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At the end of March, we threw a little shindig for Ryan on his birthday consisting of wine, mounds of grilled butifarra and dozen friends. And with the appropriate social graces, many of our friends came bearing gifts, all looking distinctly similar to a bottle of wine. Clearly, they had been well versed in the ways of gift giving for an uber-wine geek!
The Rimarts Brut Reserva from Sant Sadurni d’Anoia is one of Ryan’s birthday bottles which has been sitting patiently in the refrigerator just waiting for the right moment to be uncorked. And today just happens to be the lucky day as new friends for the States have been invited for a traditional Catavino Cookout on our terrace complete with grilled chicken, butifarra, grilled peppers, artichokes, and of course, regional cured hams and cheeses.
The strangely appropriate timing of this grand uncorking comes just one day before DO Cava releases their brand new image, coupled with the new slogan, “From the Land to the Heart”. Can you hear the violin’s playing the background and feel the gentle wind ruffling your hair, as you overlook their vast, rolling vineyards? As told on the Wines of Spain website, the idea behind this heart warming slogan according to DO Cava?s Regulating Council, Gustavo García Guillamet, is to encompass the entire winemaking process, from the very earth where, ?Cava is born as a gift for the senses, wooing one?s emotions and going straight to the heart?. Question: Do you suddenly feel compelled to savor a glass of cava based on this eloquent and moving slogan? Are your keys in hand prepared to buy up a few cases of brut, brut nature and semi seco cava?
But wait, there’s more. The slogan is being launched in conjunction with their sleek and minimalist new image. According to Gustavo, ?It?s a simple silhouette of four bottles where one of the bottles represents young cava aged from 9 to 15 months, the second bottle represents cava Reserva aged more than 15 months, the third bottle represents cava Gran Reserva aged more than 30 months, and lastly the forth bottle represents a cava that boasts the same qualities as the rest but differs because it?s a rosé?. The image is further expounded upon in how each letter describes a characteristic of its particular style. Therefore, “C” stands for ‘Characteristic’ and ‘Convincing’, describing how a young wine is intended to fully express the varieties in their raw form. The first “A”, for its ‘Ample’ character’ and ‘aromatic’ expression of ripe fruit of a slightly old, mature wine. So on and so forth.
Clearly this marketing campaign took a considerable amount of money and time to put together, but is it effective? Personally, I believe this is a complete waste of time and resources, simply because the international availability of cava other than Freixenet, Gramona or Codorniu is still limited, as is the amount of quality and comprehensive information on the web. Take the DO Cava website for example. Is this helpful to you? Would you not prefer that money be spent on effective education and international marketing strategies? Granted, maybe we’re biased, but somehow, I doubt that you’ll be looking at your next bottle of cava, while standing in the middle of your wine shop, saying, “So, this ‘c’ stands for a young cava that I should drink now.”
So we’re a bit skeptical of their campaign, but that doesn’t mean that we will ever stop drinking cava, and this particular one is no exception. Albeit a wee flat on the finish, we loved the creamy caramel notes on the wine, accompanied by a lush round mouthfeel, and we definitely would try another bottle to see whether the acidity is merely a flaw in this particular bottle or emblematic of the wine.
That said, we’d like to know what you wish DO Cava would spend their money on? What resources are you craving to help expand not only your Cava education, but also the accessibility?
Cheers, Gabriella
Gabriella’s Tasting Note
N.V. Rimarts Cava Brut Reserva - Spain, Catalunya, Cava (5/13/2008) Nice straw yellow in color with covered in a brilliant lime green tinge. Medium bubbles gently drift to the surface, in a lazy and casual manner. Reserved tropical notes on the nose of pineapple and banana supported by a denser, more robust butter and wood background. In the mouth, the wine lacks in acidity, but makes up for it in its lush round mouthfeel. Big almond, ripe pear, lemon cream, and a touch of caramel and butter on the finish. Truly a lovely wine that only needs a touch of acidity to make it extraordinary. 3/5
Ryan’s Tasting Note Light golden color with medium large bubbles. The nose on this is bready with with a nice lemon cream undercurrent, and light caramel nut notes on top. Really a pretty wine. In the mouth the acidity and vigor is low, ending with a flat finish. Though I really like the flavors of marzipan, nuts, lemon, and creamy yeast. Incredibly flavorful and a real treat on the palate. Ony with it had a bit more spritz and acidity. 3/5
Okay, it was actually a few days before Valentine?s. But clearly our uncharacteristically small group of Vancouver American Wine Society members who had gathered to compare a horizontal flight of ten 2002 Zinfandels were jumping into the spirit of romance.
