Gewürztraminer
Gewürtztraminer is a highly aromatic grape usually grown in Alsace or in the German Pfalz region. It has an exotic, spicy perfume (often ginger and cinnamon) with a taste of lychees and Turkish Delight. It can be dry or sweet, with low acidity, high alcohol, and an oily texture. It is usually unoaked and is drunk young.
Cheese include Asiago, blue cheeses, Cheddar, Crowley, Dry Jack, Emmentaler, Fontina, harder goat's milk, Gouda, Limburger, Parmesan, Provolone, harder sheep's milk, and washed rind cheeses.
Blanck 2005 (Tasted in 2007) 13% alcohol. $19.99 at Chambers wine store in NYC. Alsatian Gewurz. For being Alsatian, this has a good bit of sugar in it. Huge nose. Extremely full-bodied with lots of peach and some lime. It is good, but I might like it to be a little dryer. Not too high of alcohol. It finishes a tiny bit tart.
Blanck with Stilton. Somebody suggested Stilton with this - not a cheese person per se, but rather a cupcake aficionado! I am trying it with a pretty gnarly slab of Stilton that has probably seen better days, hopefully, for its sake. Not so bad. I think this would work with a younger Stilton. The textures are nice together - both heavy and creamy. The spice in the wine stands up to the exploding blue and earthy flavors in the cheese. The stinky cheese does blow away the interesting spices in the wine, though.
Château d'Orschwihr Gewurztraminer Bollenberg 2002 Retails about $20. Not chaptalized. 14.2% alcohol. Alsatian French wine. Imported by Langdon Shiverick. Very fruity, oily nose. It has a beautiful dark yellow color. This is such an exciting wine. Tropical, yellow fruits, like mangos and then a bitterness and wonderful acidity on the finish. It is full of spices like nutmeg and flowers. It makes my tongue tingle and burn. Very well balanced. I love this wine. It comes in a Riesling style of bottle, which is typical of Alsatian wines, but it is packed full of alcohol and spice. I have to watch out or I will chug this like a Riesling and then regret it. http://www.chateau-or.com
d'Orschwihr with Asiago. Very good, though the wine overpowers the cheese somewhat. This wine, even though it overpowers, seems to go best with semi-soft of mild Swiss type of cheeses. I like how this cheese is mild and milky, and contrasts nicely with the spices in the wine. Then, at the end, the cheese is a little animaly tasting, but not bitter.
d'Orschwihr with Brin d'Amour. Herbed sheep's milk cheese from Corsica. This was not as good as it was with the Muré.
d'Orschwirh with Crescnenza. Domestic Crescenza. Not horrible, but the wine makes the cheese taste extra sour and the styles just don't seem to match.
d'Orschwihr with Fleur Verte. Chèvre with fresh herbs on the outside. I am hoping the spices will go well together. It's ok, but then a little too wild tasting at the end. It's bitter. It's not a great match.
d'Orschwihr with Etivaz Gruyère. This Gruyère was a little too stinky for this wine. I think the Cave Aged would have been better with it. It ended up tasting muddy together.
d'Orschwihr with Gjetost. Caramelized goat cheese. Pretty good, but not as good as the Gjetost with Riesling. Actually, this is really nice. I like the thickness of the wine with the nutty, heaviness of the cheese.
d'Orschwihr with Ribeaupierre. Stinky washed rind French cheese. The finish is hideous, but at first, they are nice together.
d'Orschwihr with Sottocenere. The spices in the outside of the cheese (cinnamon) is interesting with the wine. It's ok. The truffle taste is a little weird with the wine, but not so bad. It's good if you don't eat the rind and just get the spice from inside the cheese, but the wine overpowers the cheese somewhat.
d'Orschwihr with Taleggio. (young Taleggio) OK, but too bitter at the end. The wine makes the cheese taste very Italian, like lots of earthy animal flavors. The d'Orschwir brings out a nuttiness in the cheese.
