Our Tasting Group visits Moët Hennessy

This past Tuesday, our Food Network tasting group was treated to a tasting at the Moet-Hennessey headquarters in New York. Moet owns or has a hand in 18 different estates producing approximately 100 different wines.

We stated with the Veuve Cliqout Brut which was straw yellow in color with yeast and lemon notes and a driving minerality.

After that aperitif, we tasted through six wines from their portfolio, a mix of red and whites.

First up was the ’08 Cloudy Bay Sauvignon Blanc. It was dry and acidic with lemon and minerals. Medium long finish. Balanced, zippy and grassy.

’07 Livio Felluga Terre Alte followed that. It was an interesting blend of 40% Sauvignon Blanc, 30% Pinot Blanco, and 30% Freluano. It was soft and rounder than the Cloudy Bay with plenty of acidity. Medium bodied with a medium finish. While this was the wine of the night for some in our group, I found it a bit all over the place.

’07 Chateau La Nerthe – Chateauneuf du Pape White was next and this was also round with nice acidity. Light gold in color with floral and orange spice aromas. Stone fruits, flowers, and minerals emerged as the wine had time to warm up. Medium bodied with a medium long finish. I thought this wine was very good and the white wine of the night for me.

’06 Newton – Unfiltered Chardonnay finished off the white wines. This had obvious oak and vanilla notes with lemon fighting through the background. Golden colored and the darkest hue of any of the whites tasted. Lush texture with a long finish. Good but not necessarily my style of wine.

We moved on to two reds after this. The first being the ’06 Terrazes de los Andes Reserva – Malbac which was a garnet colored, acidic and dry. Notably tannic leading to a long finish. OK.

Last was the ’06 Numanthia from Spain. Garnet colored with dark fruit, cider and spice box notes. Lots of various dark fruits going on and chocolate, cocoa, and mocha mixed in. Smooth, balanced with a persistent long finish. This was my wine of the night hands down.

What was also interesting about this tasting was the “how to taste” suggestions we were given from our guide.

(1) Is the wine “Yum” or “Yuk”?
(2) Does the wine have any faults or is it funky in any way?
(3) What are the fruit aromas and are they primary or in the background?
(4) What are the secondary or tertiary notes? Are they up front or in the background? Is there noticeable wood notes? They are more likely to be upfront in older wines?
(5) What’s the color of the wine? Lighter wines are likely to have less or no wood aging while darker wines are more likely to have them.

- Acidity is best defined by how much the wine makes your mouth water.
- Tannins are mainly imparted by the oak/wood aging or through seeds, skins, and stems. Tannic usually translates to a dry wine. It can also become astringent.
- Alcohol – If you smell it and your nose burns than it’s too alcoholic.
- But… Just because a wine might be 15% alcohol, it doesn’t necessarily mean its “crap” if its still in balance.
- Balance – When all of these elements come together.
- Finish – Are you still thinking about it after you drink it?
- Persistance – You should get this, essentially an extended finish, with an expensive bottle.
- Acid cuts though fat.
- Proseco is grapy by nature and goes great with a good fresh squeezed OJ.

- If is there for you, its there for you.
- Trust your taste.

These “musings” are the opinions of our tasting guide and guided towards our relatively “newbie” tasting group but I think he did a pretty good job of summing everything up.

Overall it was a great outing and we’re looking forward to our next visit.

Pisoni Vineyards at Union Square Wines

I've been a little lax in updating lately but hopefully things will pick up…

That said, I also haven’t been taking as many notes as I normally would. Again, I’m hoping that turns around too…

However, I’ve still been drinking and have been to some pretty decent store tasting of late.
One recent visit (with our one year old tagging along no less) was at Union Square Wines where Gary Pisoni and his son Jeff were pouring wines made from their Santa Lucia Highlands grapes along with their own wines which are currently made by Jeff Pisoni.

I’m not the best at taking notes at events like this. For one, you taste so many wines and they often blur together. Also, it’s hard enough to fight through the lines to get a pour and the last thing you want to do is to find a spot to write down thought. Finally, the size of the pour at tastings like this are often small enough to get the essence but often not large enough to give a full expression.
All that said, below is a list of the wines tasted with what sparse notes I have.

Luli ’07 Chardonnay – “Peach and bracing acidity.”
Lucy ’08 Rose of Pinot Noir – “Very Good”
Lucia ’06 Pinot Noir
Lucia ’05 Pinot Noir ‘Gary’s Vineyard’ – “More character than the ‘06”
Pisoni ’06 Estate Pinot Noir – “A+ - clean and smooth”
Lucia ’05 Syrah Susan’s Hill Vineyard

Loring Wine Company ’05 Pinot Noir ‘Gary’s Vineyard’ – “Very good and a lot lighter in body and weight than other Loring’s I’ve had in the past.”
Lorca ’03 Pinot Noir ‘Pisoni Vineyard’
Capiaux ’06 Pinot Noir ‘Pisoni Vineyard’ – “One of my least favorite wines of the afternoon.”
Patz & Hall ’05 Pinot Noir ‘Pisoni Vineyard’ – “Another of my least favorites of the afternoon.”