Here they come in the order we tasted, and although it would be fun, we can take no credit for the final ?heartfelt? evaluations of the ten offerings ? each was delivered from an appointed, if sometimes reluctant, spokesperson at a different table.
Wine #1: Paso Robles Westside from Peachy Canyon Winery Thin, weak, and presenting surprisingly little fruit either on the nose or the palate. This wine is like a ghostly and somewhat disappointing lover. Neat tasting room though as seen at the right.
Wine #2: Alexander Valley Todd Brothers Ranch from Dashe Cellars Made with 4% Petit Syrah, the general consensus was that this wine was approaching ? or perhaps even past ? its prime. Tannins were still a bit coarse, and there was definite sediment. This wine was ranked as a dark and sultry, if a bit over the top lover. Wine #3: Sonoma Valley Rhinefarm Vineyard from Gundlach Bundschu Winery Softer and with a better balance than the previous one, most people agreed this wine showed coffee, chocolate, and mint overtones. The finish was longer, smoother like a well-oiled lover ? apparently appealing as this wine was ranked Number One of the evening.
Wine #4: Amador County Grandpere from Renwood Winery Made from old vines though from a newer winery (shown right), this wine was deemed somewhat austere. Oak on the nose but light in fruit, this wine ? according to the table?s spokesperson ? would not be finding its way onto her table nor into her bedroom even on Valentine?s Day.
Wine #5: Dry Creek Valley from Chateau Souverain Not offensive, merely flat and faded from time with not enough fruit remaining to be worth mentioning. This wine is one lover who simply doesn?t deliver ? even after midnight.
Wine #6: Dry Creek Valley from Foppiano Vineyards Although we knew this vineyard specializes in ?affordable,? this vintage was rather like stuffing your face full of penny candy in the general store. A fickle lover ? even on a one night stand, first he thought he loved her, then he didn?t, then he did.
Wine #7: Napa Valley from Napa Wine Company Like a chameleon, this wine exhibited the most dramatic amount of change of any poured this evening and garnered second favourite in the process. On the palate cedar, tobacco, and barnyard. In bed, an almost schizoid lover ? but definitely one you?d happily suggest a roll in the hay with.
Wine #8: Napa Valley Old Vines from Fife Vineyards Simple and somewhat nondescript but still comfortable, this wine is from old vines. Good for mindless quaffing on an open-air patio. A lover wearing nothing but flannel pajamas.
Wine #9: Napa Valley from Ravenswood Winery Although this wine didn?t open as much as many of us had expected, it was ?no wimpy wine.? Brawny and well structured, a few people found a hint of cream soda. This one is a somewhat reticent lover but definitely well built lover ? perhaps even a redhead. (Note: these guys have a really fun website and a terrific sense of humour. Here?s an excerpt: At Ravenswood, there?s no pinkie raising, Brie eating, wine spitting wimpiness. Oh no. At the home of No Wimpy Wines, you?ll get to taste mind blowing zinfandel, witty conversation with our behind-the-bar staff and, if you so choose, private or group tours of the winery aka Zinfomania Central.)
Wine #10: Napa Valley from Rutherford Ranch Controversy swirled around this wine as it became clear there was an almost unbelievable amount of bottle variation between each of the three that were poured. Some felt theirs was corked, others said ?no, it?s just the style.? Was it a Madame wearing pancake make up and a feather boa or a great lover who hadn?t showered for a week? Few could agree.
As the name suggests, Hint has just a, well, hint of flavor in each bottle. There?s no sugar or added sweetness, no preservatives, and the natural flavors are very subtle ? you get a little on the nose before drinking, then a bit on the finish. It?s a nice, refreshing alternative to the sweet sports drinks and waters currently flooding the market.
hint flavors are: mango grapefruit, pomegranate-tangerine, lime, raspberry-lime, peppermint, pear, tropical punch, strawberry kiwi, and cucumber. Honestly, you REALLY gotta like peppermint and cucumber to enjoy these two flavors. But the rest are very good.
An interesting note: each bottle has a bit of trivia/history associated with the flavors inside. For example, the ?Tropical Punch? flavor bottle has the history on how the ?pineapple? got its name. So not only will it quench your thirst, it?ll make you a bit smarter as well.
