An internationally renowned Travel, Food & Wine Writer/Chef, Dr. Lim has traveled the world in a relentless search for good food and winsome wines. Trained by top 3 Michelin Star Chefs, LeNotre Culinary School in Paris & CIA (Culinary Institute of America), he is also a parachutist, fencer, SCUBA diver & big game hunter.

Each week we will feature a new wine blogger committed to sharing with readers their passion and knowledge of wine. If you are a wine blogger and are interested in being featured on our website please email us at secretsherrysociety@gmail.com.

Stupendous Sherry!

The intrepid Travelling Gourmet tells you about Spain’s gift to the world…

By Dr. Michael Lim, The Travelling Gourmet

My fondest memories of Sherry are from when I was an undergraduate student at the  University of Newcastle upon Tyne in England. Every time you visited your friends or Professors socially, they would offer you a nice glass of Sherry. Inevitably, it was Harvey’s Bristol Cream. Then you would sit by the blazing fire in the living room and chat. At Christmas time, Sherry was the tipple to go with beloved Christmas Plum Pudding Flambe served with lashing of Rum Butter or Brandy Butter. OMG! It was super yummy! And who can resist that classic English dessert…Sherry Trifle with jelly, strawberries and custard! Made with Lady Finger sponge biscuits soaked in…lots of (what else?) Sherry!

Sherry actually comes from the Moorish language – “Seris”. In Spanish, Sherry is Jerez which is also the name of the Spanish town which is the center for Sherry production.

A typical sherry has a nose of blue steel like that of my favourite H&K USP 9mm pistol, light amber in colour, bone dry in the mouth, it is so powerful your first taste may be a shock to your taste buds…

John Harvey & Sons was founded in 1796 in Bristol and Harvey’s Bristol Cream has become the world’s best selling Sherry. How “Cream” became a part of this famous label is the stuff of legend. In the 1860s Harvey’s already had a popular blend called Harvey’s Bristol Milk. When an aristrocratic lady visited the cellars and tasted a new blend, she promptly declared: ”If that be the milk, then this is cream!”  Made exclusively from Palomino fruit from their own Spanish vineyards in Jerez Superior appellation, it is a blend of four wines. They are Amontillado, Fino, Oloroso and Pedro Ximénez from more than 50 different Soleras with an average age of 8 years on bottling. Heady caramel and raisin aromas entice with a palate of dried fruit and nuts plus a lingering voluptuous finish…like the kiss of a ravishing woman. The cobalt blue bottle has been a distinctive feature since 1990.

Sherry’s Humble Beginning

Dry Sherry or Fino Sherry accounts for 95% of Sherry production. From a simple white wine crafted from the Palomino grape grown in this arid region of southern Spain, it is  fermented till there is NO residual sugar. American oak casks are filled till five-sixths of the way and left partly covered.

Some, not all of the barrels develop a layer like cream cheese. Called Flor, it comprises Saccharomyces yeast and shields the wine from oxidation. The wine is lightly fortified and will be used to make Fino.

More alcohol is added to barrels without Flor. The wine oxidizes and they become Olorosos.

Solera aging

This is very complicated, which is why there are Almacenistas who are specialists in this art. In a nutshell, a part of the younger wine is added to an older barrel. From the older barrel, a part is added an even older one, and so on…A 100 barrels or more can make up a Solera! They are carefully arranged in a pyramid with the oldest at the bottom. Simply put, it is a precise form of fractional blending

Make mine a Fino…

Finos from Jerez, where the hot summer burns off the Flor, are heartier.  while those made In Sanlucar, the milder weather is conducive to growing Flor all year-round and they are more delicate. The latter are known as manzanilla, perhaps because have nuances of chamomile tea which bears the same name. An example of ‘terroir’ or the taste of the place.

These wines are pale, light…to be enjoyed young. Chill before drinking for the best taste. On the contrary, having taken on unique flavors from the flor, Finos are very popular due to the collection of unique and complex flavours from the Flor. It is like caviar and foie gras an acquired taste, not for the hoi polloi.

Fino is generally young, about five years old. Age it to obtain Fino Amontillado. It begins to take on oxidative characteristics as the Flor disappears. Almonds and hazelnuts, toffee notes and a deeper colour. In the Soleras the younger more vibrant & expressive wines are foiled by the older, more complex wines.

OMG! Oloroso

Olorosos are older…richer and more costly but worth it if you are partial to such flavours and complexity. Oloroso means “fragrant” in Spanish. Sweet Amontillados and Olorosos are lovely with Crème Brulee, aged cheese and of course, a perfect match for Ye Olde English Sherry Trifle. Sweet Harveys Pedro Ximenez VORS Sherry explodes on your palate with voluptuous flavours of figs and Arabian dates. A dash of sherry also brings out the flavour of Lobster Bisque.

Say cheers to suprising Sherry…Salud!

The Travelling Gourmet’s SAS (smooth as silk) Sherry Trifle

A ravishing English lady taught me this recipe…

Ingredients

• Big clear glass bowl for the Trifle
  
• 1 packet of Lady Finger sponge biscuits
  
• Fresh Strawberries.
• Fresh Raspberries
• Chocolate curls
• ½ cup Orange Juice
• Strawberry Jelly
• Pedro Ximenez Sherry
• Sliced almonds
• Custard or Crème Anglais.

Method

Place the Lady Finger sponge biscuits to line the bottom of the bowl.Then pour on orange juice and sherry to taste ( 5 tablespoons). The sponge will soak up the juices and sherry.
Add in the fresh strawberries. Make some strawberry jelly and pour carefully in. You can add strawberry jam to the jelly for more texture. Let it set in the refrigerator.

Before serving, make the custard, let it cool and pour it on top of the set jelly. Chill in the refrigerator for 15 minutes. Garnish with fresh strawberries, raspberries, chocolate curls and serve immediately. Enjoy!

