Sweet Endings

For Restaurant Week/Eric and Jon's birthday a few of us went to the Beehive, a trendy-as-hell place in the South End. It's somehow cavernous and still intimate.

The wine list here is great, with bonus points for an amazing collection of sparkling wine/champagne. Mike and I shared some Mumm Napa Prestige with oysters and a proscuitto flatbread (the wine was actually great with it, cut through the rich saltiness of the meat well), then he opted for the duck risotto (fine) and I got the hanger steak with a substitution of sage and sea salt frites (disappointing). Our dinner wines (Pinot for him, a Bodegas Tempranillo for me) were also nice and appropriate.

But the highlight of the meal was the dessert (and dessert wines) we had. Mike had the chocolate pot de creme with the Pfeiffer Muscat (an Australian dessert wine that was luscious and decadent, sweet dried fruit flavors, and a nice match with the chocolate). I had the Irish cream cheesecake with Dr. Loosen Auslese Riseling, a honeysuckle-scented glass of richness (and since the Irish cream flavor was essentially missing from the dessert, actually a great pairing too). Reminds me that I need to experiment more with dessert wines...last night, this was the perfect way to end our meal.

Eating Crow and Drinking Wine

At some point (two Boston Wine Expos ago I believe), I tasted several dreadful sparklers . One was a sparkling white zinfandel (I'm fairly sure it's Beringer, and I wouldn't recommend it), another was a sparkling Shiraz. In any event, despite loving sparkling wine in general (and I'm not opposed to sweet or unsophisticated!) these two wines left me cold.

As will happen when you drink 100+ samples of wine in a few hours, I mixed up the name of the sparkling Shiraz and Banfi Rosa Regale, a delicious frizzante--lightly sparkling--red dessert/aperitif wine we had last night at Icarus. I was denouncing the Rosa Regale during one course and loving it in the next. I'm not too proud to admit I was wrong!

And I was wrong--the Rosa is a sweet and fruity treat, great with the peach compote/poundcake combination it was paired with, but also delicious with the decadent chocolate cake I had. It's low in alcohol and gorgeous in color. And it definitely has a celebratory tingle. Drink it with a smile!