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Latest Wine News
There were a number of interesting developments in the world of wine and related “beverages”, which prompted this post. Here are some of the latest happenings:
Who doesn’t like Rum and Coke? It is easy, simple and refreshing, and it clearly says “warm days are here”. Yielding to the ever increasing popular demand, Coca-Cola company just announced the brand new product – Rum and Coke in the can, which should be available in the supermarkets next to you starting in May. Going an extra mile, and taking an advantage of thawing relationship between US and Cuba, Coca-Cola signed an agreement with Bacardi company to use their famous authentic Cuban Rum for this product line, thus this new line from Coca-Cola will appear under the name of “The Real Rum and Coke“. Coca-Cola arch nemesis, Pepsi-Cola Corporation is reportedly peeved by the announcement and entered into the talks with the famous French Cognac producer, Hennessy, to come up with some authentic concoction. Stay tuned for the further updates.
Starbucks recently announced that in addition to the Starbucks Evenings program, which adds wine and beer offerings at a number of select Starbucks locations, the purveyor of the fine coffee will add a Starbucks Mornings program, which will feature a special morning beer program to be available in select markets nationwide. The pilot will start in Las Vegas and New Orleans stores, and then it is expected to expand to New York and Los Angeles markets. Starbucks also announced a partnership with Blue Moon Brewing Company to produce a special light morning brew called “Blue Bucks”. A number of analysts in the industry believe that Starbucks Mornings program will be widely successful.
Considering recent acquisitions of Siduri Wines by Jackson Family and J Vineyards by the Gallo, Bronco Wine Company, producer of the famous Fransia and Two Buck Chuck wines, decided not to be outdone by the competitors and made an offer to buy a legendary California producer, Sine Qua None, at an undisclosed amount. To express his reaction to the Bronco’s offer, Manfred Krankl, proprietor at the Sine Qua None, responded in his usual eclectic fashion by sending a case of one of his latest and greatest wines, a 100% Grenache, to the Bronco’s headquarters. The wine, called Middle Finger, had specially designed unique label, surprisingly quickly approved by TTB. There is a great suspicion in the industry that the acquisition talks might collapse after that.
And just a few more tidbits. Screaming Eagle, producer of the eponymous most desired California Cabernet Sauvignon, recently acknowledged growing trend of “Rosé Rules” by announcing the brand new Rosé, made from the best plots of Cabernet Sauvignon, under the name of “Screaming Hen”. The new Rosé wine will be priced at the $500 per bottle, and will be available to the mailing list subscribers. 150 cases will be produced. After this information became public, Christian Moueix, producer of the famous Petrus wines in Bordeaux, reportedly attempted to enter into the partnership with Chateau Miraval in Provence, to produce the best and most expensive in the world Rosé. Based on the limited information available to the press, the talks fell through as Christian Moueix was unable to convince Brandelina team to rip out Cinsault and replant it with Merlot.
That’s all I have for you for today. Happy Wine Wednesday and Cheers!
A Few Blog Updates
Actual title which I wanted to use for this short post was talking about SSP (Shameless Self Promotion, of course), but then I decided against it. However, this is what this post mostly is all about – a SSP, consisting of some “asks” and updates.
First, the “ask”. SAVEUR, the “definitive culinary and culinary-travel magazine” (their own wording), is running its annual SAVEUR Blog Awards. There is at least one category there, “Best Wine Coverage”, where this blog might apply. If you like what you are reading and think this blog is worthy of a nomination, here is the link to do so:
http://www.saveur.com/article/contests/blog-awards-2015-nominate
Note that nominations will close on March 13th, so you have less than 2 days left. Apparently, the more nominations, the better it is, so … thank you!
Now, a few small updates regarding Talk-a-Vino and social media overall. After long hesitation, I created a Talk-a-Vino page on Facebook. The page had been live for about 9 month, and in addition to all of the blog posts, I share interesting wine news and articles there as well, so you might find it useful. Here is the link so you can follow the Talk-a-Vino page if you are not doing so already:
https://www.facebook.com/talkavino
In case you are using a blog reader, such as Bloglovin’, you can find my blog there as well – below is the “follow button” for your convenience:
Last note regarding social media – about 6 month ago, I finally made it to Instagram. I didn’t create a specific blog account there (yet), instead I created simply an account for myself, so while you will find some pictures of food and wine there, most of the stuff simply relates to the travel, places, nature, flowers and so on. I’m thinking about blog-specific Instagram account, but I don’t know how to manage two with an iphone – if you have any ideas, I would greatly appreciate an advice. In any case, feel free to connect with me on Instagram (@anatoli.l).
