Happy Birthday Blood Hawk 23

[No Dice]

Happy Birthday John,

Hope it is a great one,

Dave

[gius]

HAVE A GREAT DAY, JOHN!!!!

[Blood_Hawk23]

Thanks Guys.

I have the day off and I'm enjoying it.

My wife is making a nice dinner for me. Pasta fagioli and homemade focaccia bread, Yum!!!

Now I just need the Wine to go with it and maybe a Steak.

Oh its the first day of Autum. Hope everyone can enjoy it.

Till Later,
John

[misson]

Happy birthday Bloodhawk!
Mario

[Fibber]

....41 , those were the days!!!! You are getting to be a old geezer there buddy. Enjoy it and have a great day, you deserve it! BTW, I will be short one year next month being married to the SAME woman as long as you have been here! Mind numbing!

ADDENDUM: you just gave me a (ahem) reason to have a nice afternoon celebration! Here's to you!

[Allen]

Happy birthday!

[Rami]

Blood_Hawk23,

Happy birthday, buddy!

[ElsnerMarkus]

Happy Birthday

[_486_Col_Wolf]

Happy Birthday BH !

[Sarg Willy]

Hot wax , bondage , Ahhhh the good old day,s ,

[kelticheart]

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, JOHN!

If I may, a good Cabernet or, even better, a Cabernet-Sauvignon would have accompanied your pasta e fagioli and you steak nicely!

Have a good one!

Cheers!
KH

[Blood_Hawk23]

Kelti,

Thats exactly what I was thinking. Col Di Sasso is the label of Cabernet-Sauvignon that we normally get. Although I wish we could have access to the wine you can get.


Thank you again everyone. It was a very good day. I hope everyone had a good one.

[kelticheart]

.....Although I wish we could have access to the wine you can get.

John,

I am not a wine connoisseur, my fiancée is more knowledgeable than me, since he attended private courses over the years to learn about good wines. She introduced me to Cabernet-Sauvignon and I even drank excellent Cabernet-Sauvignon and Sirah produced in Australia!

I am a simple man and I love keeping the old tradition here of going to the wine producer directly around mid-February, buy the wine bulk, bring home around 60 litres of red wine and then bottle it myself. My granddad did it, my dad did it and now I do it.

Usually, I obtain around 80 bottles of wine, each bottle capacity is 0.75 litres. I am not a great drinker either, that's my wine consumption for two years, usually, which allows me to age a few bottles for two to four years, the top ageing for red wine of this area. Gutturnio is the name of the most popular wine produced in the province of Piacenza, known since Roman times. It's made out a variable mixture of two native red grapes: 2/3 of Bonarda (sweet and mild) and 1/3 of Barbera (dry and strong).
The two grapes are mixed right before pressing them and the fermentation process happens with the two juices already together. The variation of the proportions between the two grapes employed produces a range of Gutturnios running from demi-sec and sparkling to flat, drier variants. I love the demi-sec, sparkling Gutturnio.
The sparkling aspect develops after bottling it and it's completely natural. When I bring the bulk wine home, it's completely flat and very sweet, when I open the first bottle 12 months later the wine is sparkling and demi-sec. The fermentation process continues after bottling, it's the high sugar content of specific grapes, in this case Bonarda, that causes it.
A characteristic of local wines here, brought to an art by Spumante (it means very sparkling) Brut producers here and Champagne makers in Southern France.

I am not familiar with Col di Sasso brand, as I said I am not an expert, but rest assured that the export production here has the same quality levels you could find locally. By the same token, dishonest people plague the entire mankind and wine scams are quite common here. An incautious buyer here can get worst wine than you can get in the US!
Recently the news reported a huge scam discovered about Brunello di Montalcino, a very expensive red wine from Tuscany. Few producers were caught by Police with such amounts of Brunello that could not even be made if the entire Italian territory were covered with Brunello grape plants! All kinds of low quality red grapes, coming from who knows where, were thrown into it! Earnings would have been huge, if the wine could have been sold.

Authorities were able to impound 100% of the phony Brunello stores and close down the wineries involved, yet some quantities were exported already.

If you wish to treat yourself with a bottle of Brunello di Montalcino, make sure you trust your local wine store dealer blindly, because a bottle of forged Brunello is sold at 300% more than its real value! Not counting it could even be bad for your health.
Brunello is good very old, aged for at least 10 years. This is why is sooooo expensive!

Cheers!
KH

[Cody Coyote]

Celebrate all week (with a different wine each night)!

Hope you had a great day.