Barton Orchard

Mandarin Wine - 8/11/11

2011-08-18T02:22:00.000-07:00

Four years ago Burt and I made wine from my Rangpur Limes. Burt was over recently and saw the tree was full, so suggested doing it again. We stripped the tree clean, then spent the next few hours juicing the fruit. In all, we yielded 3.4 gallons of juice from 4 bins of fruit.

Amit joined us to adjust for fermentation. We added water and sugar to 15 gallons, adjusting the sugar up to 21.5 brix. It tasted great! Rangpur Limes are very intense in flavor. The only question was acidity, which tasted perfect. We didn't want to dilute any more than necessary. It tested out to .86% TA.

Racking the '10 Syrah - 5/3/11

2011-05-27T20:02:00.000-07:00

Amit, Burt and I got together to rack our group's '10 Syrah. We cleaned the tank, pump and tubing, transferred the wine off its lees to the tank, cleaned the lees out of the barrel, then back to the barrel it went. Then we cleaned again, before sitting down to taste the wine. It's coming along well.

Barton Orchard '10 Syrah Coastview Vineyard (Monterey County)
Sulfur is minimal and color is darker.
Nose - dark, rich, soft, more integrated, lovely black and red fruit from blackberry to cranberry, good smoky character, hint of bacon, clean mineral sense.
Grippy tart blackberry, juicy, a bit of pith and plum skin, good mineral - granite and graphite, hints of meat and mushroom, orange zest. Lighter on the finish, with a touch of bubblegum, purple basil, thyme, violet, savory and passionfruit.

'10 Plum Bottling - 4/29/11

2011-05-27T18:41:00.000-07:00

Gil, Burt and I got together to bottle our most recent plum wine. Burt bought a floor corker, like the one we used for the '09 Cabernet, which is far superior to the hand corker we'd been using. Like last year's Elderberry, Burt wanted to filter his portion of the plum wine. First, we tasted our wine as it was, dry and unfiltered. Then we filtered his half and tasted again. Then sweetened to his preference level and tasted again. I chose not to filter, as I feel it strips the wine of some complexity. We also tried his version of the '09 Elderberry wine. I'll include my notes from my unfiltered version, tried two days later. Lastly, we sampled from our barrel of '10 Syrah, deciding it was reductive and in need of racking.

'10 Plum dry, unfiltered
Nose - bright and heady, with deep plum skin, black plum and raspberry, with touches of apricot and strawberry.
Quite tart. Intense flavors follow through. A touch of bitterness from the concentrated skin taste.

We're thinking that since the intensity of flavor is always so high, and that the '08 came out too acidic, that this year if the acidity is too high at crush, we can simply adjust it by adding water. Some of Burt's friends would prefer it less concentrated, anyway. (That would, of course, be done before adding sugar to desired brix level. I should also note that our desired acidity level for the plum is higher than just about any grape wine.)

'10 Plum filtered, dry
Cleaner, lighter, simpler. Plummy, more strawberry.

Burton's '10 Plum "Barton Orchard" Filtered
Sweetened with 6 cups of sugar to 7 gallons.
Nice round smoky plum, strawberry and raspberry. Good grip.

Barton Orchard '10 Plum "Estate" Unfiltered
Sweetened with 1 cup of sugar to 6 gallons.
More delicate, more strawberry, less sweet than previous off-dry. Nice.

I was planning to do this completely dry, but chicken out due to the minor bitterness. Then, after trying the Elderberry, which was quite bitter when bottled last year, I immediately regretted my second guessing. But I did do 2 bottles completely dry, in order to have something to check in on.

Burton's '09 Elderberry "Barton Orchard" Filtered
Nose - shy light red fruit, a touch meaty, musty, opening up with pomegranate.
Delicately sweet, light red fruit, a touch meaty, foxy/musty elderflower. Bitterness is almost completely gone.

Barton Orchard '09 Elderberry "Estate" Unfiltered
5/1/2011: Bitterness is pretty much resolved. Very fragrant and floral with lots of raspberry, other red fruits and elderberry, some astringency and a hint of bitterness. Good complexity and body. Should be better dry, or at least sweetening wasn't necessary after all.

Barton Orchard '10 Syrah "Coastview Vineyard" (Monterey County)
Nose - deep, touch of sulfur, classic dark Coastview Syrah, touch of smoked ham, soft expression.
Sulfur note, blackberry, smoked ham, good mineral, touch of mandarin.

Pathway to Pinot Paradise - 3/26/11

2011-04-04T18:04:00.000-07:00

Pathway is the support event on the Saturday of the Pinot Paradise weekend. A self guided tour, where many of the Santa Cruz Mountains Pinot Noir producers host open houses, bringing out special treats such as barrel samples, library wines and limited release wines. I joined my friend Tom for a visit to the four Corralitos wineries.

NICHOLSON VINEYARDS
The Nicholsons planted their first vines in 1996. In 2008 they were joined by talented winemaker Ian Brand. Ian is also winemaker and vineyard manager at Coastview Vineyard, among other things. Bringing Ian on board has really brought their wines up to the next level.

'07 Chardonnay Estate (SCM)
Nose - rich, dark, unctuous, smooth, loquat and cinnamon.
Sharp, dark, brown wood spice, heavy wood over light minerally fruit, loquat, lime, cinnamon, allspice. 84 pts

'09 Viognier Cedar Lane Vineyard (Arroyo Seco)
Nose - warm peach cobbler, nutmeg.
Lovely peach and green apple, good minerality, cinnamon and a hint of nasturtium. Should round out with about 6 more months in the bottle. 91 pts

'08 Pinot Noir Brook's Block (SCM)
Nose - nice savory spice, dark fruit showing rhubarb.
Savory rhubarb with clove, firm, dusty/grippy tannins, touches of plum and cinnamon. Drink '13-'23. 92 pts

'08 Pinot Noir Estate Reserve (SCM)
Nose - more elegant, dark fruit, nutmeg, rhubarb, savory.
Savory spice, nutmeg, rhubarb. Lovely. Dusty/grippy tannin, firm, hint of lemon verbena. Drink '14-'24. 93 pts

'08 Pinot Noir Split Rail Vineyard (SCM)
Nose - light floral sense, savory, touches of black cherry and rhubarb.
Savory black cherry and rhubarb, nutmeg, dusty tannin, slight meaty tinge, hint of iodine. 93+ pts

'08 Syrah Coastview Vineyard (Monterey County)
Nose - inky, deep, boysenberry and sandalwood, cinnamon and violet.
Firm, boysenberry, plum, grippy/dusty tannin, sandalwood, cherry, violet. Drink '15-'25. 93 pts

'08 Zinfandel Old Vine (Amador County)
Nose - bright, porty, cherry and strawberry, dried plum, raisin.
Smooth raisin and cherry, cinnamon. 88 pts

PLEASANT VALLEY VINEYARDS
PPV were established in 1996, crafting wines from 5 acres of estate fruit as well as careful sourcing from distinctive sites elsewhere.

'08 Dylan David Pinot Noir Lester Family Vineyard Thelma-Henrietta Block (SCM)
(This block is planted to Dijon Clone 115.)
Nose - shy unctuous wild cherry, soft wood spice.
Wild cherry, firm, wood spice, wild plum. Drink '11-'17. 90 pts

'08 Dylan David Pinot Noir Lester Family Vineyard Willa-Louise Block (SCM)
(This block is planted to Dijon Clone 667.)
Nose - meaty, strawberry, wild cherry.
Unctuous pithy wild cherry, a bit brambly, chamomile, grass, sage. Drink '13-'18 91 pts

'08 Dylan David Pinot Noir Family Estate Reserve (SCM)
Nose - warm rich strawberry and plum, soft spice.
Savory, round, dusty tannin, plum, rhubarb, lavender, hints of thyme and lemon rind. Drink '15-'27. 92 pts

'09 Dylan David Pinot Noir Lester Family Vineyard Thelma-Henrietta Block (SCM)
(Barrel sample)
Nose - smooth savory plum, slight meaty sense.
Savory, stemmy, smooth, plum, soft oak spice. Needs time to round out. Drink '13-'18. 90+ pts

'09 Dylan David Pinot Noir Lester Family Vineyard Willa-Louise Block (SCM)
Nose - bright lovely Seguin Morreau oak spice, hint of raspberry, green herb, nutmeg.
Lovely nutmeg spice, tart. plum/raspberry/wild cherry, fine tannin. Drink '12-'22. 93 pts

'09 Dylan David Pinot Noir Lester Family Vineyard Cuvee (SCM)
(This is a blend of 2/3 clone 115 and 1/3 clone 667.)
Nose - Heady lovely savory spice, wild plum, violet.
Dusty, savory, lavender, plum, wild cherry, thyme. Drink '14-'22. 93+ pts

ALFARO FAMILY VINEYARDS
The Alfaros purchased their 75 acres property in 1997 and planted 35 acres of it to vines. The estate is planted to Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, Syrah and Merlot. They also purchase fruit and sell some fruit to other wineries, such as Big Basin.

'08 Scarlet Red Wine (SCM)
(85% Pinot Noir, 12% Syrah, 3% Merlot)
Nose - deep dark cherry and nice spice.
Deep cherry and plum, acidic, savory wood, gritty tannin, touch of rustic jujube. Drink '12-'18. 87+ pts

'09 Pinot Noir Gimelli Vineyards (Cienega Valley)
Nose - smooth, meaty, velvety berry and raspberry.
Nice savory plum and raspberry, good grip, touches of nutmeg and rhubarb. Drink '11-'21. 91+ pts

'08 Pinot Noir Schultze Family Vineyard (SCM)
Nose - warm, mildly barnyardy, savory berry, luxurious oak spice.
Lovely Francois Freres(?) spice, good mineral, berry and plum, vibrant and lingering, hints of rhubarb and cranberry. Drink '11-'23. 92+ pts

'08 Pinot Noir Alfaro Family Vineyard (SCM)
Nose - nice full savory tingly berry, touch of redwood, hint of rhubarb.
Firm, almost harsh, packed with berry, dusty tannin, good acidity, hint of cranberry, redwood, good minerality. Drink '12-'19 91+ pts

WINDY OAKS
The Schultzes planted their first Pinot Noir in 1996, and have really been been the leaders in Corralitos Pinot Noir.

'08 Pinot Noir "Diane's Block" (SCM)
Nose - light, heady, brandied spiced cherry, touch of sassafras, hint of raspberry.
Firm, spiced cherry, flan, raspberry, lime pith, a touch of bitterness and heat, smooth/dusty tannin, touch of cocoa. 89 pts

'08 Pinot Noir "Cuvee" (SCM)
Nose - full, smoky and meaty, minerally cherry.
Minerally cherry and rhubarb, some pith, smoke, lanolin, cinnamon. Drink '13-'18. 91 pts

'08 Pinot Noir "100% Whole Cluster" (SCM)
Nose - lovely and elegant, cinnamon, soft red fruit, subtle smoke.
Lovely elegant red fruit, good mineral, cinnamon, some mid-level grip, cherry, dandelion, hints of nutmeg and lanolin. Drink '13-'25. 93 pts

'08 Pinot Noir "Proprietor's Reserve" (SCM)
Nose - rich minerally berry/rhubarb/cranberry, some sandalwood and flan, smoky earthy redwood.
Minerally cranberry, berry, rhubarb, redwood, cinnamon, cilantro, some meaty pith. Drink '13-'27. 93 pts

'09 Pinot Noir "Proprietor's Reserve" (SCM) barrel sample
Nose - lovely deep velvety strawberry, flinty smoke, berry.
Grippy rustic wild cherry, strawberry, flinty mineral, lime zest. Hints of rhubarb and lavender. Lovely. Drink '13-33. 95 pts

'06 Pinot Noir "Special Burgundian Clone" (SCM)
Nose - lovely, soft, almost meaty, haw fruit, leche dulce, strawberry, bread pudding, nutmeg, cinnamon.
warm, soft, bread pudding, plum, haw fruit, lovely, firm dusty tannin. Drink now-'25. 94 pts

Ridge '10 Monte Bello Components Tasting - 3/6/11

2011-03-30T20:10:00.000-07:00

Once again, I conspired with friends to meet up for this fun and insightful event, followed by a picnic. Like last March, the weather was less than ideal. But at least drizzling, cool and clammy is better than piercingly cold winds. The food and companionship made the "ordeal" worth it.

The idea of the components tasting is to allow us to get a feel for what some of the different grapes, from different vineyard blocks, contribute to the blend. Sometimes an individual component is amazing on its own. Other times one will come off as incomplete, but having attributes that would make a good ingredient.

As usual, we were greeted with a Chardonnay before moving on to four components, then an early blend (allemblage) and finally, an older vintage. The Monte Bello designated Chardonnay is selected from the estate lots to be a long lived wine that rewards significant aging.

'07 Chardonnay Monte Bello
Nose - nice perfumed stone fruit, green melon, good mineral sense.
Firm structural frame and juicy fruit, musk melon, pith, a touch of peach, pear, floral - almost soapy, tight. Drink '21-'33. (93)

'10 Merlot Bowl Block
Nose - deep, earthy, smoky black cherry, warm with subtle spice, brambly fruit.
Grippy, smoky, rustic, dark, tart, zesty, earth and mineral. Good intensity with a light body.
Came across as a bit shy or dull to some hedonists who weren't paying much attention...

'10 Cabernet Franc Cheval Block
Nose -ethereal smoked meat over primary black currant.
Tight, smoky, grippy, black currant, mandarin zest, beef, lavender.
Pretty intriguing. This is from very young vines and will not make the blend, but instead will be bottled as its own wine.

'10 Cabernet Sauvignon New Foster's Block
Nose - inky black currant, touches of smoke and blackberry.
Classic intense Cab fruit with juicy sweet currant and dusty tannin. Just lovely!

'10 Petit Verdot Olivos Block
Nose - lovely inky perfumed boysenberry. Wow!
Sharp approach, intense minerally boysenberry, dusty tannin. Wow! Showing just a skosh of green tannin.
This one was a socks knocker offer.

'10 Monte Bello
Nose - intense, heady, inky, rustic smoky jujube/black currant/blackberry.
Intense, juicy, pert, dried herbs, black currant, berry, touches of purple basil, lemon. Dusty/gritty tannin. Drink '25-'55. (94)

'92 Monte Bello (from a 375ml bottle)
Nose - lovely round floral youthful fruit, then mature cedar, violets.
Sharp, juicy, iodine, cedar, currant and berry. Still young. 94 pts

'08 Monte Bello
Nose - lovely, soft and intense berry and purple basil.
Soft intense berry fruit, good mineral and acid structure, touches of lemon and dried herbs. Drink '21-'41. 94 pts

See Richard's write up for some pics and notes on our picnic wines.
http://www.rjonwine.com/cabernet-sauvignon/ridge-2010-monte-bello-components/
I brought the '86 Park-Muscatine Zin and '85 Jimsomare Cab, which were a bit disappointing compared to some similarly mature vintages I've had of those wines.

Rhys Pick-up Day - 2/26/11

2011-02-26T17:31:00.000-08:00

Caught a little snow in the Santa Cruz Mountains this morning, which made for a scenic visit up to Rhys. Good thing I brought the camera. Nice to see and catch up with a good selection of my wine friends, while tasting through some upcoming releases. Glad my friends have such good taste...

The first wine represents a shift for Rhys. As their estate vines began coming into full production, they phased out their second label, Alesia, for purchased fruit. Replacing Alesia will be two appellation level wines, a Chardonnay and a Pinot Noir. Doing this allows them to select only the best barrels for their single vineyard wines, while at the same time having some more affordable and more ready to drink wines. Some people call these "cellar defenders", because they provide fodder to the temptation to open wines that aren't yet at their best. Open these, age those.

Rhys '09 Chardonnay Santa Cruz Mountains
Nose - warm nutmeg-y spices and a lovely rich lemon meringue.
Rich and vibrant, lemon, nutmeg, cinnamon and subtle oak spices, good acidity. Very nice! Ready to drink. 92+ pts

Rhys '09 Pinot Noir Family Farm (San Mateo County)
Nose - incense/lavender/green wood, restrained dark purple fruit, pomegranate.
Very floral with a delicate astringency. Lavender, purple basil, pomegranate, green wood and smoke, underlying hints of jujube and boysenberry, with cinnamon and lemon zest on the finish. Drink '14-'26. 94 pts

Rhys '09 Pinot Noir Bearwallow Vineyard (Anderson Valley)
Nose - deep, dark and savory, allspice and lemon verbena, hints of sassafras and boysenberry.
Nutmeg/clove, zest, boysenberry, chalky mineral, hints of chamomile, lemon verbena and lavender soap. Drink '13-'18 93 pts

Rhys '08 Syrah Horseshoe Vineyard (SCM)
Nose - soft and warm youthful berry fruit, woodsy and floral, incense.
Soft tannin, black currant and boysenberry, soft touch of zest, with nutmeg and orange. Pert. Drink '11-'17. 91+ pts

SCMWA Trade Tasting SF - 2/1/11

2011-02-16T15:09:00.000-08:00

Dave and I drove up to sample some new and upcoming releases from a selection of Santa Cruz Mountains wineries. As usual, there were way too many wines to try, especially when pacing oneself. I think I did a pretty good job, getting to the most interesting wines I haven't tried. Dave got to some I didn't, so I'm looking forward to his notes.