Elena Walch Kastelaz Gewürztraminer 2001 (Tasted in 2004) $22.79 at Grapevine. From the Alto Adige. This is from Termeno, Italy. This is a golden-yellow color. The bouquet is supposed to be distinctive and smell of rose petals and spices. I don't know about rose petals, but it is very aromatic and floral. However, it is less aromatic than some other Gewurz's. When it comes to room temperature, slightly chilled, the aromas come out more. It is mild-tasting, good acidity, full-bodied, rich, aromatic on the finish, though not at the beginning so much. It is supposed to be good with shellfish, prawns, oriental dishes and blue cheeses.
Elena Walch Gewürztraminer with Asiago. Good at first, but then bitter, and then the milky creamy taste of the cheese comes through. It's nice, the acidic, floral, spicy, full-bodied, thick wine with the creamy cheese. It's sturdy together. These hold up well to each other. I would definitely do this again, especially since
Elena Walch Gewürztraminer with Cabécou Feuille. I thought these might go well together since the cheese is aromatic from being soaked in Schnapps and folded up in leaves, and the cheese also has some black pepper in it. Absolutely delicious. The cheese gets washed out at first, but then it pulls through at the end. The spices really come out in the wine when they hit the pepper, liqueur, and creamy tanginess of the cheese.
Elena Walch Gewürztraminer with Gorgonzola Piccante. Horrible! Bitter and metallic. I don't know why I keep seeing that blue cheeses go with this grape. Maybe a Gorgonzola Dolce would be better.
Elena Walch Gewürztraminer with Pecorino Toscano, unaged. Musky and young Pecorino Toscano. Dank tasting cheese. OK together. The combo turns really tart. The cheese tastes spicy. I wouldn't serve this at a tasting, but it works.
*Elena Walch Gewürztraminer with Sottocenere. Garlic-tasting cheese, though it's truffles. It makes an interesting chocolate, minty flavor together. Ike at Grapevine had suggested this and it is good. I don't know that the styles work so well together, and in some ways, the flavors are confusing together (garlic, mushrooms, flowers, and spice), but it blends ok. This is kind of weird, but I might reconsider doing it at a tasting. It tastes very chocolately to me. I kind of like this together.
Lucien Albrecht 2002 $14.99 at Austin Wine Merchant. 13% alcohol. From Orschwihr Haut-Rhin in Alsace, France. Imported by Robert Kacher. This Gewurztraminer is not quite as aromatic as the Muré. It is more subtle. It does smell like litchee nuts, but also orange and cloves, maybe light cinnamon. It doesn't taste quite as dry as the Muré. In some ways, the Albrecht seems better balanced, like it's not such a shock, the difference between the aroma and the taste, but both are delicious. It tastes slightly sweet, very fruity, nutty, warm, spicy, and floral. It is very full on the tongue. It's nice. I like this a lot. It also seems to go well with cheeses.
Lucien Albrecht with Brie Martin-Collet. Why not? I thought that the thick, creamy texture of the Brie might be nice with the full body of the wine. It's ok -- it doesn't fight -- but it makes a very alcoholic rotten fruit flavor in the finish. Also, the spices are overpowering.
Lucien Albrecht with Brin d'Amour. Full, sheepy, herbal cheese. Very good, but not perfect. What a shock because the Muré was wonderful with this cheese with all its spices. It's good. It's a little bitter and vomity together. It is nice, but I feel like the spices in the wine get lost.
*Lucien Albrecht with Cantalet. Buttery, mild, cheddarish cheese. I love this cheese, though some people think it's too mild. The cheese may get lost a little bit, but not too bad. Yum! Still, very palatable and pleasant. The cheese is thick and full on the tongue, as is the wine. This is nice. It tastes like vanilla wafers. It's like a dessert, it's so creamy and flavorful. They really blend well together, bringing out nuts, spices, cream, and sweet, exotic fruit.
Lucien Albrecht with Crowley Colby. Yummy, but the wine way overpowers the cheese. It's not a bad match, but the spices in the wine are magnified and overtake the cream in the cheese.
