were almost unnecessary, but I managed to slide in some cool and tasty gelattos with an excellent cappuccino to cap off a great meal. Some of our dinner companions were already asking when we could come back to this place, as there's so much more on the menu we'd like to discover - sounds to me like a pretty good recommendation for this place right there! Co-owner David asked us on the way out how we liked it, and seemed quite pleased that we were happy - seems like a very nice guy. (I had told him when confirming our reservation that I often e-mail my friends with restaurant, wine and music recommendations). We'll certainly return to L'unita sometime soon... Try it, and you won't be disappointed. Another opinion:http://www.dine.to/establishment_review_page.php?RecordID=414

the "GOATFATHER" wine

My new favourite wine is now available in the Vintages section of the LCBO:

THE GOATFATHER 2005 VINTAGES 11072 750 mL bottle Price: $ 15.95

Wine, Still Table Wine, Red Still Table Wine14.5% Alcohol/Vol.Sugar Content : XDMade in: South Africa, South AfricaBy: The Goats do Roam Wine Company/FairviewRelease Date: Feb 2, 2008
Tasting Note(an idiosyncratic amalgam of shiraz, cabernet, merlot, barbera and primitivo) Bright, dark red. Smoky, liqueur-like berries, bitter cherry and gunflint on the nose. Supple and sweet but not at all sloppy owing to its firm acid spine. Spicy red fruit and pepper flavors finish with firmness. Score - 88.
(Stephen Tanzer, International Wine Cellar, March/April 2007)