On Valentine’s Day, make a heart on top of the custard with strawberries, raspberries &cherries. Michelangelo always said: Trifles make perfection and perfection is no trifle!

Each week we will feature a new wine blogger committed to sharing with readers their passion and knowledge of wine. If you are a wine blogger and are interested in being featured on our website please email us at secretsherrysociety@gmail.com.

Tim’s Take on Sherry

By Tim Vandergrift

I am perhaps the least likely Sherry enthusiast you could imagine. Born in a very small town in western Canada, I didn’t grow up drinking wine. Indeed, the only wine available in our community was screw-topped, vaguely soda-poppish, and heavy on the sugar and bubbles, but light on actual wine content. If this was wine, include me out.

Another influence was my family’s ethnic and religious background: on my mother’s side I come from a long line of Russian-Germans, observant of the Mennonite faith. If you’re not familiar with the sect, think ‘Amish’, but not so friendly towards outsiders, or as open to new ideas. While long on community, family and church, they disapproved of beverage alcohol on general principles: alcohol beverages were not drunk to appreciate the subtle flavours and aromas. They were drunk stealthily, behind the barn, for the purposes of sneaking into the pool hall to lose the grocery money among loose women. These attitudes coloured how I felt about drinking as a lad. I grew up wanting to be like my old man, drinking beer from cans or Rye whisky mixed with cola, smoking unfiltered cigarettes taken from a pack tucked into the sleeve of my hoodlum-grade t-shirt.

And so it went, until I met the woman who would be my future wife. She came from a robustly mixed family, including French Canadian influences. They would no more sit down to dinner without wine on the table than they would sit down without cutlery or plates.

Under her influence I not only started to drink wine, I began to realize that I’d had it wrong all along—not only was wine delicious, it was more complex and challenging than mass-market beer or whiskey. I understood I’d been denied a birthright and vowed to make up for it. I drank richly fruity red wines at first, and gradually sought out stronger, more heavily extracted wines to drink, with more tannin, more oak and more alcohol. Pretty soon if it wasn’t California Zinfandel or Australian Shiraz, it wasn’t coming to my table. Certainly white wines were out, and dessert wines were neither dessert nor wine to me. And sherry? Well, I tried it once and it was thick, sticky and tooth-spinningly sweet. I thought it fit for waffles, or for reviving diabetics, but not for real men.

In a way, I was as closed to the possibility of wines as I was before, allowing only the narrowest interpretation of wine to define the whole world of the grape for me. I may have continued on like this for a long time, but for the generosity and wisdom of strangers.

I was on a solo cycling trip through the Gulf Islands of British Columbia in 1989, riding up and down winding hilly roads, soaking in some of the most breathtaking scenery in the world—cool green forests, shingle beaches, deep blue stretches of the Pacific, dotted with boats and killer whales and endless blue skies. I camped a bit, but whenever I got thoroughly dusty and saddle-sore I stopped at bed and breakfast places and basked in the sun and loaded back up on carbohydrates.

On one of the islands I was lucky enough to get in at a very eclectic bed and breakfast. The owner was a feral chef who cooked according to a complicated dedication to an arcane notion of historical authenticity, preparing ancient Roman meals that were so authentic that they didn’t include any ingredients not known to the time of Julius Caesar, or Medieval meals that included four-and-twenty blackbirds baked into a pie (I kid you not).

This might sound like a recipe for disaster, but on the contrary, the food was good, if a little odd, but it was continually engaging, in a way I hadn’t seen before. He had thought deeply what it meant to be both a cook and an eater from that time period, and wanted you to think about it too.

But the challenges of his meals aside, the hospitality was warm and open, and at about 4 pm every day drinks were served on the deck, which overlooked a gorgeous stretch of forest running down to the bay. By that time the stinging heat of the afternoon had moderated by the cool, salt-scented breezes from the Strait of Georgia, bringing with them hints of cedar, pine needles, red earth and clover, and the hummingbirds were actively zipping around the heads of guests, darting in an out of the cascades of flowers surrounding the space.

I had settled in to enjoy the view, feet up and perfectly content, feeling like I could have sat there for several years if the opportunity presented itself, when one of the staff came up with a tray and presented me with a small plate and a narrow tulip glass of white wine lightly beaded with moisture in the heat of the afternoon.

“Compliments of the house. Today we have a little tapas for you: almonds, house-cured olives Manchego cheese, and to go with it, a glass of Sherry.”

I had been with her right up until the Sherry, but it would be the work of a complete churl to refuse such a thoughtful offering. Besides, I could grit my teeth through a wee glass of pancake syrup to go with the tasty-looking snacks.

I picked up the glass and gave it an exploratory sniff. There was no caramel, no raisins, no burned sugar. Instead, I smelled sea breezes, a hint of nuts, like the ghost of particularly good hazelnuts, minerals and sunshine. Somehow through all the other smells of the forest and the flowers I could physically smell hot, sun baked earth full of chalk and gypsum and good red dirt, and something else I could not put my finger on. Suddenly my mouth watered—it smelled fantastic. Not fantastic in the sense of very good indeed, but fantastic in the sense that it seemed to have sprung from a very good imagination, one that could make up wine that had aromas worthy of a mystery novel.

I took a tentative sip. It was lightly chilled, but not ice-cold, and the first thing that hit me was the nuttiness. It was delicate and shy, but very persistent. It startled me that a wine could have an up-front flavour that didn’t rely on fruitiness! As that first sip flowed across my palate the acidity caught up almost immediately: this wine was crisp, but not actually tart, and immensely refreshing.

The flavours that came next left me dumbfounded. I already realised I was going to have to re-evaluate my ideas about Sherry, but the wine gave up wonderful minerality. Although it was pleasingly fruity, with citrusy notes and hints of stone fruit, there were cascades of carbonates and gypsum, making it seem drier than the beautifully balanced wine it really  was. And despite the delicacy of the flavours and the layers they formed, it was an incredibly robust wine, powerful and punchy.