And before we close here, a “local update”. In general, I pay very little attention to the ratings of the specific wines. However, I’m curious to know the average ratings for the wines in the specific region for the specific year. That information can be found in so called Vintage Charts. There are many sources for the various vintage charts – some are region specific, and some cover whole lot of different regions. In case you ever need to find and compare the different vintage ratings, I created a new page here in this blog which you might find helpful – here is the link. On the page, you will find a collection of various Vintage Charts from the different sources.
And this is all I have for you on this Wine Wednesday. Have a glass of something tasty and cheers!
Did the Wine Santa Delivered? Mine did!
Hey secret Wine Santas and their equally secret gift recipients, are you there? I know that the secret Wine Santa mission was once again orchestrated by The Drunken Cyclist (here is the secret post about it). If you are not familiar with the “Secret Wine Santa” operation, it works as any secret Santa game often played in the offices, only better, because there is no chance of getting wine themed underwear, you can only get wine.
All the participants provide their addresses to the Secret Wine Santa headquarters, i.e. Jeff aka The Drunken Cyclist, who then magically assigns the Santas with their respective recipients, and voila – the wine magically appears at your door step, sent directly from the North Pole and delivered by the reindeer, or something like that. Anyway, you got the idea.
I put on my Santa’s hat and send two bottles of wine – 2007 Krupp Brothers Black Bart Marsanne Napa Valley and 2011 Michel Chapoutier Tournon Mathilda Shiraz Victoria, Australia. I can tell you that my work was only 50% successful – my recipient, who will remain secret, doesn’t like white wines with the oak on them, so Marsanne didn’t really work. However, for all I understand, Mathilda Shiraz became a nice surprise, as it was for me, with its pronounced peppery qualities. All in all, I think I did okay as a Secret wine Santa, but there is definitely a room for improvement.
The best part of the Wine Santa game is that it is a two way street – you send wine, but you also receive wine! I don’t know if this was an accident or a deliberate decision, but my “secret” Santa was Chef Mimi – who was my wine recipient last year. The wine, which arrived a while back, was accompanied by a very nice letter, explaining why Chef Mimi have chosen this wine for me – it is one of her favorite wines. The letter also gave me the story of the people who make this wine, who are Chef Mimi’s neighbors.
It took me a while to find a good moment to open the wine, and finally I did. I used my trusted VersoVino to help the wine to breathe a little faster, but with or without it, what a treat it was!
Erba Vineyards is located in the Napa Valley at a high elevation site (1100 – 1500 feet above sea level) near Atlas Mountain. The vineyard was planted in 1998 with 5 of the Bordeaux varietals (Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Malbec and Petit Verdot) and Syrah, with majority of plantings (70%) been Cabernet Sauvignon. First commercial release of Erba Vineyards wines was in 2003.
The wine my secret Santa have chosen was 2007 Erba Mountainside Vineyards Proprietary Red Wine Napa Valley (14.8% ABV, $55, definitely a Bordeaux blend but composition is unknown). On the nose, the wine had beautiful, very fragrant bouquet of cassis with touch of herbs. One the palate… How should I describe the palate to you… Polished? Elegant? Textbook? Yes, all of that and more. Layers of fruit, cassis and blackberries, ripe and succulent, but not overripe at all. Underneath of the fruit, layers of herbs – sage, eucalyptus, may be a touch of mint. All interweaved together into a beautiful, firm package with clean acidity and perfect, impeccable balance. A textbook Bordeaux blend and one very beautiful wine, which was gone in no time. I generally don’t like to rate presents, but if I have to – Drinkability: 9-
There you have it my friends. If you had been on the either side of our wine Santa game, I hope to read about your experience. And if you had not, I hope you will join us next year, it is fun! It is so much fun that I’m even thinking we should have a summer mid-year rehearsal.
