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drinking pomegranates
by amy reiley
In the past
couple of years, pomegranate juice has skyrocketed in popularity -
thank you POM. And while a splash of pomegranate made Shirley Temples
so sweet, pomegranate really never found its place in sophisticated
drinks. Until now, that is.
Just in
time for Valentine’s Day, Isreal’s Rimon
Winery brings us its Pomegranate Dessert Wine, (2004
vintage). According to the winery’s PR notes, this is the
only sweet wine made from 100% pomegranate juice - no added sugar - in
the world. (A Google search turned up recipes and stories of
pomegranate home brews, but not a single other pomegranate dessert wine
for sale - certainly, it is the first pomegranate wine I have ever
tried). |
The wine, a sweet red,
is more subtly sweet than a late harvest zinfandel but offers a
slightly more medicinal sweetness than a typical grape-made dessert
wine. The wine’s most alluring attribute is a finish that is
clean, fresh and slightly bitter, (that pleasing bitterness of citrus
zest) and, for a split second, echoes the taste of biting a fresh
pomegranate kernel. Is the wine something I’m jumping to
drink every day? No - but then, pomegranate juice is not really my
thing either. However, I think pomegranate lovers will be blown away,
pairing this with bittersweet chocolate for a sexy, Valentine dessert.
As readers of my Aphrodisiac of the Month newsletter know, pomegranates
offer a wealth of folkloric history as well as nutritive properties
making the crimson fruit a potent aphrodisiac. Used as a culinary
symbol of Goddess Aphrodite by the ancient Greeks, we now know that in
addition to helping lower blood pressure, pomegranates contain the
female hormone estrogen. For more on the aphrodisiac properties of
pomegranates, visit our aphrodisiac library, http://www.eatsomethingsexy.com/aphrodisiac/pomegranate.htm.
Rimon Winery’s Chocolate Pomegranate Truffle Recipe (made
with Rimon Pomegranate Dessert Wine)
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