Fortunati Vineyards, Elote, Alicante Bouschet
Let's go cook, eat, drink and taste.
Welcome back.
Today I’m supplementing my Napa Valley Register column with extra tidbits of gustatory knowledge. My Fortunati visit and preparing Elote make up my piece in The Register ($14.95/month for online, $19.95 for online + weekly hard copy). They’re at the bottom due to length, and in case you don’t make it that far, be sure to watch my YouTube video on making Elote.
Events coming up
Friday, July 25, 2 PM
Road Trip to GREEN & RED VINEYARDS
Vineyard tour, tasting, food & fun at a little slice of Napa Valley heaven.
Members $10, non-members $25 Info and Book.
Saturday, August 23, 3 PM - SAVE THE DATE
Pre-Harvest Party at Ricci Vineyards (Carneros - Sonoma side).
Soak up the rustic farm vibe at Ricci Vineyards as we taste their wines, have some bites, play some games and enjoy the summer afternoon.
Pricing and RSVPs coming soon. For now, SAVE THE DATE.
Drinking Alicante Bouschet
I’m smitten with this wine. Taste it and you may be too. It’s very tasty, distinctive, rare as Black Opal and a relative bargain considering. Introducing:
Wrightwood Alicante Bouschet “Liquid Amber Vineyard” Sonoma Valley 2021 reminds me of a Grenache/Syrah blend: intense red fruit-driven with complements of black & blueberry, licorice, black pepper and lavender. It smells great, tastes great, finishes long, suave and…great. MABGA! Medium-bodied, aged in previously used oak, fine tannins, healthy level of acidity, not tart, just right.
Wrightwood is the passion-project or Rian Ervin, whose day job is Assistant Winemaker at Chappellet Vineyards. This Alicante Bouschet is the only wine she makes. She gets the grapes from the base of Sonoma Mountain. The vines are 115 years old, dry-farmed and organic although not certified. Just is.
If you carry a Wine Geek card you know that Alicante Bouschet is the rare vinifera grape with red flesh, red juice. It CAN make a very high-pigment, teeth-staining wine, but not necessarily. These old vines make a wiser, more complex version, and Ms Ervin helps make it this way. Great to drink on its own, although naturally you’re best served having it with roast white meats, grilled salmon, red pastas, burgers and dogs.
Only 30 cases made of Wrightwood Alicante Bouschet 2021, and Outer Space Wines in Downtown Napa has cornered the market on it. Price: $37/bottle. Order online or drop by Outer Space to purchase.
Cooking Elote (Mexican Street Corn)
How does a recipe, cooking demo and wine pairing sound? I made Mexican Street Corn on my last winery Road Trip. It was better than very good and matched well with Brockmeyer Family Sparkling Wine. While bubbles are a good match, the best match I’ve had with Mexican Street Corn (also called Elote, which translates simply to corn in Spanish, and can also refer to corn on the cob) is California or Oregon Chardonnay. Fortunati Chardonnay, with its buttered toast chorus, is dynamite with a heavily grilled Elote version. My favorite is cool-climate Sonoma Coast Chardonnay with a lemony edge and cut of acidity. Use my recipe for Elote, enjoy with the B. Kosuge Chardonnay Sonoma Coast 2023 ($36) and tell me what you think. My recipe is an adaptation of a Melissa Clark recipe.
Check out my technique on my Youtube channel.
For 6 ears of corn.
SAUCE: ¼ cup mayo, ¼ cup sour cream or Greek yogurt, 1 teaspoon cumin, 1 teaspoon ancho chile powder (any type of chile powder will work – I particularly like ancho), ½ teaspoon salt, 2 teaspoons lime juice, ¼ cup sweet onion finely diced. Mix them up and put in the fridge while you do the rest.
CORN: Peel back the husks without removing, remove the silk*, loosely cover with its husks (my goal is to partially steam/partially grill the corn). Place corn on a hot grill for 15-25 minutes depending on how hot the grill is, turning every 3 minutes. Start testing for doneness when the corn has brown spots. Press on the kernels: when its resistance is like a tennis ball, take it off.