Mount Eden '07 Chardonnay "Saratoga Cuvee" (SCM)
Nose - flinty, intense mineral, lemon verbena and other herbs, lemon, waxy white peach.
Waxy, followed by intense zing, good minerality, lemon, herbs (lemon verbena, oregano), pith. 91 pts

Mount Eden '07 Chardonnay "Estate" (SCM)
Nose - shy (served too cold), warm rich loquat, cinnamon spice, touches of lemon and orange.
Loquat/orange/lemon, good low-key oak spice, nice herbs, good minerality, good supporting richness of fruit. Drink '16-'26. 93+ pts

Mount Eden '08 Pinot Noir "Estate" (SCM)
Nose - heady and very complex, excellent minerality, rhubarb, cherry and purple basil, smoky/savory/ bay leaf, hint of kiwi.
Lovely savory spice, a bit tight, cherry and rhubarb, good minerality, touch of cranberry. Excellent! Drink '16-'30. 95 pts

Mount Eden '06 Cabernet Sauvignon "Saratoga Cuvee" (SCM)
This is from 5 vineyards in Saratoga and Los Gatos
Nose - smooth soft cherry, savory, smoky, black pepper.
Peppery black currant, firm, hints of tobacco and cherry. Drink '12-'16. 90 pts

Mount Eden '06 Cabernet Sauvignon "Estate" (SCM)
Nose - deep, smooth, a bit shy, black currant and blackberry.
Smooth entry to charry black currant, good mineral, smoky, dried herb, tight. Drink '18-'33. 92 pts

Mount Eden '07 Cabernet Sauvignon "Estate" (SCM)
Nose - basil, thyme, smooth black currant, cooked orange, good savory and smoky notes, touch of tobacco.
Firm tobacco and black currant, dusty tannin, light on its feet, background herbs and cherry. Drink '18-'35. 93 pts

Ridge '08 Cabernet Sauvignon "Estate" (SCM)
(75% Cabernet Sauvignon, 20% Merlot, 3% Petit Verdot, 2% Cabernet Franc)
Nose - ethereal black currant and dried herbs.
Grippy/dusty black currant, intense, good mineral and acid, good complexity, touches of tobacco and cherry. Drink '16-'30. 93 pts

Bonny Doon '09 "Contra" (California)
(Mourvedre/Carignane/Grenache)
Nose - deep smoky raspberry, brambly, good mineral.
Intense raspberry, blackberry, hint of rhubarb, semi-flat, good savory smoke and mineral. 90 pts

Bonny Doon '07 "Cigare Volante" (California)
Nose - smooth, good mineral, subtle depth, cherry, rustic, white pepper, complex, green wood.
Soft-to-flattish, savory, peppery, green wood, cherry/rhubarb/hay. 90+ pts

Kathryn Kennedy '09 Sauvignon Blanc (California)
Nose - bright gooseberry, touches of lime and sweet pea.
Perky lime/gooseberry/grass, tight, a bit pithy, sweat pea. 91 pts

Kathryn Kennedy '00 Cabernet Sauvignon "Estate" (SCM)
Nose - warm smooth maturing black currant with hints of tobacco, redwood and cherry.
Soft cedar/tobacco/black currant, pepper, a bit grippy and gritty, redwood, cherry, smoky savory herbs. 92 pts

Kathryn Kennedy '06 Cabernet Sauvignon "Estate" (SCM)
Nose - soft and elegant, good breadth of complexity.
Soft peppery black currant, tight, lime, cherry, smoke, very grippy, hint of orange custard. Drink '18-'33. 93 pts

Kathryn Kennedy '07 Cabernet Sauvignon "Small Lot" (SCM)
Nose - very giving, smooth cherry, black currant, savory dried herb.
Savory dried herbs - basil, smoky, soft black currant, background cherry and redwood, good acidity and complexity. Some grip. Drink '13-'23. 92+ pts

La Honda '08 Cabernet Sauvignon "Salinian Block" (SCM)
Nose - soft, peppery, intense black currant.
Black pepper, smoked chile, intense black currant, hint of char, gritty/grippy tannin. Drink '16-'21. 90 pts

La Honda '07 Cabernet Sauvignon "Naylor's Dry Hole" (Chalone)
Nose - deep and dark, black currant, black cherry, lemon merigue, soft minty note.
Soft, but grippy and gritty, cherry and black currant, red clay, touches of mint and redwood. 90 pts

Regale '07 Pinot Noir O'Neel Vineyard (Russian River Valley)
Nose - classic RRV - good minerality, cherry with a hint of cola.
Good minerality, tingly cherry, deep, good herb, hint of smoky savoriness, good acid. 92 pts
It's nice to come across an RRV Pinot that truly expresses itself. The region used to produce many lovely wines like this. Nowadays almost everybody ruins their wines by picking too late, yielding dark, thick, hot messes.

Regale '08 Pinot Noir O'Neel Vineyard (Russian River Valley)
Nose - smooth, soft, savory cherry, soft mint.
Lovely savory deep wild cherry, wood smoke. 90 pts

Regale '08 Pinot Noir "Sonoma Coast"
Nose - lovely smooth cherry, subtle vanillin oak, good mineral.
Nice smooth classic Sonoma Coast fruit, good intensity, dark minerality. 91 pts

Cooper-Garrod '06 Cabernet Franc "Estate" (SCM)
Nose - dried black plum and a hint of pepper.
Pert smoky plum, lighter body. 89 pts

Cooper Garrod '05 Cabernet Sauvignon "Estate" (SCM)
Nose - lovely classic cedary black currant, fairly soft expression, hint of white pepper.
Lovely cedary black currant, pert, leathery texture, touches of cherry and redwood, hints of tobacco and smoke. 92 pts

Cooper-Garrod '06 Cabernet Sauvivnon "George's Vineyard" (SCM)
Nose - tellicherry and white pepper, with cherry, soft, broad, lovely, good depth, back note of black currant.
Peppery/gritty, tellicherry, black currant, good length, smoky, tight. Drink '17-'27. 91 pts

Cooper-Garrod "'05 Test Pilot, F-86" (SCM)
(44% Cabernet Sauvignon, 44 Cabernet Franc, 12 % Merlot)
Nose - smooth sweet cherry, with touches of soft mintiness and black currant.
Perky and dark, cherry and black currant, good mineral, tart and smoky, with supportive lemon zest. 90 pts

Cooper-Garrod '06 Syrah Finley Vineyard (SCM)
Nose - deep dark Syrah fruit, touches of graphite and white pepper.
Blackberry with white pepper and green peppercorn, touch of cherry, tight, needs time. Drink '16+. 92+ pts

Cooper-Garrod '09 Viognier "Estate" (SCM)
Nose - bright peach and gooseberry, touch of grass.
Less ripe white peach, touches of grass and gooseberry, good grip, pith. 90 pts

Cinnabar '06 Cabernet Sauvignon (SCM)
Nose - smooth depp subtle black currant, touches of cedar and vanilla.
Smooth black currant, white pepper, vanilla, soft dusty tannin. 88 pts

Cinnabar '07 Cabernet Franc Lewis Vineyard (Lodi)
Nose - smooth and elegant blackberry and vanilla spice.
Soft white pepper, blackberry, caramel chew, some dusty char. 86 pts

Big Basin '07 Syrah Fairview Ranch (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - lovely elegant savory herbs, white pepper.
Lovely white pepper, savory smoky dried herbs, blackberry and cherry. 93 pts

Big Basin '08 Syrah "Homestead" (Santa Cruz and Monterey)
Nose - warm creme brulee, nutmeg and blackberry.
Nutmeg and blackberry, smooth/dusty tannin, somewhat savory, lovely, complex. 92 pts

Santa Cruz Mountain Vineyards '08 Durif (San Antonio Valley)
Nose - smooth dried red plum, boysenberry, sultana.
Chalky tannin, boysenberry and sultana, redwood, prune juice. 88 pts

Lytton Springs Blind Tasting 1/31/11

2011-02-03T11:37:00.001-08:00

This was a Rossbott tasting. 15 people, 8 wines. We tasted blind and individually ranked them. The rankings are compiled and tallied, yielding a group score, ranking and a spread. The score is 1 point for each 1st place vote, 2 for 2nd and so on down to 6 for 6th, so the lower the score the better. The spread shows the number of votes for the following rankings: 1st/2nd/3rd/last.

A) Nose - austere, dark, dusty, kirsh and olive, pipe tobacco.
Rich, touch of raisin, slight bitter edge, mature cherry and blackberry. Lovely. 94 pts
My #1, group #2 3/1/3/0 (57)
1992 Ridge "Lytton Springs", Dry Creek Valley (88% Zin, 8% Petite Sirah, 4% Grenache, 14.9%)

B) Nose - green cocktail olive, cherry, sweetish/oxidative.
Sweet pickle, nice mature cherry, smooth, odd, but not unpleasant. With time, some smoked meat and cabbage, dark berry. 87 pts
My #7, group #8 0/1/0/5 (95)
1990 Ridge "Lytton Springs", Dry Creek Valley (80% Zin, 10% Petite Sirah, 6% Carignane, 4% Grenache, 13.8%)

C) Nose - deep,dark, rich, classic L.S., oregano, sweet wood, floral, licorice, leather.
Cedary blackberry, tobacco, smooth/dusty tannin, slight bitterness. 91 pts
My #5, group #4 1/1/4/2 (67)
1994 Ridge "Lytton Springs", Dry Creek Valley (80% Zin, 13% Petite Sirah, 4% Carignane, 2% Grenache, 1% Alicante Bouchet, 14.3%)

D) Nose - deep and dark, basil, licorice, hint of Green Zebra tomato.
Sweet, dill, quite mature black cherry, dark dusty tannins. 91 pts
My #6, group #6 4/0/0/1 (72)
1991 Ridge "Lytton Springs", Dry Creek Valley (80% Zin, 12% Petite Sirah, 5% Grenache, 3% Carignane, 14.1%)

E) Nose - lovely savory dried herbs, blackberry, subtle wood spice.
Rich, has a funky fruit component - Alicante?, wild berry, smooth, dusty tannin, good intensity of fruit, touch of peppermint. 93 pts
My #2, group #1 3/5/1/0 (43)
1991 Ridge "Lytton Estate-ATP", Dry Creek Valley (86% Zin, 7% Petite Sirah, 7% Grenache, 15.4%)

F) Nose - odd/musty, shy, dusty black cherry.
Dark, cherry, funky, TCA, blackberry, zest. Flawed - corked.
My #8, group #7 1/2/0/3 (80)
1993 Ridge "Lytton Springs", Dry Creek Valley (85% Zin, 8% Petite Sirah, 3% Carignane, 2% Grenache, 2% Alicante Bouchet, 14.5%)
The fruit was still dominant, and most people didn't get why this wine was wrong. The quality still showed, and I guessed I'd probably rate a non-corked version about 92. Turns out this is one of the two wines this tasting had in common with the Ridge Blogger Lytton Springs tasting, where I rated it 92.

G) Nose - mature, light cherry, hint of green olive.
Olive, cherry, pert, youthful berry. 92 pts.
My #3, group #5 1/1/3/1 (68)
1994 Lytton Springs Winery, Dry Creek Valley (14.3%)

H) Nose - classic L.S., clean, shy, black cherry and black currant.
Rustic alicant-y fruit, deep, youthful, sweet, hint of cinnamon candy. 92 pts
My #4, group #3 2/4/3/3 (58)
1995 Ridge "Lytton Springs", Dry Creek Valley (84% Zin, 14% Petite Sirah, 2% Carignane, 14.3%)

As a bonus, one of the participants brought a non-commercial bottling from the 1974 vintage, made before the Lytton Springs Winery was bonded.
Nose - lovely mature fruit, cedary, smooth, perfectly integrated, hints of pipe tobacco, American oak, cherry.
Pert, round, mature, smoky caramel, cherry, good minerality. 92 pts
Started to fall apart after about 20 minutes. What a treat! Interesting to note that what looked like sediment in a few people's glasses turned out to be grape skins. (Yes, we counted 4 skins. "There's 4 skins in the wine.")

Ed Kurtzman @ Artisan Wine Depot - 11/5/10

2010-12-14T22:32:00.000-08:00

Freeman '07 Chardonnay Ryo-fu (Russian River Valley)
Nose- lovely finesse, warm broad earthy lemon and subtle spice.
Nice interplay of wood spice and cooked lemon, broad and earthy. 91 pts

Freeman '08 Pinot Noir (Sonoma Coast)
Nose - lovely savory herbs and spices with sultry Sonoma Pinot fruit.
Nice dried herb, pithy, zesty, smoky, a bit firm, cherry-ish fruit. Drink '12+ 90 pts

Sandler '08 Pinot Noir (Sonoma Coast)
Nose - deep smoky cherry, nutmeg, dried lemon rind, broad dusty spice.
Deep, sappy, sultry, spicy. Tight with a bit of burn, nice cherry and allspice. Drink '12-'15. 88+ pts

Sandler '08 Pinot Noir (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - gorgeous heady elegant fruit, touch of redwood.
Restrained, delicate smoky fruit, touch of lime zest. Seems closed - not showing what's on the nose. Needs time. Drink '12-'18. 92+ pts

Sandler '08 Syrah Connell Vineyard (Bennett Valley)
Nose - deep dark fruit with licorice, smoke. Reminiscent of an old Martin Ray Cab, with a hint of that green bamboo shoot interplay.
Inky smoky black fruit, licorice, smoked meat. Needs air/time. Charry tannins. Drink '14-20. 93 pts

Sandler '08 Zinfandel Buck Hill Vineyard (Sonoma County)
Nose - nice brambly zinberry, hint of dried fruit.
Smooth round zinberry and blackberry, dusty tannin, allspice. 89 pts

August West '09 Pinot Noir (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - deep smoky dried herb spice.
Light, round, saline, cherry, raspberry pie, dusty tannin, candied lemon zest. 90 pts

August West '08 Pinot Noir Rosella's Vineyard (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - gorgeous fruit well framed by lovely spice, savory smoke, touches of cranberry and blackberry.
Smooth and lovely, cranberry, blackberry, hint of orange, dusty tannin. Slips down the throat. Drink '12-18. 93+ pts

August West '08 Pinot Noir Graham Family Vineyard (Russian River Valley)
Nose - elegant minerally RRV fruit, good intensity, dried savory herbs, lovely redwood spice, lemon blossom, orange.
Smooth complete wine. Cherry/orange/lovely spice, dusty tannin, peppery tingle, smoky rhubarb, a bit firm, but ready. Drink '10-18. 93 pts

Roar '08 Pinot Noir Rosella's Vineyard (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - Wow! Rich deft fruit, smooth, raspberry/nutmeg/cherry/cranberry.
Smoky cranberry, with some black plum and black cherry, touch of pepperiness, dried basil, hint of orange, dusty tannin, roasty plum. Drink '12-'20 92 pts

Stefania Fall Pick-up 11/6/10

2010-12-14T20:31:00.000-08:00

From Rhys I drove to to Stefania Wines, at the Chaine d'Or Vineyard in Woodside, to join more friends, enjoy a few wines.

'09 Chardonnay Chaine d'Or Vineyard (SCM)
Nose - loquat, pear, good mineral, some cardamon and tarragon.
Unctuous pear and loquat, touch of canned apricot, subtle spice. 90 pts

'08 Haut Tubee (CA)
Nose - warm, spicy, cedary, deep black currant, and a softer boysenberry, with touches of nutmeg and redwood.
Intense black currant with boysenberry and cedar, tart, peppery mouthfeel, soft/dusty tannin. Needs 6+ months. Drink '11-'17. 90 pts

'08 Pinot Noir (SCM)
Nose - lovely savory bay, with deep red fruit, woodsy, nutmeg, just so lovely and complex.
Lovely sappy blackberry, with bay, smoky zest, lovely, savory, complex, good acid. Drink '11-31 94 pts
This is from a 30-ish year old vineyard that I helped the Stefania crew prune that spring. Pruning was the final step of restoration, but frankly, I've had a dozen or so older versions from this vineyard from a few different producers. From this and the Big Basin versions ('08 and '09), I think they got the vineyard is better shape than ever.

'08 Syrah Eaglepoint Ranch (Mendocino)
Nose - nice smoky blackberry, dried savory, nutmeg-y spice, smooth.
Nice dark blackberry and a touch of black currant, smoky, nutmeg-y wood spice, a touch of zest, and the slightest hints of orange and mushroom. Drink '12-'20 92 pts

'06 Syrah Eaglepoint Ranch (Mendocino)
Nose - smooth, lovely, softened boysenberry and cinnamon, supporting peach, bright spice. Really nice!
Lovely blackberry and peach, complemented by cinnamon and other spices. Drink '10-'16+ 93 pts

'08 Cabernet Sauvignon Uvas Creek (SCV)
Nose - Smooth black currant with a touch of resin.
Nice blackberry and black currant, round and fresh, but well framed by dusty/gritty tannins andsupporting spices. Touches of orange and black plum. Drink '10-18. 91 pts

'09 Cabernet Sauvignon Santa Cruz Mountains - barrel sample
Nose - smoked ham, trace of sulphur, blackberry.
Smoky roasty blackberry, ham, black plum, gritty tannin, good acid.

Rhys Fall Pick-up 11/6/10

2010-12-04T18:16:00.000-08:00

Kevin Harvey, Bryan Harrington, Al Osterheld

Jeff Brinkman

4 year air dried French oak from Francois Freres

Years ago Kevin Harvey caught my attention on the wine discussion forums as someone who had similar tastes in wine as me, and as someone passionate about Burgundy and the Santa Cruz Mountains. A few years later he announced he had started his own winery and was about to release the first wines. It turns out he really had the resources to put behind his passion, his pursuit of excellence. They seeked out some great sites to plant, with distinctive soils and much experimentation. With a great team and several vintages under their belt, Rhys is perhaps the best Pinot Noir producer in California. (Their Chardonnays and Syrahs are nothing to sneeze at, either.)

Last year I was invited on a vineyard tour. Ken Zinns did a great write-up:
http://www.grape-nutz.com/kenz/09_June27.html
http://bartonorchard.blogspot.com/2009/07/rhys-vineyards-tour-62709.html

This year they finished their cave at the Skyline Vineyard in time for harvest. Everything is in there, from winemaking to storage, offices to visitation. Check out Richard's entry, which includes a video tour:
http://www.rjonwine.com/california-wine/tour-of-rhys-vineyardss-new-cave-with-kevin-harvey/

Met up with some friends and saw many other familiar faces. Chatted, took notes, took pics and went on a tour with winemaker Jeff Brinkman. You can see me leaving, off to the Stefania Fall Pick-up, at the start of Richard's video.

Alesia is their second label, for non-estate wines. Bearwallow Vineyard is a new acquisition in the Anderson Valley. On one side is the noted Kiser Vineyard, on the other side is the source for Harrington's Anderson Valley Pinot.

