Unlike a lot of other wine bloggers I opted not to do a pre-Thanksgiving blog post this year. There were several reasons, not the least of which had to do with being insanely busy leading up to the holiday with my job that actually pays my mortgage, but also my realization that most of them boil down to the same thing – drink Pinot Noir, Gewurztraminer, Pinot Gris, and other dry white wines with the dinner with some suggestions based around personal tastes and region.
Also, while I had a few ideas as to what I planned to open for Thanksgiving, I hadn’t nailed down my picks since I wasn’t sure what people would have a taste for and because we were having something of a non-traditional Thanksgiving and some of the pairings were still up in the air.
When the actual day came we ran into another problem – I was feeling a bit under the weather and my desire to drink was severely limited. So, instead of a look at what was opened during the actual Thanksgiving dinner, I’m going to take more of a look at what was opened over the entire weekend that was Thanksgiving.
We started out the Thanksgiving afternoon with some baked brie and a bottle of Yellow Tail bubbles that I happened to have cold and in the fridge. I had better quality bubbles in the house, several bottles of which were sent to me as samples, but given my lack of desire to drink, I wanted to save them for another time when I would be more inclined to like it.
During the actual dinner we opened up two bottles – a 2011 Chardonnay from Blenheim Vineyards that my parents had brought with them, and a bottle of 2010 Reserve Pinot Noir from Thirsty Owl Winery that I picked up during a trip to the Finger Lakes over Memorial Day weekend because even I can’t resist opening Pinot Noir during Thanksgiving.
Over the rest of the weekend, in addition to several bottles of Alamos Malbec that my parents arrived with that were consumed during card games and crafting projects, we opened up a bottle of 2010 Narmada Winery Reflection (a dry Chambourcin) from Virginia, also that my parents brought. I had heard from them of this winery and was interested to try their wines. I really enjoyed this one and look forward to a visit to their winery in the near future.
Finally, the weekend saw two bottles of Missouri wine get opened. My mother is from Missouri and one of her sisters had sent her some, which she decided to share with me. Both were from Belvoir Winery, the first being their Casanova (a semi-dry red wine). I found this to be a bit too sweet for my tastes, especially with the leftovers that I was pairing it with. The second was their 2011 Chardonnel. It was fairly single note (pear), and the oak on it was pretty prominent, but as a sipper on Sunday while watching some football it was passable, if not memorable.
I will admit that Thanksgiving at Casa de Good Wine Guru was a bit of a let-down. My illness put a damper on the entire weekend, crushing my desire to drink. That being said, I still got to share the weekend with family, and hopefully some of the bottles that I had my eye on for Thanksgiving will get opened next month as we move into the Christmas season.
