I don't drink much wine but here lately me and a friend of mine have been puting away a few bottles. She's more partial to White Zinfandel but my favorite is by Nozzole, the Chianti Classico Riserva. It's around 20 bucks a bottle. And it's damn near like liquid valium.:drool:

Red: Valpolicella, Chianti.

White: Riesling, Spaetlese, Auslese, Soave.

It seems to be fairly hard to find a decent Spaetlese or Auslese around here. I hear there is an international wine place in Springfield, may have to try and find it.

I like Chateau Neuf du Pape - but only because it is the 1st Infantry Division's official wine. I drank a lot of it when I was assigned there.

Everything I know about wine is here:
http://www.bumwine.com/

Also, Mr. Fax:
I work about a mile down the road from Stephenson's and eat there about half a dozen times a year. The restaurant itself is old, because it's been there a long time. The food is still very good, service is fair. Lunch is a much better value than dinner, menu is quite similar for both. The cider is the best in the world. The restaurant needs a facelift. I have a friend who works there, and some scuttlebutt is the Stephenson's family wants to either sell or close the restaurant, and just concentrate on the orchard business. They used to have three other restaurants; one up by KCI airport, one on the Mo-Ark border in Jane, MO on US 71, and a pub called the Red Mule across the street from the original Stephenson's on 40-highway in Independence. The Red Mule was sold, and now it's called The Big Biscuit, which serves breakfast and lunch only. The Jane, MO store and the airport store are closed. So Stephenson's original restaurant is all that's left, and it may be gone by the end of 2006.

I live about 2 miles from Stephenson's, and have for the better part of 15 years, and I can't force myself to go there more than once every 2 years or so. You can tell it used to be a nice place, and back in HS a bunch of my friends worked there, so I remember how strict they were. But now it's awful. I ate there on New Years Eve, and the food came out dried out from sitting so long under the lamps (my ham steak had been under the heat lamp for so long, that the sauce that comes with it, that had been sitting in a cup on top of it, had left tan marks... no exaggeration)
The good thing about the place, if you want to eat poorly, are the apple fritters. Those are still top shelf, with some apple butter on top of them. mmmmm.

As far as wine, the lady and I are partial to Riesling, mostly.
And I WILL NOT DRINK ANY ****ING MERLOT!!!!!!!

Day to Day - Blue Nun white

A little pricier - CakeBread Merlot

There's a white wine from Hermann, Mo that is actually quite tasty. I'll have to go research...

What the heck you got against Merlot???

I guess you haven't seen Sideways.

Incidently, Merlot has been my least favorite red for years.

Cavit Pinot Noir
Black Marlin Shiraz
Barefoot Zin
Bolla Valpolicella

Those are my day to day wines, though we've been drinking a lot of black box lately. Across the border in MO, we can get a box for $14. That's 4 bottles of wine for $14, and it's very very drinkable.

Oh, even though I'm categorically opposed to the attack of the Australian clone wineries, I do like the Little Penguin Pinot.

No I haven't so I guess I missed the punch line. Have to pick it up, I guess. It did do a lot for the wine industry.

I bet it has. Since we saw that movie, the fiance and I have really wanted to learn the whole wine thing.
Of course, we haven't learned crap, and have pretty much stayed with the one wine we know we like. We have no idea how to taste or describe a wine to this day.

stephenson's is still OK...

anyone that has knocked the service there, trust me, you got a bad server; on any given night, i could direct you to any of several servers there that are absolutely top notch...the good ones that work there have worked there a LONG time and make damn good money as a part time job only serving a couple of nights a week

i think the problem is that it's whole premise is just getting old...i've never seen a restaurant so badly in need of a facelift; i worked there from about 91-95 as a busser and supervisor and even then, the place STRONGLY catered to the geritol crowd

the above rumors are true though, i believe that the stephenson family is trying to sell of the business. these rumors started about the time that one of the twin owners died a couple of years
ago

bp

come on, grow a set and try something that doesn't taste like sugar...riesling has a place, as a dessert wine...

i'm just giving you a hard time, if you like riesling, go to berbiglia anywhere in KC and grab some pirtle's mead...it's made at a winery up in weston, MO..

sweet and strong; a bottle or two will get you absolutely wasted
mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm......

bp