Alesia '08 Pinot Noir (Sonoma Coast)
Nose - fresh, delicate spice, rustic black plum and raspberry, lemon blossom.
Moderate fruit with a spicy structure, zesty plum, fairly firm. Drink '13-'20. 91 pts

Rhys '08 Pinot Noir Bearwallow Vineyard (Anderson Valley)
Nose - delicate, lovely, touch of blue fruit, shy.
Grippy and dusty tannin. Moderate, but very expressive fruit, good zest, needs time to develop. Drink '15-'25. 92 pts

Rhys '08 Pinot Noir Horseshoe Vineyard (Santa Cruz Mountains)
Nose - deep fruit, rustic minerality, really nice, delicately intense and floral.
Firm dark rustic purple fruit, good minerality, grippy tannins, smoky spice. Drink '14-'24. 93+ pts

Rhys '08 Syrah Skyline Vineyard (Santa Cruz Mountains)
Nose - intense, deep and expressive, lovely dark fruit and dark graphite-y mineral, delicate spice, plum pie and a touch of boysenberry.
Dusty tannin, smoky spice, grippy, nice restrained fruit, nutmeg and the slightest hint of clove. Drink '16-'24. 94 pts

Monte Bello Dinner 6/20/10

2010-12-04T16:04:00.000-08:00

While our group was picnicking at the Monte Bello Assemblage Tasting in May, Sandy suggested we do a Monte Bello dinner. Julie agreed to host. Not the worst way to spend an evening. Good friends, good food, good wine.

I brought a '99 Monte Bello Chardonnay to start. Didn't take notes, but showed a huge amount of sulfur which gradually dissipated over time. Very tight and youthful. Shows good potential, so I'd like to revisit in a decade or more. But disappointing showing this night. I knew it was young, but hoped to see a bit of what I've gotten in their '90s era SCM Chards lately. Those are at their prime.

'73 Monte Bello (Santa Cruz Mountains)
I took the foil off this and was cleaning off the lead dust, only to see bubbling up the side of the cork. Damn!
Nose - molasses, raisin and prune.
Oxidized raisin and prune. Dusty. FLAWED

'83 Cabernet Sauvignon (Santa Cruz Mountains)
As noted on the back label, this was a declassified Monte Bello.
Nose - green bamboo stalk and smooth black currant.
Gritty, char, mature cedar, fully mature cherry-ish fruit, hint of tobacco. Fairly simple, but quite nice. 90 pts

'84 Monte Bello (Santa Cruz Mountains)
Nose - warm/savory, dried herb, black currant, nice mature notes.
Warm charry mature black currant, touch of cedar, gritty/dusty tannin - not resolved, touches of black pepper and green peppercorn. 91 pts

'86 Monte Bello (Santa Cruz Mountains)
Nose - intense savory herbs, mahogany, Coca Cola, lovely aromatics.
Intense herbs and tobacco, youthful black currant and smoky cherry. 93 pts

'92 Monte Bello (Santa Cruz Mountains)
Nose - warm oak spiced plum, deep, soy.
Deep dusty black plum, soy, firm and heavy, touches of black currant and cedar, hints of tobacco and funk. 91 pts

'96 Monte Bello (Santa Cruz Mountains)
Nose - redwood, cinnamon, plum, black currant, creme brulee.
Smooth redwood, plum and black currant, dusty. Still young. Some cedar and bitter lime zest on the finish. Opens up really well. 94 pts

'97 Monte Bello (Santa Cruz Mountains)
Nose - deep, dark, porty black plum and red cherry, hints of redwood and eucalyptus.
Black peppercorn, black plum, intense black currant, grit and sap. Needs 10+ years. 93+ pts

'98 Monte Bello (Santa Cruz Mountains)
Nose - deep simple black currant, soy.
Grippy, astringent, charry Merlot, flat black currant, a bit bitter, gritty/dusty tannins, some plum and tobacco. Should improve with 5-10 more years. 85++ pts
(On release this showed some good structure and notes of interest, but was completely hollow. I thought it should've been declassified, and still think so. It is filling out well, so may become a pretty good wine, but nowhere near Monte Bello standards.)

'01 Monte Bello (Santa Cruz Mountains)
Nose - deep savory black currant, hints of ginger, molasses and redwood.
Deep dark black and purple fruit, dusty tannin, black currant, char, olallieberry, rustic, smoky, lime zest, firm, minerally. 95 pts

'06 Monte Bello (Santa Cruz Mountains)
Nose - sweetish frosting, black plum and black cherry, delicate herbs, ginger, tarragon.
Roasty toasty smooth dark fruit, black currant, elderberry, lime, hint of redwood. 94 pts

'07 Monte Bello (Santa Cruz Mountains)
Nose - lovely herbs and elegant oak spices, black plum, marachino, rosemary.
Lovely savory dried herbs, Pinot-like interplay, light on its feet, elegant, complex, nice black currant. 96 pts

Check out the write-ups from Richard and Dave:
http://rjonwine.wordpress.com/2010/07/07/ridge-monte-bello-dinner-1973-2007/
http://scmwine.blogspot.com/2010/06/monte-bello-dinner.html

Spices

2010-11-26T23:21:00.000-08:00

If you buy your herbs and spices at the grocery store, it's time to wake up! Better for less is a no brainer, right? How about OMFG better for A LOT less? Locally here, in Menlo Park, you can go by Penzeys. Do it. Check if there's a store near you: http://www.penzeys.com/cgi-bin/penzeys/penzeysstores.html?id=BMiSM8Tq They have herbs and spices in different sizes, as well in bulk. The latter means there's an open container of each that you can open and smell. When you do that, you will start putting things in your basket. Once you cook with these, you will never buy from a chain grocery store again.

In talking about Penzeys, a chef friend offered to take me to an Indian grocery store in the South Bay. Haven't done it yet. Sounds like the kind of place where a guide would be helpful. But, same deal. High-end authentic Indian spice blends for cheap. I can get the name if you ask.

Recently a couple wino friends 'liked' a new online store that a couple friends of theirs had just started. I snooped around and saw enough stuff I needed and enough that I wanted to try that I placed an order. I'm always on a quest for good coffee and am very picky, so I tried a couple. The Yemeni Mocha really hit all the notes. I use the dried mushroom melange in a chicken dish and WOW! Just so good. I was really happy with all the things I tried. So, a couple days ago I got my second shipment of goodies. Smelling the black truffle sea salt has me craving to try it on steak. The smoked alder sea salt calls for pork. I already used the chipotle chili powder to round out an heirloom tomato sauce. More coffees to try (and more Yemeni) and more mushrooms. Check 'em out: http://www.smallspecialtiesgourmet.com/shop/

Harrington Wines Open House - 11/20/10

2010-11-25T14:46:00.000-08:00

This is always a fun event. They have three tables of wines: current releases, future releases, and library wines. Harrington specializes in Pinot Noir from distinct well managed vineyards from Chalone to Mendocino. (Going forward a good portion of Nebbiolo is entering the mix.) The format of this tasting allows us to compare the vineyard characteristics of different wines from the same vintages, and also multiple vintages of some of the same wines. Good exercises to get a feel for general vintage characteristics, as well as how specific wines age.

Last year I took comprehensive notes. This year I decided to be more social and just have a good time. I value having my own notes to reference, but taking them can sometimes be a bit of a burden. One of the things I love about wine is how what specific people enjoy varies completely. On the extremes are wines some people love and others hate, for whatever reasons. Other wines seem to "do it" for everyone. Nothing extreme here, but preferences varied.

The star of the day was the '07 Gap's Crown, which was just stunning and everyone was raving about. Favorite among the other current releases varied. It was nice to see that the '08 Krause has come around and developed into a nice wine - one of my favorites. I also particularly enjoyed the '08 Iund. Most of these would benefit from some age or time in a decanter. The current releases:
'07 Gap's Crown Vineyard (Sonoma Coast)
'07 Iund Vineyard (Carneros)
'07 Wiley Vineyard (Anderson Valley)
'07 Brosseau Vineyard (Chalone)
'08 Gap's Crown Vineyard (Sonoma Coast)
'08 Iund Vineyard (Carneros)
'08 Krause Vineyard (San Francisco Bay)
'08 Brosseau Vineyard (Chalone)

The future release table was really exciting to me. The '09 Mendocino was my highlight amongst the bottled Pinots. (Sorry, don't have the line-up.) Also stunningly good were barrel samples of the '10 Mendocino and the '10 Russian River Valley. Those two may ultimately be the best wines Bryan has made. Also at the table were the '08 and '09 Nebbiolos. When I've tasted them before I wondered if they just weren't my type of wine, if they'd develop into something better, why Bryan is so obsessed. Now I get it. Don't if it's the wines developing or if my palate is acclimating to Nebbiolo, but they seem more complex and nuanced. Most people seemed to prefer the '08, which is resolved and ready to drink. But I was more impressed with the '09, despite its rough edges.

The third table showed how well these wines age. There was also a couple of side-by-sides with Gang of Six versions of the same wines. Fun stuff. It was great meeting and chatting with some new people while enjoying these wines.

'85 Cabernet Blind Tasting 11/18/10

2010-11-19T12:45:00.000-08:00

This was a Rossbott tasting. 9 people, 6 wines. We tasted blind and individually ranked them. The rankings are compiled and tallied, yielding a group score, ranking and a spread. The score is 1 point for each 1st place vote, 2 for 2nd and so on down to 6 for 6th, so the lower the score the better. The spread shows the number of votes for the following rankings: 1st/2nd/3rd/last.

For this tasting we had 3 Cabernet-based wines from California and 3 from Bordeaux. We knew what the wines were, just not which was which.

A) Nose - dark, warm, toasty, deep, rustic, mature, black currant and ash, with hints of sweet tobacco, iodine and cedar.
Cedary classic Cab with good intensity, charred oak, dry, a bit bitter, dusty ashy tannin. 90 pts Bdx (I guessed Beychevelle. We scaled down from 8 wines and I misunderstood which Bdx was eliminated. Due to the intensity I would've guessed either Lynch or Chasse.)
My #2, group #4 2/3/1/3 (29)
'85 Ch. Chasse Spleen (Moulis)
With time TCA became apparent. At least one person got this before the reveal, which surely reduced its group ranking.

B) Nose - baguette, good tone, delicate mature black currant, cedar, dill and green olive.
Roasty mature cedary Cab, dark toast, touch of bitter astringency, cherry. 90 pts Bdx - Lynch?
My #3, group #3 1/2/3/1 (29)
'85 Ch. Lynch Bages (Pauillac)

C) Nose - sweetish mature red fruit, Red Vines, hint of licorice, sweet tobacco and dill.
Woody astringency, weedy. With time this smoothed out showing some nice subtle mature red fruit. 87 pts Bdx - Chasse? (See above. Would've guessed Clocher.)
My #5, group #2 3/1/0/1 (28)
'85 Ch. Clos du Clocher (Pomerol)

D) Nose deep cedary black currant and cotton candy, hints of black olive, mint and dill.
Classic Mount Eden - deep Margaux fruit, intense minerally mountain expression, licorice with a slight hint at that green bamboo shoot. Smooth, dark and sultry. 92 pts Ca - Mount Eden no question
My #1, group #1 3/2/1/1
'85 Mount Eden Estate (Santa Cruz Mountains)

E) Nose - Vlassic pickles, mint, sweetish, green olive, nice herbs, smooth low-key mature fruit.
Sickly dill pickle and astringency dominating dark classic fruit. 78 pts Ca - Coturri?
My #6, group #6 0/0/1/2
'85 Dehlinger Estate (Russian River Valley)

F) Nose - smoky sauerkraut, smoked bratwurst, smooth mature fruit.
Sweet, feminine, nice elegant fruit, bright, strawberry and black plum. 90 pts Ca - Dehlinger?
My #4, group #5 0/1/3/1
'85 Coturri (Alexander Valley)

So, I got the CA vs Bdx right. Really, 5 wines showed CA hints and 5 showed Bdx clues, but ultimately that was pretty easy. If I had the right line-up it would've been a tossup between getting 2 or 4 wines right.

Coturri wines are controversial - made without inoculating and without any SO2 to protect the wine. They can be amazingly complex wonderful wines or bacterially spoiled messes. Some initially great versions can go bad over time in the bottle, especially if not stored properly. As one friend who's a Coturri fan pointed out, the highs are so high and the price is so low that the gamble is well worth it to him. I respect that.

Earlier this year in trying the '68 and '70 Martin Ray Cabs from the Mount Eden Vineyard, I really got the signature, as it was very prominent in those wines. Not long after, a paired of early '80s Mount Edens showed it again, to a less overt degree. Martin Ray planted the vineyard to the Margaux clone in the late '40s. It was more recently replanted, so now I'm curious to revisit some younger versions to see if that signature is still there.

Ridge Wineblogger III - Lytton Springs 9/26/10

2010-11-13T02:17:00.001-08:00

For the 3rd edition, we met up at Ridge's Lytton Springs facility. I'd never been there before, so it was interesting to check out the green building and the old vines. Saw a few familiar faces and met a bunch of new people. These events are a fun way to get an array of perspectives from various wine and food writers.

For a comprehensive write-up, see Richard's entry: http://www.rjonwine.com/2010/10/ridge-lytton-springs-bloggers-tasting-10-vintages-of-lytton-springs-plus-small-format-monte-bello/
And link's to the other entries: http://blog.ridgewine.com/2010/10/08/wine-bloggers-tasting-edition-iii-the-first-posts/

We tasted 10 vintages of Lytton Springs, spanning 21 vintages. That's a good way to compare vintage differences and also get an idea of how the wines evolve over time. We also tried 3 middle-aged Monte Bellos out of half-bottle. I've had so many vintages over the last couple years, but it had been a decade or so since I tried the '91. Back then it was still pretty hard. That vintage is interesting, because while the critics rated it as a typical Monte Bello, there's been a buzz on the wine forums with people rating it as one of the best. The secondary market also reflects this, as the '91 commands a much higher than normal price.

'87 Lytton Springs (Dry Creek Valley)
(82% Zinfandel, 13% Carignane, 5% Grenache)
Nose - mature dark fruit, showing brambly cherry, rustic and tart, touch of olive, some floral notes.
Mature tart black cherry and olive, rose hips and other floral notes. A bit too tart for the maturity of the fruit, which would be easily remedied with food. 86 pts

'92 Lytton Springs (Dry Creek Valley)
(88% Zinfandel, 8% Petite Sirah, 4% Grenache)
Nose - deep and sharp, dark brooding spicy fruit, bright clean floral notes, creamy, black currant.
Deep concentrated black currant, pert, brown spice, mid-palate shows a dusty darkness, mandarin, lime zest. Heady. Finishes with lavender and a touch of bitterness. 90 pts

'93 Lytton Springs (Dry Creek Valley)
(85% Zinfandel, 3% Carignane, 2% Alicante, 2% Grenache)
Nose - more moderate expression showing a pure berry, yellow cake, nice spice blend from nutmeg to pipe tobacco to fennel, spiced orange tea.
Nice point of maturity. Dark berry, orange zest and blossoms, hint of tobacco and dusty spice. 92 pts

'96 Lytton Springs (Dry Creek Valley)
(78% Zinfandel, 19% Petite Sirah, 2% Carignane, 1% Grenache)
Nose- lovely tobacco and barnyard, blackberry, spice, touch of flan.
Lovely dusty tobacco, black currant, lime, peppery bite, touch of blackberry, perfect maturity. Some tobacco and a hint of barnyard on the finish. 92 pts

'99 Lytton Springs (Dry Creek Valley)
(70% Zinfandel, 17% Petite Sirah, 10% Carignane, 3% Mataro)
Nose- deep black currant with a touch of tobacco.
Sweet boysenberry with dark dusty notes, nutmeg. Nice interplay of clean youthful fruit, spice and maturity. 91 pts

'07 Lytton Springs (Dry Creek Valley)
(71% Zinfandel, 22% Petite Sirah, 7% Carignane)
Nose - deep youthful brambly boysenberry, yellow cake, nice oak spice.
Deep dark youthful blackberry, Christmas spice, lime zest, dark dusty tannin, yellow cake. 93 pts

'05 Lytton Springs (Dry Creek Valley)
(77% Zinfandel, 17% Petite Sirah, 6% Carignane)
Nose - really nice deep ethereal quality, full lovely fruit, dried herbs and floral notes.
Incredibly complex, deep fruit, lavender, light floral notes, custard, boysenberry. 94 pts

'03 Lytton Springs (Dry Creek Valley)
(76% Zinfandel, 18% Petite Sirah, 6% Carignane)
Mose - a bit restrained, dense tobacco-y dark fruit, zesty, boysenberry pie, citron, earthy.
Dark peppery black currant, tight, saline quality, touch of soy and malasses. Needs time. 90 pts

'02 Lytton Springs (Dry Creek Valley)
(75% Zinfandel, 20% Petite Sirah, 5% Carignane)
Nose - shy mentholated black currant, deep and sharp, hints of dusty jujube.
Pert peppery black currant, blackberry, dried cranberry, touch of sweetness, dusty tannin, violets. Pert, round, slightly bitter finish. Drink '15-'25 92+ pts

'01 Lytton Springs (Dry Creek Valley)
(76% Zinfandel, 17% Petite Sirah, 7% Carignane)
Nose - heady intensity, maturing dark fruit, touch of soy and brown sugar, boysenberry, fennel seed, allspice.
Lovely floral zesty boysenberry, allspice, good round berry. Nice. 92 pts

'91 Monte Bello (Santa Cruz Mountains)
(85% Cabernet Sauvignon, 10% Merlot, 5% Petite Verdot)
Nose - deep black currant with green bamboo shoot, iodine, touch of cedar, violet and rose, earthy, very concentrated, licorice.
Deep concentrated black currant and blackberry, nose follows through. Finishes with licorice, tobacco, cedar, roasted green chiles. Excellent. A bit reminiscent of an old Martin Ray Cab. 95 pts

'92 Monte Bello (Santa Cruz Mountains)
(80% Cabernet Sauvignon, 11% Merlot, 9% Petite Verdot)
Nose - deep cedary black currant with a higher toned funky tobacco.
Classic cedary black currant, touch of iodine and green chile, dark gritty/dusty tannin. 92 pts

'94 Monte Bello (Santa Cruz Mountains)
(73% Cabernet Sauvignon, 15% Merlot, 9% Petite Verdot, 3% Cabernet Franc)
Nose - deep minty black currant, sultry, licorice and green bamboo.
Full black currant/licorice/mint/cedar, good maturity, leathery tannin. Drink now-'25. 93 pts

'09 Elderberry Bottling 8/25/10

2010-09-30T19:02:00.000-07:00

The next day Amit joined us to finish and bottle the elderberry wine. Burt likes a certain level of sweetness to his fruit wines, as that's what his friends and family expect. Some fruit wines taste great dry, but not this one. We've also found that in sweetening our fruit wines, there are two specific points of sweetness where they seem most focused and in balance. We add sugar at bottling time, where it's easy to do our halves differently. So, mine are usually off-dry or dry, and his are always sweet.