It was almost absent-mindedly that I popped a couple of almonds in my mouth. They were still warm, crisped from the oven and dusted with a bit of sea salt. Paired with the Sherry they formed an amazing combination. The sweetness of the almond, its nuttiness and the bit of saltiness picked up everything that was so, so right with the wine. Right up until that moment I would never have believed that almonds were the perfect food to match with any wine. The cheese and the olives were revelations as well, their powerful, savoury flavours chased, wrestled, subverted and uplifted by this beguiling wine.

I found I had reached the bottom of my glass in less than a dozen minutes. Looking around somewhat embarrassed by my greedy gulping, I saw the owner approaching with the bottle. “Can you tell me what kind of Sherry this is?” I asked, hoping for a brand name so I could pick some up on my return home.

He smiled broadly and filled my glass again. “It’s my favourite Sherry of all, Palo Cortado. It’s not a very popular style around these parts, so I have to bring it in especially for myself and my guests. I’m very glad you’re enjoying it.” In examining the bottle I realised that Palo Cortado wasn’t a brand at all, but a style of Sherry, one I was obviously going to have to learn more about.

When I had time to look it up in my wine books at home, I found out that Palo Cortado was quite rare—no wonder he had to import it himself. I learned that Sherry is made from carefully aged white wines stored and blended in a complex system of casks. There are two ways the aging, a biological process where special yeast form a crust on top of the wine in a barrel, transforming the contents over time. The other process is chemical, where the wine oxidises away until it reaches the brown richness of sweeter Sherries. Palo Cortado is made with a combination of both, and strangely enough, it’s almost always by accident: the winemaker starts off to make a normal Sherry under the flor yeast, which (for mysterious reasons) collapses, leaving the sherry to enrich and darken in colour on its own. Accident or not, it was a happy circumstance that made such wonderful wine.

I left for home the next day, and that afternoon of tapas and sherry on the deck is a timeless memory for me, a nearly perfect idyll matched by a whole new world of wine opening to me.

The bed and breakfast is gone now, all these years later, but I’ll always have fond and grateful memories of it, and the lessons I learned. First, I shouldn’t judge a wine by a single example—maybe if I didn’t like a particular wine it wasn’t because it was bad, but rather that I simply hadn’t tried enough to form a proper opinion. Second, some wines had flavours and aromas that didn’t rely on  the brute-force approach of ripe fruit, tannin and oak to be delicious and complex, but rather showed delicacy, finesse and refinement—a powerful character in it’s own right.

And now I’ve got a bottle of Palo Cortado waiting in my wine rack—next to a couple of Finos, an Amontillado and a wee bottle of Pedro Ximinez. It seems I’m a convert.

Each week we will feature a new wine blogger committed to sharing with readers their passion and knowledge of wine. If you are a wine blogger and are interested in being featured on our website please email us at secretsherrysociety@gmail.com.

Sherry, The Forgotten Elixir

By Tom Firth

I love sherry and I don’t really care if you love it.

This might seem like an outrage to the average sherry enthusiast, but I am tired of trying  and I don’t want to spend anymore of my time trying convert people to a wine that they are never going to drink.

Sherry (and the wines of Montilla-Moriles) has had a rough 50 years. Its last heyday was before the birth of most current sherry drinkers and it stands as a largely forgotten, yet mainstream, wine. Cheap and overly sweet imitations, along with the stigma of drinking what might have been your grandmother’s tipple, has all but removed the wine from the common man or woman’s drinking repertoire.

I have been a fan of sherry since my first year in the wine business, almost 16 years ago. After completing university, my first order of business was a wine trip to Spain and Portugal to taste their fortified wines. After 5 years of school, working in the wine business, I could think of no better way to give myself a reward for my hard work that that. From drinking vino tinto in white coffee mugs in Pinhão for a lone Euro (still one of my favourite wine experiences) served by a poor fellow working out of a converted aging cask, to touring bodegas in Cordoba in the scorching hot Andalucían summer.

From a delicate fino, to a sublime manzanilla, to the sweetest PX, I am always game to sit down, have a glass, and discuss the fortified wines of Spain until the wee hours. But despite my best efforts, I have yet to covert anyone who wasn’t already a fan of sherry or an open-minded wine nerd. I’ve led sherry classes and fortified wine seminars, but I’ve never seen that eureka moment in which the attendee says, ”This is the wine for me. We are going to drink fino all summer until we pass out, barf, or the snow flies — whichever comes first.”

And I don’t care anymore.

Sure, there is a market for sweet and dessert sherries, sherry-based cocktails and whisky finished in sherry cask.. Depending on who you ask, in some ways the market for sherry finished whiskies and its need for those barrels used in sherry production has helped keep the market for the wines of alive.

The dessert wine market is a big and lucrative, but fickle. Virtually every wine producing region has its own version of a sticky wine, but they move in and out of fashion almost too fast to be counted. Sherry is the best match for most dessert tarts, but desserts change and sherry cannot capture the imagination of enough diners to become a permanent or prominent addition to the average wine list.

Will it ever become the regular tipple of the thirsty masses in North America?

More countries should agree to protect the term “sherry” and stop producing their own misleading and often inferior versions of the wine. Sherry does not come from Canada, the United States, Australia, or anywhere outside of Spain. Although I do count the wines of Montilla-Moriles when I talk about the wines of Jerez.

Nothing is more refreshing on a hot summer day than a glass of fino. Sitting on a patio on a hot July afternoon in Andalusia and having a glass (or six) of sherry can’t be beat. A dry sherry is a wine that always tastes better outside.

A few years ago, Wine Access launched a competition for wines available in the Canadian market for less than $25 on a retail wine shelf. The wines are judges blind by independent and objective wine experts from across Canada.