In the long and storied history of Wine Blogging Wednesday, several bloggers have hosted the monthly virtual tasting twice. But only one, founder Lenn Thompson of LENNDEVOURS, has hosted three times. As of today, you can add my name to the WBW three-peat list as I again take up the reins and choose the theme.
The previous two times I’ve hosted, red wines were featured: first lite in alcohol, then full-tilt in the other direction. So this time out, I’ll pick my favorite white variety, Riesling. But not Riesling grown just anywhere, but where the grape first achieved noble status in the Old World: Germany, Austria and France’s Alsace region. In this terroir, the variety produces some of the most interesting and long-lived white wines from bone-dry to lusciously sweet.
Pick any style you like, at any price point, and join me as we explore Old World Riesling on Wednesday, May 7.
To participate, just pick up a wine made from Riesling grown in Germany, Austria or Alsace (OK, Northern Italy, the Czech Republic and Slovenia are also fine) and blog about it. If you don’t have a blog, sign-up and post at the WBW Community Blog. Once you have posted, send me an email at winecast (at) gmail (dot) com with “WBW 45″ in your subject line. Sometime after May 7th, I’ll post an event round-up here.
I hope you enjoy this theme as much as me and pick up a bottle from somewhere you have not tried yet. I think you will be very pleased with the resulting value.
Clos Henri is a relatively new entrant to the Wairau valley of the Marlborough wine growing region. This property is also located close to Renwick and is actually opened by the Bourgeois family from the Sancerre region in France. The first vines were planted in 2001 with emphasis on bringing out the terroir. There are a multitudes of soils here but they essentially are either clay based or rocky riverbed. Their "Bel Echo" offerings of Sauvignon Blanc and Pinot Noir show definite minerality and bely the rocky riverbed soil which it was planted on. The "Clos Henri" series on the other hand definitely is more earthy, rich and deep being planted on predominantly clay. Of all the wines tasted in this region - these wines strike me as the most "terroir transparent" I have tried so far.
Their vine planting densities are some of the highest around here of around 5000 vines per hectare. I have high hopes for this property in the future as their vines begin to acquire age and more experience is gained each year on the boundaries of each specific "terroir".
There is definite potential here for these wines - give the vines some age, more experience with the soil and LOWER YIELDS. If there is one sticking point it's the yields which tend to be on the higher end. At ~50 Hl/Ha, this is just too high to produce anythng worthy of the "ultra-premium" status and certainly world class. To get there, we are going to have to drop fruit yields by 30% or more so let's watch this space - it's a great start.
Remember I said to buy any 05 Bordeaux and give it s shot; there will be some real bargains to be found from this supreme vintage. This blend of 60% Merlot and 40% Cabernet Sauvignon is a cranberry jelly colored wine with a bouquet of fruity wood, and chocolate covered cherries. Nice.
In the mouth it is steely, a little tart tightly wound on opening and full of mineral flavors. BREATHE!
Really nice bouquet of ripe plum and a touch of cinnamon and pipe tobacco.
The palate is a bit tannic but this is a solid wine; give it two hours to air out and buy a couple for the under $10 price and put another year of age on it.
Sun Feb 20th, 2005, Sandy Hook Join us for eagle watching at the Shepaug Dam along the Housatonic River, wine tasting and hot chocolate at the Winery, and a 3 course lunch with wine at the Inn at Newtown.
I'm in the mood for a throw-down. No more of this namby-pamby dancing around the ring.
A couple of weeks ago, I got slammed on the ropes for a comment I made about a post on Vinography. The winos over there are apparently pretty fond of their New World wines because, when I suggested that Old World wines might be suffering in the global marketplace because of what is simply an archaic (or nonexistent?) approach to marketing, damn. You'd have thought I said something about their mother.
"Absurd!" they said. "Wine that tastes like fruit, not boxes of cigars and pencil lead, appeals to US consumers," they proclaimed.
Hmmm.
I'm a U.S. consumer, and I'm a pretty even-handed gal. I like New World wines; I like Old World wines. I was trying to make a point about what I considered to be the glaring difference in the marketplace. I was trying to make that point independent of taste, because I tend to believe there's a place out there for both styles of wine.
But then I started to think about it, and I've decided, even-handed is for wusses.
I'm picking sides, and do you know why? It's not about technical quality. There are New World and Old World wines of technical brilliance. It's not about image. Image is surface; popularity comes and goes.