A great tasting overall with the general impression that these wines were well made, in balance, and without the “heaft” that often mark the typical California Pinot Noir that I’ve been exposed to.

Like I said, these notes are less than helpful but there you have it anyway.

New Year's Resolutions

New Year’s Resolution #4 - To start the process of creating a more balanced cellar than what I have now.

This came about as a result of reading a thread on the Mark Squires Wine Discussion Board where the question posed was “how to other collectors balance their cellar.” It came from someone who had a fair numbers of wines stashed away but with few of them being ready to drink.

That aspect mirrors my own situation but I also have the added issue of having 75% of my cellar devoted to Bordeaux, much of which I’m sitting on for future aging!

I don’t feel that is so much of a problem but truth be told, there are other wine regions I very much enjoy drinking but are lacking in my cellar for no good reason. Among my favorites are Tuscan reds, California Pinot Noir, and German Riesling. There are also what I will call secondary regions that I am now starting to uncover and enjoy such as France’s Rhone Valley (mainly Southern), Loire, and even Cru Beaujolais. That’s not even counting dabbling in Finger Lake Rieslings (and their whites in general), Greece, South America, Lebanon, etc… This list goes on…

I admit that my palate does definitely lean heavily towards Bordeaux as it is my “first true love” in wine with Tuscany and California in the wings. But I also don’t want to shut out these other regions that I either know I like or want to explore more of. I want to continue to learn and expand my palate and and to also have more choice when heading down into the basement to pull something for dinner.

This is a long term goal given my current economic situation (see: Lily - born 3/19/08) but I would like to start the process this year.

Resolution #5 - Drink more of what I currently have. No need to sit on some of the stuff I’m sitting on and there are only so many special occasions throughout the year.

To quote Maya from Sideways - "You know, the day you open a '61 Cheval Blanc … that's the special occasion."

(Disclaimer - I do not actually own a ‘61 Cheval Blanc.)

'05 Two Hands Lily's Garden Shiraz - And the Story of a Cork

The ‘05 Lily’s Garden Shiraz from Two Hands Winery in Barossa Valley - Australia is one of the best Aussie shiraz I’ve had in a while.

This is a very concentrated wine with a nearly impenetrable black color. Very complex aroma of blackberry, chocolate and spices along with smoke and tabac notes. Silky texture and a super-long mouth-coating finish. The complexity and lushness masks its high 14.5% alcohol but I guess that’s standard with most Aussie shiraz anyway.

This wine is a definite keeper which I found for $40 at T.B. Ackerson Wines in Brooklyn.

All the above said, I did note one somewhat eye-raising mark with the cork of this wine.

I was initially worried when the foil was pulled off the bottle as wine had soaked through cork, covering about 1/3 of the top end of the cork. When the cork was pulled and examined, there was a slit from one end to the other which facilitated the seepage of wine through the cork itself. The only thing keeping the wine from soaking through more was that the cork appears to be “capped” with two end cork pieces that did not split. These were the “saviors” of the wine if you will as without them, the wine would have basically seeped on through.

This is noteworthy to me for a couple of reasons. First is that I had never seen anything like it before in a cork with the split down the side. Second is that I was surprised to see this on a relatively high end wine which retails for $40+ a bottle.

As you can tell from the note above, this wine was still fantastic. Just makes me think that screwcaps on higher end wines might not be such a bad thing, even if this particular bottle dodged a bullet.

Finnish Wines and European Union Farm Subsidies

Here is an interesting article on Finnish wine of all things and European Farm subsidies.

It appreared in the New York Times International section so it comes from a more "worldly" POV rather than being wine specific. There are also some interesting points being made regarding Global Warming.

Enjoy.

Vintage 2008

Although nothing can come close to this, here's to hoping that 2008 is also a good year for wine in regions with some longevity. I'm crossing my fingers for either Bordeaux or Tuscany!

My Wine Cellar

Here is a picture of “My New Cellar.” I like to call it new but in reality, I’ve been keeping my wine in the basement of our home since we moved in about two years ago. However, it’s been boxed up in cardboard and wood with no real easy access.

In addition to accessibility, I also had the issues of a gradual heat increase in the summertime and lower than ideal humidity in the winter.

The cornerstone of the cellar is a Vintage Keeper 500 which I purchased to hold the bulk of my wine collection and to store all the wines I plan on holding onto for long term aging. By comparison to other units like Eurocave and the like, this is on the budget side which fit… well, my budget.

The Vintage Keeper 500 will help with the temperature during the spring, summer and early fall where basement temperatures can get beyond 65 degrees and sometimes 70 degrees in the height of summer when its 90 and 100 outside.

There are two smaller “wine fridges” off to the left. One holds Pinot Noir and the other holds whites and rose wines. These “wine fridges” I’ve had for a few years and brought over from my previous apartment where they lived in the closet.

I also have a section of reclaimed wood wine boxes that I’ve stacked for decorative purposes but also use to put my everyday drinkers in. These are wines that I buy and try to consume shortly thereafter.

So now I have much easier access to all the wine in my collection and I have more control over the temperature. However, in the cooler weather, the ambient temperature is between 50 and 55 degrees so I don’t have to plug any of the units in until the temperature starts to approach 60.

