Re: The Wine Thread
 

:r Moses, you read my mind

I would do this with you folks if we can go by varietal or possibly region.


~Vitis

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I like the idea, especially if we did it every few weeks. I'm up for trying and learning. There will always be obstacles ...

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...Ok folks, everyone buy a bottle of La Tache and we'll share tasting notes the next day. :tu

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If we did by varietal I could drink the DRC and you could drink a CastleRock Pinot and we could compare notes. Oh you mean I have to BUY the La Tache? Ok, you do drink the DRC, Ill drink the CastleRock. :r:r:r:r:r:r

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Exactly!

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I didn't think I had to buy the La Tache... I thought one you were going to buy an OWC and mail out a bottle to each of us... Schucks...

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If I had the spare 15gs, I would gladly handle this for us. Untill then, lots of Morey St. Denis village level stuff for me instead. But who am I to complain.

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You are a generous man Vitis.

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Got the office today and there were a few wines open on the counter to try. Some quick thoughts:

1988 JJ Prum Wehlener Sonnenuhr Riesling
Fat and easy with low acidity and tasty Honey flavors. I'm whore for Prum, well Riesling in general. In fact my favorite grape. This is good but not great for a Sonnenuhr.

1999 Georg Breuer Rudesheim Berg Rottland Riesling
Now this is fascinating wine. Nose is dominated by honey, but the mouth is laced with lime, mineral and mint notes. Delicious and interesting with a nice backbone.

1995 Castello Di Ama Chianti Classico Vigneto BellaVista
Dried fruit, cherry and raisins, medium bodied with drying tannins. Tasty and would go great with some meat. Im thinking a Bolonegese, Mmmmm.

1990 Philip Tongi Estate Cabernet
Love it. Tongi can be very green, but this has great fruit for a 18year old. Cassis with floral notes and silky tannins. What a great wine. I could drink this every day and be pretty happy.

2005 Domaine des Farges Quart du Chaume
Wet Wool and lanolin, seems very far advanced for such a young wine. Missing those fresh fruit notes I would like to see in a QdC at this age. not my cup o tea.

Rough day at the office eh?



~Vitis

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Vitis

Some interesting picks there. I too love Rieslings, but have very few in my collection. My girlfriend is a big fan of them, so I am leaving to her to start picking them out for auction buys.

I met Dr. Loosen a few years ago. Very interesting guy and we had some wines dating back to the 60's! Wow!

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You're a lucky man and your GF has good taste. :D Wow is right on those older Loosen Rieslings. Ernst has been here quite a few times working on his Eroica project with Chateau St Michelle but I have not yet been fortunate enough to meet him. Hopefuly in the future.

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I like Ch. St. Michelle in the value category. I've had some 50's German wines that were incredible as long as the bottle was finished within an hour of opening.

Tokay is my favorite in the sweet whites, but this night pictured below was a fun one (taken at last years Passover).

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just another normal night with a 70 y'quem......

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Ya, just another night... Then we retired to the saloon with some port

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Yup, auslese level sugar and tons of sulfur keep these things for a while. I decant very young Prum to try and blow off the sulfur stank. I guess thats the price you pay for whites that can age so well.

You and me both brother. When the iron curtain fell and we started getting the 93s in Boston I was blown away. Seems like the quality is getting better every vintage since communism

Nice my friend. As a stranger in a strange land out here in the west without family, I spend Passover with a friend of mine's family each year. he has a very fine cellar, but collects top end small batch Kosher wine all year just for the Seders. Really fun drinking kosher Ch. Giscours and Léoville Poyferré etc. I look forward to it every year.

Cheers all

~Vitis

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Hey, moses, just noticed the years on the Noval Nacional and Noval. Those are interesting years. Didn't most houses not declare in 82 and 84? I only have 83s and 85s.

~Vitis

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Ya, they are all odd ball years hence us pairing them together that day. I think Nacional also has '83 which I've had a couple of times. The Sandeman was probably the last good year they did until '94. Noval/Nacional beat to their own drummer. If you can find the '80 Sandeman, buy all you can.

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Tokay is just getting super high premiums at auction. Just out of reach for me. Sauternes is still a buy if you don't buy Y'Quem.

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One of the shops around here just got a ton of Prum in- thinking about picking up one of each:

2006 Prum, J. J. Riesling Auslese Wehlener Sonnenuhr

2006 Prum, J. J. Riesling Auslese Zeltinger Sonnenuhr

Had the '05s a while back- really enjoyed them

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Good man Aldukes, very hard to wrong with Prum Auslese. If you're only buying one of each, you better have a lot patiance as these are going to start getting good in like 15years or so. Id think about getting 2of the same so at least you can try one in 5-8 years and know what youve got. These may be very sulfury if you open one now.