No, this is a matter of taste, and I'm coming down on the side of the Old World.
This is my battle cry for wines that taste like cigar boxes and dirt, seashells and truffles; for wines that taste like a location; for being able to tell the difference between chadonnays made 30 miles apart; for a wine that has structure without having an alcohol content of 15 percent; for a wine that isn't obvious; for a wine that doesn't cater to a soda-pop palate; for a wine that actually pairs well with food; for a wine that goes for elegance over brawn; for a wine that doesn't give it up on the first date - one that I've got to work for, one that tastes better the next day, one that could sit on the shelf and evolve for a couple of years, one with a little mystery.
So, when Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston split, he had to sell his Frank-Gehry designed wine cellar. But, he?s not moping around.
It's rumored that the movie star, who was adept at stomping people in Fight Club and Troy, could soon be stomping grapes, thereby putting him among the ranks of celebrities with their names on wine labels.
Pitt stayed in a village in the Piedmont (Italy that is) and visited 2 different wineries that were for sale.
Monica Tavella, spokeswoman for the Fontanafredda estate in Piedmont, told the newspaper that Pitt stayed there after the Winter Olympics and expressed interest in the art of winemaking and viticulture.
Holy Jesus. Brad Pitt and super exclusive cult Barolos?? Shhhh?. I need a moment to myself.
Okay, let's move on............
A Votre Sante
In France when you want to ?cheers? you say A Votre Sante which translates ?to your health.? Over the past 5 years we have heard a lot about compounds in red wine which are beneficial to your health, specifically resveratrol. Studies have shown that moderate consumption of red wine can reduce the likelihood of a heart attack. But check out the other things they are testing it for look at how good it actually is. Also, in the quote below MDWD refers to a moderate daily wine drinker. While our doctors and government don't recommend wine, British health officials routinely do. A growing mound of studies, reflecting sources such as the American Heart Association and The New England Journal of Medicine, confirms wine to be precisely the potent and nutritious medicine our ancestors assumed it was. Besides the magic in polyphenols, which you could get from grape juice, and in alcohol, which you could get from gin, wine adds up to more than the sum of its parts. In contrast with bingers and abstainers, as well as beer and spirits drinkers, moderate daily wine drinkers (MDWDs) are better-educated and earn more. Their higher cognitive skills propel them through the Alzheimer's years with a 50 percent lower risk of dementia, one reason they're half as likely to end up in nursing homes even though they live longer, succumbing to cardiovascular diseases at half the rate of abstainers and heavy drinkers. Since moderate daily wine raises "good" cholesterol and reduces inflammation and clotting, MDWDs recover better from heart attacks and surgery and have a lower risk of stroke. They also have a 30 percent lower rate of Type 2 diabetes. Both red and white wine pack powerful, cancer-fighting antioxidants. Incidence of endometrial cancer is 83 percent lower in female MDWDs. Wine with meals halves your risk of colorectal cancer. Wine even eases blood-vessel constriction in smokers, while its polyphenols alleviate certain lung diseases. MDWDs get fewer colds with lighter symptoms. Their bones are denser, and they have nicer teeth, due to wine compounds that zap gum-disease bacteria. But wouldn't all that alcohol play havoc with your liver and kidneys? Nope. In fact, MDWDs have 30 percent lower risk of kidney dysfunction, and liver disease decreases as wine consumption rises. MDWDs have narrower waists and half the obesity rate of bingers and abstainers. Mysteriously, adding wine to a diet appears to melt pounds. It could be antioxidants and flavanoids speeding the breakdown of fat. It couldn't hurt that red wine, at 1.37 grams per liter, provides 8.5 percent of recommended daily fiber. It might have to do with metabolism or pleasure centers, which might explain why wine also helps with anorexia.
Craziness. Not only are wine drinkers cooler, more educated, and more successful, we?re also tons healthier. Now, drink up!
English Lit, Geometry, and Vinology?
How cool is this? In Australia high school students can actually take a class to teach them how to make wine. The rules are that they cannot taste or drink wine at any point in time during the class, nor can they attend events where their wines are tasted out (bummer). But they actually get to go through the process from start to finish of making their own wine. Even cooler is that the school has now gotten their proper licenses so that they can sell and market the wine to the public. At my school the electives were art, French, and agriculture class.