Two years ago, sherries began to win Judge’s Choice awards and appear on our “Killer Values” list of the best wines under $15. The judges were thrilled; we (being the wine nerds we are) all love to see a great wine region receive recognition and the importers of those wines saw a modest rise in sales. We know that consumers are interested in trying new wines, but I just don’t know if sherry will keep their interest.

I love to “geek out” about sherry with like-minded individuals, but you will never see me emerge from my cellar with a bottle of sherry hidden behind my back, uttering the words, “I’ve got something you have to try.” I just don’t think that it’s worth the effort.

Unless you are a wine nerd, then we can talk…and I’ll bring the wine.

Originally posted on WineAccess

Each week we will feature a new wine blogger committed to sharing with readers their passion and knowledge of wine. If you are a wine blogger and are interested in being featured on our website please email us at secretsherrysociety@gmail.com.

Dallas Wine Chick’s Jerez Adventure

By Melanie Ofenloch

I was pleasantly surprised when I was asked by The Secret Sherry Society (the source for sherry information for wine lovers, sommeliers and wine retailers) to be a guest blogger on their site. I happened to have a great bottle in mind and it gave me the opportunity to open something special from a wonderful trip to Spain eight years ago when my husband and I visited the Andalusian Coast. It was a fabulous trip and we ate and drank our way through Spain visiting Marbella, Granada, Seville, Malaga and Jerez de la Frontera. On a side note, near the end of that trip was the first time my husband gritted his teeth and answered me truthfully – no honey, you cannot wear those jeans. He lived to tell the tale and reinforced that honesty is the best policy in the age old female question – does this make me look fat?

While in Jerez, we picked up a 1971 Bodegas Toro Albala Don PX Pedro Ximenez Gran Reserva, a leading producer of some of the world’s best sherry. It fit my criteria on old wines – interesting, hard to buy in Dallas and something that we could open with great memories.

Pouring the molasses-like liquid out of the bottle, we swirled the liquid in the glass and it was immediately coated. I expected sweetness, but tasted coffee, raisin, spice and almond flavors. The nose was full of hazelnut and dates. It’s delightful – and a wonderful memory of a trip that remains one of our most romantic and fun times in our 17 year marriage.

The next day we brought it to our Valentine’s Day celebration dinner where we knew cheese and chocolate would be part of the occasion. When we paired it with a piece of chocolate with a little dab of King’s Island Roaring 40’s blue cheese, the stars absolutely aligned. This sherry continued to improve with each sip and with the chocolate/cheese pairing was sublime.

Thank you to The Secret Sherry Society for reminding me that I had this sherry in my cellar and encouraging me to open it. It was an unexpected treat and reminder to go off the beaten path on your wine choices and you will be greatly rewarded.

Each week we will feature a new wine blogger committed to sharing with readers their passion and knowledge of wine. If you are a wine blogger and are interested in being featured on our website please email us at secretsherrysociety@gmail.com.

By Vicky Wine

As Saint Valentin is today and as I have no “chéri” to go for a date with – I may as well order my own “Sherry”. I don’t know weither it’s because sherry sounds like “chéri” in French, or because these nutty aromas are making it to my palate – but I’m totally nuts about sherry.

Sherry, Je t'aime!

Sherry is made of white wine fortified with brandy and aged in oaked barrel, sounds just like a man’s drink! By the way, the exact name for this fortified wine isn’t as romantic, it’s “Jerez” in Spanish, “Xeres” elsewhere and of course “Sherry” in Britain. I always new that those British had this little “Je ne sais quoi” that makes the difference. What a perfect name for such a seducing wine!

Sherry comes from South Spain, Andalucia, between Cadiz and Sevilla: So Sherry comes from paradise. Of course, Paris is one of this other paradise where you can hardly find sherry, so I don’t drink enough of it: I never drink any.

If so, today should be different, If I have the choice of a sherry for Valentines, which kind would I pick ? Sounds easier than picking a chéri…let’s have a go!

Who will be my Cheri?

As part of the Secret Sherry Society, I feel like a detective on the best of sherry tracks. Sniffing around, looking at sherry places with “chéri” features… here is what I’d say :

• First – Why we don’t drink sherry ? Because we don’t know what the hell this is and if we ever think of it we think of an 80s old TV series featuring mature gentlemen in a leither armchair smoking a cigare. So I never thought at any point that it would be decent to order a sherry  in a restaurant. Just like I would never dare inviting a handsome stranger man for a date in a bar. Also, I’m starting to order armagnac, which has an even older image in my mind, so maybe after all, sherry is not dead, and I may as well share it with a mysterious man. Or maybe, I’m just into older men .

• I love sherry when it’s dry, nutty and raisiny. In them you feel a strong man, you travel back in time. Powerful they make you dive in another dimension, where it’s only possible to relax and stay steal. It must mean I like rich sherry like the Amontillado, with more  oxidation to occur than a Manzanilla with sometimes in the nose, something of buttery almonds. I like it dry but if you like sweetness and fruits, you can find also find them in some other sherries.

• If you like lighter alcohol and can’t handle the strenght of sherry, it’s also very appreciable when mixed. Like you mix cognac with ginger ale, why not mix Sherry with other mixers? I’m not so much into cocktail but there is a great list made by the sherry secret society you might want to try or some others around here.

• It’s hard to find some Sherry on a casual walk in Paris but I’m also very happy with a cognac or an armagnac… It would be great to have a little “Chéri” invasion in the city of love anyway !

On the hunt for the perfect Sherry

Time for serious matters, as a Secret Sherry Society agent, I’ve sleuthed and gathered a few addresses for our Parisians birds:

• Willis Wine Bar – 75002
• Lavinia – 75001
• RoseBud – 75014
• La Perla Bar – 75004
• Le Select - 75006

Each week we will feature a new wine blogger committed to sharing with readers their passion and knowledge of wine. If you are a wine blogger and are interested in being featured on our website please email us at secretsherrysociety@gmail.com.

