Madison County

Hey Y'all

Well I mentioned yesterday that fall was coming and guess what appeared on the lawn this morning....a ton of yellow leaves from the walnut tree. I came down to get my coffee this morning and the weather was cool, cloudy and leaves were fluttering down from the trees. Bubba and Linus are going for a walk now and Bubba is in long sleeves. While I thought fall was coming..in fact it would appear that Fall is here.

Tomorrow's forecast is textbook: Showery with some breeze and a high of 60. I might need to wear a sweater!!

Well Bubba and I wandered about yesterday on one of the prettiest days I have encountered in a quite awhile. I bought a new (to me) 2005 Jeep Grand Cherokee this past week (it is totally tricked out and fab) and so I wanted to drive it about. So we went to the farmer's market, drove out by work and then out to a small town to the west called Dallas Center which has a good bar with food. We didn't get any food - the cook was not having a good day - but the drive through the Iowa corn and soybean fields was very nice. We also bought a new ottoman to match our new living room set that is coming in October, and went and saw my wine boyfriend the tony grocery store in Des Moines. His name is Ben and he has informal tastings on Saturday and is cute as can be.

I'm very into wine at the moment (the cosmos were getting banal) and I am exploring three different varietals at the moment.....
1. A world tour of Sauvignon Blanc
2. A comparison between German and Alsacian Reislings
3. The hybrid wines here in Iowa

I had a shockingly good Sav Blanc last night from Chile - I was talking on the phone with a friend out in New York at the time and I, briefly, was focused only on the wine - this wine is that notable. Ben has been assisting me in a tour of the world and yesterday we landed in Chile. While New Zealand makes the best and most consistent of the Sav Blancs and California is the worst (barely quaffable in my opinion) - there are alot of other regions that are working with this grape.

South Africans tend to be very much grapefruit, Argentinian tend more towards the California side with a very strong acid and weaker fruit (not good), Chileans have, in the past, been a mixed bag, and French is not in sufficient supply to really dive in and get a feel..plus the French rarely make a varietal wine anyways.

Anyhoo....Ben raved this particular Sav Blanc from Chile called Cono Sur. Delightful!! The notes that I took on it include:
Full body, excellent balance of fruit and acid, crisp but full - all notes are in harmony.

Now I have drank alot of Sav Blanc in my days and I don't know that I have ever encountered a 10 buck bottle of wine that I would say this about. The only other Sav Blanc that has come close is a New Zealand one called "Bradgate" which you can get at the fab little gay wine shop in Dupont. Careful when buying this....it is a smooth wine that you will drink without even noticing. We polished off three bottles one night in DC without even thinking about it.

So the whole point of this entry is to say that Bubba and I are taking the Cherokee down to Madison County (remember the book - the bridges of Madison County - it is the same) to check out a winery there and maybe see a bridge or two.

I'll report back in a few weeks on some Iowa wines of note.