Viticulture started at the school in 2000 with the planting of 450 vines on four old sand tennis courts, comprising 215 durif vines, 175 shiraz vines and 70 viognier vines. The course, designed for year 11 and 12 students, was developed by the Wine Industrial National Education Training and Advisory Council and is competency skills-based with students achieving an Australian Qualification Framework Certificate I in Food Processing (wine). Mr Adamson said students worked in the school vineyard and then did placements at local vineyards. Wine is stored in barrels at the school and bottled at Cofield?s. Mr Adamson said the proceeds from the sale of the wine would be used for further equipment for the course.
He said the course had plenty of success stories to day with graduates doing well in the field. One is former student, David Whyte, now assistant winemaker at Cofield?s. ?David is our technical adviser and I take samples to him for advice when we make our wine,? Mr Adamson said. ?Now he?s the teacher and I?m the student.?
Um, is it just me or do they look like something more than just "student and teacher"? Cool concept, gay picture.
I, for one, think that it is incredibly important and hip as hell to be teaching these kids a craft that they can take into the real world and be successful with. I wish they would do that more in American school systems. If there was such thing as a mini-homebrew kit for toddlers I know that my husband would have already bought one for my son. Hmmm? maybe we can just send him to school in Australia. Ha!
Anheuser Busch? new seasonal beers? The latest trend in beer drinking in America has been that drinkers are opting for hand crafted, more flavorful beers from micro-breweries. With that, Anheuser-Busch? market share has decreased so we knew it wouldn?t be long before they tried to up the ante.
Budweiser. Michelob. Natural Ice. Busch.
What do these beers all have in common? They are all brewed by Anheuser-Busch and are beers most craft beer drinkers would not think of imbibing unless there was absolutely nothing else available.
I?d go for water first. But Anheuser-Busch, at least on a small scale, is trying to change the minds of craft beer drinkers.
They have released Demon?s Hop Yard IPA, brewed in the company?s Portsmouth, N.H., brewery and only sold in New England on tap.
McGualey said, "These are just a fun way to let people take a peek inside what our company is doing. It?s all about consumers today. I think consumers are looking for products like these."
I don?t know about you guys but the tap handle alone is frightening. I can?t imagine what the beer is like. I mean on one hand I?m glad that they are paying attention enough to know they need to step up their game, but on the other hand, my opinion of their company is so innately flawed that I probably won?t even try their new seasonals. Oh, BTW the new seasonals are the Jack?s Pumpkin Spice Ale, the Winter?s Bourbon Cask Ale, the Spring Heat Spiced Wheat and the Beach Bum Blonde Ale. If any of you get to try them email me with info. I am super curious about them.
Today is hump day and I am on coast until I get outta here. My last day is tomorrow so as soon as I finish some filing I'm done!! I've got some web surfing to do do I'm out! Cheers!
What am I doing around 1:00 am EST almost every night? Checking woot.com for the latest woot item, of course! Being a computer/tech junkie, I am always finding random good deals on woot. Now, they have made my life complete, with Wine Woot.
Every week they will be featuring a single deal on wine. Take it or leave it, but when they are out of stock, you are out of luck. If this turns out anything like the regular Woot.com, a good deal will be sold out in minutes.
The wine deal they have up there right now looks pretty good: St. Supéry 2000 Cabernet Sauvignon / Merlot Sampler. Seeing as how these would fit the Cheap Wine Reviews rule of 15 bucks or less, I might give this wine a try.
This is a pretty purple Argentinian wine with cranberry bouquet and black cherry notes.
Palate is solid strawberries with slight white pepper and solid structure. I am not a big fan of Malbec but this one was decent. I believe the price point is the usual $10 range. Raise a glass.
Marketing, the life I live outside of wine, is an interesting beast. And right now I’m speaking of the segment of marketing that inspires people and creates brands. In a traditional world, you have magazines or publications with editorial calendars and predictable subject matter. When the Web1.0 world came along, things were basically the same, predictable order of operations but with a much lower barrier to entry creating a flood of information. Search engines and intelligent algorithms began indexing this information and added a way to generate leads for business by setting up Ads based on the content. The theory goes if you’re searching for the content you might be interested some related products and/or services so here they are right next to your information. That’s great for lead generation. Interestingly enough, that has minimal branding value. You can ask anyone doing search engine marketing, paid ads are great for lead generation but they work fairly similarly to how stores are merchandised - similar items are next to each other so that you generate sales. It works, everyone’s happy in Web1.0 and the world creates a multi-billion dollar online advertising industry.
