When I was a kid, I knew what wine tasted like. I knew because I'd read the Narnia books, and The Hobbit, and The Sword in the Stone, and other books in which heroic characters would raise a glass to celebrate fellowship, to steel for battle, or to toast a the dawn of a new era. Wine was a glorious potion, a mysterious, intoxicating elixir with powers to heal and embolden. It was brilliant red, the color of rubies. It was glorious gold, a liquid for kings.
I've finally tasted that wine. Last Friday Steve and I ate at Stone Soup in Strafford, Vermont. The meal was, as always, wonderful—"rustic elegant," is how I've always thought about their food. Steve had duck with apples in Calvados; I had chicken crusted with pecans.
We chose a white, Treana, on the recommendation of the owner. It was an '02, from the Central Coast's Mer Soleil Vineyard, made from Northern Rhône Viognier and Southern Rhône Marsanne. It was deep gold, bursting with flowers and huge apricot fruit, with toasty, almondy oak. It was, in a word, luscious; a wine so unctuous and fulsome, it transported me to the woods of Lothlórien. The essence of wine.
Price: $48 (but that's restaurant pricing; retail is about $24)
