This Wine is Why I Do What I Do!

I think one of the most exciting things about drinking and enjoying wine is to find incredible wine at reasonable prices.

Tonight I found one of the very best I've enjoyed in a long time. I don't buy a lot of French wine, out of ignorance, but I opened a bottle of Les Verrieres Clos des Soutyeres 2006 blend of 70 percent Syrah, 20 percent Grenache and 10 percent Carignan.

This wine had tons of wow factor even before I did my online research. I discovered that Wine Spectator gave it the No. 80 spot on its list of Top 100 Wines of 2008. It rated the wine at 92 points on its 100-point scale.

There were only 1,000 cases made of this wine and how a few bottles landed in a Terre Haute supermarket I'll never know. I bought this at the recommendation of Reggie McConnell at Beaslers in Terre Haute. Even more amazing, I paid $13.99 for this fabulous bottle of grape juice - considerably lower than I found it online.

It's a deep purple, intense, big - big glass of wine. It has strong tannins and is intense from front of the palate to the back. The tasting notes suggested drinking from 2009 through 2014. I didn't decant the wine and should have done so. I read on another review a recommendation to decant it for up to three hours. While that seems long there is no doubt it improves the longer the wine is open.

I grilled a beef tenderloin, some nice asparagus, and Vidalia onion. The steak was rubbed with cracked black pepper, salt, and a smoke cherry rub. It was a perfect match. This was a big mouthful of flavor with a strong finish.

Simply put, incredible wine for $14.

Send comment or questions to: hewitthoward@gmail.com