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Being of Italian ancestry, I have what some women have politely referred to as a Roman Nose.  Also known as a big fucking bump-in-the-middle dog-style power sniffer.  And like my canine counterparts, I’m led to and fro not by my genitals (usually), but by that monolithic – nay , phallic -  “old factory” olfactory factory stuck to my face.

This could be why I like titty bars.  More than the dancing, naked girls,  I think it’s that “stripper smell” that’s so oft referenced on the internet that gets me — baby lotion + cigarettes + something tropical from Bath and Beauty Works.  Maybe a little sweat, maybe not.  It’s a heady smell, for sure, and distinctive, and it usually means you’re in the middle of a fun night out and not at work or cleaning toilets.  I can be standing at the garlic bin in a grocery store and I’ll catch a whiff of that smell and say out loud “stripper”, and sure enough, a quick perusal of my vicinity will reveal a woman who’s just too done up in heels, fake boobs and studs to be anything but.  This has happened dozens of times.

Smell, as reference point to all sorts happy or hilarious memories.

Problem is, usually when strippers talk to you, it ruins everything.  So it’s a very, very delicate balance.

Needless to say, when it comes to my wine, it’s usually all about the smell.  If that first whiff knocks my socks off, all the wine has to do from there forward is not talk too much while it disrobes.

To further stretch this relatively useless build-up to my review of the wine, I need to give another anecdote:

I came in today after a long day of shoveling horse shit in my garden.  I was hot and tired and wanted something crisp and refreshing.  It just so happened that I had a new bottle of this Davis Chardonnay in my fridge, so I cracked it open, poured 4 fingers into my favorite stemless Riedel and immediately jammed my nose into the glass and left it there for several minutes, just bathing in the crisp, ripe Fuji apple, vanilla and touch of cinnamon aromas.  I basically went into an immediate flashback (I have them often, and sometimes at very unfortunate times) of my mom making apple pie from the tree in our yard.  There’s pie crust getting rolled out on the cutting board, some of which is baking in strips coated in sugar and cinnamon so I can have a pre-pie kid-snack, and there’s a big bowl of freshly-sliced Fuji apples coated in cinnamon and sugar in front of me.

The funny thing about my flashbacks is how they segue.  This one was so vivid that I opened my eyes in surprise, at which point one of those sci-fi vortexes ensued where the world blurs and rushes past with a big whhhooooooosh of white noise made of nanosecond memories, only to come to a screeching halt in a titty bar.  Standing in the frame where Mom was only seconds before is a 200 lb stripper with studs through both nipples on DDDD tits hanging down to her belly button.  She looks at me and says “hey baby, wanna see my cookie?” and then farts loudly.

And then “poof”, hallucination gone. So I pull my nose out of my glass, more than somewhat shaken but nevertheless ready and eager for sip #1, and….

…what the fuck is that horrible smell??!

Oh fuck, there’s a skunk on the patio.  That must be why the flashback ended with a stripper who weighed more than me.

My sense of smell has never gone from two such extremes.  From the glorious, crisp, flashback-inducing smell of this glass of Davis Chardonnay to a skunk not 20 feet from my door.  This is not a metaphor.  There was a real, living, breathing, stinking skunk in my garden trying to fuck up my wine time.

I was so pissed off at the skunk for tainting this damn-near perfect glass of wine that I immediately shot the fucker right there in my yard.  I know, bad idea.  Now THAT is a truly awful smell.  Fuckin’ skunk.

I’m going to have to come back around sometime in the future and do a proper review of the flavors peeling off this glass.  Remarkably, I can still smell Mom’s apple pie over the skunk, and I’m whole-heartedly enjoying this bottle despite the skunk’s efforts.  Guy Davis has gone to great lengths with this wine to preserve the character of the fruit– fermenting 30% of it in stainless steel in an effort to keep the fruit notes nice and bright by preventing malolactic fermentation; with the other 70% going into ultra tight-grain French oak (1/3 new, 1/3 1-year old, 1/3 2 years old).  The end result is a Chardonnay that has that vanilla-laced richness Chardonnay-lovers expect along with a bright, refreshing blast of fresh, clear fruit.  This is truly a summery Chardonnay, and is without question one of the best I’ve tasted, despite the now-dead skunk rotting out by my tomatoes.

100 points, plus 10 for helping me through the whole skunk thing.

(3 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)

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