Spirit of the Day: Marquez de Valencia Tequila Reposado

I first tasted this excellent tequila with the house’s owner, Stephanie Valencia. (Her father, Salvador Valencia, founded it.)  Take note of her name--I have a feeling she’ll become a major player in the spirits world in the coming years: Her family’s tequila is fantastic, and she has the charm and savvy to turn it into a go-to tequila in the high-end market.

This 11-and-a-half-month-aged tequila shows lots of tropical fruit on the nose, all of it limned with a hint of peppercorn spice. The agave itself comes out too, in an almost roasted corn and almond paste note that lends it all real depth. The palate shows sweet, evocative fruit like grilled pineapple, a gently smoky character, and a black-peppercorn-flecked finish that lingers beautifully. It’s a silky fabric of spirit that glides over the tongue with elegance, restraint, and complexity. This is a marvelous sipping tequila that, very quickly, has become my house pour.

Spirit Preview: Rhuby

It’s not often that we have the opportunity to experience a brand-new flavor combination. In that sense, the world of food and drink bears a striking resemblance to that of music: By now, more than a decade into the 21st century, we seem to have heard it all and tasted it all before. Which is exactly why the emergence of a truly visionary chef or winemaker or distiller--or musician--is the cause of so much justifiable excitement. Remember the first time you heard Radiohead’s OK Computer? Or Miles Davis’s Sketches of Spain?

I still remember my first bite of warm chestnut soup with its crowning igloo of bacon ice cream at La Broche in Madrid back in 2004. Helmed by Sergi Arola, protege of Ferran Adrià, this was my first tentative foray into the world of what might be called the El Bulli school of Spanish gastronomy, and a first glimpse at what was possible when the traditional bounds of flavor and texture were broken.

I bring this up because last night, at the remarkable Talula’s Garden in Philadelphia, I had the chance to taste, for the first time, Rhuby, the new spirit by boundary-pushing Art in the Age. I consulted on the wine list at the restaurant, and was in for a pre-dinner line-up discussion of Port. Afterward, Aimee Olexy, the visionary co-owner of the restaurant with Stephen Starr, joined me at the bar for a drink and a bite (or three) to eat.

And then she brought out the Rhuby. It’s not available yet, so this preview of the already-much-buzzed-about tipple caused more than a few heads to turn and eyebrows to rise as she popped the bottle open.

Turns out that all the buzz around this newest project by the mad geniuses at Art in the Age is wholly justified. As the promo video below notes (NB: Take a look at their site; it's full of great information in addition to the video), it’s sweet but not too sweet, spicy but wholly approachable. Its complexity and range of potential uses, however, is what struck Aimee and I, and it only took a few sips for the gears in her head to start really turning. The ideas came tumbling out: Highlight the spice of Rhuby by mixing it into a rye manhattan; work with the sweeter notes as a base ingredient for a foie gras torchon; play up the perfumed aspects by harnessing its pink peppercorn and cardamom notes for a gravlax cure; kiss a vodka martini with it as a way to start getting vodka drinkers more comfortable with the added complexity of gin-like flavors; or, just as appealing, simply serve it over ice, the way Italians have traditionally enjoyed vermouth.

This is a beautiful, thoroughly accomplished product, paradoxically avant-garde in its reliance on an 18th century recipe for inspiration. Perhaps the old cliche is right: Everything old has the potential to be new again. And damn delicious, too.

The Story of Art in the Age RHUBY from Art In The Age on Vimeo.

Cool Down Your Reds, and a Standout Cab from Martini

Matt Kramer has a fantastic column in the August 2nd issue of Wine Spectator about cooling down red wines. Of course, not all reds should be served at cellar temperature, and some do just fine at room temp. But I’ve generally found that even the most tannic wines benefit from a few degrees being taken off of them. Serve them too cool and you’ll get a mouthful of what feels like the unholy offspring of sand and a popsicle stick. But a quick 15-minute stint in the fridge is often exactly what a wine needs to minimize the impression of alcohol heat, amplify its acid, and freshen up its fruit flavors.

I note this because I recently tasted a remarkable red--the Louis M. Martini Cabernet Sauvignon “Monte Rosso Vineyard” 2006--that absolutely sang after a brief time in my refrigerator. This, of course, is not the kind of wine you’d necessarily expect to benefit from this treatment, but, in fact, it’s exactly what it needed: As I’ve found with other complex bottlings of this style, a hint of chill--not too much; maybe down to a very modest 68 degrees--allows all of its layers to delineate themselves more clearly, rendering the entirety of the wine itself more complete and more--well, delicious. My tasting notes are below:

Louis M. Martini Cabernet Sauvignon “Monte Rosso Vineyard” 2006, Sonoma Valley

What a warm-souled, expressive, giving nose on this wine: Imagine a chocolate-covered cigar, or a currant cobbler, or a vanilla pod toasting over an open fire. Amazing. On the palate, all this complexity works in the service of sweet fruit--blueberry, currants, and a bit of balsamic-reinforced black raspberry--as well as butterscotch, creme brulee shell, cinnamon and clove, and a subtle, almost gauze-thin whiff of sage. It’s all so giving, so beautiful, and utterly perfect right now. The tannic structure is still well present, and you could easily hold this for another five years, but the fruit is so beautiful that you might not want to wait. I know I wouldn’t if I had another bottle.

Five Italian Reds for Summer

It’s always difficult to get back into the swing of work after an extended period of time away. Fortunately, I have plenty to write about as a result, having spent the first few days in Walla Walla at Northstar’s inaugural Merlot Camp and the rest of the time in Hilton Head Island, South Carolina. There will be fewer tasting notes from the latter, as a result of the volume of cigars I smoked on the golf course and the subsequent dulling of my palate (it’s better now, thank goodness). But there will be lots of news, information, and notes from the former, during which I tasted more great Merlot than I ever have before in such a short period of time. Look for that coverage in the coming weeks as I collate my notes and impressions from what was an utterly remarkable excursion to what I’m convinced is one of the world’s best Merlot-growing regions.

For now, however, I thought I’d start off the week with a link to my most recent column in Food Republic, this one on five Italian reds that you really should try this summer. They range from the light and refreshing to the dense and complex, and cover all kinds of ground in between.