That being said, these are cream of the crop. I have had tons of Wehlener Sonnenuhr and it always pretty great. Top vineyard and big dog in the Mosel. I have not had too many Zeltingers and it seems harder to find Prums version. Theoretical could be a little riper and less mineraly but thats a guess. The vineyards are basicaly adjacent (as is Wehelen and Zeltingen)

PS: Sonnenuhr means "sundial" and there is a big clock about halfway down the vineyard slope.

http://i106.photobucket.com/albums/m...rSonnenuhr.jpg

~Vitis

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All this Riesling talk is making me THIRSTY! (it's only 8:30am :rolleyes:) We're having a rare snowstorm in Seattle and it looks like I may be in for the day. If so, this 375 of 98 Molitor Graacher Himmelreich Auslese will be the afternoon sipper.

http://i106.photobucket.com/albums/m...o/IMG_0989.jpg

Cheers :al

~Vitis

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Looks like I might be able to get these in 375's- 2 of each is a good possibility
I wish I had a cellar. :dr

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!! nice !!, thats a great way to go

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Quick question: Has anyone ever been to one of those franchise wineries where you can buy a batch of wine? Any luck with those? Let me know.

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I haven't Danny, what are you trying to get though? is it several cases of wine that you buy before it is made?

BTW, nice cigar blog

~Vitis

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http://www.crushpadwine.com/

They have an adopt a barrel program

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Hmm, seems like alot of $$ to buy 25cases of wine you haven't tasted yet. At $19-36 a bottle Id rather but something with a bit of a track record. :2

~Vitis

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Well you get to try the wine you're getting before hand. Once you select the blend you want you spread the yeast over the grape juice and they take care of the rest. It makes about 28-30 bottles of wine. When it is ready for bottling(6-12 weeks) you have a bottling party with your friends and you get to make custom labels. I got this gift for my GF, just wondering is anyone else has ever done this?

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Thanks for the kind words. I need to update it more often. Holidays are a busy time!

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Ahh, that sounds much better than a full barrel (25cs) This will be fun bottling with your friends and being involved in the process. A very nice gift from your GF. I go to bottling parties every year and we always have tons of fun .. and wine.

Enjoy

~Vitis

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Well I got it for my GF. I hope she likes it. Any other opinions?

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send me a bottle? :D

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I've never shipped liquid before, but if it aint to hard then I will. ;)

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Use lots of bubblewrap and don't tell them you're shipping alcohol. Other than that, same as shipping anything else.

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use a styrofoam wine shipper. It'll make your life easier.

http://www.uline.com/BL_5450/Styrofoam-Wine-Shippers


~Vitis

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I have tons of shippers in my basement from 6 bottle ones to double magnums. I go by the liquour stores and take them if they have them. The come in handy!

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Just picked up some mouton cadet Bordeaux for a work xmas party. It's not a specialty wine, but for 13 bux a bottle, i figured it was better than the 2 buck chuck stuff :p

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I really like the Louis Jadot Burgundy Village, especially 2005 for party drinker. At around $12 or under it is solid buy and shows nice fruit for money. Just about anyone is going to like it and it's better than manipulated crap from the New World...

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Cold and snowy here and I have the weekend to myself, so time to do a little cooking and drink some wine. Heres the weekend VanDamage so far.

http://i106.photobucket.com/albums/m...ideBlanche.jpg

2005 Dunham Cabernet XI, Columbia Valley
Enjoyed this on Friday night with steak and frites. So Im a little bias on this one. We distribute the Dunham wines and I know the winemaker/owner very well. Due to this I have had the cab 40+ times in various vintages and done full verticals several times. That being said, I was very impressed with this bottle. Extremely clean aromatics of dark cassis and oak, rich and dense in the mouth with more black fruit, a touch of sweet oak and a light herbal note. The oak and the tannins are already well integrated and the acidity is very fine. This was a realy great bottle of wine and I feel like one of the best Dunham cabs to date. Showing great compared to my last tasting 3mos ago. If you want to know what Washington tastes like, this would be a great bottle to try.


1998 La Bastide Blanche Bandol Cuvee Fonteneau
Drank with ground buffalo burgers. What could be better than 10yr old Bandol? Well, lots of things but this is still pretty good. The importer offered us 10cs of this aged stock earlier this year, and after we opened a bottle, well lets just say, very little of it made it into the marketplace. Owned by the Bronzo brothers who also have Chateau des Baumelles in their stable, the Cuvee Fonteneau is usualy 100% Mourvedre but im not exactly sure on this vintage. Initialy the nose was a touch tight, with red cherry and raspberry aromas with a touch of medicinal cough drop scent. Medium weight in the mouth, more red fruit with anticeptic or bandaid notes on the back end. The tannin structure here is just massive, you dont feel it on the midpalate but after you swallow your mouth completely dries out and puckers up. This is not overwhelming but i cannot image that there will be any fruit left by the time the tannins are completly resolved on this wine. Still, very nice. I have six bottles left and will be interested to see how this wine is over the next five or so years.

