Howard County is for...wine lovers?

In my early twenties, I was a sweet white girl.

Nowadays, I'm a bold, spicy, slap-you-in-the-face red.

I'm talking about wine, of course. (Or am I?)

On an otherwise run-of-the-mill evening in my late twenties, I happened upon a truly Good Wine. It was a red - a Montepulciano d'Abruzzo, to be specific. It was spicy and peppery and viscous and the flavors didn't stop after the wine made its way down my esophagus  - they kept going and growing, dancing on my tongue. In an instant, my eyes were opened to the wonders and possibilities inherent in fermented grape juice. Right then and there, I made a decision to slowly but surely educate myself about wine.

Luckily, I didn't have to look very far to find a good place to start. OpenTable recently named three Howard County restaurants in its 2014 Top 100 Best Wine List Restaurants in America. Phew - that's a mouthful (just like a nice old vine Zinfandel...).

The list was compiled based on five million OpenTable reviews of over 20,000 restaurants around the country. I now have a new found respect for the people who leave reviews on OpenTable.

AIDA Bistro & Wine Bar, Bistro Blanc, and Iron Bridge Wine Company beat out thousands of other restaurants, and if you've ever been to any of them (or - ahem - all three of them - on multiple occasions - as often as the Sous Chef and your budget will allow), you already know why.

You already know how much I rave about AIDA's menu, but did you know that Sous Chef and I also love going over to AIDA to enjoy a wine flight? On one particularly joyous Halloween a year or so ago, we enjoyed four wine flights, so by the end of the evening we had tasted twelve different wines, each one unique and exceptional in its own way. Much like the food, it's hard to find a wine you don't like on their list. Go do a flight or four and prove me right.

We've gone to Bistro Blanc a few times; its location in Western Howard County makes it more of a "destination" spot (we're very much homebodies who experience occasional bursts of jonesing for travel). Every time we've been, we've loved it. We've done the "fancy Blanc" for special occasions -  with its beautifully plated fine dining - and we've done the "jeans and a t-shirt Blanc", kicking back with a half-priced burger and a pint of craft beer on an ordinary Wednesday.

Iron Bridge is another great taste experience - the seasonal menu consists of smaller portions of impeccably prepared food. I once had a pot roast there that practically melted in my mouth; I'm salivating at the very thought of it. The ambiance there is intimate and cozy; it's a great place to gather on a cold winter evening.

I can't say I'm surprised that any of these restaurants are on the Top 100 list, but I will say that I'm impressed.

Drink well.