If there’s one winemaker who can be relied upon to get something right, it’s Menage A Trois. Consistently excellent, every bottle, every varietal.
I picked up this bottle of 2015 Decadence Cabernet Sauvignon for Xavier because Menage A Trois is his favorite. That being said, I think I drank most of it. There are two kinds of wine drinkers in our house: the quick and the thirsty.
As always, Menage A Trois delivers an exceptionally luscious and smooth Cabernet that is blueberry and chocolate all night long except it won’t last that long – at least not if I’m around. The wine is exactly the same color as the foil at the top of the bottle and the bottle made it through three episodes of Stranger Things.
No red wine headache and smooth like silk, this bottle was $13.99 and, for the price, it is certainly at the top of it’s class. Highly recommended!
Way back in the beginning of all this wine business, I bought a bottle of really bad Rose’, then I tried a few more at various local wineries and didn’t like them either so naturally I assumed that all Rose’ was terrible.
As it turns out, not all Rose’ is terrible.
Just some of it.
Rose’ is wildly popular right now. Its the feel-good wine of the summer. I can’t peruse my wine feed on Twitter and not see dozens of posts featuring frosty glasses of alluring pink wine.
Am I missing something?
I started to wonder if all these folks had awful taste in wine or if I had just experienced a bit of bad luck. Suspecting that the latter was the truth, I decided to give Rose’ one more try.
If there’s one winemaker who can be relied upon to get something right, it’s Menage A Trois. I have yet to try a wine from them that wasn’t delicious so off to my local state regulated liquor store I went.
Here’s what I learned:
Rose’ should be chilled but not ice cold. It’s not beer or soda and ice cold is too cold, bringing out the less pleasant tart and bitter notes. 60-70 degrees (Fahrenheit, obviously) is ideal. At this temperature, Menage A Trois Rose is smooth like buttah, lightly sweet and just barely tart. Most importantly, it’s smooth. Life is too short to choke down wine that punches you in the throat.
I paired it with chicken tiki Masala, which was excellent, but I also think it would go nicely with a mandarin and strawberry spinach salad topped with vinaigrette dressing and Gorgonzola cheese.
Menage A Trois creates their Rose’ blend from Merlot, Syrah, and Gewurztraminer.
The label describes it as, “raspberries, strawberries, lychee nuts, and flowers.” I have no idea what lychee nuts taste like and have yet to make a habit of eating flowers but this Rose is quite delectable nonetheless. It’s also 13.5% alcohol so there is nothing weak or foo-foo about it.
Menage A Trois Rose’ is the grown up, feel good, beverage of summer 🙂
Xavier recommends accompanying your Rose’ with Billy Joel’s “Scenes From An Italian Restaurant”.
Absolutely, but only if breakfast is served at 8:30 at night.
Trust me, nothing goes better with cheesy eggs and a baked potato than a nice glass of Argentinian red wine.
This was actually the 2nd Malbec wine that we tried but the first one wasn’t very good so, for now at least, it shall remain nameless.
In case you didn’t know, regardless of the specific winemaker’s locale, almost all Malbecis sourced from grapes grown in the Mendoza region of Argentina.
Anyway, as I was saying, the first Malbec we sampled was mediocre and I wanted to try a different one so I decided to give Manage A Trois a chance, figuring that if anyone could get it right it would be them.
Looking for a red wine that won’t punch you in the throat? Menage A Trois is your huckleberry.
In my opinion, the signature quality of all Menage A Trois red wine is an almost magical soft and velvety finish.
Their Malbec shares in the unique complexities and spicy quality that Malbec wine is known for but it finishes by rolling out a velvet hall runner.
In other words, we loved it!
A brief word of caution though. It is very easy to keep pouring another glass but, despite it’s incredible drink-ability, this is wine is potent!
Slow down and enjoy, don’t give yourself a bad morning.
Seriously, it’s not even fair to the other winemakers of the world.
While Xavier was switched on by the Menage A Trois Gold Chardonnay, in my opinion there is nothing finer than the Silk Soft Red.
This wine is rated at 90 points. No arguments here.
70% Pinot Noir. 20% Malbec. 10% Petite Sirah
Alchemy in a barrel.
But nothing is simple. To be human is to be caught in moments of conflicting emotions and events.
Earlier in the day Xavier was in a car accident.
Less than a mile from home, on his way to buy me fancy popcorn, Xavier was stopped in traffic when a distracted old lady plowed into the back of his car at 35 miles an hour.
Apparently Mrs. Too Old To Be Driving looked up from her knitting just in time to see to see his taillights and say “Oh Shit!”
She had longer skid marks in her Depends than she left on the road trying not to hit my husband.
She pushed his car 20 feet and into the next lane. Fortunately other drivers were paying attention and no one else hit him during his slide across the road.
Xavier was so excited about this car and had only bought it three weeks prior. It still had the temporary plates and he had not even made the first payment yet.
While not dead or paralyzed, he is definitely hurt and this situation is a long way from being resolved.
In a real time example of yin and yang, we sat on the couch drinking the most delicious wine in the world while he told me the story and showed me the police report and the photos. Being human, in all it’s conflicting glory.
Two of the most important questions in life are: What will you focus on? and What does it mean?
Could something good come of this seemingly unfortunate turn of events?
Without overplaying my hand, I believe there will be a positive outcome and, when that day arrives, we’ll celebrate with another bottle of Silk Soft Red Blend.
Xavier and I needed a new wine to try and I chose this one because the picture on the label reminded me of Adele’s Rolling In The Deep video.
Xavier was unimpressed by the comparison and even more unimpressed with Adele.
To be fair, most of her songs make me want to jump out a window but I do enjoy Rolling In The Deep just a teeny tiny bit every now and then.
Remembering a lesson learned from our previous bottle of Chardonnay, I decided to store it outside on the balcony until Xavier got home from the studio. This way, it would be cool, but not too cold.
When Xavier got home, I showed him the bottle and without missing a beat he said, “Do we have to share it with someone else?”
He’s funny like that.
Menage A Trois Goldis not a wine for the weak of heart or the repressed in spirit.
14.8% alcohol.
Time to pull up the big girl pants.
I liked it but Xavier really liked it.
He is not usually the one repeatedly interrupting the conversation to say, “This is really good!” But we couldn’t hardly talk about anything else with his constant commentary.
As we finished the last drops in the bottle I heard him say, “Can I get a god DAMN?!?!”
Later, as we were taking our little dog on the final poo-run of the night, I asked him to describe how he thought it tasted.
“Tastes like liquid sex,” he said, “My tongue feels like it needs a cigarette.”
Trust The Devil You Know 