My Fair Lazy - Jen Lancaster [100]
We come to the chardonnay-lump of infection pairing and my palms begin to sweat. I don’t want to be the only asshole at the counter who’s afraid of cheese, and yet I really, really don’t want to put this hideous concoction anywhere near my face.
Wine Goddess explains how the weird residual stuff left in your mouth after you sip some chardonnays is oak sap and tells us it’s best to serve the wine with food, as that will help get rid of the resin. Then she prompts us to taste the Roaring Forties Blue. I hesitate.
Okay, I’ve had bleu cheese before, and I like it just fine on my chicken wings and in my Cobb salad (provided the chunks are small and white), but this is . . . so far outside my comfort zone. I did mention it looks like a bruise, yes? Yet I’m fascinated to find out it originated from the cracks in a cheese mold. I love knowing that some industrious French farmer looked at the blue veins and said, “Pairhaps ziz vill bee delectabulll and not jus’ garbaaaghe?”
Taking the tiniest, least-in-need-of-an-antibiotic-looking bit on the tip of my knife, I break off a big piece of bread and spread it. Then I pop it in my mouth and force myself to begin to chew, and I realize it would be my great pleasure and honor to pair this with a chicken wing, for it truly is delectable.
Who knew?
I mean, except for the professional at the front of the room who specifically picked it, the fine cheesemakers at the Roaring Forties company, and the original Frenchman who wasn’t afraid to let a little penicillin ruin his fromage.
After a quick discussion about how screw caps eliminate “cork taint,”194 we move on to a bottle of Regis Cruchet Vouvray, which may as well mean “purple monkey dishwasher” to me. Wine Goddess explains that this is the “nerdiest” of wines, and if you ever encounter a wine snob, this is the one about which he or she will go on. I guess it’s because it’s kind of weird, it’s an acquired taste.
We huff and swirl and I take a sniff and all I smell is dark and fore boding and . . . wait, I think I caught a whiff of something other than “wine.” The nose on this is like a . . . Fig Newton?
Wine Goddess asks, “What do you smell?”
I blurt, “Figs?”
“Very good!” she exclaims. HA! Yes! In your face, imaginary person against whom I was competing! I win!
I take another taste and realize that I don’t actually like figgy wine. Huh. Apparently I have met a wine I don’t like. Considering how many boxes of pure swill and bottles of Boone’s Farm I’ve happily quaffed in my lifetime, this feels like a tiny victory.
But I don’t dump my Vouvray into my heretofore-empty spit bucket because I still haven’t tasted it with the Brie. Except, this isn’t Brie at all—it’s a Brie impostor called Robiola Due Latte. As with each cheese, we’re instructed to pick up a bit on our knife and give it a solid whiff before tasting.
“What do you smell?” Wine Goddess asks.
“A farm,” one girl replies, wincing.
“No, it’s like sheep poop,” her friend corrects.
“Eau de sweat sock?” asks the wife beside me.
Apparently because the Roaring Forties was so stinky, I didn’t even notice the stench wafting off the Robiola. The scent is indescribable unless you’ve had a mouse expire under your fridge and couldn’t get maintenance to pick it up all weekend.
I’m terror-struck about the possibility of this passing my lips, but Wine Goddess has been spot-on in almost every other instance. So, on blind faith alone, and despite my olfactory protest, Fletch and I give a quick “cheers” by tapping our knives together.
I watch as Fletch recoils and tries not to gag, which is kind of weird because there is a frigging choir of angels sounding off in my mouth right about now. They’re up there singing Ave Maria and rolling around in this stuff. I take a much larger portion and savor it before sipping the Vouvray.
Yeah, that still kind of sucks.
But it sucks less with a cheese chaser.
I deposit the rest of my glass in the bucket and swirl around a quick water rinse before declaring that figs belong in cookies, not beverages.