It is Sunday night and we have had a good weekend with nothing special but with lots of special nothings! We did our normal things like grocery shopping and laundry and I was able to spend a few hours Christmas shopping for my wonderful sisters- and brothers-in-laws. We also shopped for a snowsuit for a baby boy, whose tag we picked from the list of needs at our church. For this baby boy we bought a very warm snowsuit.

I spent most of the afternoon working on making turkey pot pies in order to use up our leftover turkey. That is a very labor intensive meal starting with making the pie crusts and then the filling. I finally got everything assembled and have been put the two pot pies away for later in the week along with a brown rice pudding that needs to bake for three hours at a low temperature. But for tonight, we had pork loin with potatoes and carrots, asparagus and a fresh salad with homemade bleu cheese salad dressing’ that I made on a whim today.

I chose this Chilean wine for our dinner tonight and it is good. This is different and not our usual. . .this is heavy on tobacco aroma and taste with a vanilla finish. This is a wine that gets better after airing. At first, it is overpowering but after breathing it is tasty and rich but not overpowering.

Looking forward to my last business trip of the year tomorrow. Just a one-nighter. It will be great to be home for an extended time. Cheers!

This was a good choice. The Carmenere has lots of fruit on the palate and spice on the finish. It complemented the burgers laden with spicy mustard and onions.  I found this wine on sale for under $10.

Time and time again, I find that you get what you pay for with wine. This goes against what I often read, which is that price has nothing to do with the quality of wine, but on the basis of experience I would generally disagree with that premise. Now, granted, I am not talking about $100 vs. $10 bottles of wine. My experience has been in the $15-20 vs. the $4 – 10 bottles of wine.

I purchased this particular bottle for $9.99. Happily, this wine is an excellent value, which is consistent with many Chilean wines that we have enjoyed. We are generally very pleased with the quality of Chilean red wines and this is no exception. This is medium bodied with a pleasant mineral and cedar taste and slightly metallic finish.

We are having this wine with a black bean/tortilla/salsa casserole (I really should come up with a clever name), baked acorn squash and green salad.

…I’m having this Haras Cabernet Sauvignon 2007 from Chile (on sale, under $10, from our grocery store).

Big, VERY chocolaty, nice New World dark fruit, a tiny bit sweet.

Very nice. Melody would like this. More evidence that: if you don’t know what wine to get, get something from Chile. You can’t go wrong.

Melody usually talks about the food she is preparing. I can say that hummus, pretzels, and swiss cheese are on the menu for tonight (and they go well with this Haras Cab). Trigger will have some ham. Otherwise, we’re in survival mode until Melody returns…

We are relaxing, reading the paper and listening to music. For dinner, I have made a chicken casserole with fresh mushrooms (from the food co-op), broccoli (food co-op) and a green salad (food co-op). Wow, I guess one of the great things about the food co-op is it forces me to prepare meals using the food!

This is a great wine. We have had many times before. I never buy this but Tom always does. I always forget how good it is. This is a spicy, fruity wine with a coffee and chocolate finish. Tom bought this on sale at our local grocery store for $9.99. A great value.

This is going on my list to buy again. This is a medium-body wine that is bursting with flavor. The most overwhelming taste is chocolate followed by dark fruit and coffee. This is our kind of wine. We are both pretty much swooning over this one.

This will go well with our dinner tonight: Beef Stroganoff with sauteed carrots and salad.

What I most love about this wine is the luscious color (deep, dark, blackish red) and the finish (dark chocolate with a hint of coffee).

Love this. . .

Tom chose this wine Santa Ema Cabernet Sauvignon 2007 from Chile tonight. He didn’t say why — just brought me a glass. It’s a good one. A nice nose — fresh and spicy. The palate is fruity in a subtle way with notes of coffee and tobacco. Nice structured tannins . .  .a good choice for a potato/beef casserole. I’ll hand over the computer to Tom for his opinion, which is always top notch (in my humble opinion).

Tom: This Santa Ema Cabernet Sauvignon 2007 is a pleasant, fruity, fairly tannic, young-tasting red with just a bit of caramel. Pleasant, not especially remarkable, but very drinkable. An above-average wine for mid-week.

For dinner tonight I have two round steaks (they look like cubed steaks to me) cooking in a mushroom sauce (with mushrooms from my food co-op). I added potatoes to the mix to simmer. I will also make a fresh salad and steamed green beans. So, for the wine, I chose this Santa Carolina Cabernet Sauvignon 2007 from Chile. I stopped at the A & L Wine Castle (in Ann Arbor) on the way  home from work last night and purchased 11 bottles. This was one of them. The nose is a bit different than what I am used to — floral with some cedar. The palate is interesting. . .and, no lie, I pondered for awhile and concluded that I was tasting green peppers and chocolate. . .then I checked the label and discovered that the wine makers said ” Bright ruby red in colour, with hints of green pepper and chocolate. . .” so I guess my impressions are not unique. Grippy tannins with a vanilla finish. Like it! This was on sale for $7. I would have to say this is a very good value. There is no doubt: Chilean wine is a very good value.

Tom: This Santa Carolina Cabernet Sauvignon 2007 is a very big wine, very full-bodied, tannic, with a chocolaty, dark-fruit taste. Very big. Perhaps a tiny bit overly acidic (to my taste), but a wonderful wine and an amazing value. A friend asked me for wine advice last week, and I said, “Really, anything from Chile is great.”