September 24, 2016 The Santa Fe Chile and Wine Grand Tasting

September 24, 2016  The Santa Fe Chile and Wine Grand Tasting

This is one of my favorite days of the year.  Thousands of happy people eating great food and drinking great wine.  It is sort of the super bowl of food and wine events in New Mexico, and actually is of a national stature.  We usually only attend every 5 or 6 years because it costs $150.00 per person, but we had so much fun this year we may go back more often in the future. 

We woke at around 8:30 and packed an overnight grip and ate a leisurely breakfast of a chicken, chard, and Comte cheese omelet.  

Then at 10:30 we drove to Santa Fe and parked in the PERA parking lot and boarded a bus for the Festival, which I'd held at the Opera.

This year there appeared to be four tents, two large ones and two medium ones.  One of the medium ones is filled with a live music stage and tables and chairs where folks can sit and eat and drink.

We arrived just after 1:00, which was when the gates opened to the regular ticket holders.  You could buy an early admission for a bit more money.  The event ends at 4:00, so we usually can eat and drink enough in three hours to satisfy ourselves.  This year it looked like two thousand tickets had been sold, so there were lines for most of the restaurants and wineries.  Suzette and I soon decided to create a wolf pack approach; one of us would take our two glasses and stand in a winery line while the other took the two plates and stood in a restaurant line.  Suzette seemed to be better at gathering food and often was able to gather food from two or more restaurants while I waited the longer period of time it took folks to decide on a wine or taste several wines from a vineyard.  

To make a long story shorter, we tried to drink over $30.00 wines today.  Since we had drunk lots of wine on Wednesday at the To the Trade Tasting, we were also looking for new wines.  I could not resist asking to taste Cocha y Toro’s Don Melchor.  Here are some ratings:

Concha y Toro Don Melchor Cabernet Sauvignon 2011

Cabernet Sauvignon from Maipo Valley, Chile

red wine

JS95

 

D95

 

WS94

 

RP94

 

WW94

 

WE93

4.5

7 reviews

2012  JS98  WS95  WE92  W&S92  RP91

2010  JS96  WS95  W&S94  RP93

The other great red we drank was Ridge’s Montebello Cabernet Sauvignon. 

Ridge Monte Bello Cabernet Sauvignon 

Cabernet Sauvignon from Napa Valley, California

red wine

◦ 2004 WS94 ST94 W&S94

◦ 2003 RP94 ST94 W&S92

◦ 2001 RP99 WE97 WS95 V93

◦

These wines were not placed on the table but were placed on the floor behind the pouring table so to taste one one had to know who had the great wines and ask nicely to try them. 

Among the new white wines, Suzette liked the Aix, a rose’ produced near Aix en Provence and I liked the Pedro Ximenez white from Chile. The Easton wines were lovely also, but we were having fun drinking and eating, so didn’t take notes. 

 Suzette after finishing the 20 bottle magnum of Aix Rose' in one of the big tents at the end of the day

There were a few surprises in food.  The best new restaurant was 

Sazon at 221 Shelby St., Santa Fe, NM. I spoke to the owner who said he tried to integrate Pre-Colombian ingredients.  The dish served was a poblano cream sauce with blue crab, which was delicious and seemed to express the New Mexican cuisine.

Other restaurants of note were Plazuela at the La Fonda that served a lovely short rib on a lovely piece of polenta with a Demi-glacé.  The Compound served fresh Hog Island oysters on the half shell and an oyster stew made with a mixed vegetable base rather than milk and flour. 

The most unusual dish was presented by The Club at Las Campanas that served a lobster flavored espresso with a small beignet.  I was so surprised by the unique flavor combination that I gagged a bit and jerked the plate and spilled some on my shirt.

By 3:30 most of the wine had been poured and the food served, so we made our way to the music venue and listened to music for about fifteen minutes, periodically walking through one of the tents to scour a glass of wine or plate of food.  We found chocolate mousse and Joseph’s butterscotch pudding.   Joseph had earlier served a lovely smoked salmon with micro greens.  

The last dish of food we ate was a Salmon sushi made by the owner of Izmi Sushi restaurant, which is the highest rated sushi restaurant.  The experience was wonderful.  As we approached the table filled with a pile of salmon and a large bowl of sushi rice.  We had eaten so much, we asked for sushi and the owner who obviously was a trained sushi chef cut two lovely long slices of salmon.  Suzette took a bit of wasabi and soy and we each picked slices of pickled ginger that we ate with sips of champagne. 

At 4:00 we walked out the gate, boarded a bus and rode back to the parking lot.  I had grabbed two bottles of water and drank them both while waiting in line for the bus and on the bus.  When we returned to our car, we drove across the parking lot to Kakawa, the chocolatier that serves several mixtures of hot chocolate.  I was amazed by the crowd.  The place was filled with folks.  

 Kakawa

We bought a bag of chocolate for Amy and Vahl and drove to their house, where we talked and looked at their pictures from their recent trip to Yellowstone.  I drank two cups of Fortmason tea and three glasses of watershed a few pistachio nuts.

Finally at 9:30 we went to bed.

Bon Appetit