Skip to main content

Dinner at Vallone's with Silvia Franco


I had a fantastic night out in Houston at the end of May with Jeremy Parzen, Mai Pham, Alfonso Cevola and Silvia Franco. The evening began at Vallone's with a tasting of some Nino Franco wines and ended with a trip to Camarata to check out the latest offerings from David Keck. As always, the food and wine were delicious and, on this evening, both the wine and the company were sparkling.

We tasted through the following wines over miniature lobster roll appetizers:

 Rustica Prosecco Superiore NV- fresh and crisp with a subtle pear and citrus aroma and flavor with a touch of yeast.
Brut Prosecco Superiore NV- dry, fresh and crisp with delicate aromas of citrus blossoms and flavors of apricot and pear with a hint of yeast.
And, the unusual 2011 Faive Rosé Brut Sparkling; this wine is made from 80% Merlot and 20% Cabernet Franc rather than the usual Glera grape that is used to produce Prosecco. It was dry and crisp with fresh aromas and light flavors of red berries and apricot.

 All were refreshing, crisp and very drinkable. They were drier and less fruity than other Prosecco I have tasted and they were somewhat softer and easier drinking than some other sparkling wines of the world. I couldn't pick a favorite, all are recommended.

 I learned that Silvia enjoys tasting wine from whatever country she is traveling in while doing business and sharing tastes of her family's fantastic wines. In addition to our Prosecco tasting, we had a "new to the Vallone's wine list" Willamette Valley Pinot Noir to wind down dinner. Check with the sommelier to try that wine or whatever else might be new to the menu now. You can't go wrong.
Labels:

Comments

  1. AnonymousJune 11, 2014 at 12:48 PM

    Your friends and my friend would get along so well. He is such a wine critic and always is ordering different kinds of wine whenever we go out to dinner. I will have to ask him if he's tried the kinds that you've written about. If he finds a new kind, it pretty much makes his whole day. http://www.giftforless.biz/listing.asp?dept_id=45160&nopopup=1

    ReplyDelete
  2. Kristen R.June 17, 2014 at 12:12 PM

    Great Prosecco, and great family! One of my favorites.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Thank you for reading Wine Life - Houston.

Popular posts from this blog

Winemaker, Andrés Sánchez of Alcance

I was invited to a media and trade tasting lunch at Backstreet Cafe with Andrés Sánchez, the winemaker for Alcance, a Jackson Family winery. As guests arrived, we were greeted with a glass of lightly chilled Alcance Chardonnay 2016, a perfect start for a hot summer day in Houston. This rich and elegant Chardonnay is grown on granitic soils in a coastal mountain vineyard in the Valle de Itata. Despite my multiple wine classes, this was a growing area with which I was not familiar. This vineyard is located between the Andes Mountains and the Pacific Ocean about 12 miles from the coast which as Sánchez pointed out adds a nice sea influence to the wine. The Chardonnay was pleasantly fresh with light citrus notes and a touch of butterscotch with a distinct saline mineralty throughout the slightly creamy finish.  A mixed appetizer platter with Gulf Coast Beignets, duck spring rolss, asparagus and zuchini flatbread, and lump crab cakes on red pepper beurre blanc were br...
Post a Comment
Read more

Darioush Wine Tasting at Pappas Grill

I went to a  Darioush wine tasting last Friday. What a delight! I found every bottle we tasted to be exceptional. Darioush is well-known for their Bordeaux styled wines so I was already familiar with both the Darioush "Signature" and the Estate Caravan Cabernet Sauvignon from Napa Valley. They are both highly rated and consistently good. The Caravan is the lower priced of the two and is something that I keep in stock at home. The wines in the line up for the evening were all from Napa Valley and included: 2008 Signature Viognier, 2005 Signature Chardonnay, 2005 Signature Merlot, 2007 Signature Shiraz, 2007 Estate Caravan Cabernet Sauvignon, and both the 2006 & 2007 Signature Cabernet Sauvignon. The 2007 was opened by mistake which was a bonus to all who were present. The Viognier varietal has been hit and miss for me at tastings in the past but this offering was an absolute stand out. It was very fragrant with floral notes of jasmine and or...
Post a Comment
Read more

"The Zen of Zin" Tasting at Fleming's in River Oaks

On Friday evening, my husband and I attended the Zinfandel wine tasting at Fleming's in River Oaks. My husband gets totally pumped up for any and all things Zinfandel but what I found really intriguing in the line up of wines were the aged offerings. Brent Sloan, managing partner at Houston's premier wine storage facility Nos Caves Vin, had provided Fleming's with four 18 year old bottlings and one 17 year old bottling from his collection of some of his favorites. I found this interesting because 1. I don't believe that I have ever had an 18 year old Zinfandel before this evening and 2. From various wine classes, I had always heard that at best Zinfandel had very limited aging ability. So, I was definitely excited to give these wines a taste. There were also an additional five younger Zinfandel wines that are some of Fleming's best sellers. The entire tasting line up for the evening included: 2009 Orin Swift Saldo - California 2007 Schulz "Lampyridae...
5 comments
Read more