The only unanswered issue I have to deal with is humidity. It gets dry in the wintertime and hovers around the 35% range when the ideal is 70%. It gets a little better in the summertime, approaching 50%. However, that is also short of the ideal.

Feel free to leave suggestions on how to improve the humidity if you have any tricks I might use. Other than that, I’m pretty pleased with my new set-up if I may say so myself!

Chateau d’Arcins 2005 – Haut Médoc – Bordeaux

I should mention first that the 2005 Chateau d’Arcins was used by myself and my friend Lisa as part of a podcast we’re putting together, taking lessons from Jancis Robinson’s How to Taste. This particular lesson was on decanting and we thought a 2005 Bordeaux would be perfect. One that could be drunk now but could use a few years of age. Hence this wine.

Pre-decanting: Ruby red in color with cherry, tar and dark fruit. Possibly even a slight floral note, but a muted one. Blackberry and oak are also noteable but again, soft notes. Texture is chewy but not overly tannic. But they are there. Tannins hold back the fruit some. Medium-long finish and just slightly off balance.

Post-decanting: WOW! This wine really changed in the decanter! It really opened us and had become very fruit forward and really lovely. Black cherry. The oak had turned into cedar. Some chocolate notes also emerged. It became slightly more complex in the decanter and had also developed a softer texture. The finish remained medium long but was much less tannic. Really nice.

This is a solid B wine after decanting and a good value at $15 on sale from Astor Wine in the East Village.

Look for the podcast soon!

Domaine de Jaugaret '02, '03 and '04 - A Classic Styled Bordeaux

Today I figured out what a truly “classic styled” Bordeaux taste like. On the advice of Eric Asimov’s “Pour” blog, I headed to Rosenthal Wine Merchants on East 84th St. for a tasting of Domaine de Jaugaret from the St. Julien region of Bordeaux.

According to Rosenthal Wine Merchants…

“The petite estate of Domaine de Jaugaret has been in the Fillastre family since 1654. Jean-Fancois Fillastre is dedicated to preserving the traditions not only of Jaugaret but of the St. Julien appellation. Stepping into the cellars of Jaugaret brings one back to an era when the Bordelais were modest and the wines were grand. Here is an estate where one finds neither pretense nor hubris, just the essence of the appellation.”

“Domaine Jaugaret comprises a mere 1.3 hectares of vineyards, made almost exclusively of Cabernet Sauvignon (80%) with some Petit Verdot and Malbac to supplement this classic Medoc structure. The average age of the vines is over 50 years and some of the Malbec vineyards are in excess of 100 years old. This combination of grape varieties permits Jaugaret to find the ultimate expression of the terroir of St. Julien taking advantage of the deep gravel beds and the long growing season that mark St. Julien. The old vines of Jaugaret combined the unfertile, gravelly soils leads to naturally low yields again providing M. Fillasstre with a concentration virtually unequalled in the appellation. Here is a truly unique wine from a gentleman who follows the most classical traditions.”

“Vinification: After being hand-harvested and hand-pressed, the cuvaison is long, frequently lasting for three weeks or more. The wines are then racked into small barrels to complete the malolactic fermentation and are left to age in a small, damp underground cellar with minimal racking. In substantial vintages (e.g. 1996 or 2000) the wines are bottled (always unfiltered) after 30 months of aging. The wines of Jaugaret, relying so extensively on Cabernet, are built to last”

At Rosenthal, where I had to ring the front doorbell and then be lead downstairs to the tasting room. Slightly odd but also kinda cool too… In the tasting room with about 10 others, I was able to taste the 2002, 2003 and 2004 vintages. As they state, they are certainly built to last, being some of the most tannic wines I’ve ever tasted and very classic in structure… What does “classic” mean? While, now I think I know. Tannins are more upfront. Fruit more in the back. Slightly less ripe. Slightly less alcohol. Certainly not approachable when young and you have to use your imagination to figure what they might taste like ten to a dozen years from now at least. I can safly say that I had tasted nothing like these wines ever before.

2004 Domaine de Jaugaret: The 2004 was ruby red in color with red fruit. Cherry. Red currant. Possibly cranberry. And definitely smoke. Tannic and dry but it was also the brightest and most approachable of the three wines tasted. Long finish.

2003 Domaine de Jaugaret: The 2003 was also ruby red in color with light cedar, some cherry and other brighter red fruit. It was almost like a pinot noir in its aroma profile. Heavy on the smoke and tar. Very tannic and dry to the point that it sucks all moisture out of the mouth. Slightly acidic and just a touch out of balance.

2002 Domaine de Jaugaret: The 2002 is another ruby red wine with smoky aroma and stronger fruit than the 2003. Here its blackberry and cassis. Bright and smoother in texture than either the ’02 or ‘03. It has a very lush long finish. Not incredibly complex but well balanced and approachable now. Even so, it still needs aging.

As I said, it was an experience to taste these wine. Although I found all three to be a bit tough to drink now, even with food, it was still a great education to what Bourdeaux was probably like back in the day. And I mean the day… 100 years ago?

