The Connoisseur - November 2024
It’s November and the Fellas mustaches are growing thicker, helped along by some great wine and long nights. We’re dusting off our slow cooker, have bought an extra decanter and are polishing the silver in excited anticipation of those long, rambling winter get togethers. Of course, all that needs a bit of lubrication, so we’ve got some new wines and some old faves in this month’s box that we are sure you will love.
Wine descriptions below, and if you run out, you can order more from The Cellar.
Don’t forget, you can look up past boxes in The Archive.
Quinta do Pinto, Chenin Blanc
[grape/vintage] Chenin Blanc / 2022
[region] Lisboa
Imagine if Dionysus had stolen one of Ceres’s cornucopias overflowing with peaches and melons and pineapples and passion fruit and maybe some lemons and limes and honeysuckle, then waved his divine hands in the air and turned it into a grape, vinified it and poured it into a bottle. Well, you’d have to call it Quinta do Pinto’s “Chenin Blanc”, a lip-smackingly fruity and full and layered wine that is like a deep-tissue massage for your taste buds.
Pairs well with grilled fish, sushi, salads and pasta, cheese platter or simply by the glass.
Read more about it in The Cellar.
Abegoaria dos Frades, Moreto Preto
[grape/vintage] Moreto Preto / 2022
[region] Alentejo
It’s a monastery somewhere in the middle of the 17th century, somewhere in the Alentejo, around midday. It’s hot and the flies are buzzing lazily. A monk has fallen asleep in the courtyard after his simple lunch of Alentejano bread and hard sheep’s cheese. A goatskin of wine lies next to the monk, it’s dark red juice spilling onto the flagstones. Pretty soon the abbot will come by and kick the monk up the backside but for now he’s dreaming of being fed fresh cherries and toasted pinenuts by scantily-clad nymphs.
Pairs well with some classic Alentejo cuisine like migas and slow-cooked black pork cheeks or anything off the bbq.
Read more about it in The Cellar.
Ribeiro Santo, "Excellence" Grande Escolha Tinto
[grape/vintage] Alfrocheiro, Tinta Roriz, Tinto Cão, Touriga Naciona / 2018
[region] Dão
Like biting into a rich Christmas cake packed with nuts and fruits and spices and soaked for a year in brandy. Your mouth does a back flip and a yeehaw and basically just collapses in ecstasy. The flavours thicken and deepen and fill your whole body. Coffee and tobacco and dark plums. WTF? Did you die and end up in a Victorian gentleman’s library with a roaring fire in the hearth and a copy of Moby Dick resting on the side table?
Pairs well with duck confit, foie gras, oven-roasted veal, roast kid goat and sausages
Read more about it in The Cellar.