Dinner - Zeppoli's (Spain and Italy)

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.

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!

Zeppoli's buffet counter

 

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.

 

Me (left) with my friend Margaret

Casey and Sarah at our group's table!

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.

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!

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!