All three are approximately $75 a bottle from Rosenthal Wine Merchants.

Wine Book Club: Vino Italiano by Joe Bastianich and David Lynch

At the beginning of January, fellow wine bloggers Dr. Debs and David McDuff proposed and are hosting a Wine Book Club with the inaugural tome being Vino Italiano by Joe Bastianich and David Lynch.

The book is a detailed to say the least and clocks in at over 500 pages. It starts off with a discourse on the culture of wine in Italy, gets into Italian wine laws, grapes and importing. Then we get to the meat of the book which details each of Italy’s 21 wine producing regions in 19 chapters and nearly 350 pages of text. The last section is a “data section” which defines the grapes, regions, and producers.

For each region there are basically three pieces. The first is a short anecdote about the wine region being covered and includes such scenes as boar hunting in Tuscany, horse butchers in the Veneto, soccer in Lazio or seeking out gelato in Sicily. The authors then break down the wines made in the region into sparkling, whites, reds and finally desserts wines, hitting on all even if the region produces only scant amounts of one. Finally, there is a “Fast Facts” section which basically reviews the pertinent data – reviewing the grapes most prominently used, acres under vine, styles, examples of wines and estimated costs.

Joe Bastianich and David Lynch are experts in the field of wine and it shows as the attention to detail is strong, leaving no region untouched and describing all wine styles, even the obscure ones, in such great detail that you can’t help but want to go out and try them.

It’s in the anecdotes though that really made me fall for this book though. For example, they describe the hillside fires of Festa di Sacro Cuore (Day of the Sacred Heart) which cast a “glow over the vineyards that cling to the steep mountain slopes” as “people sit in the cafés with places of bresaola (air-cured beef) and pitchers of wine, starring up at the blazes as if there were a movie playing.”

How can you not fall for imagery like that! Well, it did its trick and got me reading further to the details of the Trentino-Alto Adige region where they spent just as much time discussing the reds of the region as they did the whites they are more known for. They paint such a complete picture of the region that you almost feel like you have to sample the wines themselves to complete the scene.

From the entry, I felt like I had to familiarize myself with the schiava grape, the main red grape of the Alto Adige region and wine I wrote about for the last Wine Blogging Wednesday.

Bastianich and Lynch add another element to the book by including recipes from the region created by famous restaurateurs Lydia Bastianich (Joe’s Mom) and Mario Batali (Joe’s restaurant partner). Again, it’s easy to fall under the spell of these recipes which lead to me, or I should say my wife, trying our hands at the Braised Wild Boar and pairing it with a Brunello di Montalcino. Both were excellent.

All in all, I feel like this is THE book on Italian wine, at least that I’ve seen in my somewhat limited experience. The biggest takeaway for me is that I felt like I learned about Italy and its food, not just the wine. It does a great job of mashing it all together. My one complaint… 500+ pages is a lot to digest but then again, this isn’t just a wine book, it’s also a “have to have” reference.

Enjoy!

Jancis Robinson's How to Taste - Lesson 1

I’ve taken my first steps from Jancis Robinson’s How to Taste book and it had nothing to do with wine.

On page 15 of her book, she suggests that the next time you taste something, try tasting a mouthful first with your nose pinched and then again with it open.

The point she’s looking to prove is that the nose has just as much if not more to do with how we experience wine than when the wine actually interacts with the tongue and taste.

To test this out, I had my wife put various pieces of vegetables behind her back while I tasted them with my eye’s shut. The exercise was meant to illustrate that it’s really hard to pick out what you’re tasting if you don’t have the aromatic information to help out.

She proved her point. While I found it relatively easy to pick out the vegetables based off texture, broccoli for example has a very distinct texture but when plugging up the nose, you really don’t get its essence. The same held true with the peppers, carrots, and cucumbers. This exercise was also particularly interesting with cheeses who get much of their character from aroma but that gets muted with a plugged up nose.

The practice makes sense when we think about how little we taste when we have a cold. She just wants to make sure we understand that wine gets most of its character from its aroma.
Tune in next time when we tackle acidity and bitterness in a relatively unpleasant way!

Mold in the Cellar…

… or at least on the boxes that contain some of my wine. I’m count myself incredible fortunate and blessed not only to have a wonderful wife who is very understanding and willing to put up with my wine habit but we also to have an actual cellar to keep it in. We have an unfinished basement in our house in Brooklyn which would seem ideal for wine storage and it almost is. But there are a couple of flaws.

* It can get a bit dry, especially in the winter with humidity hovering between 20% and 30% when the ideal for wine is 60% to 70%. This is partly due to the mechanics of the house which include the forced air unit to heat the house and the hot water heater. They are not near the wine but they do suck some moisture out of the air. Humidity during the summer is much better.

* The second flaw is the temperature range, moving from the 50s in the wintertime to the 80s in the summer time. However, it is a slow climb and it only hits the 80s when it’s 100+ outside.

There is also what might be considered a third “flaw” but it really is only a function of my stupidity. With an unfinished basement, there is little moisture protection on the floor. Hence, when flat objects are placed down directly on the porous cement, moisture gets trapped underneath and depending on the material (think cardboard or wood wine boxes here), mold can form.

