This arty (read: unintentionally underexposed) photo is attempting to capture the tawny Brooklyn dusk through the lens of a great glass of wine. When I went to Bonita a while back I consumed the pictured glass of wine, which totally knocked my socks off.
When the waitress was taking orders, I asked what sort of white wine they had, and she said they only had one, but that it was great. I assented to a glass and found she couldn’t have been more right. It was extraordinary. Pale in color, but bursting with flavor. Very dry, but with the most amazing nose of tropical fruits. Wine reviewers talk about tropical fruit flavors and aromas especially in white wines, and I usually roll my eyes as I read that because where they taste tropical fruit (or leather, or hay, or toe jam), I just taste wine that I happen to like or not like. But in this case, the wine truly smelled and tasted of guavas, papayas, and a touch of melon and pineapple, but was very dry (which kept it from tasting like a wine cooler). Never before have I had a glass of wine with such distinct and pronounced tropical fruit flavors.
When I was nearing the end of my glass, I asked the waitress what the name of it was, again? She disappeared and came back holding the bottle, saying, “It’s called Conclass. Here, there is just a bit left, I’ll empty the bottle for you.” And she did. And I was glad.
The wine is a 2007 Verdejo, hailing from the Rueda region of Spain. By the time the waitress brought the bottle out for me to see, it was too dark to photo, but this memorable a wine merited documentation. I highly recommend it. Amazingly, it retails for under $15, though I have not yet seen it in a New York wine store. If you see it in a local store, please do let me know.
This photo is of the 2005 vintage, but gives you an idea of what it looks like.
Postscript: I found the wine just this evening at Greene Grape in Fort Greene, Brooklyn [$13.00].
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