On the Wine Side with Dominique - A Week of Wine Tue, Nov 14, 23 What a week for wine! November 15 is International Zinfandel Day, and November 16 is the release of Beaujolais Nouveau. And then, of course, Thanksgiving is just about a week away - and that's a wine occasion, for sure! For International Zinfandel Day (or any day you're in the mood for a nice Zinfandel), check out the recently arrived Mazzocco Dry Creek Reserve Zinfandel.It's from Sonoma County, where Zinfandel characteristics lean toward big, rich wines full of cocoa and spice. Mazzocco is known for producing particularly robust, sumptuous Zins, and this one doesn't disappoint, filling the nose and palate with dark fruit and dark chocolate. A beautiful fireside sipper! Beaujolais Nouveau is so named because it's a "new" wine - the first press of the current vintage of Gamay grapes in Beaujolais. Fermented for just a few weeks before being bottled and shipped around the world to be released on the third Thursday of November, Beaujolais Nouveau is meant to be drunk young, an expression of fresh fruit and a celebration of the new vintage.The 2023 Georges Duboeuf Beaujolais Nouveau is lovely - bursting with fresh red fruit notes of raspberry, cherry, even strawberry. It's fruity but not sweet on the palate, nice and light, a very enjoyable wine. It's a favorite of red wine drinkers on Thanksgiving as it doesn't overpower turkey or the variety of sides and other foods that find their way to our tables and plates. Speaking of turkey and sides and all that is delicious about Thanksgiving, choosing wines for the meal (and the various courses involved) can get overwhelming. We're here to help. We've chosen a dozen or so wines that are featured on the shelves by our Help Desk at the front of the store, all of which will complement all aspects of a Thanksgiving get-together. There are also some whiskies and after-dinner drinks! There are many more choices than there is room on that display, and we are all happy to help you find bottles that will be best for you and your friends and family. Don't get too hung up on what might be "perfect," either, because in the end what's most important is that you enjoy what you drink.One of my favorites among the selections is a white wine from Sicily called Antale Fiano. Fiano is the grape. The wines tastes somewhere between a crisp Sauvignon Blanc and an unoaked Chardonnay - bright and sumptuous at the same time, with notes of pear and honey and beeswax. The producers proclaim on the back label that it pairs well with "stuffed white meat." Turkey, anyone?As Virginia Woolf so rightly noted, "One cannot think well, love well, sleep well if one has not dined well." Happy Thanksgiving from the Wine Side! By Tyler Duma