You see where I’m going with this. (I must have missed that bio class in 7th grade when we talked about how mold forms.)

Once I figured this was happening, I pulled the three boxes that were on the bottom and checked out the damage. Two of the three boxes had mold on the bottom but none had made it to the bottles themselves. I threw out the boxes, placed the wine in new boxes and lifted them about 4 inches off the ground with bricks. I also did this with the third box but the mold had found its way onto some of the bottles.

I panicked because the wines affected were some of my favorites, namely Italian Brunello di Montalcinos. I wiped off the bottles and placed them in a new box, getting most of the visible mold off. But the bottles smelled and I was worried that the mold might have somehow made its way to the wine through the cork.

I opened one to find out. It was a 2001 Caparzo Brunello di Montalcino. I opened it and immediately poured the wine into a decanter to get it away from the affected bottle. I took the wine into the dinning room, set it down, and asked my wife to smell it. She detected nothing. All I could smell was the mold. Perplexing until I realized that I hadn’t washed my hands!!! After taking care of that, I went back to the wine and found no mold smell but the wine did seem somewhat closed. I started wondering if the mold had somehow muted the flavors of wine. I was at this point getting just a little worried. We had dinner, talked about other things, and then we went back to the wine. It had really opened up and smelled wonderful and ended up being a great bottle of Brunello! The mold had not won! The wine held up!!!

I’m still left with the unanswered question of whether the wines would have been affected if they had been left longer. Anyone?

I later checked tasting notes for the 2001 Caparzo Brunello online and read that it does indeed take some time to open up. As far as I could tell, the wine was unaffected and I don’t think I need to worry unduly about the other bottles.

So I sat back and enjoyed the bottle.

TN – One thing that stood out was that it went from being somewhat steely and minerally at first to soft and lush a couple hours later. Dark red in color. Somewhat leathery with dark fruit but also a touch of cherry to give it a little bit of brightness. Not too much but just enough. Bone dry texture with abundant tannins with a super long finish. Very well put together but it could stand at least a couple more years of age to soften up a bit more. Excellent overall. A-

How to Taste - A Great Learning Opportunity or an Exercise in Futility?

One of the crazier and completely impractical ideas I’ve had of late has been to take the book “How to Taste” by Jancis Robinson and follow it though from beginning to end and in the process… learn how to taste wine.

It’s a great book with very detailed instruction on how identify acidity, sweetness, bitterness, saltiness, tannins, etc and then apply that to wine and assess quality, imperfection and balance among other things.

If I can follow the book through to the end, I believe that my ability to assess wine will be much improved. As of right now, I think I do an ok job at it which is all fine and well but I would love to try and take the skill of tasting wine to the next level so to speak.

The book is also laid out in a really thoughtful way, splitting theory with an applied “practice session.” For example, in the section on balance, the theory section talks about the relationship between sweetness and acidity, detailing what you should notice when a wine is too sweet and out of balance, too acidic and out of balance, or when it’s just right and the two are in harmony with one another. Then it moves on to the practice section where she suggests buying a good sauternes, a less inexpensive sweet white wine, a Loire “sec”, and an inexpensive French country white and then comparing the balance of each.

I think it’s a great approach and one that I would get a lot out of. However… there are 102 of these practice sessions within the 200+ pages of the book or essentially half of the book! In short, it’s going to be somewhat expensive and certainly time consuming if I want to take this on. But… I’m going to give it a try for a couple of reasons.

* First, I really would like to take my ability to taste and assess wine up a notch or so.

* Second, I want to expand this blog a little bit and break out from the tried and true “Tasting Note” format. Writing about the practice sessions as I go along will hopefully help with that.

* Third, I want to experiment a little bit with the idea of podcasting. It’s my hope that some of these practice sessions will show up as a podcast and add a little bit of color to the experience. I’m not promising anything, I’m just saying that I’m going to give it a try.

* Fourth and perhaps the most important is that I want to include my wine drinking friends in the process and add more voices to this blog. Podcasting fits right into this. Since I believe that listening to a one-person podcast is akin to listening to one hand clapping, I’m hoping that by bringing my friends into the process will add another whole new dimension and the element of interaction.

As far as the practice sessions go, my idea is they will take the form of both standard blog entries as well as podcasts.

I also want to mention the inspirations for this whole project. First is the book itself. How to Taste – A Guide to Enjoying Wine by Jancis Robinson. I’ve had it for a while and have just recently recognized its brilliance. Second is the idea of following a guide from beginning to end. The idea is blatantly ripped off from the Julie/Julia Project masterminded by Julie Powell in blog form which was then turned into a book. Third are all the podcasts I’ve been listening to which include the wine focuses Grape Radio and 3 Wine Guys as well as a some food focused casts with the best being Eat-Feed.

By the way, the complication to all this is that I'll be a dad in March. No better time to take on a project like this!

There it is. Lets see how it turns out.

New Year's Resolution - Accomplished!

One of my new year's resolutions was to rework the Wine Index on the NYC Wine Notes blog to make it more user friendly.

It is now organized by type of wine - red, white, rose, sparkling, port, and dessert wines. From there, the wines are broken down by country and region.