With this wine there was also a lot of suspended solids. Burt was concerned about sediment freaking people out, so he wanted to filter. Sediment doesn't bother me, and filtering can strip out complexity. But, the wine has a harshness from the skins (should've racked more often) that filtering might help remove. Since Burt was set on filtering, we did his half first, and I got the chance to compare before making my decision...

Dry, unfiltered.
Bone dry. A bit bitter and astringent. Signature raw elderberry. Firm. Dark, smoky, meaty, with notes of raspberry, red plum and apricot.

Dry, filtered.
Bright clean raspberry. But it seems more bitter in the balance. Seems to have stripped out much of the other fruit character.

Easy choice not to filter, for me.

Burt added 3 cups of sugar to his half, while I opted for 1 cup. Each half yielded 19 bottles.

Barton Orchard '09 Elderberry Wine Estate
A bit bitter - needs time to (hopefully) mellow. Sugar too low for drinking not, but should be about right when ready. Sugar addition made the raspberry more prominent.

We also somehow manage the time to suffer through a barrel sample of our group's Cab...

'09 Cabernet Sauvignon GarLind Vineyard (Santa Clara Valley)
Nose - deep black currant, vanillin oak spice, smooth, hint of smoke, mellow with lovely spiciness, marigold.
Deep smooth black currant, creamy, spicy, (Hungarian, says Amit) oak, vanilla, touches of blackberry and raspberry.

'10 Plum Crush 8/24/10

2010-09-30T18:25:00.000-07:00

Production was down a bit this year due to hominid consumption, as well as the usual squirrel raids. Harvesting is daily over several weeks, to maximize ripeness. There's still enough red-ripe fruit in the mix, as well as some fully black-ripe, to add to the complexity. In addition to my estate black plums, I also include a small amount of estate cherry plums. They usually make up 3-4% of the volume, with their tart and rustic qualities adding favorably to the wine. This year, at a record 5 lbs. 9 oz. they make up a record 6%. I also included 1.5 lbs of mariposa plus from my friend Jean.

Total weight of processed fruit was about 92 lbs, which was about 11 gallons. After adding water and sugar it came to 18 gallons, measuring 27.5 brix. (Burt likes to go a little high, so he can top with water.)

Ridge Blogger Tasting II - 7/9/10

2010-07-29T14:00:00.000-07:00

This time we were summon up to sample a range of Ridge's Rhone variety wines, which are released to one of their clubs - The Advanced Tasting Program (ATP). Unlike the other attendees, I'm actually a member. From my experience and preference, they tend to improve with a couple years age, so I usually stash them away instead of opening one of my two bottles. That makes an opportunity to try them without opening one of mine quite helpful. To that end, Ridge began monthly First Friday events about a year ago, where they'll pour the latest ATP wine to members, with a wine pick-up option, on the months that coincide with a club release.

For this tasting, you'll see we were poured a current release alongside one or two bottles of the same wine with a bit of age. That's always good to get an idea of how a wine evolves, as well as to compare vintage differences.

We started with a couple single vineyard Chardonnays from along the ridge. Both vineyards usually contribute to Ridge's Estate or Monte Bello bottlings, but some or all can be bottled separately if they are distinct and/or don't meet the desired characteristics of those regular bottlings. On release, Ridge Chards appeal to those who like the typical oaky California style. Yawn. But, with a lot of age they are a very different animal and are among the state's best. These two are made for earlier drinking. As we were assembling, we were served the '08 Jimsomare, which I posted notes on a few times before. Didn't take notes, but did observe that it's mellowed over the last few months and is more ready to drink. The '08 Mikulaco is a new release, which I believe is only available through the tasting room.

'08 Chardonnay Mikulaco (SCM)
Nose - gorgeous, elegant, delicately spice loquat, with white peach, lemon and vanilla. Creamy.
Unctuous, zingy, white peach, underripe apricot, brown oak spice, lime, mandarin zest. 89 pts

'02 Carignane Buchignani Ranch (Sonoma County)
Nose - spicy, light brown sugar, mature, balsam, black plum, Hansen's cola, touches of nutmeg and cardamon.
Soft black plum, touch of raspberry jam, dried herbs, lemon zest, grippy tannin. 89 pts

'05 Carignane Buchignani Ranch (Sonoma County)
Nose - forward smoke, dried herbs and gorgeous spices, with red and black fruit, earth and savory mushroom.
Smooth, spicy raspberry jam, with touches of oak spice, lime zest and pith. Young but delicious. Drink now-'15. 92 pts

'08 Carignane Buchignani Ranch (Sonoma County)
Nose - redwood, raspberry, black plum. Very bright and heady. Dark character, dried herbs and smoke.
Dark raspberry jam, redwood, lemon balm, balsam, real cinnamon, thyme, marjoram. 92 pts

'06 Syrah/Grenache Lytton Estate (Dry Creek Valley)
Nose- spicy earthy pure purple fruit, dark, rustic, smoky.
Black plum and blackberry enveloping oak, firm tannin, astringent zest, kumquat, slight bitterness, hint of peach. Drink '14-'20. 91+ pts

'05 Syrah/Grenache Lytton Estate (Dry Creek Valley)
Nose - rustic, berry, morel, a bit of a meaty/smoky/molasses note.
Meaty, smoky black fruit, mushroom, blackberry, loquat, mango, raspberry, dusty tannin, jasmine, lime zest. Drink '13-'20. 92 pts

'03 Syrah Lytton West (Dry Creek Valley)
(9% Viognier)
Nose - sweetish/almost porty, deep berry with brown sugar and marachino, cinnamon, nutmeg, clove.
Sweet, dusty dark berry, redwood, a bit simple, very pure. 88 pts

'05 Syrah Lytton West (Dry Creek Valley)
(6% Viognier)
Nose - deep smoky dried herbs, summer savory, boysenberry, apricot, black plum.
Smoky dried herbs, boysenberry, peach. Nice. Drink '12-'20. 92 pts

'06 Petite Sirah "Dynamite Hill" York Creek Vineyard (Spring Mountain District)
Nose - dark black and blue fruit, allspice, white pepper, cinnamon, coffee/mocha.
A bit grippy, very dark fruit, graphite, good complexity. Should evolve very well. Drink now-'50. 94 pts

'03 Petite Sirah "Dynamite Hill" York Creek Vineyard (Spring Mountain District)
Nose - plum and redwood, lovely background oak spices.
Heavy dark sweet plummy fruit, grippy tannin, lemon zest, slight hint of tobacco. Drink '16-'31. 92 pts

Quite a fun event!

Plum plum plum plum plum

2010-07-29T13:25:00.000-07:00

Finished up with the plum harvest last week, so have well over 100 lbs of plums in the freezer awaiting a convenient time to start the wine. Got a good crop of cherry plums (5 lbs. 9 oz.) harvested mid-June. The skins have a very intense tart and rustic quality that adds a lot to the wine, even though it's a small percentage of the blend.

The '09 plum wine is showing really well already. Great intensity and very enjoyable, maybe the best yet. I really worked on getting them as ripe as possible. While the range of ripeness adds to the complexity, the proportional shift is better.

One thing I've always said about the plum wine is that (unlike some of the other fruit wines) there's no way it could be confused for a grape wine. Well, I dug up some '07s, serving a couple in May, and the obviously plum fruit quality has mellowed so much, and it's picked up a meaty quality, so it reminds me of a Cinsault dominated Rhone wine - and not bad, either.

Racked the elderberry wine off the sediment. Should be bottling it next week. In tasting, it's bone dry, firm, a bit harsh and with bit of sulfite, showing dark, smoky, meaty raspberry and apricot. Definitely needs sugar and some time. Next time we should rack earlier.

Ridge Vineyards Tour 5/6/10

2010-05-08T13:27:00.000-07:00

I had the privilege of joining George, Kim and Allan of Gang of Pour on a tour of the winery with Paul Draper. Gang of Pour have been writing about their wine adventures online since 1997. I've been following them since 1999, due to their particular interest in Ridge, my favorite winery. Paul Draper is one of the most significant figures in California winemaking history and is a wealth of information, a pleasure to talk to. He's responsible for a lot of innovation, taking a strong footing in the best time proven traditional practices and carefully integrating modern improvements. He joined Ridge in 1969 and his wines have stood the test of time - impressively. For an idea what he's about, I highly recommend this oral history: http://digitalassets.lib.berkeley.edu/roho/ucb/text/draper_paul__w.pdf

We met near the crushpad of the upper winery and talked about all sorts of things. The Monte Bello ridge (which extends north to Portola Valley) is unique in composition in the Santa Cruz Mountains. It derives from a seamount pushed up from South America by the Pacific Plate. It is comprised largely of Calera limestone. Paul tells of Marcel Guigal visiting and recognizing the soil - the same soil as his area of the Cote Brune.

The section above the winery is widely spaced rows of 40 year old Merlot vines. The partners planted it on bad advise, as there's about a six foot gap between roots. Production is only one ton per acre, but the quality is so high it always makes the Monte Bello blend. They've been actively acquiring and replanting historic vineyard sites along the ridge, so for now labor is being better used elsewhere than fixing this block.

Ridge does incredible amounts of research. I've read about all they've done with oak, for example. Paul was telling us about SO2. Normally, it is added at certain points (ie. crush, racking, bottling). Different levels of free SO2 inhibit or kill the various microbial beasts. It readily bonds to various molecules, and dissipates with oxygen exposure, so the level of free SO2 fluctuates greatly. The best way to control the beasties is cleanliness, of course. Some of the beasties seem to add to complexity if allowed to persist at small levels. Presumably, maintaining an even level of SO2 is the best control at optimizing beastly activity. Ridge tested various levels for what results in the best wine and settled at 30 ppm, so now they now actively maintain their wines at that level.

One other point of interest to me is that their destemmer is so gentle they get 50% whole berry in their fermentations.

After the chat, we went inside into the barrel room housing the '08 Monte Bello for a taste...

'08 Monte Bello
Nose - gorgeous Ceylon cinnamon spiced plum supported by black currant, lovely French oak-like spices, compact, smoky, delicate, lovely, subtle complex dried herbs.
Intense explosion of gorgeous black currant, with lovely smokiness and dried herbs, plum, good acid, just a little earthiness and zest. Very youthful. 95 pts

Next, we proceeded to a neighboring room to taste through a blind flight. Paul told us of their tasting and feedback methodology. These were four vintages of Monte Bello leftover from a staff tasting a day or two before. Note they hadn't been protected from oxidation (and presumably had been given sufficient air exposure prior to the staff tasting). We knew the vintages, and the '09 was obvious.

'06 Monte Bello
Nose - deep concentrated purple fruit, chocolatey, nutmeg, white pepper.
Dusty, smooth, smoky cherry, plum, round, touches of lime, elderberry and black currant. 94 pts

'05 Monte Bello
Nose - a bit oxidative, raisinated fruit, plum, marachino liqueur.
Oxidative, deep, plum, licorice, black currant. N/R
The others seemed to like this a lot, but the oxidative qualities were too dominating for me to rate this accurately (though I've always been impressed the several other times I've tasted it).

'09 Monte Bello
Nose - lovely, savory, dried fresh fruit medley, dried herbs, driving, touch of black currant.
Deeply savory, dried herbs integrated with youthful fruit, lovely gentle astringency. Just wonderful! 96+ pts
The interplay of the savory dried herbs and fruit reminded me a bit of some Pinot Noirs I've had from Arcadian and Harrington. Impressive, but not something I've gotten in a Cab before.

'07 Monte Bello
Nose - primary plum, just a little bit oxidative, spicy - cayenne and cinnamon.
Smooth simpler fruit supported by a nice smokiness. Plum, elderberry, black currant, dusty tannin, touch of lime zest, smoky peach. 95+ pts

After that, we toured around to the fermentation room where Paul showed us a fermentation tank he designed. He said the process of emptying and cleaning which used to take about 3 hours, now only takes 15 minutes. They're in common usage up in Napa.

We snaked around through more rooms, then down a narrow staircase into the caverns, around and down again. Talking some more, then a barrel sample:

'09 Geyserville
Nose - deep primary smoky purple fruit, lime, good zest and herbal quality.
Rich, passionfruit, plum, vanilla, peach, smoky and savory, lime. 93+ pts

Back upstairs, we found ourselves in an employee lounge area. Wine racks with a miscellany of interesting wines. One table had a bunch of recently sampled empties with several unopened bottles in front. Among them I spied an '09 Downhill Torrontes and couldn't help but comment how much I like that wine. Turns out (winemaker/owner) Frank Ashton and his wife had toured a few days before. Paul had nice things to say about them and said "I like what he's doing" about Frank's wines.

After that, we drove back down to the tasting room, where Christopher had some wines waiting for us. We also opened a couple I brought. Paul joined us right when we were finished with the whites.

'08 Chardonnay Jimsomare Vyd.
Nose - focused minerality, zippy lemon, pith, smoky, earthy, persimmon.
Mango/persimmon/smoke/tangello, round and full, hint of peach. 91 pts

'06 Chardonnay Monte Bello
Nose - restrained and elegant, warm earthy mineral, hint of smoke.
Intense well framed citrus and tropical notes, touch of mushroom. 92 pts

'07 Santa Cruz Mountains Estate
Nose - warm, savory, intense black currant, cedar, smoke, red currant, wild berries, nutmeg and dark spices.
Earthy dusty black currant, grippy, tight, ashy smoke, wild berries, waxy pith, peppery. (93 pts)

'02 Monte Bello
Nose - smooth, dried herb, rich, deep dark fruit, smoke, mineral.
Deep, youthful, dark mineral, smoky purple fruit, tight, black currant, hint of peppercorn. Drink '20-'40. 94 pts

'92 Monte Bello
Nose - nice mature cedary plum and black currant. Dark and deep.
Smoky, carmelized plum, good minerality, black currant, dusty sweet oak. Drink now-'30. 95 pts

'79 Zinfandel Paso Robles
Nose - warm, mature, deep, tawny, sweet dried black plum.
Pert tawny plum, cinnamon, dried plum. Has a nice zippiness. Really enjoyable. 92 pts
Revisited with dinner, it held together well for about 3 hours.

'68 Ruby Cabernet (SCM) From one acre on the Monte Bello ridge.
Nose - deep dusty redwood, deep red fruit, smoke, cinnamon, red plum, rhubarb.
Tart, smoky, smooth, red currant, dusty, hint of acetate. Had a sort of heavy dull something holding it down a bit, and also seemed to have the oomph to last open for awhile. Rated it 91 pts. Revisited late in the evening and it had lightened and brightened up - notably more enjoyable about 7 hours after opening. 92+ pts

Christopher posted his notes on the last two wines on the Ridge blog. Look for notes, pics and video from the Gang of Pour.

SCMWA Trade Tasting 4/13/10

2010-04-22T02:36:00.000-07:00

This was another great opportunity to taste a bunch of Santa Cruz Mountains wines. Again, way too many to get through. A lot of what I hadn't tried where whites, so I decided to go through them first, and didn't get much further...

COOPER-GARROD
-------------
'07 Viognier Randall Grahm Clone (SCM)
Nose - warm stone fruit/peach, has just enough earthy weight, sandalwood, hint of kumquat marmalade.
Very smooth, nice touch of oak spice, pith, with touches of kumquat marmalade and white peach. 88 pts

'06 Chardonnay Gravel Ridge Vyd. (SCM)
Nose - concentrated seam of signature SCM Chard, rich loquat, good mineral sense.
Good body, spicy oak and rich exotic fruit, nice minerality. 89 pts

DANCING CREEK
-------------
'08 Chardonnay (SCM)
Nose - nice Christmas spice frosting - good intensity.
Smooth, really nice elegant spice, mouth watering, mango, tamarind, lemon, cardamon. A bit reminiscent of Varner. 90 pts

DOWNHILL WINERY
---------------
'09 Torrontes (CA)
(Actually from the Silvaspoons Vyd. Alta Mesa, Lodi)
Nose - bright, intense, tropinal - passionfruit, strawberry, hints of mango and pineapple.
Spicy, waxy, white peach, touches of pineapple and mango. Somewhat firm. 91 pts

CLOS LACHANCE
-------------
'09 Sauvignon Blanc "White Tuffed Sunbeam" (Central Coast)
Nose - smooth lemon curd, lemon grass.
Lemon, lemon grass, fresh peas, dark woody spice, hint of cigar, pith. 87 pts

'07 Chardonnay (SCM)
Nose - high toned, light resin, smooth, clean, spicy, restrained.
Woody spice, rich butterscotch/vanilla, snap pea, lemon. Very clean and bright. Lingering wood tannin. 86 pts

BEAUREGARD
----------
'06 Chardonnay (SCM)
(This is estate fruit from the Ben Lomond area. As I noted with their Pinot, there is a definite site expression these share with McHenry estate fruit.)
Nose - rich, stony, kumquat, savory, sultry.
Really nice exotic spice, rich kumquat and mango, intense minerality, touch of lemon zest, very site expressive. 93 pts

POETIC CELLARS
--------------
'07 Chardonnay Chestnut Hill Vyd. (SCM)
Nose - light/shy.
Smooth/pert, rich mango, lemon, pea, nice wood spice, clean/smooth finish. 89 pts

ROUDIN SMITH
------------
'07 Sauvignon Blanc (Lake County)
Nose - clean, grassy, gooseberry, kumquat.
Soft, grassy, lemon curd. 86 pts

'07 Chardonnay (SCM)
(From the Terra Bonny Vyd.)
Nose - high toned, caramel, wood spice, lemon, date.
Rich fig pudding with a cross current of lemon and spice, caramel, date, PX. 87+ pts

QUINTA CRUZ
-----------
'09 Verdelho (Alta Mesa)
(From the Silvaspoons Vyd.)
Nose - clean, chalky, with a zesty citrus note, touch of grass.
Nice, easy drinking, grassy, chalky, just the right touch of pith, citrus, toast. 88 pts

FOGARTY
-------
'07 Chardonnay (SCM)
Nose - shy, good mineral, touch of lemon and spice.
Rich, with good acidity, sweet spice, well rounded fruit. Quite nice. 90 pts

PLEASANT VALLEY VINEYARDS
-------------------------
'07 Chardonnay "Brittany Morgan Reserve" Pleasant Valley Vyd. (SCM)
Nose - resin, nutmeg, smoke, roasty lemon, licorice.
Lemon, smoke, licorice, good acidity, rich, nutmeg, anise. 90 pts

'08 Viognier "Erika Anna" Hansen Vyds. (Paso Robles)
Nose - clean and bright, elegant light fruit, rich, very complex, sandalwood, smoke, mandarin marmalade.
Rich roasty mango, smoke, touches of stone fruit, with a slight bitter undertone. Impressive. 91 pts

ODONATA
-------
'08 Chardonnay Peter Martin Ray Vyd. (SCM)
Nose - smoky mineral, flinty, roasty, clean.
Savory, roasty, light stone fruit, dry, light Sprite, roasty citrus. 90 pts

The the reds...