FINISH: Put one cup of finely grated Cotija cheese in a pie tin (I buy Cotija Polvo from the store – it’s ready to go) Remove husks, snap off the end, brush cob generously with sauce (I use about 2 teaspoons per cob), roll in the Cotija cheese. Once you have all your corn on a platter, sprinkle generously with chopped cilantro. Serve with lime wedges. (The lime wedges are VERY important.)
*If you want to serve half cobs, cut the cobs partially through so you can snap them in half after cooking & before you sauce them.
Drinking (Tasting) at Fortunati Vineyards
In a way recommending one winery to visit in Napa/Sonoma is like recommending one hot sauce in a New Orleans market. You may rightly ask, “ok what’s your angle?” Sometimes I have one but in this case I can’t think of any as I write up Fortunati Vineyards & Winery in Napa.
I took my Eat Drink Cook members to Fortunati in April, so there is a relationship that in fact started in the ‘90s when co-owner/maker Gary Luchtel poured me his earlier brand, Surh Luchtel. Since then Gary and his wife Ellen have built a nice operation on Salvador Avenue in north Napa: bonded winery, vineyard, indoor/outdoor tasting house, a guest flat and their own home next door. Lots of spinning plates yet when you step in the feeling is cozy and quaint.
Visiting Napa, or live there and have friends or family coming in? Fortunati is in my top six Napa Valley wineries to visit and taste.* Walking the walk, I just went to Fortunati with my sister (in from New Hampshire), her friends and my mom. Great success. Here’s why.
Moxie, my Aussie Labradoodle, is always welcome. Special privilege for Moxie that she knows the property well enough to roam about, inside and out, usually within view. The Luchtel’s German Shepherds make their rounds, so as long as Moxie pays them deference all is well.
Liz Accardo runs the hospitality at Fortunati and hosted our tasting. A Napa native and nine year member of the Fortunati team, Liz puts on a good show of a tasting that promotes tangents and chit-chat beyond the wine in your glass. I particularly like how she starts the tasting with the compact version of her story – meets the inevitable questions about her head-on, putting her in control of the tasting. Nice move.
I’m a big fan of the Fortunati wines. Gary Luchtel, for all intents and purposes a self-taught winemaker, imprints his style upon all the wines. Rounded corners, more silky, less firm, reds are made to age for ten years and still are delicious upon release. New oak is carefully used. Let’s talk about variety and price.
There are up to eight current-release wines available to purchase, and the tasting includes six of them. Rosé of Pinot Noir is a refreshing start, Chardonnay is on the richer side yet vibrant, and the Viognier is my personal favorite with it’s fresh peach and honeysuckle exuberance (you can see the Viognier vines from the tasting room, by the way). The Pinot Noir from Santa Rita Hills and Dry Creek Valley Zinfandel are the not-Napa wines. Syrah, “Fortivo” Cab Sauv-based blend and Cabernet Sauvignon are all expressive of the grape and easy to like.
All the wines, but one, are under $100. “Signature” Cabernet Sauvignon is $95. In fact, all the other wines hover around $50/bottle (except the Rosé which is less). Join one of their wine clubs for up to 25% off. As a result of my visit, there are now TWO Fortunati wine clubs in my family. Sister and Mom both signed up. Didn’t see that coming!
Tastings are $50/person, come with a smart cheese, nut and dried fruit pairing, and waived with 6 bottle purchase or wine club sign up. 2010 prices for what you get. Ask for a taste of the Syrah Port-Style Dessert Wine at the end. It’s poured from barrel and not for sale for a couple of years even though they could bottle and sell it anytime.
Tastings by appointment can be made at FortunatiVineyards.com. Fortunati Vineyards is located at 980 Salvador Avenue in Napa.
I wrote that I had no angle…ok there’s one. Framed newspaper and magazine stories about Fortunati are adorn the tasting room. Maybe Eat Drink Cook can join the party.
*Rest of my Top Six Napa Valley wineries to visit: White Rock, Tres Sabores, Biale, Green & Red, Lola.
You made it: the end of this week’s Eat Drink Cook: a life-journal from a Napa Valley dad, wine expert and enthusiastic cook. Up to twelve subjects, often intertwined, with an emphasis on food, wine, cooking, being a dad and just a guy enjoying these crazy times the best I can. Read me for food & wine tips, recipes, and stuff I come across that you may find interesting too.