Please let me know what you think. I'm always looking to improve the site.

Happy New Year!

A Moldly Screwtop?

Last night I went downstairs to my basement to put a couple of wines away for safe keeping. While moving some of my other wines over to make room, I came across a Chardonnay that my wife and I had bought from a California Central Coast winery. The wine had developed mold at the base of the screwcap foil as well as the seam where the screwcap breaks off. In addition, the wine had lost about an inch of liquid compared to the bottle fills of other wines from the same winery that we bought on the trip. No other wines were affected.

I have seen mold on a cork before but never on a screw cap. It looks more like a science project or lost vegetables found in the fridge after a couple months.

I'm curious as to if anyone has seen this happen before?

Evolving Over Time: 2003 Château Coufran

I have a few more bottles left of the 2003 Château Coufran, a Bordeaux from the Haut-Medoc which I found at Grand Wines in Astoria about a year and a half ago. My first tasting note for this wine was almost exactly a year-ago in November ’06 and it was a nice and surprising exercise to taste this wine now and compare it to then.

First, it seems much more “mature” now as its changed its color slightly and is now a slightly lighter shade of brick red. It has very earthy, wood and leather aromas just hovering above the fruit. The fruit that’s there is dark fruit but it does take a back seat initially. The tannins are in the forefront. Very dry texture with a long finish.

What was most interesting to me is that it has essentially just switched its profile. A year-ago, the fruit was up front with the wood and earthiness in the background.

My hope is that another year in bottle will really bring these elements into harmony. I’m hopeful because after letting this wine sit out for a couple hours, it because much smoother and softer in texture.

The changes seen in the 2003 Château Coufran from one year to the next were a fun lesson in how a wine evolves. It really evolves. Fascinating!

Wines in the Cellar

One of the things I’m guilty of is holding on to wines that I really should be drinking. The reasons for this are many. For one, some wines like the handful of classified growth Bordeaux I have, I feel like I have to wait for a special occasion. Another reason is not wanting to open wines that we bought on vacation. That $10 euro wine we brought back from Italy that’s probably already started its down-hill slide… still in the cellar. With some, I loved the first bottle so much that I don’t want to open the second because I wouldn’t be able to find a replacement.

Anyway, I’m trying to get over this and I think I took a baby step forward with the 2003 Perrin & Fills Les Sinards Châteauneuf-du-Pape. We had some friends over for dinner, went through the first two bottles and I was looking for a third to open. This was it.

The wine was deep purple in color with really earthy notes of smoke and leather mixed in with dark fruit including blackberry and black cherry. The wine was smooth with a nice long and lush finish. It’s a blend of 70% Grenache, 15% Syrah, and 15% Mourvedre.

I loved this wine and gave it a B+. It also made me want to explore the Rhone Valley more, an region I know relatively little about.

I didn’t sit on it forever. I might not have know what I was missing.

P.S. - One thing I like about Perrin & Fils is that they have a blog!

Writing notes at wine tastings. Can it be done?

I love wine tasting events. I think they are flat out fun and a great way to taste wines that I would normally never have thought to try before. For people just learning about their wine preferences, it’s a good way to taste your way through all different kinds of grapes and come away with something like “I think I like Riesling.” For someone on a wine budget, some tasting pour super premium bottles which, for a taste, might be worth the price of admission alone.

What’s not to like!

However…. Every time I go to one of these, which is twice a year at best, I struggle with how I’m going to write about it during and after. While at an event, I always take a small notepad and a pen, thinking I’m going to write some kind of detailed tasting note for most everything I taste. I’m lucky if I write even one down. Even after the event is over, I think I’m going to blog about the wines I’ve tasted, which ones I like, etc. But there are literally hundreds of wines to taste and with my memory, I’m lucky to remember anything beyond the top handful that really truly stood out. Because of that, I usually end up keeping my thoughts to myself.

Now, I think I’ve come up with a way to do it. Just write or mark down the wines I taste and very simply put a + sign(s) next to the ones I liked. In theory I could even do this after the event if I had a half-decent memory.

I got to try this out last week when I went to Wine Library’s Super Tasting as a guest of my friend Julanne, a regular at their shop in Springfield, NJ. The event is HUGE as they offer over 700 different wines to sample, all spread out over three huge rooms at The Manor in West Orange, NJ. The tasting can seem somewhat overwhelming with so many wines, no real way to find out what’s being poured until you get there, and the fact that they’re organized by distributor rather than region or type.

On the upside there are over 700 wines to taste. That’s a pretty big upside if you ask me and I found a lot I liked. My two favorites were dessert wines, the 2001 Filhot from Sauternes which at $14 a half bottle is an amazing bargain. My second favorite wine was slightly more expensive at $140 a bottle. That was the 2002 Gunderlock Nackenheim Rothenberg Berrenauslese from Germany. Taking the prize for “taste of wine that was worth price of admission” based purely on cost per bottle was the 2004 Haut Brion ($400 a bottle). Prize for “wines I was really excited to taste because I had never had them before” were both from Australia, Shiraz’s from Two Hands and Fetish.