In comes “Web2.0″ where there is a shift. Really the type of fundamental shift that creates markets. It was subtle and natural evolution to end users but a disruptive shift for marketeers. This new e-commerce and publishing platform suddenly became less about broadcast and more about conversations. Less about a hyper-advanced information source and catalog and more about meeting people with common interests and creating “social” groups.
When people are on MySpace, the activity they?re doing isn?t search. It?s something akin to ?hanging out? or ?networking?. Their task is almost the opposite of search. They are already on the site they want to be on. They don?t need to click on links to take them where they want to go.
In other words, the context is entirely different. When you?re in search mode, you are playing by different rules.
Social ads don?t work as well because people are being social, not searching for something.
What the Author is saying is that in the world of conversations, social networking that happens to be online, and interaction, understanding context of the situation is king. Automating the placement of a static ad based on certain keyword matches has modest success on blogs (but the blog has to be very popular because its only those doing some searching that will be interested in the ads) and much less success on an actual social platform. Ads based on keywords in content are worthwhile if the activity the “clickee” is engaged in is searching for information (Web1.0). But if the published word that is triggering the static ad is part of a conversation that Richard and I are having on his blog about the Wine.com direct shipping whistle blowing debacle…er…debate (hypothetically), then that ad won’t be of interest to me.
Additionally, straight forward ad networks won’t help either. They just lump conversations into categories (either Tags or worse), match advertisers with categories they want to serve ads to in an automated fashion, and then serve away. Its arguable that this is even MORE Web1.0 than keyword advertising.
Marketing is being disrupted and its going to take a disruption to this market, not just in the technology but in the approach to marketing, to make online marketing effective in a Web 2.0 world.
Big News! Okay, I was trying to keep this one under wraps but it seems a few people have already found out and, well what better place to announce it than here right?
As of August 7th I will be back at the Wine Warehouse full time drinking for my living. I am very excited and can't wait to get back in the game.
Also My friend Andi got a new job at the O'Henry Hotel and I wish her mucho success in all of her endeavors. I will miss her.
Pinot Gris is a grape varietal that is a mutation of the Pinot Noir grape. The Pinot Gris vine appears similar to the Pinot Noir, but it produces a grape that is coppery gray instead of the dark violet of Pinot Noir. In fact, the only certain method of differentiating the vines is by the fruit that they produce. Researchers have found that the DNA structure of Pinot Gris and Pinot Noir are virtually identical.
The Pinot Gris grape produces a delicious white wine with a rosy platinum color. This wine captures a perfect balance of acidity, fruit flavor and sweetness.
I've tried to be good this week, I really have. Sober-sided comments. Touristic pictures of great Italian locales. No foul-mouthed drunken rants. Bonhomie and good will toward all. No silly business. Christ, it's killing me. Forget my consuming jealousy of bloggers who get invited to write in serious wine journals for money (imagine! it happens!). Forget, like totally forget, writing a book about the nectar of Bacchus. So, to quote the great American poet, "Let's go crazy / Let's go nuts!" To set the scene: I was reading my favourite...
Kansas City, there I came, for an evening of 1947 Bordeaux assembled by one of the Midwest?s top connoisseurs, Mark. When it comes to Kansas City and wine, there is only one Mark. It was actually a wine weekend, but I could only get away for a Saturday night due to a June catalog production [...]
I was googling "Blind Tasting Party" and found this picture:
The picture is from an article talking about a blind tasting at Halloween. It's so ridiculous and the more I look at it, the more I find things to laugh at. Hope you all enjoy. Cheers!
This wine was in a flight of 2004s from DRC at the Mornington Peninsula International Pinot Noir Celebration. I wrote about the Echezeaux 10 days ago and someone pointed me to an article on DRC in the Dec/Jan 07 Gourmet Traveller Wine, which gives some indicative pricing. This wine has not been officially released but I may take out a loan to get a bottle or 2 for a benchmark tasting of the future. DRC is not the sort of stuff your average serious pinotfile buys all the time. In fact the Chardonnay Princess reminds me how many lovely Chardonnays I could buy for a single bottle of DRC. But that is why I want to write about it so the Winorama readers can share this very fortunate experience. The nose was very clean, showing pure fruit, mainly of the cherry tree type. The palate was rich with silky sweet red cherry as well that seemed to flow on and on with just a little crescendo of plum on the finish. Over the hour I managed to keep my meagre portion in the glass it revealed some dark cherry and plum. The classic iron fist in a silk glove fruit power and texture combination.