By Gwendolyn Alley

A few years ago, I was enjoying dinner with then California Poet Laureate Al Young at the home of his hosts, the Central Coast poet Glenna Luschei and her husband Bill. Bill found out I appreciated wine and he asked me

“So have you discovered sherry?”

Sherry? I thought to myself. “You mean like cooking sherry?” I asked.

There’s much more to sherry than what you cook with, he assured me. He offered to open some up and share it with me but by this time the evening was late and I needed to drive home and teach the next day so I took a pass.

Fast forward several years later. At the last minute, I was offered the opportunity to attend the 2009 European Wine Bloggers Conference in Lisboa and to tour the Alentejo region of Portugal as a guest of Enoforum Wine.  Of course I said yes!

Unfortunately, I was traveling and missed the first day of the conference when Esteban Cabeza taught the group about sherry and led them through a tasting.

Fortunately, I met Esteban later in the conference and he gave me a tutorial using the power point he’d prepared. We were also able to procure bottles of three types of sherry so I could taste them.

To be honest, it seemed like his lecture went on and on when there were three bottles of sherry available to open and to taste while learning about them! But Esteban really knew his subject and I found the process of how the various kinds of sherries were made quite fascinating.

You can read more about the process of making sherry here on this site, but in a nutshell, as you probably know, sherry is a fortified aged beverage.

One aspect of sherry that makes it distinctive as a wine is the way that it’s aged: each year a portion is taken out; the wine is transferred over the years from one barrel to another, combining older sherry with newer. Each year the sherry acquires a different name and different qualities depending also upon its exposure to air which oxidizes it or flor (yeast).

One aspect that makes sherry interesting is why it was fortified in the first place: to make it travel better! Adding a distilled spirit kept the wine from spoiling as it was transported from Spain to various ports in Europe and America.

What really makes very good sherry interesting to me is its complexity: the sherry I had with Esteban seriously blew me away. I’d never had anything like it and I didn’t know where to put the experience in my categories of taste memories.  I wasn’t even sure whether I “liked” it, actually—the taste was so different than what I expected, especially the fino, the most dry sherry. I just knew that I wanted to puzzle it out, come to know it, and understand it.  It truly challenged me.

While I was tempted, I couldn’t imagine how I would manage to bring three open bottles of sherry with me back to the United States so I gave the bottles to my host Delfim Costa of Enoforum.  If I had only known how impossible it was to find sherry of this quality here in the US, I would have connived some sort of way to bring the sherry back—or I would have drank it!

Because what I have discovered in my part of California is this: it is difficult to find truly amazing sherry here. And until it is readily available, people will have no idea how wonderfully complex and engaging sherry is.

I had no idea how hard it was to find really good sherry until I was asked back in November by the Secret Sherry Society to write something up about sherry for this blog post.

I figured I just wasn’t really putting an effort into my quest for sherry but with that much lead time, I’d find something interesting but not too obscure  and of Spanish origin.

Last winter at a Henry Wine Group wine tasting held at a local restaurant and open to the public, I’d picked up and written about a bottle of Gonzalez Byass Solera 1847 Oloroso Dulce sherry ($20) which I found to be good but rather sweet and simple compared to the sherry I tasted in Portugal; read more here. The rep told me no one was carrying it around here and he had no suggestions for places to go for sherry.

So when I didn’t find anything at the Ventura Wine Company and time was running out to find something to write about for the Secret Sherry Society, I turned to Twitter and Facebook to ask where my friends and followers would get sherry around Ventura. Fellow sherry fan and photographer/blogger John Nichols shared my grief, told me the following story of one of his sherry searches and suggested the Ojai Beverage Company:

Sherry is one of the greatest wines on the planet but it does not get the respect it deserves. I didn’t always know that. It came to me slowly and by chance.

I have been visiting a friend’s cabin in Big Bear on Labor Day weekend for over 20 years. About 10 years ago we were digging through the liquor shelf and way in the back was a dusty bottle of sherry. I asked permission and was allowed to open it. It had been there for at least 15 years said the owner of the cabin. The label read El Monisterio. We drank some that weekend and it was so delicious that it set me off on a multi-year quest to find another bottle or something as good.

When I searched online, it was not available. The owner finally remembered that it was purchased years ago at a Santa Paula, California shop long closed called The Coffee Bean. The great thing was that the owner had one other bottle at her home in Santa Paula. I had a good year or two to continue tasting from those two bottles. After no luck with internet searches I contacted the distributor. They answered that the company was likely out of business. He said that sometimes a family will sell a lot and have it bottled and then that will be it.

Years later I was thumbing through a catalogs when I spotted a bottle of El Monisterio on the shelf in one of the home product photos. They were selling accessories, not sherry. I wrote to that company asking for a lead. They asked the photographer. It was just an old bottle he had and was using for a prop. Another dead end but a valiant search.

All during this time I was tasting sherry. It was incredibly inexpensive relative to the high quality I was getting. It was also a complex product to delve into. There are many variations from sweet to dry. I found I liked the stuff in the middle of the spectrum.

It’s been a while since I had my last glass of sherry. I think it’s time for some more.

I couldn’t agree more, John! An excellent sherry is a worthy quest!

I followed John’s advice and trekked up to the Ojai Beverage Company. The clerk said they’d had quite a variety back in November but over the holidays, they were cleaned out.

I came home with a $25 bottle of amontillado, a semi-dry, nutty expression of the sherry family made by Bodegas Dios Baco, S.L. in Jerez which, while not as complex as the sherry I had at the European Wine Bloggers Conference, took care of the ache for sherry I had in my heart with its seductive rich, warm color, deep caramel color, its butterscotch aromas, its nutty, spicy, fruity character…

If you’re looking for something a little different and special to surprise your sweetie on Valentine’s Day, this might be it! Sherry goes quite well with candlelight…and this one was a winner with Belgian chocolates with a hazelnut praline filling. Remember to serve it chilled—not cold, but not room temperature either. Bring the temperature down in the refrigerator then bring the temperature up with a seductive and lengthy presentation! Or you might try one of the many sherry cocktails now in vogue.