Thank you very much Secret Santa Chef Mimi for the delicious wine! And to all of you who celebrates, Merry Christmas! Cheers!
Wednesday’s Meritage – An Award for Women in Food, Thanksgiving Wines, Ageing of the Napa Cabs, Screw Top versus Cork and more
Meritage Time!
Abundance is the word today. Thanksgiving, the holiday which we will celebrate tomorrow in United States, is usually associated with abundance. Lots’ of food and fun. And so is today’s Meritage issue – lots of interesting things to share. Let’s go!
First, I want to bring to your attention an opportunity for an award for the deserving women involved with food. KaTom, one of the largest restaurant supply companies in the world, wants to create a special award to recognize women involved with food, and it is asking for your help with this. If you click on this link, you will get to the KaTom web site, where in the upper right corner you will find the link for the video and a special award survey. Watch the 2-minutes video and then take a short survey – this will greatly help KaTom in their quest to create that special award.
Well, it is kind of late, but still worth a few minutes of your time – W. Blake Gray wrote a blog post which might help you to select the right wine for Thanksgiving. Instead of focusing on the particular wines, W. Blake Gray gives you an idea of the broad categories which might fit well at the Thanksgiving table.
Do you like aged wines? Which wines do you think can age well? If you think about California Cabernet Sauvignon wines as age-worthy, you might find interesting this article written by Lettie Teague for the Wall Street Journal. In the article, Lettie is exploring in depth if California Cabernet Sauvignon wines can actually age as well as many of us think they are. I definitely agree with one of the takeaways – it is hard to predict if the particular bottle of wine will age or not. But – I’m willing to take a chance. Anyway, read the article and let me know what do you think.
In the next interesting post, Jamie Goode, one of the very well known wine bloggers and writers, ponders at the [almost eternal] debate of wine enclosures – screw top versus cork. This is not a theoretical debate – Jamie actually is talking about blind tasting and comparing the same wines enclosed with cork and screw top. Based on what I see in the post, cork edges the screw top – but read the comments to see all of the outcry about spoiled, corked wines. As far as I’m concerned, I’m willing to take a risk of having a corked bottle in exchange for greatness, versus screw top which just doesn’t allow the wine to age properly – but this is not the popular opinion. Anyway, take a look for yourself.
Which country do you think is a number 1 importer of Beaujolais Nouveau wines? Prepare for the surprise, as this country is … Japan! This article from Decanter magazine is exploring the virtues of the Beaujolais Nouveau phenomenon using some numbers. Japan is the biggest importer of Beaujolais Nouveau – it imports more Beaujolais Nouveau than the next 9 countries combined. Definitely some interesting numbers, well worth your attention.
Last but definitely not the least – here is another nudge regarding the the Monthly Wine Writing Challenge #13. The theme is Serendipity, and you really have to start working on it now, if you didn’t have already. No excuses – have some turkey, have some wine, and get to it. Even if you think you can’t write the #MWWC post, believe in yourself, just sit down and write – you can do it! For all the rules and regulations, please take a look at this post.
And we are done here. The glass is empty, but the refill is on the way. Cheers!
Celebrating New Harvest – Beaujolais Nouveau 2014
On Thursday, November 20th, all wine (and probably well beyond wine) social media outlets were filled with “Le Beaujolais Nouveau Est Arrivé” messages, pictures and videos. For more than 30 years, what was at some point a simple local celebration of the new harvest, became a big international affair. Always happening on the third Thursday in November, the wine called Beaujolais Nouveau magically appears on the shelves of the wine stores and on the restaurant tables all over the world to ring in the harvest.
This international celebration is largely a result of the efforts of one man with the vision – Georges Duboeuf, the famous french wine négociant and producer. It was his vision and hard work which lead to the event celebrated from Paris to New York to Tokyo. At some point the Beaujolais Nouveau phenomenon became oversubscribed, leading to the glut of insipid wines saturating the market, creating a bad image associated with the whole Beaujolais Nouveau idea. But with the modern winemaking improvements, the quality of the Beaujolais Nouveau wines started to improve year after year, which brought the feeling of the celebration back over the last 5-6 years.