A couple of people asked me what happens when it rains during harvest. As the skies above some of the world's greatest vineyards seem to be dumping unending moisture on the fragile grapes, the questions seems particularly timely.
Water is an important part of the cycle of life. Almost nothing can live without it, and most non aquatic life will drown given too much water. In all things balance, and when it comes to harvesting grapes, less water is better.
Wet bunches of grapes tend to rot. Rot does not add pleasant flavors to wine. Even Nobel Rot (botrytis) which is responsible for the world's great dessert wines is not a good thing for dry wines.
Some grapes tend to have tighter bunches than others, and these are that much more susceptible to rot, since air can not easily get between the berries to dry them out. And air is the key. A few warm windy days following a heavy rain can save a vintage.
Even if the grapes do not rot, they may absorb the water and swell, reducing the intensity of flavors. Picking while it is raining poses a similar danger. Wet grapes add water to your wine.
If a grape swells beyond the skin's ability to contain it, it will burst. Now you have a grape that is exposed to insects and bacteria. The aphorism about bad apples is doubly true for bad grapes. You don't want these grapes in with the rest.
The best defense against the bad grapes, not only those that may have burst, but those that may have been damaged by birds or other animals, is to hand sort. This costly and time consuming procedure is exactly what it sounds like.
Imagine staring at a conveyer belt full of grapes and trying to pick out the bad ones (along with leaves and other non grape materials). Not much fun, incredibly labor intensive and for some wineries difficult or impossible to accomplish.
Even if your grapes survive the rains, the rot, the birds and the bees (ok, yellow jackets) you may have a whole new issue to deal with. Those cloudy cool days kept your grapes from ripening, and now you are faced with the prospect of leaving your grapes out even longer than you intended, just to get that little bit of extra ripening.
The longer your grapes are left out in the field the riper they get to be sure, but also the greater the risk. The later in the season it gets, the greater the chance of frost in some regions, and rain in many others.
Winemakers that find themselves staring at soggy vineyards this week are all posing the same dramatic query. To pick, or not to pick, that is the question. Whether 'tis nobler of time to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take arms against a sea of troubles, and by opposing, end them.
They may not have to chose between life and death, but for some it may be the financial equivalent. To play it safe and make a lesser quality wine, or to take a chance for better quality and profits. Ay, there's the rub.
I have a whole bench full of wines open tonight. Many of them I will re-taste tomorrow but no need to wait with this wine. It is delicious and ready right off the bat and at the price point that is exactly what is required. It would be a shame to wait any longer.
Strong purple colour. Aromas of blackberry, cassis, dark chocolate cake, camphor, dark tobacco and cedar vanilla oak. On the palate full bodied and packed with blackberry, chocolate dipped cherry, coffee and tobacco flavours. Lush fat fruit lazing on a bed of ripe soft tannin. Entirely decadent but satisfaction is guaranteed. Outstanding drink now value.
Tecnorati
The previous two times I’ve hosted, red wines were featured: first 
To participate, just pick up a wine made from Riesling grown in Germany, Austria or Alsace (OK, Northern Italy, the Czech Republic and Slovenia are also fine) and blog about it. If you don’t have a blog, 
This wine was in a flight of 2004s from DRC at the Mornington Peninsula International Pinot Noir Celebration. I wrote about the Echezeaux 10 days ago and someone pointed me to an article on DRC in the Dec/Jan 07 Gourmet Traveller Wine, which gives some indicative pricing. This wine has not been officially released but I may take out a loan to get a bottle or 2 for a benchmark tasting of the future. DRC is not the sort of stuff your average serious pinotfile buys all the time. In fact the Chardonnay Princess reminds me how many lovely Chardonnays I could buy for a single bottle of DRC. But that is why I want to write about it so the Winorama readers can share this very fortunate experience. The nose was very clean, showing pure fruit, mainly of the cherry tree type. The palate was rich with silky sweet red cherry as well that seemed to flow on and on with just a little crescendo of plum on the finish. Over the hour I managed to keep my meagre portion in the glass it revealed some dark cherry and plum. The classic iron fist in a silk glove fruit power and texture combination. 
I have a whole bench full of wines open tonight. Many of them I will re-taste tomorrow but no need to wait with this wine. It is delicious and ready right off the bat and at the price point that is exactly what is required. It would be a shame to wait any longer.