Six bottles of 2010 southern French red wines told the story. With the low yield, long hang time, high quality vintage examples selling for $17 and under at retail, the story wanted to be good. All of the wines were without flaw, dark purple, full of fruit, round, rich, and without any hard edges to make them […]
Blind Tasting 1998 Chateauneuf du Pape
Early critical accounts pegged the 1998 Chateauneuf du Pape vintage as monumental. Grenache and Syrah flourished under favorable growing conditions. Yet, decade old tasting memories bulged from powerful, tight, and stubborn bottles expressing convincing cellar potential. Could a dozen year term of lingering dark, cool rest unveil beauty beneath youthful armor? With this in mind, […]
2010 Donkey and Goat Rosé vs. 1985 La Chapelle?
Just like clocks striking twelve, our cellar coughs up one bottle of 1985 wine every year on April 14. My wife and I were lucky to be married in this vintage year. The Bordeaux have aged gracefully despite the vintage’s early accessibility, northern Rhones are holding onto their fruit even now, 1985 Sassicaia made our evening […]
3 Reasons Puech-Haut Prestige 2009 Is Top Holiday Wine
Imagine the convenience of someone delivering two cases of one very perfect red wine to your front door every year at the start of the holiday season. Not 100 point and $6,000 a case perfect, just perfectly versatile, delicious, and affordable red wine for all the usual and familiar holiday situations. Something to serve at oversubscribed […]
Grace Connects Wine & Winemaker
I do not know Angela Osborne personally but we have had a few email exchanges and I have tried her A Tribute to Grace Grenache from the Santa Barbara Highlands Vineyard. The wine literally shook my senses and turns out to be unlike any other US made Grenache I have ever tasted. The 2008 vintage example is […]
Palate Press Uncorks Swartland Revolution
Earlier this summer (winter in South Africa’s Swartland wine growing subregion) I had the chance to mix it up with the drivers of the Swartland Revolution; the winemakers. Ever since I began to comprehend the unusually high authenticity and quality levels of the upstart region’s wines, I started sharing information about individual pieces of the […]
Top Three Wines of July: Swartland, Minervois, Santa Barbara
This month’s top wine wrap up spans three continents including Africa, Europe, and North America. These are all remarkably compelling wines pushing farming and élevage to the edge of their regions’ traditional boundaries. While they are all urgently recommended, securing a bottle or two of Testalonga El Bandito or A Tribute to Grace will require intense investigation and […]
A Tribute To Grace Tops Wine Blogger Conference Wines
On a weekend in Charlottesville, VA with scores of domestic and international wine pouring sponsors, ballroom wine fests, fleets of buses covering area wineries, half a dozen restaurant wine lists, and countless treasured bottles transported by wine bloggers from their personal cellars, I had the prettiest and most compelling wine poured for me by Hardy […]
Loomis Vineyards Achieves Early Statement of Style
I like discovering young wineries working their own infant vineyards as wine makers unveil unique styling and a reliance on their own maturing vines that are not yet naturally producing lower yields with more intense and concentrated fruit. While it can take years to release the untold treasures embodied in newly planted land, it is […]
Three Sparkling Wines Upstaged By Patricia Boyer-Domergue’s Profound Minervois
We rightfully anchored our post graduation ceremony celebration with a potpourri of sparklers including two that previously received favorable reviews here, NV Chidaine Montlouis Methode Traditionelle Brut Loire and NV Aubry Brut Premier Cru, Champagne plus a really interesting and exotic sparkling Malvasia Dell’Emilia value that you will read about at WineZag soon. But on this late afternoon […]