I had been closely following the Beaujolais Nouveau celebration ever since this blog started – here are the posts from 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2013. While working on this post, I checked my notes on the past releases of Beaujolais Nouveau, and it looks like with the exception of 2011, all the vintages were very consistent, offering good quality, very drinkable wine which gave a lot of pleasure. I know that some people dismiss Beaujolais Nouveau as a marketing gimmick and simply refuse to drink the wines – however, I wholeheartedly disagree and I believe this young celebratory wine well worth wine aficionados’ attention.
This year, I had an opportunity to try two different Beaujolais wines – 2014 Georges Duboeuf Beaujolais Nouveau (12% ABV, $9.99) and 2014 Domaine Manoir du Carra Beaujolais Nouveau (12.5% ABV, $10.99). Talking about interesting experiences, for the first time I remember drinking Beaujolais Nouveau, and definitely for the first time while writing this blog, I found two of the different bottles of wine which taste nearly identical. This was very puzzling experience, as I was looking for the different descriptors, and couldn’t find any. Okay, they were not 100% the same wines, of course – but differences were very subtle, may be in the particular fruit profile being more pronounced in one wine and not in the other, and majority of the description would stay the same. To acknowledge that, I will give you a description for both wines at the same time.
Color: Bright Garnet
Nose: Freshly crushed red fruit, lavender, unmistakable aroma of the young wine
Palate: Red fruit, cherries, tart blackberries, violet, lavender, medium body with some structure, vibrant acidity, good balance, medium finish.
Verdict: a good wine, easy to drink, fresh, should play well with the wide range of food due to the substantial acidity. Yes it will do just fine on your Thanksgiving table (will be definitely on mine). Drinkability: 7+/8- for both – really hard to decide.
Yet another Beaujolais Nouveau day becomes a history. Well, of course not so fast – the wines will be available for a while, and while they are not meant for aging, overall textural presence of the two wines I tasted suggests that these wines can last for the few years – but this is definitely not what you want to do. And than that mind boggling similarity between the two totally different wines – I don’t know what to think of it, except that may be the similar winemaking methods used, like carbonic maceration and such, lead to the similar results for the two totally unrelated wines. Perhaps this is not a very solid explanation, so I would love to hear your theory if you got one.
Did you already have the Beaujolais Nouveau 2014? If you did, what kind and what did you think of it? Cheers!
My #ZinfandelDay experiences – [mostly value] Zinfandels
I like to celebrate grape holidays in a close proximity of my wine fridge – there is always a good chance that I have a good bottle of the appropriate celebratory wine. So if I would’ve been next to my cellar for the #ZinfandelDay, I would be able to chose between Turley, Carlisle and St. Francis – not too shabby, right? Only I wasn’t. I was traveling, so it was the whole different game.
Once again, I was in California. As it was mentioned many times in this blog, when I’m in a close proxomity of Trader Joe’s which sells wine, then Trader Joe’s it is. So I went to Trader Joe’s and bought 3 different Zinfandel wines – two of the Trader Joe’s own labels, and Ravenswood. Literally next door to my hotel, on my way back, I saw a store called Grocery Outlet, which I never heard of before. So I had to stop by and check it out. Interestingly enough, the store also had a wine section with the number of very interesting bottles, with prices starting from $2.99. When I saw another Zinfandel at $5.99, it was also quick and easy decision. And now, there were four.