Please note: the hand painted gold glass I used in the photo was one of my grandmother’s; the hand felted Valentine angel is by boridolls; the card was made for me by my son, now 7.

Happy Valentine’s Day! May your quest for love and sherry be a fun one!

Each week we will feature a new wine blogger committed to sharing with readers their passion and knowledge of wine. If you are a wine blogger and are interested in being featured on our website please email us at secretsherrysociety@gmail.com.

By Nathan Hazard

Let’s be up-front, I am a relative newcomer to sherry.

A fledgling enthusiast.

A convert.

When I was younger, sherry was purely of the discount cream variety and sat on the shelf above the stove for ages beside the canola oil, spices, and kosher salt. It was used maybe twice a year, and tossed upon moving, to be replaced eventually by an equally abased bottle of Marsala. Then one adventurous eve at the market while in college, I picked up a bottle of fino sherry, checked out the label and decided to give this “bracing aperitif” another shot. I chilled the bottle as instructed and poured myself a taste. Akin to my first sip of grappa, the bone dry mineral sting came as an unpleasant surprise, and thus tawny port took a healthy lead in the fortified wine department.

Many years, bottles, and a port club or two later, experience has lead to a rekindling of curiosity. Following a stunning meal at downtown Los Angeles’ Latin powerhouse Rivera last year, I decided to leap once more and finish the meal with a glass of sherry. The server aided me in selecting an Amontillado. As soon as the first amber drop hit my tongue I felt shame, and by the time the almond aromatics filled the back of my mouth a tear had formed in memorial of lost time. Supple, elegant, fascinating, and sexy… I couldn’t recall the last time a single spirit caused such electricity on my palate. It was love. Latent, but true.

In approaching this post, I couldn’t ignore the rich world of sherry cocktails and not due to their burgeoning popularity currently, but for the sweet atonement the trend represents after years of bottom bar shelf desecration. Yes, on the heels of Amari, sherry’s unique notes are fast becoming the barman’s friend.

After a tipsy weekend recipe testing in my kitchen, I’m sharing a voyeuristic dip into my own affair – specifically with Amontillado. Echoing the simple Basque dessert Peras al Vino and named after the Spanish pear, this cocktail relies on subtle aromatics of the dry pear brandy, cinnamon bark and orange oils to enhance the smooth almondy character of the sherry.

Conferencia

• 1 oz vodka
• 1 oz dry Amontillado sherry (I used Gran Barquero)
• ½ oz Clear Creek Pear Brandy
• ½ oz Dolin Vermouth de Chambery Rouge
• 1 cinnamon stick, broken
• Orange peel

Combine all ingredients in a shaker with cracked ice. Shake lightly and strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with a flamed orange peel.

Because sherry is so food friendly, I couldn’t help but whip up a quick snack to compliment the cocktail.

I first fell in love with deep-fried olives when I worked for a summer at Bluehour in Portland, whose fried picholines were the hit of the Pearl District happy hour set. For these, I used larger Manzanilla olives, so I had room to stuff them. To prepare, first soak the olives in a water bath for a half hour or so to mellow the brine. Pat dry on a paper towel. Finely mince a couple slices of prosciutto and stuff in the olives, using an almond to cork. Line up three shallow dishes with flour, one beaten egg, and panko bread crumbs filling them respectively. Heat 3 inches of oil in a heavy saucepan until a bread crumb browns upon hitting the oil (375 degrees). Dredge olives in flour, shake then cover in egg, lastly rolling in the panko. Deep fry for about 2 minutes or until golden brown. Drain on paper towels and let cool slightly.

Sip cocktail, eat olive. Let love do the rest.

Each week we will feature a new wine blogger committed to sharing with readers their passion and knowledge of wine. If you are a wine blogger and are interested in being featured on our website please email us at secretsherrysociety@gmail.com.

By Alfonso Cevola

When I first fell in love with wine it was because of the sunshine. I was young, broke and trying to find a wine I could take home. The winter was almost over. I was tired of dark and wet and cold. I walked into my local store, and before me were these beautiful bottles in all colors and with any number of exotic names and labels. Sherry.

It’s a sliver of glass,

It is life, it’s the sun,

It is night, it is death,

It’s a trap, it’s a gun

I picked up a Manzanillo and took it home.  I have to say it felt more like I was rescuing the wine from the store than anything. The reality that it was in my budget was a factor.  But once I got the wine home and lived with it I started to fall. Hard.

Pale, salty and cold, it wasn’t unfamiliar to me. It was more like a lightning bolt of recognition. I loved it, wanted more of it. I was drinking sunshine, solar energy in a bottle. I was in love.

A few days later I went to the store. An older gent, seeing that I was back in, came over to me. “We just got in a new shipment of Sherry, some Amontillado. Over there.”  What was I, the stray Sherry rescuer? The bottle was odd, all silvery looking with a bright label. It looked more like a Piñata than a bottle of wine. But I was a sucker for unusual wines and this really wasn’t a rescue as much as a reconnaissance. I bought the Amontillado and opened it later that evening.

A fish, a flash,

A silvery glow,

A fight, a bet,

The range of a bow

Once again, there I was with this amazing Sherry in my hands. This time I was being kissed by this voluptuous sun-tanned beauty. A little fuller, a little richer, I was a boy-toy in the company of this striking exquisiteness. Yeah, I was in love. And not with just one. Now it was Manzanillo and Amontillado. Life was getting interesting, if not just a little complicated.

A few weeks later, I was in the wine shop and I saw a pile of cream Sherries tossed about in a shopping basket. I am a soft heart. These ones really looked miserable sitting there in the cold cage of the cart, in the corner, in the dark; they needed to be liberated from the glumness of their current existence. I made a deal with the clerk (I took three bottles off his hands for $10). It wasn’t that the wines weren’t worth more. Sherry is one of the most amazing wines in the world and they are generally delicate and need some TLC. They take time to get to know them in a world that wants it now. But I was young and frugal and I had me a trio of lovelies to take home that evening. I had no idea what I was getting myself into.