PLEASANT VALLEY VINEYARDS
-------------------------
'08 Pinot Noir "Dylan David Thelma-Henrietta Block" Lester Family Vyd. (SCM)
(Dijon clone 115)
Nose - bright sappy/savory, rhubarb/blackberry/cranberry.
Roasty smoky cherry, savory complex spice, cranberry, boysenberry, pithm good mineral, raspberry. 92 pts

'06 Pinot Noir "Dylan David Family Estate Reserve" (SCM)
Nose - deep savy/smoky, lovely, wild cherry, touch of cranberry.
Deep, dark, savory, zesty, black cherry, excellent smoke character, dusty, boysenberry streak, touch of rhubarb, really nice Seguin Moreau oak spice. Sort of Rhys-lite, by way of lighter bodied Corralitos fruit. 94 pts

'07 Syrah "Sean Boyle" Lester Family Vyd. (SCM)
Nose - deep rich dark fruit, star anise, white pepper, boysenberry, ash, citron.
Spicy, tart, deep purple fruits, elegant wood spice, boysenberry, raspberry, white pepper, ash. 94 pts

'07 Merlot "Casey Alexander" Edsell Vyd. (SCM)
(This vineyard is near Picchetti on the Monte Bello ridge.)
Nose - deep berry, roasty citrus, nice vanilla spice, cinnamon, pepper.
Smoky zesty blackberry, lemon, nutmeg, cinnamon, nice lingering spice. 92 pts

POETIC CELLARS
--------------
'06 Mourvedre Muse Vyd. (Livermore Valley)
Nose - nice intense savory spice, dark smoky fruit.
Rich dark toasty savory spice, smoky dark blackberry. 91 pts

'06 Syrah Stanza Vyd. (Livermore Valley)
Nose - warm dense dusty fruit and stemmy spice.
Light berry, peppery heat, green stemmy spice, zesty lime. 82 pts

'06 Petite Sirah Pentameter Vyd. (Livermore Valley)
Nose - dark smooth black currant, French oak spice.
Dusty tannin, smooth berry, black currant, char, smoky, oak spice, hints of mandarin, lime zest. 86 pts

'80s Cabernet Blind Tasting 4/8/10

2010-04-14T19:55:00.000-07:00

This was a Rossbott tasting. 19 people, 8 wines. We tasted blind and individually ranked them. The rankings are compiled and tallied, yielding a group score, ranking and a spread. The score is 1 point for each 1st place vote, 2 for 2nd and so on down to 8 for 8th, so the lower the score the better. The spread shows the number of votes for the following rankings: 1st/2nd/3rd/last.

A) Nose - mature, warm, smooth, integrated redwood, sweet spice, tobacco, cedar. Really nice.
Very dilute expression of tobacco and dried plum. Lingers well, but not much there. 84 pts
My #6, group #7 2/3/1/3 (95)
Sherrill Cellars '80 Cabernet Sauvignon Shell Creek Vyd. (Paso Robles)
Note: This was a Woodside winery. My first experience with one of their wines.

B) Nose - Sweet oak, cedar, smooth mint, chunky redwood, cigar, black cherry.
Smoky red plum, tobacco. 90 pts
My #1, group #4 2/1/7/1 (88)
Ridge '80 Cabernet Sauvignon "Spring Mountain" (Spring Mountain District)
(90% Cabernet Sauvignon, 10% Cabernet Franc)

C) Nose - green olive and pimento juice, jalapeno pizza.
Spicy cherry, jalapeno, touch of cedar, hint of mint. 88 pts
My #3, group #5 1/1/3/2 (92)
Ridge '80 Monte Bello (SCM)
(100% Cabernet Sauvignon)

D) Nose - Reggiano, french bread, canned green beans, black cherry, mint.
Char, harsh green, bitter, plastic, black cherry, tobacco. Bitter finish. 72 pts
My #7, group #1 3/5/1/1 (75)
Santa Cruz Mountain Vineyards '80 Cabernet Sauvignon Gamble Ranch (Napa Valley)

E) Nose - dusty red cherry, balsa, hint of black olive, sweet cedar.
Musty, astringent, outhouse. 65 pts
My #8, group #6 2/3/1/5 (94)
Mayacamus '80 Cabernet Sauvignon (Napa Valley)

F) Nose - deep, youthful, tobacco, dark cedary fruit.
Smooth meaty cherry, mature with tobacco notes, wood smoke. 89 pts
My #2, group #8 1/2/1/3 (100)
Ritchie Creek '80 Cabernet Sauvignon (Spring Mountain District)

G) Nose - bright, dark, plastic/outhouse, black plum, tobacco.
Dark, rich, smoky black cherry, quite charry, tart, dusty wood. 86 pts
My #4, group #3 1/2/3/2 (87)
Keenan '80 Cabernet Sauvignon (Napa Valley)

H) Nose - Cabernet port.
Sweet sense but dry, dusty dark charry tannin, astingent, black plum, black currant. 85 pts
My #5, group #2 7/2/2/2 (84)
Chateau St. Jean '80 Cabernet Sauvignon Wildwood Vyd. (Sonoma Valley)

'80 Zinfandel Blind Tasting 3/29/10

2010-03-30T07:43:00.000-07:00

This was a Rossbott tasting. I made a last minute decision to go when I saw there'd be 4 old Ridge Zins in the line-up, including one from Shenandoah. I've been very impressed by a couple of their old Zins from the Sierra Foothills.

11 people, 8 wines. We tasted blind and individually ranked them. The rankings are compiled and tallied, yielding a group score, ranking and a spread. The score is 1 point for each 1st place vote, 2 for 2nd and so on down to 8 for 8th, so the lower the score the better. The spread shows the number of votes for the following rankings: 1st/2nd/3rd/last.

A) Nose - pungeant, mature, biting, smoky, ashy, delicately sweet, carmelized, cinnamon, redwood, candied orange zest, breakfast tea.
Biting, tobacco, kirsh, peppermint and spearmint, slightly bitter chalky finish. 80 pts
My #2, group #1 3/4/2/0 (26)
Ridge '80 Geyserville (Sonoma Valley)
100% Zinfandel, 14.6% alc.

B) Nose - salty, tawny cherry, green olove, tamarind, smooth, Christmas spice, Pfeffernusse.
Sour, flat, ashy, dusty, dark fruit, Scotch. 79 pts
My #3, group #6 0/2/2/2 (54)
Sarah's Vineyard '80 Zinfandel Lime Kiln Vyd. (Cienga Valley)
15.2% alc.

C) Nose - musty - corked? Deep, darker fruit, less mature, black olive.
Nice tobacco, musty, tart cherry. 60 pts
My #8, group #8 0/0/2/2 (60)
Joseph Swan '80 Zinfandel (Sonoma County)
13% alc.
A couple people strongly disagreed this was corked. The same two who ranked it 3rd.

D) Nose - high-toned, plum pudding, touch of tamarind, cinnamon, nutmeg, peppermint tea, chamomile.
Chamomile and breakfast teas, dry, orange zest, touch of heat, dusty bitter finish. 73 pts
My #4, group #4 1/1/3/2 (51)
Ridge '80 Zinfandel Glen Ellen (Sonoma Mountain)
100% Zinfandel, 16.0% alc.

E) Nose - smoky Shenandoah fruit, delicate sweetness, chamomile.
Bitter, astringent, tart, woody. 68 pts
My #7, group #3 1/1/1/1 (47)
Ridge '80 Esola Vyd. (Shenandoah Valley)
95% Zinfandel, 5% Petie Sirah. 13.9% alc.

F) Nose - creamy mint, vanillin, shy red fruit, slight hint of olive, ashy, Aussie Tokay - tawny orange character.
Sweetish orange and tawny notes, tea, tart, cedary redwood. 84 pts
My #1, group #2 3/2/0/1 (47)
Sarah's Vineyard '80 Zinfandel "Les Vignerons Vignoble" (Sonoma County)
15% alc.

G) Nose - deep, dark, peppery tobacco, hint of outhouse, ammonia, plastic.
Bitter bretty tobacco, astingent, bitters, hint of band-aid. 72 pts
My #5, group #7 1/0/1/2 (57)
Clos du Val '76 Zinfandel (Napa Valley)

H) Nose - bright, smoky/ashy, farty, dark, dusty, hint of plastic.
Smooth, non-descript, outhouse, chalky/dusty tannin. 71 pts
My $6, group #5 2/1/0/1 (52)
Ridge '80 Langtry Road Claret (Spring Mountain District)
57% Zinfandel, 33% Petite Sirah, 10% Carignane. 13.4% alc.

Amazing aromatics on these wines, so varied and exciting. No two were close. Too bad only two were pleasant to drink. I'm glad I nailed the Shenandoah. None of the others were obvious, as their various prominent aromatics had nothing to do with the sites.

Pinot Paradise 3/28/10

2010-03-29T16:27:00.000-07:00

This is an annual event in Campbell, organized by the Santa Cruz Mountains Winegrowers Association, featuring most of the Santa Cruz Mountains Pinot Noir producers - 37 this year.

I started with the VIP tour. Some of the wineries poured different wines for the general tasting, so I revisited a couple for those. I like very much that the wineries are organized alphabetically, so they're easy to find despite the crowd. What I didn't like *AT ALL* is that they have the food stations interspersed with pouring stations. The A-M side is more densely packed and much of it was overwhelmed by strong food odors. This made it difficult to impossible to smell some of the wines, and it's very fatiguing. I had to get a pour, walk out of the area to take notes, then walk back to get the next pour. Stupid! Some of the pourers didn't seem too happy about it either, BECAUSE THEY ARE PROUD OF THEIR WINES AND WANT PEOPLE TO ABLE TO DISTINGUISH THEIR CREATIONS FROM GENERIC $8 GROCERY STORE WINES!

Anyway, this is my favorite wine region and there are so many good wines. I paced myself and only managed less than half of who was there. Lots of familiar faces and good conversion. What I most looked forward to was trying the Nicholson Pinots and the '07 Mountain Winery. Ian Brand started at Nicholson in '08, having apprenticed at SCMV and Big Basin. I was impressed by some other wines of his previously, especially the '08 Nicholson Viognier. Jeffrey Patterson of Mount Eden makes the wines for the nearby and historic Mountain Winery. You can dig back to find a post on a visit last year to try their '06 estate Chard and Pinot. Okay, enough with the rambling...

BIG BASIN VINEYARDS
-------------------

'08 Woodruff Vineyard
Nose - soft, smooth, berry,cigar box, dried herbs, smoke, a touch of orange zest.
Soft, spicy, roasty berry, dried savory and bay, lemon zest, touches of raspberry, pith, meat, cranberry. Needs a year. 91+ pts

'09 Woodruff Vineyard
Nose - lovely pure fruit framed by dried herbs and spice, primary Morgan - lovely!, nice mineral sense.
Smooth mushroomy Morgan, good mineral and earth. Needs 2 years. 92 pts

BURRELL SCHOOL
--------------
'08 with RC212 yeast
Nose - odd piquant aromatic wood, dusty, nice dark berry.
Very dark berry and black plum, full, beefy. 89 pts

'08 with Assmanshausen yeast (I think that's German for Assman's house)
Nose - lighter, fully ripe, more raspberry.
Deep, tingly, dark berry, pungeant, dusty spicy wood. 90 pts

HALLCREST
---------
'08 Assmanshausen yeast
Nose - softly meaty, mushroom, bay.
Light, lovely spice and mineral, soft berry.

'08 DMY5 yeast
Nose - bright berry and sandalwood, smooth, flat mushroom, nice berry, tart, a bit savory.

'08 RC212 yeast
Nose - dusty smooth dark berry, with kumquat marmalade.
Dusty, tart, smooth blackberry and mushroom.

I'd guess the fungal notes on these were from too many moldy grapes in the mix. It certainly detracted from their potential. I reserved judgment as the grape quality is there and they may evolve well. Right now, not impressed.

'06 Vista del Mare
Nose - forward berry, with citrus, spice and VA (slight hint of nail polish).
Smooth, flat, berry, meat, pith. 84 pts

'05 Terra Serena (AKA Woodruff)
Nose - lovely, full, savory, nice forest floor, smooth berry.
Smooth berry, peppery spice, savory, a bit flat, biting, rustic. 89 pts

WINDY OAKS
----------
'07 Wild Yeast
Nose - shy, complex, berry and spice, lovely balance.
Smooth, soft oak, nice perfumey berry. 91 pts

'07 Cuvee
Nose - full bursting berry.
Smooth soft berry, spice and mushroom, bay. 91 pts

I was a bit fatigued at this point, keeping up with the group. I would expect a bit more from these delicate wines, but they could also just not be showed all they have in store for when they hit their drinking windows. Anyway, after this I went at my own pace.

ALFARO
------
'06 Lester Vyd.
Nose - lovely heady spice and berry.
Lovely roasty smooth berry, savory spice, touch of redwood. 91+ pts

'07 Lester Vyd.
Nose - rich, bright berry, lovely savory spice, roasty citrus note.
Nice spicy oak, blackberry, spiced plum, good complexity. 92 pts

'07 Lindsay Paige Vyd.
Nose - spicy plum, soft berry, biscotti. Intriguing.
Soft berry, nutmeg, redwood, cinnamon. 91 pts

'07 Alfaro Vyd.
Nose - warm citrus, berry, savory.
Smooth, peppery, soft berry, green peppercorn, biting. Needs 1+ year. 90 pts

MOUNT EDEN
----------
'06 Estate
Nose - rich, savory, minerally berry.
Smooth, shy, still a bit primary, raspberry, good minerality. 92 pts

'07 Estate
Nose - lovely, heady, smooth, rustic roasty berry, good mineral.
Moulin-a-Vent. Excellent berry and mineral expression. Just lovely! Smooth, light on its feet, broadly complex. 95 pts

MOUNTAIN WINERY
---------------
'07 Estate
Nose - smoky, smooth, dark plum and berry, good mineral, bay, citrus.
Smooth/dusty oak tannin, blackberry, tangello, refreshing, dark minerality. Ready to go, but should improve over a year. 92 pts

BEAUREGARD
----------
'07 Estate Beauregard Ranch
Nose - really nice dusty peppery spice, smooth youthful rustic berry.
Spicy/peppery roasty berry, touch of jujube, smooth, dusty, touch of green peppercorn, nice lingering spice. 92 pts

'07 Trout Gulch Vyd.
Nose - Smooth, rich, youthful syrupy berry, reminiscent of McHenry in its complex background notes, spicy, savory, blackberry, bay, black pepper, tarragon.
Smooth, peppery, nutmeg, berry, balsa, dusty tannin, grippy finish. Drink '11-'15. 91 pts

BLACK RIDGE VINEYARD
--------------------
'06 Estate
Nose - bright earthy berry, orange blossom.
Smooth savory earthy berry, exotic wood aromatics, savory. Drink now-15. 91 pts

'07 Estate
Nose - bright pure berry with a lovely nutmeg spice, custard.
Exotic spiciness, firm dusty tannin, fresh berry, citrus and zest. Drink '11-'17. 92 pts

'08 Estate barrel sample
Nose - Lovely blackberry, creme brulee, redwood, cinnamon.
Exotic wood spiciness, nutmeg, redwood, cinnamon, boysenberry, dusty/chalky tannins. 92 pts

BIG BASIN VINEYARD
------------------
'07 Alfaro Vyd.
Nose - citrusy sandalwood, savory, exotic oak.
Sappy - lovely stemmy spice, fresh boysenberry and plum. 93 pts

NICHOLSON
---------
'08 SANTA CRUZ MOUNTAINS
Nose - a bit shy, with bay, cinnamon, orange marmalade, nutmeg, redwood.
Peppery orange spice, redwood, cinnamon, savory berry. 92 pts

'08 RESERVE
Nose - impressive savory spice, rich berry, white pepper.
Lovely peppery savory berry, boysenberry, cinnamon, green cardamon, redwood. 93 pts

SARAH'S VINEYARD
----------------
'07 Santa Cruz Mountains (Veranda & Regen vineyards)
Nose - nice perfumed berry, savory note, primary.
Nice savory berry, a bit peppery, hint of green peppercorn and bay, boysenberry, dusty gritty tannin. 92 pts

'08 Santa Cruz Mountains
Nose - bright, redwood, white pepper, full berry.
Dusty wood, bright berry, jalapeno. Really nice. 92 pts

'09 Santa Cruz Mountains
Nose - lovely primary candied berry, smoky, rich.
Blackberry, peach, apricot, redwood, orange custard, nutmeg, white pepper, ash. 93 pts

'07 Rebhahn Vyd.
Nose - rich/roasty/smoky/savory, exotic deep dark fruits, white pepper.
Savory, smooth, Juicy Fruit gum, full berry, redwood, cinnamon, cardamon, lovely lingering spice. 93+ pts

I need to visit this winery.