Below I will share with you my notes on the wines, which ranged in prices from $4.99 to $9.99. Some of the takeaways were quite interesting, as I tasted the wines over a few days, but I will let you read through my notes as they are. And there was one more Zinfandel to mention. Here we go:
2012 Ravenswood Old Vine Zinfandel Vintners Blend California (13.5% ABV, $7.99) – Crushed red fruit on the nose, touch of earthiness. Palate is a little thin on the finish, first showing a burst of dark fruit and smoke, but again, the finish was disintegrated with sharp acidity. This was the end of my notes on the first day – as you can see, I didn’t really like it. At the end of the second day, however, the wine showed a lot more round, integrated and balanced – dark fruit, spices and touch of herbs (sage). Drinkability: 7+
2013 Trader Joe’s Zinfandel Growers’s Reserve Paso Robles (13.5% ABV, $4.99, made with organically grown grapes) – Touch of fresh berries on the nose. Smoke, clean fruit, blueberries and blackberries on the palate. Clean, simple, easy to drink. Opened up even more at the end of day 3 (!) – smoke, sandalwood, round with nice open complexity. My favorite out of the 4. Drinkability: 7+/8-
2012 Trader Joe’s Reserve Zinfandel Lot #92 Dry Creek Valley Sonoma County (14.5% ABV, $9.99) – dark fruit on the nose with touch of blackberries. Hint of smoke and roasted notes on the palate, blackberries, restrained, somewhat round, but need more substance. This was the end of the day 1 – an okay wine (I’ve been nice here), but not anything interesting. At the end of the day 3 (!), very noticeable tannins came out with smoke and dark fruit, overall much better than before. Needs time? Drinkability: 7-/7+ (on day 3)
2009 Parallax Zinfandel Amador County, Sierra Foothills (15.1% ABV, $5.99 at Grocery Outlet) – touch of fresh blueberries on the nose, just a touch. Round, clean, blackberries on the palate. Touch of earthiness. Finish somewhat lacking, need more complexity – this was an initial assessment at the end of the day 1. At the end of the day 2 – nice complexity, spices, lots of blackberries, very noticeable tannins. An excellent steak wine, good balance, more dark fruit. Very impressive. Drinkability: 8-
So what do you think? A very interesting experience, if you ask me. It took these wines a few days to change and open up – the biggest winners were Parallax Zinfandel and Ravenswood, which improved quite a bit, from barely drinkable to pretty much delicious. And the most interesting wine was probably the least expensive Trader Joe’s Grower’s Reserve Zinfandel, which tasted fine from the very beginning and even throughout the three days. Considering its taste profile, it would make it a perfect Thanksgiving wine, as it will match a wide range of flavors.
Well, to top it all off, I need to include one more Zinfandel here. On the exact #ZinfandelDay, we had dinner at the 71 Saint Peter restaurant in San Jose, and as you can imagine, I wanted to start the dinner with the Zinfandel, just to properly acknowledge the holiday. Out of only three Zinfandel wines available on the wine list, 2012 Peachy Canyon Westside Zinfandel Paso Robles (14.5% ABV, $22 winery, $45 at the restaurant) was highly recommended by the staff. You know, when you drink the wine in the restaurant, you don’t have a luxury of playing with it for 3 days to see what will happen… The wine had ripe blackberries on the nose, and was dark, firm and concentrated on the palate, and also had some nice black fruit. I think it would open up more if it was given a chance, but it was gone way too quickly, so in the interest of fairness, I will not rate this wine.
There you have it, my friends – my [mostly value] Zinfandel experiences, with some interesting outcome, when even the inexpensive wines can evolve and surprise you. How was your #ZinfandelDay? Cheers!
Mini Quiz Answer and #MWWC13 Theme Announcement
Happy Halloween Friday!
Last Wednesday I had a small “what is it” quiz where you were supposed to figure out what was that object in the picture:
What Is It?
Well, somehow it happened to be a difficult question ( or may be it was just boring). Anyway, here is the answer – this is “The Original Lancashire Bomb” – a cheese, produced in Lancashire in UK.
This cheese is covered by the black wax and shaped like a bomb, hence the name. I found it in my local Costco store, and by the time I left the store a number of people just stopped me and asked “what is it???”, which prompted the mini quiz. In case you are wondering , the cheese was very tasty.
And now, to the more important business. The time has come for the new round of Monthly Wine Writing Challenge, this time it will be the challenge number 13, so it should be known as #MWWC13. I know that I already promised that it will be devilish, and I had some ideas – but actually, I’m not as mean as it might appear at the first sight :), so I hope you will like this theme, which will be … wait for it…
Serendipity! I have to admit – not being a native English speaker, while I know the word, I often have to reach out for the dictionary if I want to understand the full context of the sentence which contains “Serendipity”. So this theme might still be challenging, but it will force you to look for the happy moments, which is definitely a good thing in my book.
As Jeff the drunken cyclist now is hosting the challenge, I will let him to come up with all the dates for submission deadlines etc., but you have a theme and you can start working on it now. Let’s make sure we will have a record participation in #MWWC13! I promise to be a “nudnik” and will remind you an ample number of times.
