I recommend the carménère

This past weekend, we hosted The Wine Club. Yep, Wine Club is still going strong (though somehow I'm thinking it's time we should come up with a better name for it.) I think this was about our seventh gathering, and we celebrated the first anniversary.

On to the important bits. Chilean wine. This is what we featured this time around. (And if you're not into wine, scroll down for FOOD!)

Chilean wine rocks! What we found in our research (ie: months of pre-event sampling and sampling during the final event):

$10 Chilean wine is better than most $10 wine. Some are even darn good. We recommend Cono Sur Merlot (from regular shelves at LCBO). The pinot noir beside it isn't bad either.

A couple bucks more in the Chilean section gets you really nice wine. Our faves at our tasting were big, juicy, delicious. Interestingly, of the 6 reds we tried, the less expensive ones were the group favourites:

Yali Reserver carménère 2005 ($12)
Equus carménère 2006 ($13)
Arboleda merlot 2005 ($16)

(All from Vintages.)

And in general, the carménères were quite divine. (We were comparing them with merlot. Which was also tasty.)

We all agreed that they'd stand up against much more expensive Cali or Aussie reds. (Not quite comparable to French wine - definitely more new world, but equally delicious.)

I also have food recommendations. Because Wine Club is as much about food as it is about wine!

Best Chocolate Cake Ever (and ridiculously easy)

Chilean Empanadas (we're totally making these again. Cheaters like us use unsweetened frozen tart shells instead of making our own pastry. Hey, we had a half dozen different dishes to make in one day!)

We also made peanut-crusted chicken (nuggets in our interpretation) and ricotta fritters, both of which were delicious. Recipes for both are in the Spring Food and Drink magazine.

Oh, oh, one more recommendation! Next time you're in a cheese shop, look out for manchego cheese, and try some if you find it. It's a wonderful Spanish sheep's milk cheese. Very similar to pecorino, but slightly milder.