If Californians (and BuonVivanters, of course) reflect back on 2015, what two things comes to mind?  Water …. and Crab! The lack of both!! Sad but true! We are starting off the year fairly wet (excuse me, rain wise) so things are finally looking quite good for these two life necessities. To me, all shell fish is just pure heaven. Tonight, we were still in a holiday’ish celebratory mood, we decided to whip together a linguine & clam dish at home. The clams and Whole Foods always look so fresh and upon arrival, they were all buried in cold ice, and the clams seem shut to the gills — displaying freshness; yay! The very nice fishmonger chose individual clams carefully for me and I just couldn’t wait to devour them at home. Well, for those of you who are familiar with steaming clams, as they open up, you set them aside and just wait for of them to open up, otherwise they were probably dead to begin with. Patiently, I’m waiting … and waiting for the last clam to open up in my Vermouth white wine/brothy sauce….. I even placed a lid on the pot, tapped the clam a few times to wake it up, still, …. the clam was shut tight. We gave up so as I was picking up the comatose clam with the tongs — kaboom! The poor thing exploded and black gook just oozed out — and I thought….. WTH is that?! I’ve steamed clams several times and have never witness such a thing in my life. There goes my wine sauce. Of course, I had to throw it out for the potential toxins and basically remade the entire sauce portion  — again. Not happy! Well, to cheer things up a bit, we decided to open the Monsanto Chianti 2005.

This Monsanto Chianti Classico 2005 (sip#3) revealed an amazing profile of red berries, herbs, crushed flowers and spices. The wine possesses an attractive up-front personality and finessed tannins, but it does taper off a bit on the mid-palate. In this rain-plagued vintage Monsanto did not produce its Riserva Il Poggio, and the best fruit from that site was added to this Riserva bottling, which was aged in a variety of used French oak barrels. We’ve held on to this bottle since 2009 and I thought it was perfect. Monsanto is made by Andrea Giovannini, formerly at Ornellaia. Delizioso! The clam pasta and this 11-year old chianti survived! Thank goodness!!