Series Description
Wine in Real Life is a new series on My Nova Wine Blog about how wine shows up in everyday moments—the planned and the accidental, the celebratory and the oddly ordinary. These posts aren’t full tasting notes or winery profiles; they’re snapshots of real life with a glass in hand. From weeknight dinners and snow days to holidays, friends who feel like family, and the strange in-between moments where time doesn’t quite make sense, this series explores Virginia wine as it’s actually lived: opened, shared, paired with comfort food, and woven into the rhythm of daily life.
On a weird week between holidays, my life gets funny—especially when there’s good Virginia wine open on a random weeknight. There’s that partial loss of sense of what day and time it is, and what is actually even happening right now. Add in working from home, days off, freezing cold followed by 65 and sunny, and everything in between, and suddenly nothing makes sense.
It’s a strange window of time—one that feels especially surreal to people in my age range, who remember their childhood winter break as a single week off from school that was very clearly December 23 through January 1, followed by a hard return to reality on January 2. No ambiguity. No netflix binges. Just back to the grind at school.
So my typical rule—no wine from Monday through Thursday—gets suspended during this stretch. Time isn’t real, rules don’t apply, and it’s game on.
What I’m Drinking When Time Isn’t Real
I pulled another bottle of Glen Manor’s 2023 Cabernet Sauvignon off the rack—juicy, fruit-forward, young, fresh, and so much fun. It’s also almost sold out. I’m guarding four bottles, though I’m realistic enough to know that three of them won’t see past spring. Fingers crossed for a 2024 vintage release around May. This wine is easy and fun, and you don’t need to plan a complex meal around it.
Then there’s Ankida Ridge’s 2022 Pinot Noir. I don’t think of myself as a massive Pinot Noir fan, mostly because my reference points are grocery store bottles. But I adore this wine. This vintage has truly come into its own. I have four bottles left, which is fortunate, since they’re winding down inventory and preparing to release the 2023. We paired it with meatloaf and mashed potatoes the other night, and it was absolutely singing along… “I would do anything for love…” (dad joke central here).
New Year’s Eve meant steaks with friends who are family. Alongside some French bubbles and gimlets, a few of us sipped and loved Jake Busching’s 2017 F8 with rare filet. This wine persists—dark, rich, and deeply satisfying—even though it’s sold out now and I have just one bottle left on my rack. Built on two of my favoritest grapes, Petit Verdot and Tannat, it knocked my socks off.
F8 and filet still red in the center, yes.
Think of that favorite scene from When Harry Met Sally.
Yup. That was me.
I’m gonna hold that last bottle of F8 for something incredible, that’s for sure.
After the big production of Christmas, which required thoughtful pairings, easy drinkers and true favorites were the best picks. Once we got to New Years’ Eve – more intensity was required with one of only a few remaining bottles of something special.
The holidays are not a time for schedules or rules. Did you break your own rules during this magical time? What bottles did you open and savor?
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