New Haven Independent

The wine came from around the world Thursday night, and the tasters from towns well beyond New Haven’s borders, at a free event at Kitchen Zinc behind Zinc restaurant on Chapel Street.

Thursday morning Wells’s and Burdzy’s friend Adam Thornberg, who is from New Haven, received an email notice of Kitchen Zinc’s first free wine tasting of the summer-fall season.

Around noon he texted Wells and Burdzy, who were planning to go to Bridgeport for a 7 p.m. Cirque du Soleil performance. Why not tarry at a watering, or wining, spot on the way? By 3 p.m., the plan had been made.

Thus the newest technology made possible one of the most venerable forms of human interaction, enjoying a glass of wine together.

More than three dozen oenophiles, or people who like free drinks, or, more accurately, people with an affection for Zinc restaurant off the Green who had word-of-mouthed their friends, gathered on the porch of Kitchen Zinc for the first in an ongoing series of free wine tastings.

The events, to be held for the next three Thursdays and then every other Thursday on through the fall, are designed, according to the restaurant’s manager, Elizabeth Ciarelli, to expand Kitchen Zinc’s audience.

Kitchen Zinc (or KZ as it is becoming known) is a new lower-priced, recession-era alternative serving healthful pizzas with local ingredients and classy but affordable wines. The concept, according to Ciarelli, is working. (Click here for a previous article.)

“We tasted [approximately] 125 wines, not all at once, and none are more than $28 per bottle,” she reported.

The Bridgeport-bound trio of friends tasted the two mentioned wines deemed “approachable.” Translation: a great way to start a meal, according to Peter Apotrias, of Connecticut Distributors, Inc., who served as sommelier for the event.

On the hot night the lightly iced Prosecco was popular. Wells also liked the Australian Shiraz called Shiraz Viognier. With 94 percent Shiraz grapes and 6 percent Viognier, a white grape originally from France, the wine gave Wells a bit of a buzz. As a graduate of the Albany College of Pharmacy about to open a pharmacy at the Walgreens in East Haven, she ought to know her buzzes.

The Cirque du Soleil-bound friends were, according to Ciarelli, an example of KZ’s target market. KZ, which is operated by the popular, higher-priced and more formal Zinc, is the successor to Chow. It is accessible down the alley at the side of the restaurant.

“The casual concept,” Ciarelli said: “You can decide on an impromptu basis; we provide wonderful food, without breaking the bank.”

Susan Nutson, pictured with Apotrias, is a Zinc devotee from West Hartford. She called the Prosecco refreshing. She said the Pinot Grigio tasted like, well, Pinot Grigio. They were on their way to hear some jazz at cafe nine. They come into New Haven often, and frequently to Zinc.

These folks love New Haven and would be coming in wine-tasting or not. “It [New Haven] reminds us of Ann Arbor,” said Nutson, as she waited for her husband Larry, who was late.

All in all, Apotrias said, the cool Prosecco was the event’s biggest hit, not surprising on such a broil of a day. The Shiraz, with its touch of white grape, was termed interesting. The rose, a combination of Syrah (that is French for Shiraz), Grenache, and Cinsault grapes, was a bit “new,” he said, to the tasters’ palates. Still, it was a hit with Ciarelli, and it’s going on the Kitchen Zinc menu.

It was certainly new to a reporter, thrown suddenly to the rigors of the Independent’s wine beat, who also now fully appreciates that if you squeeze a red grape, clear juice emerges; it’s the skin that gives the darker color.

All KZ’s wine tastings are free and the pouring continues for a well regulated and agreeable one hour, always between 5:30 and 6:30 Thursday nights.