Lucien Albrecht with P'tit Basque. Delicious! Creamy-tasting, sweet, smooth, sheepy cheese with a thick wine. It makes the wine tart. I lose some of the flavor of the cheese, but this is still really good. Better than with the Muré.
*Lucien Albrecht with Old Amsterdam. This Old Amsterdam tastes off, for some reason. (Maybe my palate is off from tasting so much.) It tastes grassier than usual. Nice with the wine, though. I still taste a lot of toasted nuts in the cheese, and it has a wonderful creamy texture. Yummy together! I really like this a lot. I like the nuts and warm flavor in the cheese with the rich spices in the wine. It's very mouth-filling. Both the wine and cheese flavors stand up throughout the pairing.
Handly 2001 (Tasted in 2003) $13.99. From Anderson Valley in CA. 14.2% alcohol. It is tingly and fruity, and tastes like woody flowers. It is also a little spicy. I taste peaches or apricots, and maybe even grapefruit. It has a bitter finish. This wine leaves a thick feeling on the tongue, kind of like a dessert wine, but lighter.
Handly with Cheshire. The wine overpowers the cheese. It is good and definitely an ok match. This wine may have too much alcohol to go with this light cheese.
Handly with Gorgonzola Dolce. Great blend. Light sharpness of the blue comlements the spicy, thick, sweetness of the wine.
Handly with Roasted Ricotta Sheep. Very good. I am surprised. The saltiness of the ricotta went well with the sweetness of the wine. There was some bitterness in the finish, though.
Handly with unnamed sheep cheese. I am not sure what sheep this was, but apparently it was awful. It made me make faces. It will bring a person to tears. I can't even describe it, it was so bad.
Handly with Swiss Emmental Wheel. Not good. It is bitter and the wine is way too strong and apple-y. It said on a chart that it would be a good pairing, but it isn't. Maybe it would be better with a stronger mountain cheese.
Messina Hof and Campo de Montalban. Nastiness! Like cough syrup and rubber. I thought this might be good, but it wasn’t. This cheese has gone so well with all the reds, but it just didn’t do well with the sweet white. The blend was bitter. This cheese does better with a dryer white.
René Muré Rouffach 2002 $14.99 at Austin Wine Merchant. From Rouffach in Alsace, France. 12.5% alcohol. This wine is supposed to be very dry, but should show off its aromas and spice. It is a new wine that Austin Wine Merchant got in. Wow, boy is this aromatic! Exciting! It smells like It is a dark yellow color. It is supposed to be good with litchee nuts, and smell like them as well. I smell mango, spices (maybe ginger), honeysuckle, flowers, vanilla or maybe almond extract, and something citrusy and sweet like tangerines. The smell is overpowering. The litchee nut, I just happened to fine at the grocery store recently. Disgusting-looking little thing! They are about half the size of a golf ball, dark orange/pink colored, tough, and prickly. Some have a mutant baby growth hanging off the top. I opened the "nut" up and it was even worse. The interior flesh is white and it looks and feels like eating an eyeball, and the center nut looks like a black olive. It is very unappetizing. It does smell a little like the wine, but the real litchee nut has more of a weed aroma. The smells are similar, though. This fruit is better than it looks -- it tastes like light, sweet flowers. It's ok with the wine, but a little tart for it. This wine is much dryer than it tastes. In fact, it is completely dry. I really taste the litchee nuts and flowers in the finish. It is citrusy, spicy, and full-bodied. Spice first, then citrus, and then flowers and the infamous litchee nuts. It really tastes just like honeysuckle. Excellent.
René Muré with Appenzeller. Nutty, spicy cheese. Bitter, but this match works. This is good. These two are just the right strength for each other. The nuts and spices are nice together. I get some good citrus in the wine. A little bitter orange peel. The aromas are really on display with this pairing, but the cheese is not lost. There is a subtle undertone (from cheese) of nuts, cream, spices, and that stinky, rotten-fruit mountain flavor. I don't know about this. I tasted it once and loved it, and then retasted it and it tasted weird, like rotten fruit. I don't know if the average American would be into it.
