Happy Birthday Dear Mandee…

Voice & SoVino… So Wonderful

If my birthday celebration was any indication of how this year is going to turn out, I think 26 is going to be pretty great. After a night spent with family and friends on Friday, Andrew and I had Saturday night to ourselves and it was such a treat. Ever since Voice opened in April at Hotel Icon in downtown Houston, I’ve been itching to try it. I’ve also wanted to try SoVino for a while now and I was so pleased with both places!

Mandee & Andrew At SoVino

Walking into Voice, the decor and design of the resaurant are immediately impressive. It’s very cool and classy but fun at the same time with black and white cowhide barstools, velvet patterned drapes hanging from the very high ceiling and ornate gold trim everywhere. Leather chairs made for comfortable dining but we were seated at a table for two and it was so long that it felt like we were a mile away from each other. That was the only part of dinner that I didn’t love. It made it difficult to share things, which we always do, and even to have a conversation. The one thing that made up for the lack of gab was the awesome music they had playing in the background. Everything from the Rolling Stones to Michael Jackson made dinner a lot more entertaining. Enough about the atmosphere, let’s get to the good stuff. Food and wine!

We ordered by the glass since I was in the mood for white and he wanted red. They could have offered a few more options by the glass but overall their wine list looked pretty impressive and was very well priced. I would say it was definitely one of the best value wine lists I have seen in Houston. I thoroughly enjoyed my 2006 Van Duzer Pinot Gris from Willamette Valley, Oregon. It was light, crisp and refreshing which is exactly what I wanted and expected. It was structured and balanced with a clean finish. It would go well with at least half the menu which made ordering dinner especially easy. I started off with the Mushroom Soup Cappuccino which was heavenly. Crimini mushroom soup topped with truffle foam and porcini powder. It almost plays with your mind a little when it first arrives in front of you in a coffee cup because it truly does look so much like a cappuccino. I then had the Maytag Blue Cheese Salad which was good but nothing to write home about. Andrew ordered the Asparagus Salad and they looked almost identical while they sounded completely different on the menu. For my entrée I had the special which was a Tazmanian Trout which looked and tasted like salmon. It was very good but I would order something else next time. Andrew started with the Composition Of Local Heirloom Tomatoes with goat cheese, black mission figs and arugula… very tasty but exactly what you would expect. I like that all of the ingredients are local. His entrée was to die for! He ordered the Venison Sous Vide with a sour cherry sauce. My mouth is watering just typing about it right now. It was so tender he didn’t even need a steak knife. It also paired beautifully with his Australian wine, a 2005 Loose End GSM (Grenache, Shiraz and Merlot) from Barossa Valley. It was fantastic and definitely a wine I plan on seeking out to enjoy at home. Perhaps the most exciting part of this meal were the Truffled Parmesan French Fries. Yes I said Truffled Parmesan French Fries. Little bites of HEAVEN is what those were! It was just silly how good they were. I would say they were better than dessert which is true blasphemy for a sweet-eater like me. Speaking of sweets… I can’t really complain. While it looked like they had several yummy choices, our waiter decided to order for us which we were ok with. Normally I wouldn’t have been but I think I may have been a little bit high on truffled french fries and my judgement was impaired. Before my delectable Study in Chocolate came out (and Andrew’s Warm Chocolate Cake) we had a champagne toast to celebrate my birthday. Like I always say, you can’t properly celebrate without some bubbles. We each had a glass of Leon Palais Brut Blanc de Blancs from Champagne, France and it was perfect. It was, in my opinion, everything a good glass of bubbles should be. It wasn’t too sweet, it had a gorgeous single line of bubbles coming straight up the middle of the flute and it went down easy. It was so good that it left me wanting more… which led us to SoVino.

I am actually headed back to SoVino this weekend because I didn’t get enough of it on my first trip. The atmosphere was fantastic. Here we were able to sit next to each other which was nice since we were so far apart at dinner. The lighting was dim and romantic, the music was good and the company was better. I decided to stick with bubbles and enjoyed two marvelous glasses of Mumm Napa Brut Prestige. I actually liked the Leon Palais better but would be happy to order this again as well. Andrew drank the 2003 Oberon Cabernet Sauvignon from Napa which of course inspired me to go on some sort of rant about Oberon, the King of the Fairies, in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. That’s about as intellectual as I got that night. My brain was too overwhelmed with delicious food and wine to think about anything else. It was all in all perhaps the best birthday I have had to date and I am so excited to see where this year takes me!

Cheers!

Mandee

 

Educated Guess Cabernet Sauvignon 2005

Wine As Interesting As Its Label

I don’t have too much to say about Educated Guess other than it was one of the most interesting Cabernets I have ever had the pleasure to drink. It was incredibly smooth with flavors of juicy blackberries, boysenberries and creamy vanilla. I think it may have been the creaminess that made it so unique. That’s not a texture I’m used to in a Cabernet. I wanted to hold each sip in my mouth, close my eyes and savor it. It was jammy without being overly sweet. It was a true delight.

I will say this, however. I ordered this wine at a tapas and wine and tapas bar called Oporto which specializes in Portuguese wines and foods. They offer other options, of course, or I would never have ended up with this lovely Californian variety from Roots Run Deep winery. I just didn’t love the wine as much with any of the foods that we ordered. The wine was ordered before the food (obviously first priority). We ate curried lamb meatballs, lump crab meat crepes with bechamel sauce, a marinated portobello mushroom stuffed with spinach and cheese and finally baked brie with fig preserves, strawberries and sliced pears. Does that sound like a delicious meal or what? Oh it was. The Educated Guess didn’t taste unpleasant with the food… it just didn’t add anything to the meal and the meal didn’t accent the wine, either. This is definitely a wine I would buy again, but perhaps just to enjoy on its own. I have not found this wine in a store yet but am keeping my eyes open for it. After doing a little research I learned that all the chaos on the label is actually meaningful. Those are five different formulas that are used in winemaking. Who knew?

If you are in Houston and happen to make it over to Oporto on Richmond (which I would highly recommend) you should try the Estampa Cabernet/Syrah blend from Chile. This was my companion’s order and upon first sip I was certain I had once again out-ordered him. It was almost too dry but once it had a second to open up and breathe in the glass it was absolutely gorgeous and it was even better with everything we ordered. I am always impressed with a wine that can pair beautifully with so many different types of foods. That is no easy task. It was definitely much drier than the Educated Guess and had flavors of cherries and black pepper but still had a very slight hint of vanilla on the finish… very seductive. My second glass of the night was a 2004 Barahonda that was also smooth and dry but, like the Educated Guess, did not pair as well with the foods as the Estampa.