Below is the list of the wines I tasted, keeping in mind that this list is literally less than 10% of what I could have tasted!

The Bordeaux Table
Chateau Beau Sejour Becot - 1988 (++)
Chateau Beychevelle - 2005
Chateau Beychevelle - 2006
Chateau Clarendelle Blanc
Chateau Clarendelle Rouge
Chateau d'Issan - 2001
Chateau Filhot - 2001 (+++ - the best wine I tasted that evening - $14 a half-bottle)
Chateau Grand Mayne - 1999 (+)
Chateau Haut Brion - 2004 (++)
Chateau La Mission Haut Brion (++)
Chateau Lanessan – 1996 (+)
Chateau Lascombes - 2001
Chateau Le Gay - 2004 (+)
Chateau Monbousquet Rouge - 2002

The Rest
Abadia Retuerta Selection Especial - 2003
Adelsheim Pinot Noir - 2006
Angel's Cuvee Ripasso de Tannat Amarone - 2005
Au Bon Climat Chardonnay - 2006
Banfi Brunello di Montalcino - 2001 (+)
Bethel Heights Pinot Noir "Eola-Amity Cuvee" - 2005 (I like this a lot)
Bravante Merlot - 2004
Carpineto Chianti Classico Riserva - 2003
Caymus Conundrum - 2005 (+)
Caymus Napa Cabernet Sauvignon - 2005 (+)
Cesari "Il Bosco" Amarone - 2001
Cesari Amarone - 2004
Chapelle St-Arnoux Vacqyeras Reserve Vielles Vignes -2003 (+)
Chateau Franc Maillet "Cuvee Jean Baptiste" Pomerol - 2001 (+)
Chateau Fuisse - Pouilly Fuisse Vielles Vignes - 2004
Chateau Rontets Pouilly Fuisse "Les Birbettes" - 2005 (++)
Chimney Rock Cabernet Sauvignon - 2004
Duckhorn Napa Merlot - 2005
Falesco Marciliano - 2003 (+)
Fattoria La Lecciaia Brunello di Montalcino Riserva - 2001 (+)
Fetish - Playmates Shiraz/Grenache/Mataro - 2005
Fetish - The Watcher Shiraz - 2004 (++ - really good and I thought better than the 2005)
Fetish - The Watcher Shiraz - 2005 (+)
Fritz Haag Brauneberger Juffer Kabinett Riesling - 2006 (+)
Gaja Magari - 2005 (++)
Groth Cabernet Sauvignon - 2004 (+)
Gunderlock Dry Estate Riesling - 2005 (+)
Gunderlock Nackenheim Rothenberg Berrenauslese - 2002 (+++ - 2nd best wine of the evening and it should be at $140 a bottle!)
Hitching Post Pinot Noir Highliner - 2005
L'Aventure Optimus Cabernet/Syrah - 2004 (++)
Le Chiuse Brunello di Montalcino - 2001 (++ - best Brunello of the evening)
Le Volte Tuscany - 2005
Moulin du Duhart Pauillac - 2002
Nickel & Nickel Sullenger Cabernet Sauvignon - 2004 (++)
Parusso Barolo - 2003 (+)
Pine Ridge Cabernet Sauvignon - 2003 (++)
Prunotto Barolo - 2003 (+)
Sanford Pinot Noir - 2005 (+)
Santi Amarone della Valpollicella - 2003
Schafer Frohlich Bockenauer Felseneck Spatlese Riesling - 2006
Sebastiani Sonoma County Cabernet Sauvignon - 2005
Stag's Leap Artemis - 2004 (+)
Two Hands Angel's Share Shiraz - 2006 (++)
Two Hands Bella's Garden Shiraz - 2005 (+)
Two Hands Lily's Garden Shiraz - 2005 (+)
Von Buhl Armand Kabinett Riesling - 2005
Von Hovel Qba Riesling - 2004
Wegeler Wehlener Sonnenuhr Spatlese Riesling - 1994 (++)

Tasting Wine in Kansas with Friends

“Fruit present and accounted for.” as noted by Zack upon first sniffing this wine, the first of five bottles we shares together with his wife Darci when visiting them in Lawrence, Kansas earlier this month. The bottle was a 2004 Argiolas – Costera – Isola Dei Nuraghi from the Sardina region of Italy. The wine is a blend of 90% Cannonau, 5% Carignano and 5% Bovale Sardo with the Cannonau grape thought to be a descendent of Grenache and that might be the reason it was reminiscent of a Chateauneuf du Pape. The wine has nice balance between the fruits, acids, and tannins with the fruit dark cherry driven, possible blackberry. There are also notes of spice and anise. It’s dark red in color, full bodied with a nice long finish. Very tasty but it could also last another few years. (B+)

It was followed by an actual Chateauneuf du Pape. The 2000 Le Vieux Donjon. A dark, inky black wine that might have been just slightly less complex than the Costera above but what it might have lacked there, it made up in finesse. The wine started out with an earthy mulch like nose but opened up to reveal notes of leather, dark fruit, notably blackberry. Texture was slightly tannic but they were soft tannins, leading to a nice long lush finish. (B but possible a b+ if the flavors meld more together after a few more years in the bottle.)