SANTA CRUZ MOUNTAINS VINEYARD
-----------------------------
'07 Branciforte Creek
Nose - peppery, savory, blackberry, exotic wood, lovely, heady, aromatic.
Ashy, peppery, blackberry, savory stemmy spice. 92+ pts

'06 Bailey's Branciforte Ridge
Nose - rich barnyardy berry, good minerality, white pepper.
Tart, smoky boysenberry, with elderberry, a hint of raspberry, orange zest, dusty tannin. 91+ pts

SOQUEL
------
'07 Proprietor's Reserve Saveria Vyd.
Nose - youthful, smooth, blueberry and boysenberry.
Exotic roasty raspberry, bright, hints of jujube and redwood, passion fruit, very expressive of Corralitos. 93 pts

FOGARTY
-------
'08 Santa Cruz Mountains
Nose - rich but shy berry, notes of mushroom.
Rich sappy berry, pert, savory dried herbs. 91 pts

'07 Windy Hill Vyd.
Nose - lovely peppery shy berry fruit.
Smoky ashy roasty blackberry, sappy/savory, rustic dark fruits. Could use a couple years, should evolve well. 93 pts

WINDY OAKS
----------
'07 Henry's Block
Nose - light headiness, with a smoky/roasty note, bay, shy red fruit.
Peppery feel, shy, smooth, red plum, hints of cranberry and rhubarb, dried savory. 91 pts

'07 100% Whole Cluster
Nose - smooth savory stemmy spice, berry, white pepper.
Smooth berry, nice stemmy peppery spice, a bit smoky. 92 pts

WOODSIDE
--------
'06 Estate
Nose - deep, dark, savory, dark berry, smoke, candied lemon zest.
Deep dark fruit, peppery, savory, dried basil, nutmeg, citrus, zesty, redwood, roasty fruit. 93 pts

KING'S MOUNTAIN
---------------
'05 Estate
Nose - lovely dried herb, heady smoky spice, dark fruit.
Smoky sulfitey dark berry fruit, with lovely savory dried herbs, slight hint of brett. Needs air. 90 pts

All in all a fun event.

Ridge Wine Blogger Special Tasting 3/18/10

2010-03-26T09:43:00.000-07:00

Christopher Watkins, Ridge's Monte Bello tasting room manager, invited a bunch of us local bloggers up to taste through a line-up similar to what Robert Parker recently sampled. Quite a stellar array of wines, a pleasure to revisit many and sample a few new ones.

'08 Chardonnay Jimsomare (SCM)
Nose - stony/steely, brown spice, tight/focused, really nice lemon, some mango, exotic spices.
Rich texture, tropical-mango, lemon, zest/pith, lanolin, kumquat, cardamon. Needs about 1-2 years for the oak to resolve. 91 pts
Note: This lot was held out from the regular SCM blend, as it doesn't have the structure to meet the ageability expectations of that wine. Very nice, but a young drinker. Due to its small production volume it will only be sold through the tasting room for slightly less than the SCM.

'08 Chardonnay Santa Cruz Mountains
Nose - sweet, light, lovely spiciness, litchi and lemon.
Redwood, hint of integrated sulfite, shy, sweet, light fruit, touch of bitter oakiness. Needs 2+ years. 90+ pts

'08 Zinfandel East Bench (Dry Creek Valley)
(100% Zinfandel)
Nose - carmelized cream,rich berry, very primary, dark, brambly.
Sweet primary fruit, rustic, brambly, lime and orange zest, very aromatic sandalwood, olallieberry. bitter zest on the finish. Needs 2+ years. 91 pts

'06 Zinfandel East Bench (Dry Creek Valley)
(100% Zinfandel)
Nose - smoky, with smooth, rich, dusty oak, blackberry and custard.
Smoky, lime zest, charred oak, blackberry, bay. Fruit is stil fairly primary. A bit rustic. Drink '12-'17. 90 pts

'08 Geyserville (Sonoma County)
(72% Zinfandel, 20% Carignane, 6% Petite Sirah, 2% Mataro)
Nose - lovely Draper perfume, berry, fairly primary.
Smooth, deep, berry, quince, nutmeg, sandalwood, nice dark smokiness. Primary berry and vanilla on the finish. Drink '15-'35. 93 pts

'07 Geyserville (Sonoma County)
(58% Zinfandel, 22% Carignane, 18% Petite Sirah, 2% Mataro)
Nose - warm, smooth dark berry and jujube, reticent, showing hints of spice and tropical notes.
Dark berry, sappy, dusty tannin, tight, showing richness. Grippy/zesty on the finish, with an ethereal nutmeg/cinnamon spice. Drink '12-'27. 93 pts

'08 Lytton Springs (Dry Creek Valley)
(74% Zinfandel, 21% Petite Sirah, 5% Carignane)
Nose - Wow! Lovely heady spice, primary blackberry, touch of pink peppercorn, black pepper, orange cream.
Nutmeg, blackberry, mandarin, sage, green peppercorn, black pepper, roasty black currant, orange cream, smoky char, bay. Drink '12-'27. 92+ pts

'07 Lytton Springs (Dry Creek Valley)
(71% Zinfandel, 22% Petite Sirah, 7% Carignane)
Nose - a bit of stinky integrated sulfite, young purple fruit, smooth oak spice.
Zesty, dusty, smoky purple fruit. Very tight. Drink '15-'35. 91 pts

'07 Santa Cruz Mountains Estate
(58% Cabernet Sauvignon, 42% Merlot)
Nose - classic SCM Cab, and forward proper Merlot fruit, lots of black currant, youthful, pepper, vanilla, golden beet, hint of green peppercorn. Cedar shows with time. Coal, blackberry.
Lighter body, black currant and cedar, Merlot, lime zest, hint of tobacco. Drink '17-'37. 92 pts

'06 Santa Cruz Mountains Estate
(56% Cabernet Sauvignon, 42% Merlot, 2% Petit Verdot)
Nose - peppery, cedary, boysenberry and black currant.
Peppery, very intense blackberry and black currant, smooth, tight, some green herbs, roasty, vanilla, dried herbs, touch of cedar, a bit bitter. 92 pts

'05 Santa Cruz Mountains Estate
(58% Cabernet Sauvignon, 42% Merlot)
Nose - lovely cedar, classic black currant, green pepper, boysenberry, black pepper, blueberry, jujube, vanillin.
Pepper, black currant and cedar, good density, dusty/chalky tannin, touches of blackberry and black olive. Drink '20-'40. 93-94 pts

'08 Monte Bello (SCM) barrel sample
(72% cabernet Sauvignon, 28% Merlot)
Nose - heady purple fruit, mango, black peppercorn, black currant, smoke, bay.
Dark, black currant, black peppercorn, some primary purple, lime zest, dusty tannin. 93 pts

'07 Monte Bello (SCM)
(79% Cabernet Sauvignon, 10% Merlot, 9% Petit Verdot, 2% Cabernet Franc)
Nose - light on its feet, classic, dusty, rich, smooth, Petit Verdot shows. Just so elegant and complex!
Intense black currant, tart, smoke, bay, cedar, tight, PV note, elderberry, redwood, cinnamon, boysenberry, green peppercorn.
I originally put down 95 pts, but Dave and I revisited this later, after everyone else had left. It opened up quit a bit and was much more expressive. The nose was very rich, showing some pungeant elderberry, redwood and mint. Drink '25-'50. 97 pts

'06 Monte Bello (SCM)
(68% Cabernet Sauvignon, 20% Merlot, 10% Petite Verdot, 2% Cabernet Franc)
Nose - smoky, peppery purple fruit, rich, touch of black currant, boysenberry, peach pie and black pepper.
Dusty black currant, very full bodied, smoky, dried herbs, lime, orange zest, touch of PV, cedar. Drink '24-'44. 94+ pts

'05 Monte Bello (SCM)
(70% Cabernet Sauvignon, 22% Merlot, 6% Petit Verdot, 2% Cabernet Franc)
Nose - opened up since last time tasting. Smooth, warm, black currant, mango, touch of cedar, hint of pepper.
Lovely smoky dried herb quality, restrained black currant and blackberry, smooth/dusty tannin, tangerine zest. Really nice! Drink '20-50. 96 pts

'04 Monte Bello (SCM)
(76% Cabernet Sauvignon, 13% Merlot, 8% Petit Verdot, 3% Cabernet Franc)
Nose - lovely rich smooth purple fruit, light dusty complex spices, white pepper, hints of black currant and dried apricot.
Peppery, black currant, boysenberry, cedar, green peppercorn, dried herbs, smoke/graphite, hint of fig. Drink '16-'36. 94 pts

'03 Monte Bello (SCM)
(85% Cabernet Sauvignon, 8% Merlot, 7% Petit Verdot)
Nose - smooth, dark, elderberry, black currant, hint of mint, smoke, date, nutmeg, thyme, pepper, very deep.
Smoky, elderberry, redwood, black currant, dusty, wild cherry, nutmeg, rangpur lime, dried herbs, less ripe blackberry, zesty finish. Drink '22-'34. 93 pts

'96 Monte Bello (SCM)
(80% Cabernet Sauvignon, 11% Merlot, 9% Petit Verdot)
Nose - stinky outhouse, rich savory mushroom, smooth, warm, nice subtle oak spice.
Smooth mushroom and black currant, cinnamon, redwood, touch of cedar, slight hint of bandaid. Drink now-'20. 93 pts

Rhys Vineyards Spring Pick-up Day 3/13/10

2010-03-26T09:08:00.000-07:00

This was a great opportunity for some of us Rhys customers to sample a few future releases. This should be the last pick-up day at their San Carlos warehouse, as they expect to be fully set up in their Skyline cave by the fall pick-up day.

Alesia '08 Pinot Noir Somona Coast
Nose - lots of mineral, brambly boysenberry, tarragon, yerba buena, hints of black cherry, rosemary, subtle oak spice, with an intriguing lightness and freshness.
Lovely dusty spiciness, boysenberry, mandarin, lime, zest, redwood, an underlying touch of mushroom, with some pithy bitterness on the finish. Drink '12+ 91++ pts

Rhys '08 Pinot Noir Family Farm (San Mateo County)
Nose - smooth, floral, rose jam and strawberry, sappy spice, and boysenberry, pure, rich, with persimmon bread.
Dusty, pert, zesty, olallieberry, lemon, bay, sage, nutmeg, rhubarb pie, roasty, porcini. Drink '15-'30 93-95 pts

'08 Pinot Noir Alpine Vineyard (SCM)
Nose - ethereal spice, smooth rich but restrained fruit, purple basil and rosemary, strawberry, raspberry, boysenberry, roasty, smoky, cardamon, with notes of mango and green melon.
Lovely, roasty, grippy, zesty, boysenberry and green melon, sage, nutmeg, balsa, black plum, lime, cinnamon, with a touch of mushroom and fine dusty tannin on the finish. 95+ pts
Note: the '08 includes the Hillside section, which is usually bottled separately.

Rhys '07 Syrah Horseshoe Vineyard (SCM)
Nose - smooth, pure blackberry, banana cream, plum, raspberry, nutmeg, warm, toasty, rich.
Pure boysenberry, lime, smooth/dusty tannin, a background rusticity, graham cracker, jujube, pithy zest, black plum. Drink '13-'20 92+ pts

Ridge Monte Bello Components Tasting 3/7/10

2010-03-25T04:09:00.000-07:00

A favorite event, a bunch of us meet up for this every year. It provides a bit of insight into their blending and selection process. What different lots have to contribute, why some juice doesn't make the cut, etc. After the introductory white, we tried 4 single variety lots, then a blend of what is to be included, so far, in the '09 Monte Bello. It's still early going, so many lots are still developing, and further decisions about blending will be made.

'07 Chardonnay Santa Cruz Mountains
Nose - light on its feet, elegant, spicy, floral, minerally, citrus notes.
Very expressive, a bit heavy on the oak for now, nose follows through, touch of pith. Needs 5 years. 92 pts

'09 Cabernet Franc North Gate Block
Nose - very heady, savory purple fruit, dried herbs, dense charcoal smoke, dusty dried plum note.
Dark dusty boysenberry, very pert, smoky, dried plum, Sprite.

'09 Merlot Avenue Block
Nose - forward sulfite, dark fruit, smoky, dried savory.
Sulfite, char, dusty jujube, plum, touch of zest and pith, hint of mushroom.

'09 Cabernet Sauvignon South Slope La Cuesta
Nose - bright fresh berry, reall nice, quality really shows, subtle spices and herbs, and a warm citron note.
Lovely minerally berry, signature SCM Cab fruit, subtle herb and spice.

'09 Petit Verdot Olivos and La Vassuer Parcels
Nose - reduced, rustic, deep and dark, nice berry.
Dusty, zesty, smoky, thin, shy berry fruit.

'09 Monte Bello
(67% Cabernet Sauvignon, 25% Merlot, 8% Petit Verdot)
Nose - smooth sultry berry and primary purple fruit, nice Draper perfume, smoke and a rustic note. Very nice!
Smooth, good acid, pure berry, very dusty/grippy, rustic purple fruit, intense, smoky, touch of zest. 95+ pts

Then some current releases...

'07 Monte Bello
Nose - intense, cedary, black currant, gorgeous, Draper perfume, dried herbs, smoke, peppercorn.
Lovely, intense, good acid, black currant, smoke, minerals, hint of tobacco. Broadly complex and seamless. Amazing! 97 pts

'07 Geyserville
(58% Zinfandel, 22% Carignane, 18% Petite Sirah, 2% Mataro)
Nose - not showing much
Dense smoky round fruit, boysenberry, plum, orange, floral. Very young. Silky. 93 pts

'07 Lytton Springs
(71% Zinfandel, 22% Petite Sirah, 7% Carignane)
Nose - smoke, berry, peach, vanilla, touch of spice.
Peppery, lush berry, peach pie, smooth/dusty tannin, mandarin and zest. 92+ pts

'06 Zinfandel Old School (Alexander Valley)
(Incl. 15% Carignane, 2% Petite Sirah)
Nose - bright, jammy, blue elderberry, smooth plum, hints of peach and blackberry, Musar-like spice.
Spicy/peppery, boysenberry and elderberry, juicy, pure. 90 pts

'06 Santa Cruz Mountains
(56% Cabernet Sauvignon, 42% Merlot, 2% Petit Verdot)
Nose - green peppercorn, black currant and cedar.
Smoky black currant, zest, berry, dusty/gritty tannin. Drink '15-'25 91 pts

'04 Grenache Lytton Estate
(Incl. 16% Petite Sirah, 9% Zinfandel)
Nose - lovely spicy boysenberry jam, vanilla spice, deeper rustic fruit.
Sweet, dusty, berry, smoke, rhubarb. 91+ pts

After that, we had a picnic. Excellent food and wine with some good friends. Weather turned rather cold, though. I didn't bother with notes on the wines, but I can sum them up...

'75 Monte Bello
Very mature and lovely, seems at the tail end of its peak. Drink soon. 92 pts

'95 Zinfandel Jimsomare
Also very mature, maybe a little past its peak. Had some lovely signature notes, but also a bit odd. I revisited this a few hours later with dinner and the odd notes had blown off. 89 pts

'89 Petite Sirah Paddock Vines
Really in a nice place right now. Full, rustic, brawny, with smoke and tar. 92 pts

'07 Zinfandel Dusi
Overripe and hot. Quickly spit out. About as pleasant as someone bumping into me and stepping on my foot. 75 pts

Richard's notes: http://www.cellartracker.com/event.asp?iEvent=10145
Dave's notes: http://scmwine.blogspot.com/2010/03/2009-ridge-monte-bello-component.html

Big Basin Vineyards Winter Barrel Tasting 2/28/10

2010-03-24T12:27:00.000-07:00

Amit and I took the opportunity to drive over and try a few wines. In addition to the barrel samples, there was a new rose and several fall releases to revisit.

'08 Aura Rose of Syrah (CA)
Nose - strawberry and lemon rind, touch of savory dried herb, smoky and earthy.
Pithy strawberry, a bit meaty, a bit flat with some musty wood. 81 pts

'07 Pinot Noir Bald Mountain (SCM)
Nose - lovely savory, smoky persimmon, deep array of red fruit, good mineral sense.
Lighter body, smoky, savory, rhubarb/cranberry, touches of cherry and persimmon, some pith, an ethereal spiciness. 91+ pts

'07 Syrah SCM/Monterrey
Nose - deep, stemmy spice, blackberry, smoky, hint of patchouli, a bit meaty, dried mango, sandalwood, fermenting mango.
Smoky, minerally, sultry, dried herb, boysenberry, and incense shop/exotic wood. 91 pts

'07 Syrah Fairview Ranch (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - smoky lavender, jujube and black plum.
Perky red and black fruit, lavender, raspberry, jujube and smoke, with good minerality. 92 pts

'06 Syrah Rattlesnake Rock (SCM)
Nose - deep, dark minerality, shy roasty black fruit.
Smooth, dark smoky fruit, graphite, meat, dusty tannin, subtle smooth char. 93+ pts

'09 Pinot Noir Lester Vyd. (SCM) barrel sample
(Formerly known as Deer Park Vyd.)
Nose - smoky, longan fruit, exotic wood, touches of blackberry and apricot.
Exotic Asian wood spices, boysenberry, smoke, longan fruit, chalky tannin. 91 pts.

'09 Pinot Noir Alfaro Vyd. (SCM) barrel sample
Nose - dense purple fruit and smoke, jujube, sandalwood.
Exotic dark fruit, citron marmalade, dusty tannin, smoky/roasty, touch of lavender, jujube, raspberry, plum. 93 pts

'08 Syrah Coastview Vyd. (Monterey County) barrel sample
Nose - fresh smoky black plum and boysenberry, touch of oak spice.
Sweet, biting, plum, cassis, tangello,juicy and grippy. 91 pts

I should note that while Amit pretty much agreed with me on the other wines, his stand out favorite was the Lester Pinot.

Big Basin will be pouring at Pinot Paradise this weekend (3/28). http://www.scmwa.com/PinotParadise.htm Also, I highly recommend stopping by their Spring Open House Apr. 3-4 http://bigbasinvineyards.com/news_events.html

Monte Bello Half Bottle Showcase 2/5/10

2010-02-06T18:30:00.000-08:00

This was a First Friday event up at the winery, for ATP members. The public version is next weekend, 2/13-14.

