I suggest you head to The Capital Grille between now and September 4th for one of the best wine specials of the summer. The event, called The Generous Pour, is similar to something that I reported on last summer. For a flat $25 you can sample up to nine selected wines with your meal. Last night, at the press announcement, the restaurant presented a live satellite feed from Florida with Capital Grille’s corporate Master Sommelier George Miliotes, who talked about the wines and paired them with some popular items on the menu.
Jump for my favorites.
My highlights from the tasting were a classic California Chardonnay (2006 Ch. St. Jean, Belle Terre); a well-aged Napa Cabernet Sauvignon (2003 Freemark Abbey, Cabernet Bosché) that has plenty of ‘Rutherford dust’ on it; a younger Cabernet from Sonoma for comparison (the 2006 Chalk Hill Estate – no relation, unfortunately); and a dessert wine from Rutherglen, Australia in the style of a classic tawny port (RL Buller, “The Portly Gentleman”). The full list and a video are here.
While we expect restaurants to run promotions to goose sales in the dog days of summer, I found this promotion to be well conceived and certainly one of the best value wine deals around. It will be hard to beat. No word yet on whether the Plano branch of the restaurant will be open on time for the promotion but it is running at the Dallas establishment and all branches nationally.
