My wife made stew. It was really, really good. Full of beef and carrots, white and green beans, onion, potato, etc., etc. She also made pumpkin pie with a gingersnap crust. She makes great food.
This was a wine that paired quite nicely with both dishes. The barbera—my first taste of this grape, recommended to me by the greatest bar manager in Walnut Creek—had a nose ripe with cherry and an odd inkiness (that perhaps could be better explained by a more accomplished oenologist, but to me it smelled “inky”). The front of the palate was all fruit, mostly more of the rich dark cherry and some raspberry.
The more I drank, however, the wine opened up a bit. The mid-palate eventually revealed hints of coffee and chocolate that I was pretty excited about. And the pepper—ohhh, the black pepper in this wine—it finished with a dry pepperiness even at the beginning, but more so as the wine took on some oxygen over the course of the meal.
All in all, a good wine. I’m more excited about barbera than I am about this Tamas wine in particular, but it was a very good experience nonetheless.
Verdict: 82/100