*René Muré with Brin d'Amour. Delicious! I love this creamy cheese. The spices in the cheese go great with the spicy wine, and then textures (thick) go well together. This is the best thing I have ever had with Gewurz -- spicy, creamy, earthy, nutty and fresh, both from the exotic fruit flavors in the wine and the Mediterranean herbs on the cheese. My friend Brad says it's fabulous!
René Muré with Cantalet. Nothing else has worked, so I am going with a milder cheese. This is much better than the below pairings. The cheese is lightly nutty, which is nice with the spices and rich aromas of the wine. Still, I feel like the cheese is "just there" to serve as a backdrop for the wine.
René Muré with Chaudron. This is a French mountain style cheese, akin to a Swiss. Brings out a nice orange-peel bitter flavor in the wine. This cheese is spicy and has a nice grassy flavor. It tastes like fresh pastures. The cheese is too mild for the wine, but they are still very good together.
René Muré with Cheddar, Fiscalini Bandage Cheddar. It's ok, but they don't do much for each other.
René Muré with Cheddar, Old Quebec. OK at first, and then horribly bitter. Yuck. This just ruins it all.
René Muré with Double Gloucester. Very mild cheddary type of orange cheese. Very good, but the wine overpowers the cheese. Still, this is nice.
René Muré with Gjetost. Caramelized goat cheese, which has gone well with Riesling in the past. It is nice -- floral, nutty, and sweet. The cheese tastes really sweet and a little salty. It's a very fresh taste. The cheese flavor really comes through without washing away the strength of the wine. There is something weird-tasting, but I really like this.
René Muré with Munster. Oooh, this is a stinky, but mild, cheese. It is like some really foul b.o. Once I get used to it, it is really good. Creamy and spicy. Then, awful! Oh, this pairing is bad. It is making me not like wine and cheese anymore. Bitter. Rotten vegetables, dead rats, and bad breath. This is supposed to be a classic pairing.
René Muré with P'tit Basque. Basque sheep cheese. Britt at Austin Wine Merchant thought this might be a good pairing. It's good, but a little bitter. It's alright. This is good. It's not perfect, but they are definitely a good match. I like the spiciness with the oh-so-creamy tasting, nutty cheese.
René Muré with St. Agur.
Trimbach, Alsace 2000 (Tasted in 2003) $16.79 at Grapevine. 13% alcohol. The guy said that this one was a sweet gewurz. I tried it with a dryer Riesling to see the difference and with some cheeses. It is thick-looking and looks like morning pee. Syrupy smell, and I can smell the alcohol. Perfumy and ginger smell. Bitter in the finish. This is too sweet for me. It is tingly in my throat. I can’t tell what fruit – maybe maraschino cherries. Maybe some sort of melon or kiwi, but really ripe kiwi.
Trimbach, with Appenzeller. This gewurz is sweet. The cheese is nutty, spicy, and fruity. I liked this better than the Riesling with it, but it gave a different taste. Patrick liked the other mixture. This is a totally different taste. I like the sweet spiciness of the wine with the nuttiness and fruitiness in the cheese. They mix well together, but they end up just blending, so you can’t tell what’s what. The cheese seems to magnify the sweetness of the wine a little bit, so maybe the wine is overpowering the cheese.
Trimbach, with St. Agur Blue cheese. I liked this a lot, but Patrick said that it made the wine taste a lot sweeter. I thought it was a good alternative to a dessert wine like Sauternes. I think they blend really well together. The light acidity in the wine cleans the palate a little after the cheese, but does not knock out the strong mold flavor. I like these together. I don’t know why. It brings out the nuttiness in the cheese. It tastes like something burnt, kind of like burnt marshmallows.
Trimbach, with the Montagnard creamy washed rind. This cheese is so excellent with a creamy, beefy, lightly spicy flavor. It tastes much milder than it smells. I thought this would be a really good match, but not really. The sweet wine completely knocks out the flavor of the cheese. Just as I started to really relish the meatiness of the cheese, I got thirsty and then it was gone. I like the wine, but with the cheese, it is like when you have two puppies fighting for attention, and the crazy hyper one wins.
