2000 Chateau Orme de Brun

Name: 2000 Chateau Orme de Brun
Area: Bordeaux, France
Color: Garnet
Nose: HIghly aromatic.
Taste:Crisp, dry well balanced with flavors of blackverry, vanilla, chocolate.  Long finish.
General Impression(s): 2000 bordeaux is everything that they say.  Even a lesser known chateau such as this shines after 12 years of aging.  Loads of chocolate and cherries.  A full mouth feel and a smooth lingering finish of earthy spices and mellow oak.  Smoky, oaky and vanilla with a firm tannin base that does not overwhelm. 

2003 Chambolle Musigny Domaine Arlaud

Name: 2003 Chambolle Musigny Domaine Arlaud
Area: Burgundy (Chambolle Musigny), France
Color:Ruby
Nose: crisp and intense Inviting aromas. 
Taste: Flavors of Currant, Cassis and oak.  This is a dry earthy wine, well balanced with a long finish.
General Impression(s): A traditional burgundian with loads of red fruit, spices and oak.  A crisp clear ruby red that is vibrant.  The wine has some acidity that is playful on the tongue.  The wine can age for another 4 or 5 years.  There is a nice oak backbone that provides some structure and age-worthiness.   This is a solid example of a reasonably priced Burgundy that is a crisp and fresh when young and will age into an elegant spicy earthy Pinot.

2000 Shea Wine Cellars

Name:2000 Shea Wine Cellars
Area: Yamhill-Carlton District,OR
Color:Brick Red
Nose: Highly aromatic, elegant style.
Taste:  Intense flavors with Currant, Cherry, Cassis and plum.  Spices, pepper, herbs and cola.  This is a dry, medium acidity, well balanced wine.  Long Finish.
General Impression(s):The 2000 Shea Vineyard Pinot noir is a good example of an Oregon winemaker doing it Burgundian.  Very meaty and coppery on the nose with lots of red fruit both on the back nose and in the mouth.  The fruit includes loads of cranberry, cherry,red current and plum.  The tannins have been smoothed out and the finish is long and velvety.  There are hints of spice and dark unsweetened chocolate in the finish.   Definitely ready to drink.

2008 Summerland (Fiddlestix Vineyard)

Name: 2008 Summerland (Fiddlestix Vineyard)
Area: Santa Rita Hills, CA
Color: Ruby
Nose:  Pleasant aroma, red fruits
Taste: Brown sugar, molasses and cola.  Cherry.  An earthy mountain grown Pinot.
General Impression(s): An earthy crisp oaky,pinot.

2001 Duckhorn Cabernet Sauvignon

Name: 2001 Duckhorn Cabernet Sauvignon, $60

Grape: Cabernet Sauvignon

Area: Napa Valley, CA

Color: Garnet

Nose: Highly aromatic, bountiful, aromas of currant, cassis and oak.

Taste:  Dry, medium-acidity, full-bodied Cabernet.  Well-balanced, aged well.

General Impression(s): Great wine, still somewhat tannic, can probably age at least another 5 years.

1999 Beaux Freres Pinot Noir

Name: 1999 Beaux Freres Pinot Noir, $59

Grape: Pinot Noir

Area: Newberg, Oregon

Color: Mahogany

Nose: Aromas of plum, raisin and spice.  Earthiness, aged nicely.

Taste: A dry, high-acidity, medium-bodied, well-balanced Pinot.

General Impression(s): Beaux Freres incorporates classical Burgundian viticultural techniques, and this is a great example of wonderful American Pinot emulating Burgundian techniques.

2004 Paul Hobbs To Kalon Cabernet Sauvignon

Name: 2004 Paul Hobbs To Kalon Vineyard, $250

Grape: Cabernet Sauvignon

Area: Napa (Tokalon), CA

Color: Garnet

Nose: Highly aromatic and elegant wine. Red fruits, cherry and oak aromas.

Taste:  Powerful, full-bodied dry red wine.  Needs decanting, but has a wonderful flavor.  It is everything a Cabernet should be.  Finish is everlasting.

General Impression(s): A great example of a fantastic Cab grown in the Tokalon vineyards.

2005 Kalyra Pinot Noir

Name: 2005 Kalyra Pinot Noir $n/a

Grape: Pinot Noir

Area: Santa Ynez, CA

Color: Ruby

Nose: Inviting aroma, elegant style, light raisin, cedar, coffee, and earthy.

Taste:  A dry, medium acidity well-balanced Pinot with a long finish.

General Impression(s): Kept it longer than recommended, but it ended up being a great Pinot that aged with elegance.  Highly recommended.

2007 Far Niente Estate

Name: 2007 Far Niente Cabernet Sauvignon Estate Bottled  $89
Grape: Cabernet Sauvignon
Area: California, Napa Valley, Oakville 
Color: Garnet
Nose: Highly aromatic, elegant, blackberry, cassis and blueberry nose, slight cedar.
Taste: A full-bodied, harmonious wine. long finish.
General Impression(s): Wonderful cab, but it needs a few more years in the cellar, too young...