It’s the wind blowing free,

It’s the end of the slope,

It’s a beam, it’s a void,

It’s a hunch, it’s a hope

Turns out this was my Siren call. These were Sherries, with names like Amoroso, Olorosoa and  Moscatel and creamy and unctuously rich beyond anything I had ever experienced. But these wines not only did me in with their exuberance and gifts of beauty. They taught me, schooled me, in the ways of wine and life like no other wines I had encountered up to that time.

Help me, help us, above all, help yourself to an incredible love. One you can share with your mate, your spouse or your lover. Guilt free. Over and over. Anytime you fancy.

Sherry – the one who taught me to love wine.

A spear, a spike,

A point, a nail,

A drip, a drop,

The end of the tale

Águas de Março (Waters of March) Lyrics by Antônio Carlos Jobim

Each week we will feature a new wine blogger committed to sharing with readers their passion and knowledge of wine. If you are a wine blogger and are interested in being featured on our website please email us at secretsherrysociety@gmail.com.

Spherified Sherry Pearl Canapés

By Linda Miller Nicholson

E-to the-U-to the-REKA, Eureka! A whole realm of liquor-drenched possibility just ensconced itself in my kitchen-cum-laboratory.  I mean, when you can transform sherry into concentrated, raisin-like pearls, the world really is your oyster. And when you hit upon the technique through the grueling process of research and development (aka drink lots of sherry and experience the miracle of a happy accident) it’s all the more satisfying.

I recently read a review from El Bulli wherein Ferran Adria was said to have spherified sherry into raisins, thus my interest was piqued. I could find no information on the actual process, so I set about experimenting. I’ve done typical calcium chloride/sodium alginate spherification with alcohol and other acidic liquids before and was less than pleased with the results. That’s because you have to add an acid-balancing chemical (sodium citrate) that I feel adversely affects the final flavor.

I knew it was time to embrace a new spherification frontier, and I’ve been playing around with gelling techniques and agents recently, so why not spherify with one such as agar agar or gelatin? I read somewhere that someone dropped agar agar-infused liquid into cold oil and pearls were formed, so I figured I’d give it a go with sherry.

I got very lucky by simply following my preferred agar agar to liquid ratio (1.25:100) and dropping the mixture via kitchen syringe into freezer-chilled canola oil. Not only did it spherify, it proved just the right amount of agar agar to form an exterior skin while still remaining perfectly gushing on the inside.

Now that I’ve accomplished this feat, it’s like I played god for one brief moment. I have to wonder why the original god- Yoda, some nymph-mermaid hybrid, whoever that elusive god-creature really is- didn’t make raisins this good in our existing universe. I mean, if you can pack an 18% whollop of sweet but not too sweet high-brow alcohol into a sphere the size of a pinkie-toe and make it taste good with fewer ugly wrinkles than the passé raisins of my youth, why wouldn’t you?

Remember when you used to trade chocolate chips for raisins in the lunchroom and there was always some snot-nosed social-climbing weirdo who would give you all her chocolate chips in exchange for your palm-sweat coated raisins? Well all bets would be off with these “raisins” let me tell you. Kids would fight tooth and nail over them. Mormon entrepreneurs-in-training would quickly realize they could sell these sherry pearls to their classmates for a premium and once again they would take over a hedonistic hotbed of sin, just like their elders have done with Las Vegas. It would be drunken fifth grade mayhem of the highest order if only we’d serve sherry raisins to students. Seriously gives new meaning to No Child Left Behind, doesn’t it? Alas, a girl (who entertains brief delusions of deity) can dream…

Back to the reality of my kitchen for a moment: I chose to showcase my favorite flavors of España along with the sherry pearls- at least for their inaugural outing. I topped a puff pastry round with manchego cheese foam, slid in a sliver of Marcona almond, and dappled the canapé with the sherry raisins. It was simple, elegant and worthy of serving to your most discerning food-critical friend.

Speaking of simple, many feel that techniques which may or may not fall under the label “molecular gastronomy” are soulless sleights of science. This dish is emphatically not so, and would be a great launching point into that world since it is easily done with fairly accessible ingredients straight from a well-stocked grocer. Agar agar is easily sourced in both powder and strip form at natural foods or Asian markets. The other ingredients may be considered “gourmet” by some, but nevertheless can be found in any major city and most progressive towns across the US.

I don’t believe in creating esoteric food just for the sake of it being esoteric. I do, however, constantly strive to make things better, and these sherry raisins elevate both sherry and raisins to a level suitable to be served on the dinner plate, which is a place you don’t often see either.

Manchego Foam Canapes with Sherry “Raisins”

Makes 24 canapes

For the sherry raisins:

• 2 cups canola oil that has been frozen for at least four hours in a dish wide enough to drop sherry into
• 100 grams water
• 3.75 grams agar agar powder or strands (note- do not use agar agar that has been pre-mixed with sugar as the concentration is diluted and you won’t achieve proper spherification)
• 200 grams Sherry (I used Pedro Ximenez)
• 1 kitchen syringe, baster, or squeeze bottle.

1. Bring the water and agar agar to a boil over medium heat stirring constantly until agar agar dissolves.

1. Add to agar agar mixture to sherry and blend completely. You may wish to blitz it with an immersion blender to ensure complete uniformity. Place mixture into syringe, baster or bottle.
2. Working quickly to ensure your oil does not get above 20°F, drop raisin-sized droplets of sherry mixture into oil. My oil container is about 3×5” and I can usually get about 20 droplets per batch. Remove oil droplets with a slotted spoon to a mesh strainer after one minute. You should have perfect, raisin-sized spheres. Repeat with remaining sherry, however you will need to re-freeze your oil periodically as it must not go above 20°F.

