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TN: Brun Fleurie and Cairnbrae SB With vegetarian tacos on Wednesday, the 2005 Cairnbrae "The Stones" Sauvignon Blanc (Marlborough). Seemed a little softer on the acid front than previous two vintages, a pleasant but innocuous NZ SB- soft gooseberry fruit , ok but not with a lot of character. I'm a little disappointed. But stop, hey, what's that sound? It's the Cairnbrae opening up on night two. As an apertif before Thursday dinner, the gooseberry is there, but a touch more tart and tingly, with a little hot green pepper on the palate and some mineral on the finish. A B- morphs into a solid B The main course Thursday is beef jantaboon, a stir fry dish of marinated beef with fresh rice noodles and bean sprouts, served with baby bok choy with mushrooms. I opened the 2004 Terres Dorees (J.P.Brun) Fleurie, and it was a big hit with my favorite audience, Betsy. She liked the little strip label, but liked the wine even more. She thought it was a good match, and she was right (she used Italian peppers, not as spicy as if she had used birdseye chiles). The cherry fruit was sweet, had just enough tartness to keep it lively. Balanced acidity, a bit bigger than one might expect, clean and minerally and ....yummy. Got better through meal, interested seeing what it will be like after two nights in fridge (tonight is a Bordeaux offline). A strong B+ for night one. Grade disclaimer: I'm a very easy grader, basically A is an excellent wine, B a good wine, C mediocre. Anything below C means I wouldn't drink at a party where it was only choice. Furthermore, I offer no promises of objectivity, accuracy, and certainly not of consistency.
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