Trimbach, with
Cave Aged Gruyère. The cheese is
nutty and sweet. This causes a
little bitterness. It is ok
The fruit comes out in the wine.
*Trimbach (Alsatian) with Cave Aged Gruyère. This is alright. You definitely don’t lose the cheese with this wine, or lose the wine with this cheese. Even after the big splash of sweet fruit, I can still taste the cheese, and the wine doesn’t fade away. I like the spiciness of the cheese mixed with the sweet spice of the wine. They bring out good things in each other. Looks like I had tried this before and didn’t like it so well. It is a little bitter, but I like the balance of the two. I don’t know why I liked it more this time. Maybe it’s my mood. I liked this because the wine wasn’t too acidic so that it wiped the cheese taste off the palate. I think it is because of the sugar in the wine. I ended up liking the sweeter Riesling with the Gruyère as well.
Trimbach, with Père Joseph Chimay style cheese. These two are ok at first, but then the aftertaste is kind of unpleasant.
Weinbach, Domaine Weinbach Vin d'Alsace, Cuvée Théo, Clos des Capucins, Colette Faller et ses filles 2001 (Tasted in 2003) $29.99 at Grapevine. I guess this is a wine made by women since her name is Colette and she works with her daughters. Interesting. French Alsatian Gewurztraminer. It has a picture of a monk with a long beard carrying a big basket of gapes on his back. This is from Kaysersberg. Domaine Weinbach has 62 acres of vineyards on the hills and valley of Kaysersberg, including the Grand Crus Schlossberg, Furstentum, Altenbourg, and Clos des Capucins. Each vineyard has its individual character. The Clos surrounds the château, which is a former Capucin monastery established in 1612. The grapes are hand picked. They go through a slow, natural yeast fermentation in oak. The label says that it is rich, elegant, and perfumed with rose petals, lychee nuts, exotic fruit, and spices. The different vineyards of the domaine make Gewurztraminers. This one, the Cuvée Théo, is supposed to be intense and spicy. It was imported by Vineyard Brands Inc. in Birmingham, so it made me want to buy it more.
This wine is dark yellow. I am not getting a lot of smell from it, but it does smell a little perfumy and spicy. After it warmed up, I could smell the spices a little better and maybe some honeysuckle. Patrick thinks it smells metallic, a little like his "Champagne" smell. It is crazy tasting. It is very sweet. It tastes like apricots, peaches, honey, and a little bit of lemon. It is bitter in the finish. I guess it tastes like lychees like they said. I have only smelled lychees once before, but yes, it was similar. It does taste a little like ginger. It tastes almost like a dessert wine, they way it is so syrupy. It is also a little effervescent.
Weinbach, Domaine Weinbach Vin d'Alsace, Cuvée Théo with Epoisses from Burgundy. This cheese is fairly mild for a stinky type. I taste more milk than spices. Yuck! These two are horrible together! I'm making awful faces. I taste old mold and bitterness.
Weinbach, Domaine Weinbach Vin d'Alsace, Cuvée Théo with Cave Aged Gruyère.
Weinbach, Domaine Weinbach Vin d'Alsace, Cuvée Théo and HEB Swiss (like very very mild Emmentaler.) This cheese is super mild. These are nice together. The wine definitely overpowers the cheese, but the cheese is a little boring anyway. Most of what I like is how the cheese smoothes out the lively wine since it is so tame. It makes the wine less bitter. I like the nuts, and then the craziness. It has a little of a bitter taste at the end, but it's not bad.
*Weinbach, Domaine Weinbach Vin d'Alsace, Cuvée Théo with Alsatian Munster. This actually worked out better, even though the cheese has past its prime. The spices do merge together. I guess there is something to regional pairings. The cheese resembles the wine -- spicy, fruity, and bitter. They go very well together. The wine cools off the hot crazy cheese, believe it or not. They blend very well together. I like the light bubbles with the creamy, piquant cheese.