Two-bucks chuck chardonnay just won some award at some fair, and thus I wanted to try it. I read that sweet wine went well with spicy food, so I had it with the balti lamb tikka I made today for dinner. It was not a good combination. The lamb made the wine taste too sweet, an assault to my palate.
I tried it hours later and liked it more. It now tasted like semi-sweet white grape juice, with a sharp, bitter finish. It’s still a bit too sweet to sip much of, but it is a sipping wine. For $2, it’s very good.
Mike, however, didn’t like it.
Category: Wine (Page 6 of 7)
NOTE: Find more wine reviews under the “wine tasting” category.
Caveats to my winery/wine reviews
I generally prefer bold flavored wines and lots of oak. I like my white wines on the sweet side, I usually prefer oakey Chardonnays, and my red wines heavy. I used to be almost totally into Cabernet Sauvignons, but in recent years I’ve started to prefer Zinfandels. I like Merlots and Malbecs, but I usually find them too mellow for my taste buds. I’m usually not a fan of Pinot Noirs, and I used to really dislike Syrahs, but they’ve been growing on me lately. Finally, I don’t like fortified wines.
I usually cannot identify specific flavors in wine. A wine may taste flowery or fruity to me, but don’t ask me which flower or which fruit it is. Mostly I concentrate on the things that scream to me: how balanced the wine seems, how full, how alcoholic/tannic/acidic, basically, how much I enjoy drinking it :-)
I bought this wine because “Katz” is Mike’s name, not knowing absolutely anything about it, not even what kind it was. I wasn’t planning on drinking it tonight, but I realized at a late hour that the recipe I was making called for white wine, and I had this one already chilling. Alas, only later I found out that many Qualitatswein are late harvest wines, more fit to be served as dessert than with a meal. Indeed, my first thought when I started sipping it is that this would make a good dessert wine.
The bottle does not indicate what type of Qualitatswein but it’s not terribly sweet. Or rather, I thought it was very sweet when I opened it, but it mellowed out after dinner. It’s very floral, with strong fruit overtones – peaches and apricots – and a very smooth finish. It’s pretty good as an after dinner drink and I’d have it again.
Mike, OTOH, thought it almost tasted like a Chardonnay and he did not think it tasted like a dessert wine at all. Granted it was considerably less sweet that the majority of these. He thought it was easy drinking, and not that sweet.
I bought it at TJ’s, and I *think* I paid $7-8 for the bottle.
If you are not convinced I’m not really into wine, you’ll probably be after looking at my poor wine “collection”. It’s not really a collection as such, just a bunch of wines meant to be drank. I figured I’d blog about them here, so that I can remember how much I paid for each one of them and where I got it, so I can know which ones deserve a special occasion. And for me a $20 wine is a special occasion wine.
Cheap TJ wines
2005 Les Caves Joseph Bordeaux (bought ’cause it’s similar to my last name)
2005 Black Mountain Malbec, Wastson’s Grove
2005 Zarafa Pinotage
2005 Gladiatore Frascati (liked the bottle)
Zonin Proseco Brut
Villar Carlotti Prosecco
Piper Sonoma Brut (got as gift, $11)
Better wines
2000 Atlas Peak Vineyards Sangiovese, Napa Valley
2002 Casola Lopez Malbec (my cousin Betiana Lopez gifted it to me in Argentina)
2004 DeLoach Sonoma County Zinfandel ($35 or so, bought at winery)
2003 BV Rutherford Cabernet Sauvignon (I think $20, Mike likes it)
2003 Chateau Souverain Dry Creek Valley (was 50% off at Safeway, $20 original)
2001 Yorkville Cellars Cabernet Sauvignon (bought at winery)
A syrah we bought at Roederer and that’s too high up in the closet for me to look at.
2001 Fife Meritage (was $15 at Safeway off $32)
1999 Roederer L’Ermitage Brut ($45 bought at winery)
Sweet wines
Westover Port (someone must have gifted it to us, doesn’t say which kind, must be around $20)
2005 V. Sattui Muscat (bought @ winery >$20)
2005 Navarro White Riesling ($29 small bottle)
Lustau Dry Amontillado Los Arcos Sherry
I’m not a big fan of white zinfandel, call me a snob but to me it tastes very much like a wine cooler. That’s not bad in itself, I like wine coolers, but they shouldn’t go around calling themselves wine ;-).