The next night we shared a 1999 Rosemont Estate Belmoral Syrah from the McLaren Vale in Australia. It was dark inky black in color with aromas reminiscent of grilled meats and prunes with the later coming through on the taste as well. The alcohol shows itself at 14% but softens after some time in the decanter. The acids and tannins had also melded well. (B)

That was the wine of the second evening but we stated out earlier in the afternoon with a couple of white wines.

The 2006 L’ete Viognier is from Mendocino County in California. It was straw yellow in color with a somewhat yeasty nose. The fruit was not as immediately identifiable. Possibly citrus peel underneath but hard to distinguish. Pleasant summer quaffer but not too remarkable. (C)

Also sampled that afternoon on the back patio was the 2005 J. Albin Pinot Gris from the Willamette Valley in Oregon. The wine was mainly fermented in stainless steel with a small portion aged sur lie in small oak barrels. It was straw yellow in color. Very floral on the nose. Honeysuckle. Citrus zest. Grapefruit. Actually more like pink grapefruit. Nice balance of acidity and fruit. Medium long finish. Very good and another strong case for Pinot Gris from the Pacific Northwest. (B+).

As for prices, the only two I bought were the L’ete for $11 and the J. Albin for $17 and those were purchased in Kansas. Other than that, the other wines were generously provided by Zack and Darci.

Those were the wines of the first night. Shared with friends I hadn’t seen in a really long time. The wines were shared over cheeses, olives, caperberries, homemade pizza and long discourses of child rearing and friends. You know how people say that the context of tasting a wine, where you are, who your with, etc. adds to your perception. Well, I would have probably given a Yellow Tail an A+ in this context.

All in all, a great wine weekend and a great weekend with friends. Zack was probably the first friend of mine who developed an interest in wine back when I thought red table wines from the Finger Lakes were the pinnacle of class. It’s be nice to have him here to drink away with at times.

Cheers!

My Sister’s Wedding Wines

Back in June, I was tasked by my sister Cindy to help pick out the wines that will be served at her wedding in October. At the time I was thinking there would be PLENTY of time and that it might actually only take a weekend to put something together. However, not only do these things take longer than you think, it is for my sister and her fiancée and of course, I wanted things to be perfect. And of course, there is a budget.

(1) Wanting the wines to be “perfect” and (2) wanting to find them for under $10 a bottle equals creative shopping. Below is what we came up with.

The Reds…
2004 Falesco Vitiano – Umbria - $7 on sale from Zachy’s
2004 Cap de Faugeres – Bordeaux - $12 on sale from Zachy’s
2006 Julienas Flower Label: Georges Duboeuf – Beaujolais - $5.50 on sale from Zachy’s “The Flood Sale”

The Whites…
2005 Domaine Gaujal - Cuvee Dames Coteaux du Languedoc - $7 from Garnet
2005 Domaine de Pouy – Gasgone - $7 from Garnet
2005 “Rabbit Riesling” - $10 from Northside Wine in Ithaca

This last wine, the “Rabbit Riesling” is not its real name and was not chosen by me. I have had it and think its good and a good value. However, this is Cindy’s choice and she picked up the case of this. I think its German.

However, the others are all solid wines and I believe them to be better than most selections you’d get from a caterer. Especially the Cuvee Dames from Languedoc and the Julienas.

This later wine is interesting. It’s from the Gamey grape and is grown in Burgundy. It’s also an excellent wine but more on that in a minute. What’s interesting here is the price at $5.50 a bottle. In the spring, there were rains. At times they were heavy enough in the New York City area to cause flooding and this is what happened to one of the Zachys warehouses in Westchester. While not heavy flooding, it was enough to damage labels for the cases on the bottom of the pallets. For these wines, which they all claim to be undamaged except for the labels, they cut prices in half. Perfect for me and perfect for my sister’s wedding in terms of price. It’s a way to get an $11 wine for half the price!

In a different sense, this is what happened with the Cap de Faugeres although in this case, Zachys was looking to clear inventory of its 2004 Bordeaux to make room for the higher priced 2005s and 2006s. In essence, I think they needed the cash.

Now for the wine. 2006 Julienas Flower Label: Georges Duboeuf . I had to take the Julienas before agreeing that it would work for Cindy’s Wedding. It did. The wine is ruby red in color with notes of smoke, spicee, blueberry and cherry. It has a fantastic bright nose. There are other aromas going on here too. Maybe white chocolate? Cotton candy??? That might be going to far but regardless, there’s a bright cherry scent. Very soft texture, spicy taste which mixes well with the cherry. Medium to full bodied with a wonderful long and slightly dry finish. Fantastic. It gets a B+ (maybe an A if it holds up at the wedding!)

2006 Domain Mont Chavy – Morgon – Georges Duboeuf Beaujolais

This wine was tasted at the same time as the Julienas but as a way of checking out Beaujolais rather than for the wedding.

This was another winner. Dark purple in color. Earthier than the Julienas with notes of dark cherry and blackberry. Chewy texture, dry and more tannic than the Julienas. Long finish. Blackberry tastes as well. Maybe a layer of raspberry underneath. A very nice wone. Solid B.