There’s a conversation between my girlfriend and I which repeats itself once or twice every month. It goes something like this:
“You look beautiful.”
“You’re sweet, Matthew.”
“There is a fantastic Riesling out now that I’d like to buy for the cellar.”
“How much?”
“$48.00”
[A breathless silence follows, then the sound of body hitting the floor. Usually mine.]
Careful negotiations like this are part of the tender process by which wine enters the Short Cellar.
If I have to deploy all of my skills as a mediator to buy an absolutely stellar bottle of wine for $48.00, you will understand my frustration upon entering your average restaurant and, without a second thought, paying the same amount for a bottle that could be swill. I hate most wine lists: limited choice, no opportunity for research, and a 240 percent mark-up.
Thank the heavens there are restaurants like Coca (783 Queen St. W., Toronto, 416-703-0783) or I would never leave my house. It’s a tapas bar that’s also one of the best places in Toronto to sample interesting wines at reasonable prices.
What makes Coca’s wine list so much fun? First of all, it has a magnificent selection of wines by the glass. Not only that, but glasses come in three sizes (2, 4 or 6 ounces), and the 2 ounce taster is exactly one third the price of the 6 ouncer, making it economical to spend the evening just sampling. Most of the 6 oz. glasses are well under $10.00, providing excellent value for money. Finally, the wine list contains pithy and perceptive descriptions of each wine. An evening at Coca is like taking a class in the joys of Spanish wine.
Spain is perhaps best known for red wines from the Rioja region that are earthy, smokey and compelling. However, Rioja doesn’t open up until it has been cellared for a few years. What really earns Coca points in my books is their selection of well-aged Rioja. My favourite is the 2001 Puerta de Alcala by Vinos Jeromin. It’s elegant and complex, with a light body and notes of spice, brambles and cranberries. It was a wonderful contrast to their feature wine, Beronia Crianza 2004. This younger wine was still tight and the fruit in it hadn’t yet ripened. But it had a wonderful nose of violets and the finish felt like cigar smoke dying on my lips.
Coca also has one of the most eccentric desert wine lists that I’ve seen in the city. My girlfriend fell in love with a sweet wine called the Noble Blend by Lillypilly Winery in Australia. It’s a succulent wash of burnt orange, buckwheat honey, and lemon drops. I bought her another glass, and “got to yes” for my $48 Riesling.
Matthew Sullivan is a lawyer with the Department of Justice in Toronto. He writes a weekly blog entry here on lawandstyle.ca. The Short Cellar column appears in the print edition of Precedent. Matthew can be reached at matthew@lawandstyle.beta-site.ca.