We started off with another bottle of...

'92 Chardonnay Santa Cruz Mountains
Nose - brighter, more youthful. Lemon, lemon verbena, good minerality, vibrant, hazelnut and other mature notes.
Creamy, nutty, sweetish Varner-like fruit character, nice spicy oak, nutmeg, nice round citrus, hint of mandarin rind on the finish. 92 pts

The headliners...

'87 Monte Bello (SCM)
(Includes 5% Merlot, 3% Cabernet Franc. 11.7% alc.)
Nose - warm spicy cigar box and rich dark fruit, lovely peppery tobacco.
Lighter body with intense tobacco and black currant, smoky, good minerality, dusty tannin, blackberry. 92 pts

'88 Monte Bello (SCM)
(Includes 3% Merlot, 2% Petit Verdot. 12.9% alc.)
Nose - smooth full purple fruit, kind of rustic, creamy, cardamon, smoke, dried herbs.
Sweetish tart boysenberry, smoke, blackberry, blue elderberry, plum, black currant, dusty/woody tannin. Comes together a bit odd in a way - tart, round youthful fruit, light body - that more time may help. 88+ pts

'93 Monte Bello (SCM)
(Includes 7% Merlot, 7% Petit Verdot. 12.5% alc.)
Nose - minty lamb, smooth, intense, shy and youthful blackberry and black currant, eucalyptus, pineapple sage.
Lanolin, blackberry and black currant, smoky and tart, dusty and slightly grippy tannin, blue elderberry, dried sage. Very youthful. Funky jujube note and a touch of cedar. Should peak in about 15 years. 92 pts

Then we tried the latest ATP release...

'04 Syrah Lytton Estate (Dry Creek Valley)
(Includes 10% Viognier, % Grenache. 14.4% alc.)
Nose - Wow! Heady, intense, youthful, smoky Syrah fruit. Dusty sandalwood, black pepper, various floral notes, very dense with savory oak that reminds me of Harrington Wines.
Dense blackberry, savory Harrington-like oak, dark, rich, jujube, floral and peach notes, leathery/chalky tannin. Drink '15-'25. 91+ pts

Funny when an aspect of a wine reminds me so specifically of a particular producer. Of course part of what I get in Varner Chards is a regional character - and Ridge has been around longer - but I've had plenty of Ridge Chards and never gotten that match before. The Syrah is 100% American oak, 25% new and the rest 2-7 years. Harrington is French oak. Maybe the answer is in specific yeasts, and how the characters they imparted interacted with other notes in the wines..?

'84 Cabernet Blind Tasting 2/4/10

2010-02-06T00:42:00.000-08:00

This was a RossBott tasting. 16 people, 8 wines. We tasted blind and individually ranked them. The rankings are compiled and tallied, yielding a group score, ranking and a spread. The score is 1 point for each 1st place vote, 2 for 2nd and so on down to 8 for 8th, so the lower the score the better. The spread shows the number of votes for the following rankings: 1st/2nd/3rd/last.

A) Nose - white floral note with a smooth moderate tobacco and black currant character. Hint of cherry and oak spice. With time some limoncello and kirsh.
lemon/black plum/black currant, watery-refreshing, cedar. Soft mid-palate, peppery on the fringe. A bit of bitter black olive on the finish. 87 pts
My #7, group #4 1/4/2/3 (74)
'84 Ridge York Creek (Spring Mountain District)

B) Nose - a bit of volatile resin character, dusty wood, cherry, sweetish.
Pert cedar/tobacco, smooth plum with some black currant. A touch of lime zest on the finish. 87 pts
My #8, group #5 2/3/0/6 (75)
'84 Rodney Strong Alexander Crown Vineyard (Alexander Valley)
It's interesting that all six of us at our table voted it #8, and that we got the first pours.

C) Nose - sweetish, brett - horse stable, tobacco, black plum, lead pencil, green olive.
Smooth peppery black currant, a touch of barnyard, watery, lemon, black olive, lime zest, touch of barrel char. 88 pts
My #6, group #8 0/1/2/0 (79)
'84 Château Pichon Longueville Comtesse de Lalande (Pauillac)

D) Nose - sweet redwood and cedar, cinnamon, red plum, vanilla oak.
Cedary Black currant, good acid and mineral, nicely integrated, redwood, plummy spice. 92 pts
My #4, group #3 4/0/2/1 (66)
'84 Swan Estate (Northern Sonoma)

E) Nose - cassis liqueur, smooth, shy, hint of white pepper.
Smooth intense mature plum, with tobacco, redwood, zest, cedar, black currant. 93 pts
My #2, group #2 3/2/3/1 (59)
'84 Girard Reserve (Napa Valley)

F) Nose - farty tobacco and pencil lead, intense minerality.
Prominent outhouse, lighter body with black plum and black currant, dried herbs. 92 pts
My #3, group #7 0/3/3/3 (78)
'84 Ridge Santa Cruz Mountains

G) Nose - sweet, peppery, dark, soft black plum, touch of white resin, black olive, barrel char.
Smooth/cedar/tobacco/black currant, charcoal, green peppercorn. 91 pts
My #5, group #6 2/0/3/2 (78)
'84 Mount Eden Estate (SCM)

H) Nose - bright, tobacco, dark minerality, graphite, sweet French oak, dried basil.
Tobacco, black currant, cedar. Classic. Touch of green peppercorn, good minerality, intense. Seems a decade younger. 94 pts
My #1, group #1 4/3/1/0 (58)
'84 Ridge Monte Bello (SCM)

A very enjoyable tasting and I'd be happy drinking any of the wines again.

Richard's notes: http://www.cellartracker.com/event.asp?iEvent=9852

SCMWA San Francisco Trade Tasting 1/26/10

2010-01-27T03:32:00.000-08:00

Dave Tong and I went up together. With just 3 hours for 27 wineries and over 100 wines, it's just not possible to try them all. Luckily, several were wineries I'd just tasted at at the last Passport weekend. Others were easy to skip as I'll be visiting soon or they'll be at Pinot Paradise. Still, there were several on my short list I couldn't get to in time. Good thing Dave tasted a bunch I missed and vise versa. Check out his notes: http://scmwine.blogspot.com/2010/01/scmwa-trade-tasting.html

Martin Ranch JD Hurley '08 Chardonnay (SCV)
Nose - warm, round, kumquat and spice, really nice.
Citrusy with excellent spice, kumquat, papaya, lime, lemon. 91 pts

Martin Ranch JD Hurley '06 Merlot (SCV)
Nose - warm, smooth, cedary plum.
Cedary plum, exotic spice notes, a bit roasty/smoky, hints of tobacco, white pepper and green peppercorn. Ready. 89 pts

Martin Ranch JD Hurley '05 Cabernet Sauvignon (SCM)
Nose - soft, creamy berry and plum, cedar, hint of mint.
Tobacco/cedar/pepper, dusty tannin, plum with a hint of raspberry. Smooth, with a bit of pith on the finish. 89 pts

Martin Ranch Therese Vineyard '06 Syrah (SCV)
Nose - savory, lovely stemmy spice, soft plum and berry.
Savory, thin plum, clove, bramble, roasty zest. Drink '11-'14. 90 pts

Martin Ranch Therese Vineyard '05 Cabernet Sauvignon Estate (SCM)
Nose - smooth, minty cedar, plum and chocolate.
Blackberry, cedar, touch of black currant, plum, drying dusty tannin. Drink '12-'17. 90 pts

Martin Ranch Therese Vineyard '06 Sangiovese (SCV)
Nose - sultry/soft/savory/smoky, shy red fruit, nutmeg, citron.
Soft rustic plum, roasty, sweetish, tea, fresh herbs, hint of raspberry, gritty dusty tannins. 89 pts

Martin Ranch Therese Vineyard '07 Zinfandel (Amador County)
Nose - black cherry, marachino, nutmeg, zesty, sweetish.
Sweetish, nutmeg, black cherry, raspberry, smooth roasted plum, smoky. 89 pts

La Honda '06 Cabernet Sauvignon 57%/Sangiovese 43% (SCM)
Nose - smooth, light, warm spice, shy red fruit, hints of black currant, mint, roasted plum.
Thin red plum, then a wave of black currant and cedar, balsa and lime. 86 pts

La Honda '06 Cabernet Sauvignon (Chalk Hill)
Nose - smooth, shy black fruit, nice oak spice with a touch of cedar, mint, blue elderberry.
Dusty, roasty, citron, plum, black raspberry, cedar, lime zest. 88 pts

La Honda '06 Meritage (Chalk Hill)
(Cabernet Sauvignon 76%, Malbec 14 %, Cabernet Franc 10%)
Nose - smooth plum with touches of cedar, black currant and mint.
Roasty plum and black currant, cedar, lime and mandarin, some char and zest. Smooth cedary finish. Should age well. Drink '10-'20. 90 pts

La Honda '06 Cabernet Sauvignon Lonehawk Vineyard (SCM)
Nose - sandalwood, black currant, orange zest, cedar, allspice, black cherry.
Cedary smooth dusty black currant, nutmeg and white pepper, black plum, lime zest, firm structure. Drink '12-'22. 92 pts

La Honda '07 Pinot Noir (SCM)
Nose - savory, dusty, black cherry, mushroom, bay, roasted plum, meyer lemon zest.
Rustic/roasty/zesty/savory/dusty, a bit tight, black cherry, bay, mushroom, lime zest, dusty wood, cedar. Needs time. Drink '12-'20. 91+ pts

Mount Eden '07 Pinot Noir Estate (SCM)
Nose - smooth red and black plum, medley of dried herbs, round, savory, black cherry, sandalwood. Sultry and gorgeous!
Amazing, just so much going on. Savory roasty, bay, red cherry, black plum, lovely smoke, citrus medley. Very enjoyable now, but will improve a lot. Drink '16-'33 96 pts

Mount Eden '06 Cabernet Sauvignon Estate (SCM)
Nose - black currant, mint, thick savory fruit.
Minty cedar, black currant, really nice SCM character, touch of black pepper and campfire. Drink '15-30. 94 pts

Kathryn Kennedy '01 Cabernet Sauvignon Estate (SCM)
Nose - silky smooth, red plum and cedar, black currant, hint of tobacco. Classic expression.
Round, peppery feel. Plum and white pepper, black currant, roasted plum, tangello, cigar, black raspberry. Drink '10-'20. 90 pts

Kathryn Kennedy '05 Cabernet Sauvignon Estate (SCM)
Nose - white flowers, red plum, smooth, slightest hints of cedar and black currant.
Smooth plum withcedar and mint, black currant. Peppery finish. Drink '12-'22. 90 pts

Kathryn Kennedy '06 Cabernet Sauvignon Small Lot (SCM)
Nose - smooth peppery plum, chamomile, mint.
Gorgeous pert/smoky/cedary plum, black currant, lime zest, mint, tarragon, nutmeg. Drink '11-'26. 92 pts

Fleming Jenkins '06 Syrah Black Ridge Vineyard (SCM)
Nose - velvety black plum, with mere hints of smoke, mint, rosemary, zest and vanilla.
Velvety pert red plum, green basil, tarragon, lime zest, smoky black plum. 89+ pts

Fleming Jenkins '06 Syrah Madden Ranch (Livermore Valley)
Nose - savory, stemmy spice, nutmeg/plum/boysenberry, soft mint.
Soft mint/plum/lime zest, hints of white and black pepper. 88 pts

Fleming Jenkins '06 Choreography (Napa Valley)
Nose - pomegranate/black plum, smooth mint, nutmeg.
Raspberry and black plum, nutmeg, orange and lemon zest, sandalwood and orange. 88 pts

Bargetto '07 Chardonnay (SCM) $20!
(100% Regan Vineyard, primarily Mount Eden clone)
Nose - rich spicy pear, nutmeg, quince, cinnamon, hints of stone fruit. Good minerality. Really nice.
Nice spice medley and pure pear, poached pear with cinnamon and a touch of lime. 93 pts

Bargetto '07 Pinot Noir Regan Vineyard Reserve (SCM)
Nose - gorgeous sultry stemmy resin spice well integrated into the red fruit, with just the slightest hint of bay.
Nose translates well to the palate. Silky smooth. Cranberry/red plum, bay, lime. Very complex. 93 pts

Bargetto '06 Merlot (SCM)
(100% Regan Vyd.)
Nose - lovely green peppercorn, classic Merlot fruit.
Green peppercorn, cherry/Merlot, chlorophyll, grippy dusty tannin, hints of lime zest and char. Drink '13-'16. 88 pts

Bargetto '04 La Vita (SCM)
(100% Regan Vyd. 59% Dolcetto, 24% Refosco, 17% Nebbiolo)
Nose - smooth pert fruit, cinnamon, cherry soup, mint, oak vanillin.
Dry dusty prune, ashy, astringent, lime zest, plum. 85 pts

Storrs '08 Chardonnay (SCM)
Nose - smooth nutmeg spice and intense pear, with quince and tangello.
Spicy cinnamon pear, smooth, round, with a slight peppery feel, pure ripe pear. 91 pts

Storrs '06 Pinot Noir (SCM)
Nose - soft raspberry/plum, with good stemmy spice.
Slightly glyceriny red fruit, with peppery/stemmy spice. 89+ pts

Storrs '06 Two Creek (SCV)
(Syrah 60%, Grenache 22%, Grand Noir 18%)
Nose - smooth mint.
Minty fennel, rosemary, red fruit, cinnamon. 87 pts

Storrs '05 Petite Sirah (SCM)
Nose - funky, brambly, smoky, with a good mineral sense.
Balsa/sandalwood, dense black fruit, charcoal, lime zest. 84 pts

Ridge Vineyards Club Preview Event 1/23/10

2010-01-25T17:29:00.000-08:00

Amit and I went up, and were soon joined by Dave Tong (see his blog entry on this event). This event was to show off examples of their 3 clubs, ATP, Z-list and Monte Bello Collector. ATP (Advanced Tasting Program) is limited production wines that are difficult to get your paws on if you aren't a member (about 9 wines a year). Z-list is two annual shipments of their larger production Zinfandels (ie. Geyserville, Lytton Springs, Pagani, etc.). The Monte Bello club gets you an invitation to the futures tastings and enables you to then buy at the futures price.

We opened with a couple Chards.

'07 Chardonnay Santa Cruz Mountains
Nose - warm oak spice and lemon verbena, good citrus undertone and minerality, smooth, elegant, complex.
Sweet oak, smooth lemon, basil, zingy, zesty, an enveloped note of pith, oak spice and fresh herbs. Needs time for the oak to integrate. Drink '15-'20. 92 pts

'92 Chardonnay Santa Cruz Mountains
Nose - very mature, smooth, hazelnut, cardamon, subtle lemon curd, tarragon.
Hazelnut, savory lemon, smooth zest, cardamon and nutmeg, tarragon. Excellent mature Chard. Drink now. 92 pts

Then a couple from the Z-list

'07 Zinfandel East Bench (Dry Creek Valley)
(8% Petite Sirah)
Nose - youthful dark, brambly fruit, heavy almost tar-like sense. Opens up with nutmeg and smooth purple fruit.
Dark, very plummy, spicy/peppery, slight touch of heat, dusty gritty tannin, some primary Cab-like notes. Drink '13-'18. 91 pts

'07 Zinfandel Pagani (Sonoma Valley)
(5% Alicante Bouschet, 3% Petite Sirah)
Nose - shy purple fruit, campfire smoke, dusty.
Pert, brambly purple fruit, smooth boysenberry, mandarin, blackberry and jujube, dusty tannin. Drink '12-'16. 90 pts

Some ATP wines

'07 Carignane Buchignani Ranch (Sonoma County)
Nose - smooth dusty fruit, a bit shy, blackberry.
Smoky, pert, sultry, blackberry, raspberry, tarragon, dusty tannin, hops. Zesty finish with blackberry and lemon cream chocolate truffle. Drink '10-'16. 91 pts

'04 Grenache Lytton Estate (Dry Creek Valley)
(16% Petite Sirah, 9% Zinfandel)
Nose - deep smoky mineral, smooth American oak, black fruit.
Rustic, roasty/smoky plum, gritty tannin, orange zest, bramble, a bit astringent. Drink '14-'18. 88 pts

Then, drum roll please...

'06 Monte Bello (Santa Cruz Mountains)
(68% Cabernet Sauvignon, 20% Merlot, 10% Petit Verdot, 2% Cabernet Franc)
Nose - sweet heady spiced blackberry, touches of cinnamon and raspberry jam, sandalwood.
Bursting zesty/smoky/savory/minerally blackberry, dusty tannin, good acid, some cedar and black currant, touch of lemon zest. Drink '20-'30+ 94 pts

After tasting, we sampled the impressive goods from Fatted Calf Charcuterie, and tested how well they interplayed with some of the wines. Impressive stuff! They are based in Napa and can also be sampled at the Saturday farmers market at the Ferry Building in SF.

Winter Passport Day 1/16/10

2010-01-21T00:59:00.000-08:00

Richard, Ginny, Sandy and I went over to the Surf City Vintners neighborhood to do some tasting. It's nice to have so many wineries grouped together. There are some other businesses in there, including Bonny Doon's excellent restaurant, where we lunched, and a bakery, where we took a coffee break.

