Wine Pairing Dinner #2 - Palisades: Portugal - Apr. 20, 2016

Another wonderful dinner blog was enjoyed at the great Eggleston, VA restaurant of Palisades. The theme of today's dinner was Portugal. This is an area of the wine world that isn't very popular in the United States. They have some great wines like the famous Vinho Verde which is a wine that expresses the town it is from and gathers from a plethora of grapes grown in the area. There are Vinho Verdes that have 300 different grapes blended to make a crisp, refreshing and acidic combo that is a summertime powerhouse. I also was able to meet and talk with the good Dr. Boyer. Pictures were taken as a bonus!

To the left, you can see the menu that was featured for this event. The wine and food pairing were really good and the best part was that the pairing I thought I'd dislike became one of my favorite combos of the meal. To start off, we had a Caldo Verde paired with a Conde Villar Alvarinho 2013. The caldo verde was a great soup with kale, sausage, some potato with garlic and onion. It was quite good and reminded me of typical Dominican soups that are salty and filled with flavor. The second pairing involved a wonderful Rojoes paired with Dao Quinta das Camelias Red Portuguese Blend 2008. The pork was braised in wine and featured some garlic for that extra flair. This was fantastic. Again, a typical food flavor that I am use to from my hometown cuisine. Of all the foods. this would be my favorite on its own. Lastly they featured a Queijadas with a Ferreira White Port 2005. This was one hell of a surprise. It was a cup cake made with sweet egg cake with a wonderful raspberry center. I am not a fan of sweets but this thing was insane. It was really 'sweet' but that is exactly what I like in a desert.

The food and wine can be seen in the image to the left. This review is going to be different from that last one. Since we have a two dry white wines and a sweet alcoholic port, I didn't mix the sweets and the drys. So in this review, the white and the red are to be tried with Caldo Verde and the Rojoes. The port wine was only an experiment with the Queijadas. Next I will describe each wine with the food.

1) Conde Villar  Alvarinho 2013: I didn't know that white wine could be so acidic and floral but this was exactly that. The smell was incredibly floral like walking into a floral shop. The taste was acidic as hell! The sides of your mouth would light up, but this is the type of wine that I love. The body was light with a razor sharp feel that was incredibly refreshing. I want to buy this wine and sip outside with.

The Caldo Verde was the first thing to pair it with and it was amazing. The balance between the salty and full flavor of the soup was really well balanced with the acidity of the wine. The salty sausages was great to taste with the floral aspects of the wine with the dry acidic finish: loved it.

The Rojoes was the next paring to try. The blend was nice. There really wasn't anything special to it though. The acidity of the wine was too powerful for the pork.

2) Dao Quinta das Camelias Red Portuguese Blend 2008: This is another great red wine to add to my list of favorites. It had a great smell of blackberries, blackfruit, and sour cherries. It tasted wonderful. Smooth and silky with an acidic backbone and super soft tannins to complement. The after taste of acidity was perfect for a long taste profile. Simply beautiful and would recommend.

The Caldo Verde was a decent pairing. Since the red wine didn't have the super strong acidic taste, it didn't provide enough 'umph' to restrain the salty sausage and kale.

Now, the pairing with the pork was wild! The Rojoes combo was on point. I don't even know how to describe how these two went together well but it was damn good. It kinda softened the tannins a little while providing the braised pork taste that just floats on the blackberry aftertaste. Marvelous!

3) Ferreira White Port 2005: I was VERY presently surprised buy the port. I am known to really dislike sweet wines but this was so well balanced I couldn't believe it. The nose was strong of PLUM and had a slight smell of brandy in the air. I mean, it was amazing though. The alcohol tingle was great for an after dinner wine such as the port. The combo with the Queijadas was just amazing. The port was so well balanced with the raspberry center of the cup cake that I couldn't believe how good it was. Couldn't recommend this more and frankly, my favorite pairing of the night.

In conclusion, the pairing was marvelous. The wines where all top notch wines that I couldn't believe. The Vinho Verde and the Red Blend were so good on their own it was incredible. The real champ of the night was the port and Queijadas mix. It was something I had never had in my life that was just so good. I want to go and drink a whole bottle of that port with different sweets.