Paradocx Touriga and Domaine Ste Michelle Champagne

Last night, July 26th, was our one month wedding anniversary, so we celebrated with a filet mignon, roasted potato, roasted sweet potato and corn dinner. And, obviously, a bottle wine. This celebration, mind you was different from the fourth Saturday of married life celebration we had two days prior we had with friends. I swear, if Treasa ever got a job at Hallmark, she’d make them a fortune with her ability to invent holidays that husbands are legally, at least by the law that counts, obligated to celebrate.

I did the usual burnt herb roasted potato side, but also got frisky and tried something with sweet potatoes too. To contrast the burnt, savory herb flavor of the former, I did the latter with more of a Persian flair with a hint of cinnamon sugar. Treasa nuked the frozen corn, added a stick of butter for each week of our marriage, the steaks came off the grill, and we sat down to eat.

We had a Paradocx Touriga left over from the wedding. Not only was this sentimental and thoughtful, but practical as the wine goes well with red meats. It also gave us an excuse to try our new Vinturi wine aerator, which was a wedding present from Treasa’s aunt and uncle. I’ll be honest, I really can’t tell you if it works because we didn’t aerate one glass and just uncork and pour the second one to have a taste test. (I’ll try to remember to do it next time though). However, the aerator is really easy to use, dishwasher safe and makes a really cool sound when you pour wine through it. So even if it is a gimmick, which I doubt, the sound effects are worth any incremental effort.

And partially because we still have most of a case left over from the wedding and because it’s really good for twelve-ish dollars, we relaxed after cleaning up the kitchen with a bottle of Domaine Ste Michelle.

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This post is a continuation from the previous, where we are about to head down for dinner at the Waterford Castle in Waterford, Ireland.

I can’t find my notes which captured our wine selections for the evening. I’m going to use their disappearance as an excuse for not updating here in a few days. So, if I find the page, on which I distinctly remember writing the wines down on a piece of paper separate from my trip journal, I’ll come back and update the following:

The chef provided a non menu special to get us started. I’m sure the official name was something tastily extravagant, but I remember a grilled pita chip, cheese and a spicy roasted pepper spread with fresh parsley. It was a fantastic one bite course.

Treasa had the lobster bisque for an appetizer while I enjoyed seared scallops in a bisque-esque sauce over a red onion salsa.

Treasa had a meat trifecta, not the Castle’s wording, for her entrée consisting of pork loin, pork shoulder and lamb. I had a filet mignon with a mushroom black peppercorn sauce. While mine was certainly good, her pork won the most attention. As a side note, this was the second time we had ordered a filet, both time medium rare, on the trip. Each piece was cooked to what I would consider just a hair past medium. Being as both places were definitely fine dining, I’m starting to wonder if there is a disparity between the US and Ireland meat temperature scale.

Pierre Darcy’s Brut Champagne

I’ve fallen a little behind getting the honey moon exploits in blog format. This entry relates to our 5th day in Ireland, Sunday, July 3rd. We spend the day in Waterford. We arrived late morning and were taken aback by the ghost town likeness of the city. We stopped into a pub for lunch. After we finished, we were astounded at how the city had come to life. Apparently, either you go to church on Sunday mornings in Waterford, or you don’t show your face in public if you didn’t.

Prior to arriving at Waterford Castle, we stopped and got a bottle of Champagne for the night (along with a few other bottles, but those are for another post). Funny how you can get booze in a town on Sunday where people are afraid to show their face if they aren’t in church, but in Pennsylvania you’re SOL.

We found a E38 bottle of Pierre Darcy’s Brut Champagne for 50% off. We didn’t notice this until after we paid, but it’s a blend of Chardonnay, Pinor Noir and Pinor Meunier.

We arrived at the Castle, unloaded the luggage and I parked the turbo diesel. Somehow in the course of checking in, the fact that we were on our honeymoon emerged as a focal point of the conversation. Almost on cue, the concierge told us that we were upgraded to the Presidential Suite.


This. Was. The. Best. Hotel. Room I. Could. Possibly. Imagine. Our suite had its own foyer. Our bathroom was about the size of the first floor of our home in Delaware. It had a living room with a flat screen, two couches, a desk, dining table and three or four bookcases. (If you go to the link above and wait for the page to scroll through the photos, you’ll see a few of the room we stayed in). The master bedroom was probably a third of an acre. We decided that we could manage in these accommodations, and uncorked the champagne. Lemon and apple flavors were apparent. It was good, and we certainly didn’t complain, though Treasa and I prefer the bubbly a tad drier.

