Ordering wine in a restaurant: “By-the-glass” offers a fun learning experience (4 wines with steak)

After a few hours of working on the kitchen Saturday, Kim and I were getting hungry and it was getting late. 8:00 PM rolled around and we decided we wanted good steaks. Our favorite steakhouse in town is Fleming’s Primes Steakhouse and Wine Bar which offers 100 wines by the glass, an extensive reserve wine list and a variety of meats and seafood to satisfy any appetite. Beware that the wine prices are a bit high, but their by-the-glass list offers many good values, the food is always good, and the service is outstanding. So we called, squeezed in a 9:30 reservation and excitedly hurried over anticipating a great meal.  (Image from dreamstime.com)

Now, normally at a nice dinner I order a bottle of Champagne and a bottle of red wine at the beginning of the meal. This gives the wine time to sit in a decanter if necessary and helps us decide on what we are going to eat. At a steakhouse, it’s almost always a Cabernet or Bordeaux-blend, with the occasional Malbec or other miscellaneous varietal wine. On this night, though, we decided to try something different. SO we started our meal with a round of white wines by the glass, a Riesling and a Gewurztraminer to be precise. Both were quite good and perfect with our fried calamari appetizer.

When it came time to order our entrees and dinner wine, we went with some of our favorites. Kim ordered a Filet Mignon covered in Lobster meat, while I went with my favorite steak in Baltimore: bone-in ribeye cooked rare-plus (just below medium rare). But, Instead of pairing the steaks with one bottle of wine, we decided on having four wines poured so we could compare how each went with the steak. Having an extensive wine list afforded us the ability to try a variety of good wines, all under $15 per glass, to determine what we preferred most with steak. We had a lot of fun doing it and it was a good learning experience.

The first wine we tried was a 2005 Casa Laposteolle Merlot. This Chilean Merlot had interesting flavors but fell apart a bit on the finish. The spice notes up front were nice and made this an OK pairing with my steak. Overall the wine was good, I ended up giving it 86 pts, whereas Kim liked this more and would have scored this a few points higher.

The next wine in the lineup was a 2005 Rust En Vrede South African Merlot. The earth notes on this wine were very pleasing, a lighter wine than the Casa Laposteolle and more balanced. This went nicely with Kim’s Fillet, and overall I rated the wine at 89 pts, a very good wine.

The third wine in the flight was a 2006 Palacios Remondo Rioja La Vendimia that had notes of black cherry, clay, cheap cologne with moderate tannins and medium acidity. The wine again lacked balance, but was still suitable for either cut of steak. I gave this wine 83 pts and Kim agreed there was just something missing here.

The last wine was a different animal altogether. The 2005 Chateau Ste. Michelle Cabernet Sauvignon Columbia Valley Indian Wells. I found flavors of blackberry, rich cassis, cocoa and toasted oak. The tannins were elegant, a touch sweet, and this was the most balanced wine out of the group. I thought this wine was great, giving it 90 pts and at it’s $18 in the store, it’s an incredible value. It opened up nicely after an hour in the glass and went very well with the ribeye steak.

Overall we had a lot of fun going back and forth between each glass, reaching across each other and trying to keep from mixing the wines up! Next time you’re out for dinner at Fleming’s, or any restaurant with an extensive by-the-glass list, consider having some fun and trying a variety of wines. It’s a great way to learn what food and wine pairings you like the best and most importantly, it’s a great time for everyone at the table!