But a bottle of Eagle Canyon White Zinfandel mysteriously appeared in my fridge (I assumed somebody brought it over some time and I just put it on the fridge), and I figured I’d give it a try tonight. I didn’t dislike it.
The wine itself is nice. It’s very floral and fruity, with strong hints of peach and of strawberry essence (the fake stuff, not actual strawberries), perhaps raspberry as well. It doesn’t taste at all alcoholic, and it has a clean finish. The problem with the wine is that it’s too damn sweet. It’s almost like a syrup, or a dessert wine at that (though it lacks the substance and complexity of such wines). It’s nice to sip, but you definitely can’t drink much of it. That may be a good thing, though 🙂 It also doesn’t go well with cheese, at least not with brie, though the cheese did cut into the sweetness.
What I find weird is that I wasn’t able to find out anything about the Eagle Canyon winery of Manteca. I can tell from a couple of sites that this is a cheap wine (maybe $5-6 a bottle), but I can’t find anything else about it or its winery. Weird, eh?
In any case, I wouldn’t buy it myself but I’m going to finish the bottle (not all at once, though 🙂
I first tried Beringer wine when I went wine tasting at their impressive operation in Napa many years ago. They give a great tour of their facilities – or at least they did back them – but their wine seemed inferior. Outside the winery, it’s certainly affordable. Last night I wanted to drink some wine with our steaks (steaks two nights in a row, courtesy of Costco’s large sizes), but I didn’t want to open another bottle of expensive wine (and for me expensive is anything over $10), so I decided to open this Beringer bottle that somebody had brought us. It wasn’t that great.
It didn’t have much of an aroma to speak off, and the taste itself was very mild. Low on tanins with a bare hint of oakiness. It did improve when drank with the steak, assuming a complimentary role. I’d drink it again, but with food.
After our trip to the wine country, Mike and I seem to be getting into wines. We’ll see how long it lasts. But we’re happy with our half a dozen collection of good quality reds, 3 sweet wines and 2 sparkling. Not very much, specially if we start drinking it up. Alas, wine is not hard to find 🙂
Last night we opened a bottle of Tobin James 2002 James Gang Reserve Zinfandel. We had won it the previous day at a charity raffle.
It had a very strong fruity aroma, and was somewhat sweet, with a strong hint of plum. It was smooth, somewhat acidic, and really nice to sip by itself. It also went well with dark chocolate, marrying in your mouth. I thought it might be too fruity/sweet for the red meat we were having that night, but they went very well. The wine dried up and let the taste of the meat win over. Very good. Mike liked it too.
On our third day in the wine country, we tried the wineries in the Anderson Valley in Mendocino. I had never been to this part of California before and enjoyed the wine tasting experience very much. None of the wineries we visited were as beautiful as those we’ve been to in Napa, Sonoma and even the Russian River, but they were nice, friendly and relaxing experiences.
We started at Yorkville Cellars a small family winery that sells organic wines. It’s run by an English lady and it’s been there since 1986. They mostly sell at the winery, local shops and restaurants. We’d had organic wines before and had not been particularly impressed by them, so Yorkville pleasantly surprised us. The tasting room itself was small but featured a veranda with picnic tables and a view of the vineyards. They had a very friendly black lab greeting you. Tasting was complimentary and they gave us good sized pours.
On the second day of our wine country trip, we headed to the Russian River Valley. I’d been there only a couple of months before, when my friend Lola treated me to a wonderful girls-weekend-out for my birthday, and I was eager to go again. I found the wineries in the Russian River Valley more relax and more friendly than those in Napa, and I was there purely for relaxation (OK, and wine tasting too).
Last time, the helpful manager of the West Sonoma Inn, where we had stayed, had recommended we go tasting at the wineries on Olivet Road. We hadn’t managed to do it, but it made sense to try them on our way from Calistoga. So there we headed.