Huia Sauvignon Blanc & Ontanan Crianza Rioja

…continued from previous post…

After finishing the bottle of Henriot Souverain, taking pictures of the empty bottle, and ironing our fancy clothes, we headed down for dinner. The wine list was fairly extensive, and considering we were already lubed up with a few Guinni (plural for ‘Guinness’) and a bottle of bubbly, we decided to let the sommelier match wine to our food in half bottle increments.

Treasa selected a roast duck breast appetizer while I went with the Atlantic sea bass and tiger prawn. The sommelier, who was excellent though I didn’t note his name in our daily log, paired us with half a bottle of an ’08 Huia Sauvignon Blanc from Marlborough New Zealand for E26. We each really liked it. It was much fuller and rounder than a lot of the Sauv Blancs we typically drink in the $10-$14.99 range. While it wasn’t a perfect match to either of our dishes, it was very good with both.

Treasa went with lamb chops with a side of shepherd’s pie while I had a filet mignon with a sweet onion puree for entrees. We were paired with a E22 half bottle of Ontanon Crianza, which I absolutely fell in love with. It was very similar to one of my favorite wines, Bogle’s Phantom, in so far that it was bold and robust, yet it was also a smidge smoother and lighter.

After a fantastic day and a wonderful meal, we retreated to our suite to combat the forces of jet lag.

Henriot Souverain Brut

This post refers to Tuesday, June 29th, our first night in Ireland. Treasa and I flew into Shannon and proceeded to the car rental counter to pick up our Hyundai i30 turbo diesel. This car was really fun to drive. Except for the fact that everything was on ‘the wrong side.’ The driver’s seat was on the right, you drove on the left side of the road and I had to shift with my left hand. Luckily, the pedals were oriented normally, with the clutch on the left, brake in the middle and gas to the right.

And if that wasn’t nerve wracking enough, a combination of narrow, seemingly medieval roads and psychotic Irish drivers was sufficient to make me wholeheartedly appreciate my first Guinness. But I’ll get to that. In so far as the roads were concerned, picture this: all of the various and frequent corners are blind because the road serface is below field level with grasses and shrubbery lining the pavement. One road was so narrow that the aforementioned grass was hitting each of the side mirrors and the speed limit was 80 km/hr. And for the cherry on top, the road is a two way street!


After driving north to see the Cliffs of Moher, we head back down near Limerick to the Adare Manor. If you follow golf, you’ll recognize Adare Manor from the JP McMannus ProAm Tiger Woods played in the weekend following our stay. Because of the upcoming event, we saw the Manor’s grounds in a state of absolute perfection.

We went into the clubhouse for the golf course, watched some Gaelic football, and had our first Irish Guinness. It really does taste better there. Then had our second.


By this time it was getting close to dinner, so we had a bottle champagne sent up to our room while we were getting ready. The staff selected the cheapest champagne on the wine list…for E78 (I’m going to use a capital ‘E’ to denote Euro’s) which after the American Express currency conversion, leaves me with a $106 line item on this month’s credit card statement. And this is how we were introduced to Henriot Souverain Brut. By no means was this a bad bottle of champagne, but I feel comfortable putting a ‘nothing special’ label on it. And considering Domaine Ste Michelle can be had for about $95 less, well, we’ll chalk this one up to first night on the honeymoon indulgences.

Paradocx Left Overs

Treasa and I just got back from our honeymoon in Ireland. I’ll be updating with posts about the wines we drank abroad, along with a daily recap of our doings, over the next few days.

This post refers to Sunday, June 27th, which was the day after our wedding. We had a few open bottles of wine left over from the reception, and considering they’d go sour while we were abroad, I decided to do a little wine tasting while I cooked dinner. Despite the caterer’s leftovers in the fridge, Treasa wanted spaghetti and meatballs for dinner. Combining the desire to cook and the motto, ‘If she ain’t happy, you ain’t happy,’ I made sauce from scratch to go along with beef-pork meatballs.

Paradocx packages some of their wine in paint cans, as shown in the picture. It’s pretty unique, and a pinch classier than a box. Of course, the incremental classyness aspect of it isn’t something I particularly care about much. If you like it, drink it. But, it’s touted to keep the wine fresh for 2-3 weeks, and, well, it’s pretty darn cool.

Wines I re-sampled were the Touriga, Leverage, Merlot and Barn Red. I’ve listed them in the order of my preference. I didn’t have any of the leftover whites. The opened bottles went to Miranda and the Whitewash paint can still resides in my refrigerator.