AZWINEGROUP to drink their way down 32 of Bill Wilson’s Wine for Newbies episode

For a while I have been trying to figure a way spice up and diversify our wine tasting and I remembered Bill Wilson’s wine podcast.   A few years ago I listened Bill’s podcast  called “Wine for Newbies”.  This podcast was a great way  to learn about everything related to wine, from serving, tasting, learning about the different grapes etc.  The podcast is no longer offered on itune but can be found here (unfortunately they are the new video one not the original audio).

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House Wine (or) How and Why To Make Your Personal Cellar Selections More Like a Restaurant Wine List: Part 4 of 4

In Part III I discussed the different wines you should own in your collection. In this the fourth and final installment I will discuss how your overall collection will look at the highpoint of the first year and how to continue building.

As you have by now purchased a complete assortment of wines for the year, or at least are planning to, your collection will look something like this.

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House Wine (or) How and Why To Make Your Personal Cellar Selections More Like a Restaurant Wine List: Part 3 of 4

In part II I addressed the first issue of building your collection: How many bottles of a given wine should you buy. In this installment I will dscuss the second important issue of building your wine collection.

The second issue you will face is which wines shall I buy?

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Road Warriors: The Ultimate Wine Travel Kit

Traveling with AZWINEGROUP requires having a set of glasses and a decanter.  We tried many different setups but none ever met our "gearhead" requirements.  So when I embarked upon building a travel kit, I decided that it needed to be both rugged and elegant.  The AZWINEGROUP Wine Travel Kit ended up consisting of the following:

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House Wine (or) How and Why To Make Your Personal Cellar Selections More Like a Restaurant Wine List: Part 2 of 4

In Part I, I discussed the background of why you should consider building your collection like a wine list. In this installment I will discuss the first of two issues in buying and selecting wines for your collection.

The first issue to conquer is how many bottles should I buy of a given wine?
This is more often an issue of space and cash on hand than the availability of a particular wine. Here are my recommendations and an accompanying rationale.

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House Wine (or) How and Why To Make Your Personal Cellar Selections More Like a Restaurant Wine List: Part 1 of 4

There are many types of wine buyers and drinkers: the buy and hold, the buy and drink, the you buy it I drink it!… I am the type who doesn’t buy enough of the bottles offered to me and wish I had bought more. Furthermore I won’t drink those bottles for fear they will be so amazing I will wish I had bought more at which point I would fall into deep despair.

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Merry Edwards Meredith Estate Pinot Noir

Last night Dave and I went out for beers (yes we drink beer too) and we were wondering how to follow Chef's wonderful "$6 Bordeaux" blog post. After pondering the question we decided to purchase a $90 Pinot to drink while watching Season 5 of Dexter.

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The Six Dollar Bordeaux: ~ Chef ~

6:47 A.M. I cannot think of a better time to start writing about wine. External forces have kept me from this article for too long and I can no longer bear the pressure from our managing editor to submit. As I hear all too often from him “ZER WILL BE ORDER”.

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Comment Dites Vous Meritage?

A few years ago my friend Andy corrected me when I said Meritage the “French way" (sounding like mirage), but off course there is no such word in French.

The term was created by a group of Napa wine maker in the late 80's to describe a California Bordeaux blend.  It was  formed by joining the words Merit and heritage and is  pronounced like Heritage not like Mirage.  

Meritage [mer-i-tij].

Decanting, Aerating....

Why pour a perfectly good bottle of wine in one of those contraptions that wine stores like selling us, Not only do I need "special" glasses but I also need a decanter.

There are two reasons for using a decanter.  The first one and most common is that the wine is still young, usually “big”, tannic, high in alcohol, these wines will taste much more subtle, more elegant after an hour in a decanter where they had time to breathe, open up.  I strongly recommend decanting big wines like Zinfandel, Shiraz, Cabs, but also lighter wine like Pinots.  Most young wines get better after a little trip to the decanter.  Remember to taste the wine before it goes in and after it comes out to compare and see if you like what aerating did to the wine.

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2006 Fantesca

Name: 2006 Fantesca  $70
Grape: Cabernet Sauvignon
Area: California, Napa Spring Mountain
Color: dark Garnet
Nose: Dark cherry, vanilla and earthy
Taste: Loads of cherry, dark fruits with a candied fruit fell and mocha with a light vanilla oak and a long finish the tannins are still big but balanced.
General Impression(s): A big mountain Napa cab with a full mouth feel.  The tannins do not overpower but are very present.  Can age for another 10+ years.  A complex wine that brings a different impression over time.  We decanted for about 1 hour and the wine opened nicely.