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What is the wine world's best kept secret?
Join us for a special menu and wine pairings on: Wednesday, November 24th 5:30 p.m. – 11 p.m.
Dear Friends,
No, the best-kept secret is not the wines of the Jura. Despite their recent hipster appeal, Jura wines are barely a blip on most wine drinkers’ radar. And it’s not the wines from suddenly-popular Sicily, either, although we wine people have been dropping hints about Sicily’s (now realized) potential for years. Why have some of the world's most individual and expressive wines remained a secret for so long? Possibly the infamous 1985 “glycol scandal” is to blame, when a few unscrupulous wine producers were caught adding air-conditioning fluid to their commercial blends to fatten them up. It might also be the fact that the wines come from a country less than half the size of Nebraska, or that they speak the silky patois that is the German language. Whatever the reason, the wines of Austria have been kept a secret for far too long.
Austria, a country rich in history, music, and natural beauty, produces white wines that are dry and brilliantly precise, as well as red wines which are vibrant, full of fruit, and cuisine-friendly. Austria also produces sparkling wines that are festive yet serious, and sweet wines that are nothing short of legendary. But how much do we know? Name a red-wine grape of Austria, or trickier still, name one of its wine regions. Difficult, isn’t it? I’ll give you a couple of hints: Austria produces stunning Pinot Noir, and if you know Austria’s capital, you know one of its wine-producing areas. Vienna is Europe’s only capital city with its own designated wine region. Glycol scandal? Austria now has Europe’s strictest wine laws and its wines are held toexasperatingly high standards.
On November 24th, I'll be back on the floor of the Boiler Room to unveil Austria’s wine secrets, starting with a wine that no Austrian can live without: their much-beloved sparkling Sekt. I love it, too, and we’re not just pouring any old Sekt, but Sekt from Schloss Gobelsberg, its finest producer. And remember when I said Vienna produces its own wine? They call it Gemischter Satz (gesundheit!), which simply means “field blend,” and it’s delicious. Fritz Wieninger makes an especially tasty version, and he happens to also own a wine tavern, the type of place that’ll make you forget all the sightseeing you intended to do and spend your entire vacation drinking, eating, and singing with all the locals. And we must drink Grüner Veltliner as well, Austria’s signature grape, coming from Rudi Pichler no less (Austria’s winemaker of the year), and a red wine, Blaufränkisch from Prieler of Austria’s Burgenland region. The menu, you ask? You know the drill: Chef Kulik and the Boiler Room’s kitchen will be fine-tuning the menu until the moment the doors open, but there are rumors of tafelspitz, spaetzle, and strudel. I did make one request of Chef Kulik because I’m craving wiener schnitzel, the pounded and fried veal cutlet that is one of Austria’s signature foods. It’s one of those foods that you try several times and find yourself asking: what’s the big deal? It was Rudi Pichler, in fact, who told me that Austria’s schnitzel is a lot like its wines: once you have a good one you will never forget it.
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