Every other Sunday, Zeppoli’s
Italian Restaurant and Wine Shop has a wine tasting/ food pairing dinner for
only $15.00. Last week, the dinner was called “Spain and Italy, Vino di Vino.”
The region of focus this week was on Spain and Italy, both of which I would one
day love to visit! I finally decided to go to a tasting last Sunday night, and
I definitely had both an enjoyable and educational experience. My good friend
Steelie (also in Geography of Wine) works at Zeppoli’s, so our group was
definitely well taken care of during our dinner! Zeppoli's is located on University City Boulevard across from Panera Bread.
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| Front View of Zeppoli's |
I went to the dinner with a
group of friends from Geography of Wine. The seven of us arrived at the
restaurant a little before the dinner was scheduled to begin at 8:15 pm and
then paid and were seated in the designated wine room with other wine tasters.
The food was set up buffet style on a counter, and we were each given a glass
of water and a wine glass by our Zeppoli’s wine tasting host, Matthew Burch.
When the food was ready, we filed up to the counter and filled our plates with
a variety of foods- crackers and a variety of Virginia cheeses, turkey wraps,
Greek salad, bread with olive oil for dipping, meatballs, gnocchi, and
margherita pizza. Everything looked delicious and we could barely wait to start
trying wines so we could eat the food!
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| Zeppoli's buffet counter |
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| My plate of food...yum! |
We ended up trying more wines
than planned (and some that the Vintage Cellar coincidentally had at their
tasting last week, like Cortenova Pinot Grigio) but I will talk about the main
five we tasted here.
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| Me (left) with my friend Margaret |
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| Casey and Sarah at our group's table! |
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| Tasting Cortenova NV Prosecco |
The first wine we tasted was
the Cortenova NV Prosecco from Veneto, Italy. The alcohol content was 11% and
the wine is priced at $13.99. It is 100% Prosecco. The nose smelled like fresh
pears and Granny Smith apples. It tasted fresh and clean and had a pleasant
aftertaste. It was very balanced. With this wine, I sampled the local Virginian
soft Brie cheese. Tasting the wine with the cheese made the wine’s flavors seem
more bold and flavorful. It was definitely more refreshing of a wine combined
with the cheese!
The second wine we tasted was
Opera Prima NV Sparking Moscato. This pink Moscato is from La Mancha, Spain and
is priced at Zeppoli’s at $5.99. It is 100% Moscato and is 7% alcohol. I found
this sparkling wine to be extremely refreshing and easy to drink. According to
Matthew, this wine is a crowd pleaser for its simplicity and goes well with
desserts! The nose had a fresh, flowery
smell on the nose. It was almost like an entire bouquet of flowers. The peachy
taste was very pleasant, and the sparkling element made it crisp and delicious.
I tasted this wine with a meatball and the bread dipped in olive oil. The
meatball made the flowery notes stronger, and the olive oil dipped bread
intensified the crisp, sparkling element of the wine. Overall, tasting the wine
with the food was a good experience! However, I would like to try this wine
with a decadent, chocolate type of dessert in the future.
The third wine we tasted was a
2011 Opera Prima Tempranillo from the La Mancha region in Spain. It is 100%
Tempranillo, priced at $6.99, and is 12.5% alcohol. This spicy wine had notes
of deep purple plums and blackberries and a full finish. For me, the wine was
somewhat a punch in the mouth and was a little overpowering to my taste buds.
However, pairing this wine with the gnocchi pasta toned it down and made the
richer, creamier elements of the wine come out. I would definitely recommend
this wine with a rich Italian pasta or grilled meats, as I think that would be
a good pair.
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| Cortenova Sangiovese |
The fourth wine was a 2011
Cortenova Sangiovese from Veneto, Italy. This wine is 100% Sangiovese, 12.5%
alcohol, and had a very deep red color. Priced at $6.99, I would definitely
consider it to be a value! Right off the bat, I noticed a pleasant, warming
cherry aroma. The nose smelled rather sweet. Upon tasting the wine, I was a
little taken aback at how tart it was, but the finish was sweet, which balanced
it out really well. I actually really liked this wine! I tried the Greek salad
and margherita pizza with this wine. I found it to pair well with the Greek
salad, because the pleasant tartness was intensified while the finish remained
sweet. However, I did not notice any change when sampling this wine with the
margherita pizza.
The fifth wine we tried was a
2009 Damilano ‘Marghe’ Nebbiolo from Piedmont, Italy. It is priced at $16.99 at
Zeppoli’s and the alcohol content is 14%, which is relatively high. I have to
say that I did not enjoy this wine whatsoever. It was too dark, heavy, and
spicy for my tastes, and the alcohol content was definitely obvious. I detected
a sort of industrial metallic taste from this wine, and the mouth pucker was over
the top. Matthew suggested this wine be paired with aged cheese, so I tasted it
with the variety of Virginia cheeses. To me, the cheeses just made the strong
tannin taste even more evident, so I did not really enjoy the combo. I think if
I had any gnocchi left, this wine may have paired better with that. This wine was a miss for me. However, I
enjoyed every wine prior to it, so I still consider the tasting a success!
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| Wine tasting notes on the sheet provided to us from Zeppoli's |
Overall, I had an extremely great evening pairing
wines with food at Zeppoli’s! The food was delicious, and I like that we tasted
a wide variety of Spanish and Italian wines. The sparkling Moscato was
definitely a favorite of mine, as it was extremely easy to drink. However, the Sangiovese
was probably my absolute favorite of the tasting, because it surprised me how much I liked
its tart, fruity flavor. Red wines are generally not my favorites, but this
wine opened me up to the idea of drinking reds more. It also paired really well
with the Greek salad, and I would love to see what else it goes well with. I
would definitely consider my Zeppoli’s wine dinner a success!
