Saturday

Posted by Karen Ralph on Jan 5, 2012 in Featured, Red Wine Tongue | 3 comments

Saturday morning I wake up next to boyfriend Ribsy and the cats. Po is curled on my pillow, Toba anchors the blankets on the end of the bed. Ribsy had a gig the night before and didn’t get home until 3AM. Since he makes me coffee every weekday morning, I head into the kitchen and make him breakfast. Shooing the cats away, he eats and gives me the highlights of the previous evening; drunk girls falling onto the stage and fighting. A good time was had by all. While he was rocking out, I was at home, having decided to have drinky winkys and cook a leg of lamb with a couple of friends.

We had started with Rene Geoffrey, pink Champagne and moved onto Cote du Rhone with dinner, back to bubbles in the form of Cremant d’Alsace and finally a small glass of violet liquor that I brought back from France followed by green tea. The last guest had departed in a taxi minutes before Ribsy had arrived home.

Breakfast finished, Ribsy heads down into his studio to work on some songs and practice drums. I walk into the kitchen and survey the fine collection of empty wine bottles lined up on the table. Some are from last night, others from recent gatherings.

It’s obvious that France is popular; Champagne and Cremant bottles stand beside Burgundy (both colours) Cote du Rhones and pinks. All empty. Nothing is outrageously expensive, these are solid, quality wines. I’m putting my money where my mouth is, practicing what I preach, keeping my palate within my price range- all the cliches. This philosophy extends to food. Since starting to make bread, I’ve been branching out into pickling and smoking. The advantage is that I can control what goes into it. Reading the ingredients on commercial, store brand smoked salmon I discovered that it was the cheapest, lowest quality chum salmon, previously frozen, and “Smoke Flavoured” which doesn’t mean flavour from smoke. This big, chain grocery store wanted $7 for a piece of pet- food quality, previously frozen, “smoke flavoured” salmon. Hell hasn’t frozen over yet, and as long as I can read labels I won’t be buying their fake smoked fish.

The wine equivalent is juice of dubious quality sourced from all over and blended into one fruity shit- mix. There is no reason to justify that kind of purchase.

Instead, think of countries like Spain or Portugal for good, inexpensive wine. Remember Mateus? We drank it when we were young because it was dirt cheap. I revisited it recently and was pleasantly surprised. It was the first time I had ever tried it chilled, in a glass. It was perfectly acceptable but it made me nostalgic for the days of youth; 6 friends squeezed into a parked Trans Am listening to Led Zeppelin, swigging warm Mateus straight from the bottle after pushing in the cork.

Those days are gone forever but you can still have silly good times with wine and friends; Invite a couple of people over, plan a simple menu, decide upon a budget, and don’t be afraid to try new wines. It’s what keeps us sane.