For the canapés:

• 1 sheet puff pastry barely thawed
• ¾ c grated manchego cheese
• ½ c heavy cream
• 24 marcona almond halves

1. Preheat oven to 400°F.
2. Using a 1.5” cutter, make 24 rounds of puff pastry. Nestle rounds into cups of a mini-cupcake pan and bake until golden brown and puffed, about 15 minutes. You can make a light indentation with your finger in the cups in order that the toppings will sit well, if you wish.
3. Meanwhile, place manchego and cream in a small saucepan over medium heat. Stir frequently until manchego melts into cream. Blend with an immersion wand until fully incorporated,then chill in an ice bath until needed.

To assemble:

1. Place scoops or quenelles of manchego foam on the puff pastry rounds. Wedge in a marcona almond half. Drop one or two sherry raisins on top and serve.

Each week we will feature a new wine blogger committed to sharing with readers their passion and knowledge of wine. If you are a wine blogger and are interested in being featured on our website please email us at secretsherrysociety@gmail.com.

By Jennie Schacht

That the holidays are over should not foretell an end to celebration. Nor to dessert! With a new calendar year to adjust to, and Valentine’s Day around the corner, there’s plenty of cause for enjoying good food and wine with friends—and that includes indulging in sweets with sherry. If you thought that January was the time to pare back, think again. Desserts based on the bounty from your local farmers’ market can help you get your five-a-day without threatening any of your New Year’s resolutions.

As co-author with pastry chef Mary Cech of The Wine Lover’s Dessert Cookbook [http://jennieschacht.com/books.html], I have had the great enjoyment of pairing sherry with a variety of sweet somethings. Right off the bat, let’s remove the notion that pairing desserts with wine has to be intimidating. In fact, the only true rule is to eat and drink what you like, either separately or together. That’s right—toss out the guidebooks! What’s most important is your own personal preference. I mean, come on, it’s dessert after all. Let’s not get overly serious.

I can, however, offer a couple of suggestions about learning to taste. First, sample, sample, sample. Most dessert wines keep well for a week or more after you open them. (Vintage-dated reds are best consumed within a day or two.) That means you can keep a nice range of sherries on hand for sampling with desserts. Any time you make a dessert, try it with several different wines and pay attention to how the dessert’s flavors are enhanced or masked by the wine, and how the wine affects a bite of the dessert. In fact, why not have a dessert potluck? Pop open a few bottles of sherry, invite some friends to bring over their favorite dessert, and explore the combinations together.

Second. get to know your local wine merchant. A wine buyer tastes hundreds of wines, whittling the list down to what you find in their store. Once you find a wine shop with selections you tend to like, you can count on them to carry others that mirror your taste. Don’t be shy to chat with the sales folks. As they get to know your preferences they can introduce you to new wines you’re likely to enjoy.

You might wish to keep a few guiding principles in mind when pairing sherry and other wines with desserts. These are not intended as hard-and-fast rules, but rather as things to notice and think about as you taste.

• It’s generally best if the wine is a bit sweeter than the dessert it’s sharing your attention with. A less sweet wine may taste flat or even sour next to a sweeter dessert.
• Think about matching the weight of the wine to the richness of dessert, pairing fuller-bodied wines with richer desserts.
• Look to complement, marry, or gently contrast the dessert’s flavors with the wine.
• Don’t make your wine and dessert fight for attention. If the wine is complex, show it off with a simpler dessert. To highlight a dessert with many elements or flavors, choose a more straightforward wine.

I don’t need to extol the virtues of sherry in this forum. You are in good hands with the Secret Sherry Society to learn everything you need to know about this wondrous class of fortified, oxygen-exposed libations that range from dry to sweet.

Thinking specifically about desserts, sherry has a special affinity for almonds owing to oxidation in the winemaking process, which imparts nutty flavors and aromas. In Spain it is customary to snack on the two together. Almonds are one of two hundred species in the rose family, along with stone fruits like apricots, cherries, and peaches. So it’s no wonder that many of these fruits are compatible with that nut, and also with sherry. Sherry can also show walnut or hazelnut flavors, making it a stand-out pairing with many nut-based desserts. That extends to other flavors that tend to pair well with nuts. In fact, nuts can act as the bridge between a dessert and wine, helping to seal the match.

In our extensive, ahem, scientific experimentation, we found that sherry shared the dessert plate most amicably with the rich dairy flavors of butter, cream, and custard, sweet syrups (caramel, honey, butterscotch), warm spices, and of course toasted nuts. Chocolate often worked well, too. We found ourselves loving it as a match to many of the desserts in The Wine Lover’s Dessert Cookbook, from gingered pears to holiday fruit tartlets, and from a rich and sticky caramel apricot pecan tart to simple almond wafers.

I didn’t actively seek to pair the desserts with wines in my latest book, Farmers’ Market Desserts [http://tinyurl.com/yar3t8v]. But you can pretty well bet that any desserts with those classic flavors of butter and cream, honey and caramel, or toasted nuts will afford a lovely pairing with sherry.

Right now, in the dead of winter, try a belly-warming glass of sherry with a Cranberry-Pecan Tart in a Cocoa Crust, Oven-Steamed Persimmon Pudding with Honey-Lemon Hard Sauce, Roasted Pumpkin Pie in a Maple-Pecan Crust, or that lingering slice of Not-Your-Typical Holiday Fruitcake. In autumn, think Apple, Pear & Quince Galettes, Baked Apple Dumplings with Cinnamon Caramel, and Amaretti-Filled Caramel Roasted Pears. And when summer rolls around, keep a bottle of sherry on hand for pairing with an Aprium Almond Tart, which also has almond meal in the crust. Year round, sherry is the perfect complement to Hazelnut-Almond Biscotti.

Don’t wait until the year flies by and you find yourself preparing for the 2011 Holidays (gasp!). Start living this year now, with friends, something sweet to share, and a glass of sherry.