Latour tasting at Blue Fish

Mama Squirrel and I went to a fantastic tasting of French wines, particularly Latours, put on by Great Wines and Spirits at Blue Fish in Cooper-Young last night. Mama was taunted as a wine snob by her coworkers for going. I, on the other hand, got there, took a look at the fantastic spread prepared by Blue Fish, and was hard pressed not to say, “and there’s wine too? Hoo wee!”

I wouldn’t presume to describe the wines. Hopefully Mama will have some time soon to describe them. There were a couple of wines that I just didn’t care for, but I liked to some extent or another most of the 19(!) wines that we sampled. Mama has already put together an order of a case and a half of four different wines. Some of them will be nice and cool when they arrive in the midst of the June heat. Others will be even more reason to get Granddaddy Squirrel to help us design a wine cellar in our basement.

For me, the high point of the evening was getting to meet my long-time hero, Fredric Koeppel. He was gracious enough to provide an answer, petite Sirah, to my profound question, “so, what wine would you recommend to go with squirrel?” He truly was gracious and chatted with us about boys, blogs, and Brussels sprouts. We will be trying his Brussels sprout recipe soon.

I am a big fan of wine tastings like this one. They provide a cheap, sometimes even free, way to educate one’s palate. This tasting was a new challenge for me. Many of the wines will be best after aging 5 – 10 years. It will be exciting to see how some of the bottles compare when we open them in a few years to celebrate Teh Boy leaving for college.

Tastings are also good for socializing old grumps like me. I would recommend checking out the Commercial Appeal’s food section for wine events, or, even better, drop by the Great Wines and Spirits store or website and join their mailing list.