That’s all I have to say for now. Now, back to my original dilemma – Zinfandel or Petit Sirah for tonight? Grrr… Happy [winey] Halloween! Cheers!
Wednesday’s Meritage – A Mini Quiz, 100 Point Scores, Super Rhone, Story of Pappy and more
Yes, there been a lapse in the wine quizzes and subsequently, in these Meritage posts – the quizzes will resume at some point, I just think that I exhausted the ‘grape’ series and need to come up with another series which can last for a while – if you have any suggestions, please let me know. But – I came across quite a few interesting articles well worth sharing, and – I also have a mystery object for you to guess what it can be – so let’s have some fun!
Meritage time!
Instead of providing the answers for you today, I have a mini-quiz. A few people saw this and asked – “What is it????”. So the idea came – why don’t we make a quiz out of it? Please take a look at the picture below and let me know what do you think this is, and as a bonus part, name the place of origin of this object:
What is it?
Please provide your answers in the comments section, as usual.
And now, to the interesting stuff around the vine and web!
First, I came across an interesting article by Tim Atkin, Master of Wine and an author of a number of wine books. In this article Tim is talking about the problem with 100-points wines, which seem not to be a “universal truth” for everybody. He is talking about his personal experience with 3 of the 100-points wines, where his own ratings were not anywhere near that perfect score. I can also attest to having the same situation with two of the 100-pointers I was able to try. Yep, a classic case of YMMV – but read the article, it’s definitely worth your time.
We all know the carrying power the words “super-tuscan” have – attach those to the simplest bottle of wine, and everybody are immediately interested. Put some effort into that bottling – and you can easily ask for $90+ per bottle, and you will have no problems selling the wine at that price. Yes, the Super-Tuscan is an Italian phenomenon, and now some producers in France, in the Rhone valley to be precise, are trying to create something similar – a Super-Rhone wine. Here is the link for you to read more.
Have you heard of the Pappy Van Winkle? Well, if you didn’t, may be it is better to leave it like that? Pappy Van Winkle is an American whiskey, a Bourbon, which has such a cult following that while it costs a lot more than absolute majority of single-malt scotches of any age (prices for the simple 10 years old start from about $300), it is literally impossible to find, especially the well aged bottles of 15, 20 or 23 years old. I think it is one of the most fascinating stories for any of the alcoholic beverages, considering that it got to such a prominence in less than 10 years. The story of Pappy Van Winkle definitely worth few minutes of your time – here is the link to the article.
Bordeaux is coming back! Well, of course it never really left, but it lost its luster, especially in the eyes of the millennials, and finally the folks at Bordeaux decided to do something about it. The Bordeaux wine Bureau (CIVB) is starting a global campaign in US, China, Japan, UK and a few other countries to convince the wine buying public that Bordeaux is well and alive, and worth their hard earned money. You can find more details about the campaign here.
Last for today – a few words about 2014 harvest, which have mostly completed in thew Western hemisphere. This article from Wines and Vines presents some interesting numbers – for instance, the whole grape harvest in California was a bit less than 4 million tons. It also goes beyond the numbers and presents some of the trends – as an example, some growers in California Central Valley pull out the vines and replace them with the nuts – our sacred beverage, wine, is only a business for many, and it must be profitable, or else. Go read it for yourself.
And we are done here. The glass is empty – but the refill is on the way. Cheers!
Thank you, #GrenacheDay
September 19th was yet another “wine holiday” – the Grenache Day. Grenache, which is known in Spain as Garnacha, needs no introduction for the oenophiles. One of the most planted red grapes in the world. A star of Châteauneuf-du-Pape, Priorat, California, Australia and many other countries and regions. A grape with the middle name “rich and opulent” (when was the last time you had a lean Grenache wine? No rush, think about it…). If big wines are your territory, Grenache is definitely your grape.
So what this “thank you” all about? Easy, let me explain. When I know about the certain “grape day”, I usually try to honor it by opening the wine made with that specific grape. Considering the connotation of the “holiday”, I also look for the somewhat of a special bottle. I’m not saying that I would casually open DRC for the Pinot Day (I wish I would have that choice), but still, it should be an interesting bottle. Talking about the holiday at hand, #GrenacheDay, I realized that Grenache is grossly underrepresented in my cellar. Cabernet, Pinot Noir, Syrah, Tempranillo, Zinfandel – plenty of choice, Grenache – not so much. Searching through the shelves, I noticed the bottle of 2006 Pax Cuvée Moriah. Checked the back label – 88% Grenache, definitely qualifies as Grenache for me. 2006 is considered young in my book, but – either that or some random non-grenache bottle. Done.