Cheers
~Vitis

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Thanks for the review, Marc. Glad to see you're holding up in the storm

;)

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I'm still recovering from the office Holiday party Thursday night. I have lots of tasting notes- post coming tomorrow.

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On Friday, we had:

1963 Warre - A little thin and not one of Warre's best
1963 Dow - The best '63 Dow I have had in years. Rich, full of fruit great body
1970 Sandeman - One of Sandeman's better vintages, solid all around.
1977 Offley - Cake dough tastes, good body.
1977 Taylor - What else has to be said about this one.
2000 Dom Perignon - Pretty good, not one of the Champagne's ever, but would never ever turn it down.

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Nice lineup Moses. A perfect way to celebrate a winter storm. I love the 77 taylor, an unbelievable Port.

Cheers
~Vitis

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Yup, '77 Taylor is a 95 point port all day long. It really needs 12+ hours decanting and we only had about 4 hours on the ones above.

My friend has about 4-5 double mag's of '77 Taylor, but we have never drank one.

We are in the works of importing double mag's of Colheitas (for sale); just bottled- back to 1937.

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Keep us in the loop on the Colheitas. Might be something I need in the cellar

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I see the Dunham 2005 syrah made one of the top 100 Washington wines (No. 18) -- I assume you've tasted this one as well ......your thoughts?

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The Syrah is a nice wine. Wont age as long as the Cab will but a few years will make it even better. If you are looking at Gregutts top 100 list (Seattle times), its not the regular Columbia Valley Syrah he has listed. Its the Lewis Vineyard Reserve Syrah. A big heavy hitter wine. The winemakers seem to love this vineyard as it has interesting cola notes and realy bright fruit which can be more akin to Australia than Washington in alot of ways. Erics Lewis vineyard wines can be epic and age very well. ME LIKEY :D

~Vitis

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Another snowy day here in the NW on Monday. Had to work late, and then couldn't get my car up the driveway in the ice and snow. :mad: What better way to unwind than Pinot! This was enjoyed over a few brisket sandwiches and the final episode of The Shield on my DVR.

http://i106.photobucket.com/albums/m...ne/Chezeau.jpg

2006 Chevillon-Chezeaux Nuit-Saint-Georges Les Saint-Julian
This is a house that has only been in our local market for two vintages so my experiences are only with the 05's and 06's. They are based NSG, and have parcels in 5 premier cru vineyards that I know of. Their wines use less than one quarter new oak. This wine initialy had a nose of black cherry with a light smoke component and a touch of sweet spices. Medium weight in the mouth with lots of slightly tart red and black cherry flavors. The acid is quite crisp, and the wine had more tannin than I had expected. Not complex at the current state, but a very tasty wine with great balance so Im betting some aging will not be a problem and this could make a very nice mature wine. Im really starting to like the 06's. They dont have the intensity of the 05s but the acid it terrific. I will be grabbing a few more of these for the cellar for a five year nap.


Cheers
~Vitis

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Last weeks office party:

2006 Bethel Heights Eola- Amity Hills Cuvee Pinot Noir
Eola-Amity Hills AVA, Willamette Valley, Oregon

Lots of cherry and vanilla on the nose and even more in the glass- raspberries, light charcoal, I would recommend this. Had it with everything from Tuna Tartare and crab cakes to ribeye- etc.

2005 Hardin Cabernet Sauvignon
Napa Valley, CA

According to the interweb this retails for about $23. It tastes more like a $40 bottle. A little sweet, but went very well with steak and all the tasty steakhouse sides. Really high quality for the price, but a tad too sweet for me.

1994 Niepoort
Porto, Portugal

Now were talkin'- really good for a newish port- chocolate, black pepper, perfect raisin. I will be buying a bottle of this soon- if I can find one. Awesome.

1977 D'Oliveria Terrantez Madeira

Lots of raisin, lots of plum- drank way too much of this. Very good.

Had a quick sip of '85 Dow's too- but I wasn't in any conditions to remember note taking.

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I am really loving the great information and reviews posted here by many, especially Vitis, Aldukes, Mosesbotbol and Richardw.

If it's possible, I would love it, if you guys and others, would mention the approximate prices of the wines you list and review. This will help me decide, if it's worth it for me, to search out a particular offering or not, when one peaks my interest. It would probably help many others as well.

Johnny