Friday, November 16, 2018

Tasting Wines for the Holidays...

It’s that time of year again. The “holidays”.

You throw a party, or you go to a party. For a huge meal. It could be a traditional roast turkey, accompanied by stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce, and pumpkin pie. Or it could be roast goose or duck, or a Honeybaked ham. Or (shudder) a turducken. Or brisket or veal. So many choices, all depending on your cultural background and family traditions.

Regardless of what you, your friends and family choose to share, it’s going to be a big meal with a lot of different elements, so you’ll want to choose wines that will enhance and not conflict with the flavors found in your meal. You can play it safe and offer Chardonnay or Pinot Noir with your turkey, but how about trying something different to spice up your feast?

The Goddess of Wine tends to favor wines with good acidity to counter the fatty content of many of the tasty accompaniments to a hopefully moist and well-seasoned entrée, and its accompaniments. Here are my suggestions for the holidays. All of these wines retail for under $30. Oh, and full disclosure: portions of these notes are taken directly from the wineries' spec sheets, although my group of student tasters found them to be accurate.