Okay, so here is our wine – 2006 Pax Cuvée Moriah Sonoma County (15.9% ABV, 88% Grenache, 6% Mourvedre, 3% Syrah, 2% Counoise, 1% Roussanne). Cork is out, pour in the glass, swirl, smell. Beautiful. Bright fruit, spices, herbs – a delicious promise. On the palate, great concentration, big, texturally present, roasted meat and bright cherries, clean acidity, an excellent wine overall. Drinkability: 8+
I stepped away from my glass with a small amount of wine left in it. Come back 15-20 minutes later, ready to finish. Swirl, sip – the wine is past prime. Touch of stewed fruit and over-ripe plums. The wine completely transformed. So here is the “thank you” part. If it wouldn’t be for the “grape day”, I would still be waiting for the right moment. Only to find out at some point that all the pleasure was gone, without been experienced. Thanks to the #GrenacheDay, we were able to experience this wine still at its peak (it was only a tiny amount in the glass which turned around).
Let’s raise the glass to the grape holidays, the experience savers. Cheers!
Sharing the Pleasure – Two Cabernets for the #CabernetDay
Yes, it is a #CabernetDay, and a post about Cabernet wines should be rather appropriate – but somehow, I was on the fence about it, until the AME opened up a little bit… When the wine give you lots of pleasure, why not talk about it? Well, this is how I felt anyway.
Cabernet Sauvignon and Cabernet Franc make some of the very best wines in the world, both when they fly solo, and when assisted by the other grapes. Myriad of love letters err tasting notes, blog posts and articles had been written to those grapes and wines, and hundreds millions of dollars traded hands for the pleasure of owning and drinking the Cabernet wines. Yes, we love our Cabernet wines (even Miles didn’t dare to poop on them). Thus I will not inundate you with another ten (or fifty) interesting facts, and instead will simply share the pleasure I had drinking the wines.
The greatness of the #GrapeDay is in the fact that it helps to select the bottle to be open. It also makes it appropriate to break a special bottle, and so I did.
The first bottle opened was 2009 Gramercy Cellars Cabernet Sauvignon Columbia Valley. What makes it special? I had only one bottle, and read some rave reviews advocating giving this wine some time – thus I was waiting for the “special occasion” (thank you #CabernetDay).
I don’t know how this works, but when I think about the wines in the terms of how I would describe them, I get some random analogies at random times. This time my brain decided to go with the athletes analogy. To give you an idea of how this wine tasted, imagine a runner, may be a sprinter – perfectly built slender body, perfectly visible muscles, everything is tightly wound and ready to spring at any moment. A perfectly looking, but minimalist body. That was the impression of this wine – restrained cassis notes, espresso, earth, plums, clean acidity, firm and perfectly structured – a great package all around. (Drinkability:8)
The second wine was 2005 Neyers Vineyards AME Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley. What makes it special? I love Neyers wines – their 2003 Cabernet was spectacular, for instance. And I had only two bottles of the AME (I rarely buy wines by the case, so having only two bottles is rather common). I would say that this wine was special even for the Neyers – the AME constitutes first initials of the names of their 3 children – Alexandra, Michael and Elizabeth.
Going to the sports analogy, imagine the same perfectly built athlete, but make all the muscles at least 3 times bigger – still perfect body, no fat, just muscles, but much bigger frame and much bigger muscles. We are not getting to the bodybuilder sizes, but this might be Stallone rather than Schwarzenegger – I hope you got my point.
Delicious open nose of dark fruit, cassis, loads of cassis, eucalyptus, earth. On the palate – so many things happening – cassis, plums, earth, pencil shavings, dark chocolate and espresso combined, clean acidity, perfect balance, firm structure and powerful tannins – a wow wine. (Drinkability:9).
There you have it, my friends – two great wines in honor of #CabernetDay. What is in your glass? Cheers!
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