This week Mike and I took a mini-vacation to the northern California wine country. We spent three days wine tasting, in Napa, the Russian River Valley and Mendocino. Of necessity, we visited only a few wineries, but you can read my notes from them. Alas, I’m in no way a wine connoisseur and I’m completely unable to taste any of the dozens of flavors experts can discern in wine. Berries? mango? licorish? I can’t find them. So don’t take my reviews too seriously. In reality all I can say is what I liked and what I didn’t like, which may be very different from what you like. I tend to like full-bodied wines, neither light or heavy in tanins and with a well defined oakiness (which I didn’t find at all in this trip).
Anyway here is my report from Napa. Reports from the Russian River Valley and Mendocino will follow.
A couple of weeks ago, my sister Kathy and her friend Anna were in town and I decided to take the girls winetasting. Once again we headed to Livermore as it’s significantly closer to us. It was quite fun, we visited several wineries and had lunch at one of them. Anna became exposed to a few new wines, even found one she liked, and while Kathy didn’t try anything (she’s not a wine drinker) she said she enjoyed herself.
Once again, I was not impressed by the quality of the Livermore wineries. I am not a wine connoseur by any means, and I’m mostly a Cabernet Sauvignon drinker – that’s great if you’re in Napa, not that great if you are in Livermore where Cabs don’t a abound. I prefer complex, smooth, oaky flavors, and these were rare. In all, my impression was that the wines were young and simple, generally easy to drink but not fun or interesting. I didn’t find any wines that attracted me. Most of the wines are only available at the winery and at local grocery stores.
The guide below is mostly for my benefit, so that I can remember the experience and decide where I want to go back in future trips.
We started at Garré Winery with lunch at the Café Garré (good sandwich, OK pastas) before tasting. I found their wines easy drinking but unremarkable, often lacking complexity. Their Nonna’s Reserve, a combination of Merlot, Barbera and Cab Frank was particularly disapointing, it tasted mostly like cab frank but was very shallow. A 2000 Merlot was very melow, but had a sharp finish. The wine tasting room itself is very plain.
I was happier with the wines at Cedar Mountain, perhaps because they were tasting cabs. I wasn’t too excited about the 2002 Cab which was easy to drink, but didn’t have much depth, but loved their ’98 Cab which was very well balanced – but way overpriced at $50 a bottle. A ’99 Duet, a combination of Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon, was more reasonable at $22, but tasted younger and less refined than the cab. The tasting room here was also plain, but the people were very friendly and very much into wines, which made the wine tasting more fun.
Ríos Lovell charges a $4 tasting fee (you get to keep the glass) which is worth it given the quality of their wines and the friendly attitude of the attendant – who let us taste wines not in the list. In general, I found their wines to be much more finished, more balanced and substantial than those at the other wineries. I really liked their ‘2001 Reserve Estate Chardonnay ($14), it was somewhat tanic and oaky and not too sweet. Anna enjoyed their ‘2003 Viognier ($16) which tasted like an explosion of flowers and had a sharp, yet nice, finish. She also liked their 2001 Barbera ($18), an easy drinking yet nice wine. I wasn’t impressed by their Cab, which was in need of tanins. The tasting room was one of the larger ones, and had a nice store. I’d go back here again.
Tesla Vintners offers wines from 4 local wineries, the tasting room is very small and crowded but cute and it offers some cool novelties for sale that I hadn’t seen elsewhere. The server looked like a grandma and was quite pleasant and there is a grassy area outside and even a little playhouse for children to play in. If I ever came winetasting with the kids along, this would definitely be a spot. Here we tried the flavored champagnes by Little Valley winery. They are a gimmick, of course, but I rather liked the almond one – though I’m not sure if enough to drink a whole glass of it. The other wines we tasted were fine, easy drinking but not sophisticated.
Livermore Valley Cellars is a small, family winery behind a new McMansion housing development. We wanted to like the wines, many of them inventive mixes, but we didn’t. Most of them were shallow, tasted too acidic and lacked finishes. The woman serving them to us also gave us a weird vibe.
Finally, we went back to Concannon, where once again I noticed that their new syrahs are almost undrinkable while their older ones are quite good. This is one of the prettier tasting rooms in the valley and it has a nice grassy area outside, so while I’m not crazy about their wines, it makes a nice stop.
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