Odonta '08 Chardonnay Peter Martin Ray Vineyard (SCM)
Nose - deep, rich, complex, integrated, spiced persimmon.
Zingy, zesty, persimmon, lemon, nutmeg. Tight. So complex and lovely. Moderate oak. Needs time. Drink '12-'15 91 pts

Odonta '08 Grenache (Alta Mesa)
Nose - lovely, white spiciness, persimmon bread, candied lemon zest.
Lovely spice, strawberry freezer jam, lime zest, smoky, savory. 93 pts

Ondonta '07 Malbec St. Olof Vyd. (North Coast)
Nose - really nice high toned spices, dark plum, raspberry.
Pert, rhubarb pie, raspberry, lime, full spice, thinner fruit, plum. 88 pts

Odonta '07 Durif (McDowell Valley)
Nose - dark plum, spicy oak, nice.
Tobacco, ashy, Lemon zest, black currant. 90 pts

SCMV '06 Pinot Noir Branciforte Creek (SCM)
Nose - warm, slightly rustic, plum, cranberry.
Tart, bay, dusty/peppery tannin, savory, mature seeming fruit. 91 pts

Quinta Cruz '07 Tempanillo Pierce Ranch (Monterey County)
Nose - boysenberry, lemon curd, sandalwood.
Tart, excellent French oak spice, touch of tobacco, plum, blackberry. 91+ pts

SCMV '07 Grenache (McDowell Valley)
Nose - smooth, spiced plum, mango curd, white pepper, French oak spice.
Lovely tobacco, pepper, plum, French oak spice, mango curd, fig. 92 pts

SCMV '06 Cabernet Sauvignon Luchessi Vyd. (SCM)
Nose - moderate barnyard and tobacco, black currant.
Funky black currant, dusty wood, some zing. Tobacco on the finish. 88 pts

SCMV '06 Syrah Fairview Ranch (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - lovely, smooth, creamy, white pepper, boysenberry.
White pepper, red peppercorn, plum, mandarin zest, smoky, savoy, bay. 90 pts

Quinta Cruz '07 Graciano Bokisch Vyd. (Lodi)
Nose - nice raisin, plum, touch of vanillin, very full.
Spiced plum with a touch of raisin and dried plum, pepper. 89 pts

Quinta Cruz '05 Rabelo Pierce Ranch (Monterey County)
Nose - sultry spiced plum/raisin/dried cranberry/marachino.
Sweet clove and nutmeg, marachino, black plum, raisin, cinnamon, peppery spice. 92 pts

Sones '08 Cancion del Mar (California)
Blend of Viognier, Torrontes, Pinot gris, Sauvignon Blanc
Nose - lovely lemon, white peach.
Underripe peach, some pith, hint of mandarin. 87 pts

Sones '08 Zinfandel Wiedeman Vyd. (SCV) barrel sample
Nose - raspberry/jujube/raisin
Sweetish, some heat, marachino, plum, zest, dark tannin. 84 pts

Vino Tabi '06 Chardonnay Silver Mountain Vyd. (SCM)
Nose - shy lemon, black sevillano olive, dried mango, touch of that SCM signature.
Pithy, underripe peach, touch of resin/solvent, musty oak, green mango. 83 pts

Vino Tabi '07 Syrah (Central Coast)
Nose - warm, smooth, sandalwood, spicy dense dark fruit, vanillin.
Spicy tobacco, dark fruit, charcoal filtered black plum. 86 pts

Bonny Doon '07 Cinsault DEWN (San Joaquin County)
The Cinsault is from a 125 year old Vineyard in San Joaquin. There's also 15% Pinot Noir from Monterey County
Nose - smooth, shy, hint of tobacco, blackberry, pithy tangerine.
Tobacco, red currant, black plum, blackberry, touch of rhubarb. No structure. 86 pts

Silver Mountain '06 Pinot Noir Miller Hill (SCM)
Nose - shy peppery tobacco, vanilla custard, intense mineral, sweetish oak, hint of berry.
Intense, tart, smoky, berry, dried herb, bitter stemminess. 87 pts

Silver Mountain '06 Pinot Noir Muns Vyd. (SCM)
Nose - sweet flat oak spice, shy berry.
Simple berry, bitter tobacco, peppery feel, dried herb, touch of green, lemon and lime zest. 85 pts

Silver Mountain '06 Pinot Noir Estate (SCM)
Nose - ripe, sweet, boysenberry, marachino.
Sweet, touch of heat, disjointed berry fruit, orange fruit and zest, bitter finish. 80 pts

Silver Mountain '05 Syrah Weideman Vyd. (Central Coast)
Nose - sweet tobacco, savory, some dried herbs, spicy plum.
Sweetish, disjointed, some prune and herb, bitter char, berry. 81 pts

Silver Mountain '05 Cabernet Sauvignon Weideman Vyd. (SCV)
Nose - plummy/pruney, sweet.
Sweet red currant, tobacco, touch of black currant, lemon zest, dusty tannin, a bit savory. 87 pts

Hillcrest Terrace '07 Sauvignon Blanc Cedar Lane Vyd. (Arroyo Seco)
Nose - lemon, zest, grass, sweet pea.
Sharp acidity, bright lemon zest, pea, grapefruit, some minerality. 87 pts
Too acidic for some - needs food.

Hillcrest Terrace '08 Chardonnay (SCM) - Corralitos fruit
Nose - nice warm oak spice, savory, smoky, citron.
Oaky, flat, savory, citron. 86 pts

Hillcrest Terrace '08 Chardonnay Regan Vyd. (SCM)
Mount Eden Clone. Recently bottled.
Nose - smoky, pear, vanilla cream.
Spicy oak, lemon custard, savory, bay, meyer lemon. 89 pts

Hillcrest Terrace '08 Pinot Noir Regan Vyd. (SCM)
Nose - clean, fresh, pure berry fruit, excellent spice, savory smoke, dried herbs.
Zesty primary fruit, some char and green peppercorn, peppery mouthfeel, savory, pithy. Definitely needs time. 86++ pts
Has potential to dramatically improve.

Hillcrest Terrace '07 Pinot Noir (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - savory, leathery, dark smoky berry, tobacco, very nice.
Leathery feel, horsey leather, tobacco, dark berries, dried herbs, sage, hint of zest and roasted plum. 89 pts (if you don't mind brett)

Hillcrest Terrace '07 Cabernet Sauvignon (Carmel Valley)
Nose - pure blackberry and black currant, touch of tobacco.
Firm black currant, lime, peppery tobacco, dusty tannin. Needs 2 years. 89-91 pts

Equinox NV "Harmony Cuvee" (SCM)
71% Chardonnay, 29% Pinot Noir
Nose - savory, dark toast, brett?
Fine bead, dark toast, brett, touch of lemon. 86 pts

Trout Gulch '07 Chardonnay "Le Pecherie" (SCM)
Nose - citron marmalade, smoke, dried mango.
Smooth citron, zest, meaty, touch of apricot. 88 pts

Trout Gulch '07 Pinot Noir "La Source" (SCM)
Served too cold!
Nose - savory, dried basil, rhubarb and blackberry.
Blackberry, dried basil, fennel, cranberry and rhubarb, tangerine zest, peppery tannin. 88 pts

Trout Gulch '07 "Les Trianon" (SCM) Bdx blend
Nose - intense black currant, tobacco, hint of cedar, SCM signature note.
Tobacco, barrel char, black currant, dusty tannin, lighter body. 87+ pts

Bartolo '07 "Minerva" (SCV)
47% Grenache, 33% Syrah, 20% Mourvedre. Mann Vyd.
Nose - full, light oak resin, raspberry, blackberry.
green pean and blackberry, spicy oak, touch of jujube. 86 pts

Bartolo "Cioppino Rosso" (Central Coast)
61% Syrah, 20% Chardonnay, 19% Mourvedre. Mann Vyd.
Nose - pure boysenberry, with raspberry and a touch of zest and smoke.
Raspberry, lemon zest, jujube, touch of tobacco. 87 pts

Bartolo '06 Syrah (Central Coast) Mann Vyd.
Nose - black currant, plum, cedar.
Cedary boysenberry, blackberry, black currant, dusty tannin, vanilla, orange zest. 89 pts

Bartolo '06 Merlot (SCV) Mann Vyd.
Nose - Cedar, black plum, touch of black currant and tobacco.
Tobacco, black plum, peppery, cedar and black currant, lime zest, mandarin, dusty tannin with smooth fruit. Nice. 90 pts

Copious Winery '07 Mourvedre (Sierra Foothills)
Nose - warm, meaty, dried sage, summer savory.
Meaty, dark Mourvedre fruit, sweet jujube, raspberry, char, somewhat rustic. 87 pts

Copious Winery '07 Cabernet Sauvignon (Sierra Foothills)
Nose - creamy smooth fruit, raspberry, candied zest, black plum, black currant.
Clean raspberry and black currant, limeade, dusty tannin. 89 pts

Copious Winery '07 Petite Sirah (Sierra Foothills)
Nose - dark, restrained purple fruit.
Primary dark purple fruit, char, smoke, mandarin zest, firm tannin - very grippy. Needs a few years. 87+ pts

Mount Eden article by Matt Kramer

2010-01-16T23:00:00.000-08:00

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704586504574654552094029972.html?mod=wsj_share_facebook

Arcadian Tasting With Joe Davis 12/19/09

2010-01-05T03:46:00.000-08:00

Thanks to Paul Galli for organizing this and inviting me, Barry Sunderland for hosting, and Joe Davis for so generously sharing his wines and knowledge.

Arcadian '98 Pinot Noir Sleepy Hollow Vineyard (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - Wow! Lovely fruit, smoky with dried herbs, cherry, spicy stemminess, bay. With time some smoked meat - beef jerky.
Savory/meaty, biting tannin, zesty, smoky, cherry and rhubarb. A step down from the nose. 89 pts

Arcadian '01 Pinot Noir Sleepy Hollow Vineyard (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - more creamy, white floral notes, foresty, good stemmy spice, black plum.
Smooth, smoky plum, zesty rhubarb, dried herbs, good savoriness, lemon verbena. Zingy citrus oil and plum finish. Still young. 92 pts

Arcadian '02 Pinot Noir Sleepy Hollow Vineyard (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - wood spice, black plum, hint of citrus, smooth.
Dried herbs, black plum, lemon zest, cardamon, pith, tingly, touch of bitter spicy stem. Still a bit tight. 91 pts

Arcadian '05 Pinot Noir Sleepy Hollow Vineyard (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - sweetish red fruit, black plum, creamy, nutmeg, sandalwood, smoky.
Somewhat primary, round, rich, dusty tannin, smoky roasted rhubarb and plum. 92 pts
Joe suggested a 12 hour decant.

Note: There's something I find a bit off-putting about Garys', and I've had many. This vineyard has big fans, so take my personal tastes with a grain of salt. These wines were well made. I just can't bring myself to overrule my palate.

Arcadian '00 Pinot Noir Garys' Vineyard (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - warm dark spiciness, Gary's signature, light oak spice, smoky roasty plum and jujube, lighter tone.
Very dark, almost charry, grippy, spicy stemminess with a hint of green, tart cherry, smoke. The best Garys' Pinot I've had. 89 pts

Arcadian '01 Pinot Noir Garys' Vineyard (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - high-toned spice, candied lemon zest, woody spice, rhubarb and strawberry.
Very smoky, a touch of bitterness, tart cherry, dusty, rustic, glyceriny plum. 86 pts

Arcadian '01 Pinot Noir Pisoni Vineyard (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - dark, rustic, tight, purple fruit, fennel, cardamon, nutmeg.
Farty, smoky, rustic purple fruit, some char and lime zest. 87 pts

Arcadian '05 Pinot Noir Fiddlestix Vineyard (Santa Rita Hills)
Nose - very shy purple fruit, warm, touch of licorice.
Pert, smoky, intense complex fruit, plus char and lime, very floral, chervil. Very young! 92 pts

Arcadian '05 Pinot Noir Pisoni Vineyard (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - funky, bright, smoky purple fruit, dense.
Smoky, rustic, dark, jujube, lime zest. 91 pts

Arcadian '05 Pinot Noir Clos Pepe (Santa Rita Hills)
Nose - sweetish clove, black cherry, touch of marachino, sandalwood.
Intense tart charry lime zest, cherry, black plum, lovely floral note on the finish. 92 pts

Arcadian '05 Pinot Noir "Francesca's Cuvee" (Central Coast)
Nose - Rich, clean, spicy stemminess, smooth, black plum and black pepper.
Smoky jujube, smooth, dense, subtle complexity. Drinking well now, but should age deceptively well. 91 pts

Arcadian '05 Pinot Noir Dierberg Vineyard (Santa Maria Valley)
Nose - perfume, bell pepper, violet, dry dusty purple fruit.
Lovely florality, deep dark fruit. Really nice. 93 pts

Then, Ray Walker threw this in:

Truchot '00 Morey St. Denis 1st Cru Clos Sorbes
Nose - lovely, subtle, integrated nutmeg and red fruit.
Bacon, strawberry, smoke, some cherry. Just really nice and drinking perfectly. 93 pts

Arcadian '99 Chardonnay Sleepy Hollow Vineyard (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - Wow! Cinnamon, brown sugar, almond, nutmeg, maple, lemon balm, sandalwood. Just so complex!
Pert lush lemon, almond, tarragon, basil, lemon grass. At its peak. 93 pts

Arcadian '01 Chardonnay Sleepy Hollow Vineyard (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - kiwi, exotic spice, lemon verbena, sandalwood, luscious expression.
Sweet vanilla oak, fresh herbs, lemon, French oak spice, firm. 92 pts

Arcadian '05 Chardonnay Sleepy Hollow Vineyard (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - warm, nutmeg, lemon meringue, lemon verbena.
Intense, complex, lush, pert, lemon verbena, touch of caramel. 93 pts
The two previous bottles I had of this showed much more and were really impressive. As in 97 pts and the best CA Chard I've had. Some air would probably have brought out more, and that may be true for some of the other wines, too.

Arcadian '06 Chardonnay Sleepy Hollow Vineyard (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - sharper lemon, excellent fresh herbs, brown spice, warm.
Smooth, lush, brown woody oak, lemon, fresh herbs. Well structured. Hope this integrates. Drink '13-'18 Can't score

Joe is truly a master with Chardonnay. It occurred to me that Corralitos Pinot Noir would be perfectly suited to his style.

One interesting point is that Joe personally manages his blocks of all the vineyards he sources from.

Loose SCM Themed Dinner 12/12/09

2009-12-31T21:45:00.000-08:00

A wine discussion board member recently moved to town, and he and his wife hosted a dinner to meet some of us locals. They served an excellent multi-course Italian dinner. The original wine theme was Chards and Pinots from Burgundy and California. We decided to put an emphasis on our local wines, to give our hosts a taste of what's produced nearby.

The first three wines were served with appetizers. I opted against note taking, as we were up mingling, but all were excellent.

· NV Prosecco di Conegliano, Valdobbiadene, Il Sogno di Annibole

· 1990 Mount Eden Vineyards Chardonnay, “Estate”, Santa Cruz Mountains

· 2002 Puligny-Montrachet 1er Cru, “Les Perrières”, Louis Carillon

Our organizer kept secret who was bringing what wines. I knew what I brought, and had some ideas what else might be there, but didn't know how many of what type of wine would be opened.

White blind flight

A) Nose - smooth, white flower, sandalwood spice
Smooth, sweet oak, vanilla/lemon creme. Ridge?

Ridge '05 Chardonnay SCM

B) Nose - sulfury, tighter, cool mint
Wood spice, lemon, mint, exotic.

Rhys '04 Chardonnay SCM

C) Nose - resiny, lemon, exotic spice
Varnishy, oxidized.

Rochioli '01 Chardonnay "South River Vyd." (Russian River Valley)

D) Nose - savory spice.
Smooth, lovely, mellow, well integrated, lemon curd. This is the '96.

Ridge '96 Chardonnay SCM
Hands down favorite. (I brought.)

Red Blind Flight 1

A) Nose - very mature, darker Mount Eden-like fruit, dusty pruney note.
Dark, dusty tannin, smooth, plum, golden raisin.
Thinking '70s or weaker '80s Mount Eden.

Chalone '79 Pinot Noir (Chalone)

B) Nose - very mature, sandalwood, lighter expression.
Dark, intense, firm, zesty, dusty, tea, mineral, touch of bitterness.

Arthur Barolet et Fils '79 Clos de la Roche

Red Blind Flight 2

A) Vine Hill minerality, cherry, kirsh liqueur.
Dried herbs, cherry, with dark, dusty tannins. '91 pts

Santa Cruz Mountain Vineyards '88 Pinot Noir Jarvis Vyd. (SCM)
Yes, that's Vine Hill. (I brought.)

B) Nose - heavy, dried herbs, sage, basil.
Dark, tart, zesty, smoky, dried sage, iodine. 90 pts

Mount Eden '90 Pinot Noir Estate (SCM)

C) Nose - dark, earthy, hint of lemon.
Dark with a bit of barnyard, black plum/black cherry, a bit drying, iodine. Better with food. 88 pts

Santa Cruz Mountain Vineyards '91 Pinot Noir Jarvis Vyd. (SCM)

D) Nose - rich fudge, marachino.
Hot pruny marachino, chocolate. 82 pts

Mount Eden '94 Pinot Noir Estate (SCM)

Red Blind Flight 3

A) Nose - young, intense, savory, touch of resin.
Intense, voluptuous, whole cluster resin stemminess, sweet rhubarb and strawberry. 89 pts

Marcassin '03 Pinot Noir "Bondi Home Ranch (Sonoma Coast)

B) Nose - shy, smooth, spicy, needs to open up.
With time: Younger, very ripe, rich, hot-ish.
Very young, sweetish, char, hint of jujube, primary. 88 pts

Radio-Coteau '04 “Alberigi” (Russian River Valley)

C) Nose - a bit of soy/molasses, heavy.
Savory, sickly, soy/molasses, sweet. 78 pts

Martinelli '02 Pinot Noir "Bondi Home Ranch - Water Trough Vineyard" (Green Valley)

D) Corked

Radio-Coteau "Savoy" (Anderson Valley)

The rest were served blind, but in a less structured manner:

Mount Eden '06 Chardonnay Estate (SCM)
Nose - Intense, lemon, spicy, tropical, well structured.
Fresh herbs, lemon verbena, nutmeg, cardamon, lovely creamy spicy lemon curd, touch of purple basil. 94 pts

Windy Oaks '06 Pinot Noir "Proprietor's Reserve" (SCM)
Nose - smooth, lovely, rich rhubarb, dark mineral, cherry, forest floor, sage.
Bay, sage, rustic roasted fruit, lots of rhubarb, peppery feel, intense, structured to age. 94 pts

Château Loupiac-Gaudiet '83 Loupiac
Nose - balsa, sherried.
Orange/lemon marmalade, sandalwood, sherry note. 86 pts
Some people really loved this.

Kosta Brown '04 Syrah "Amber Ridge" (Russian River Valley)
Nose - smooth, woody, pruney.
Burning hot, peppery, bitter, hint of black fruit, gritty bitter tannin. 65 pts
Another example of age taking away the facade from over-ripe crap.

Salamandre Wine Cellars '03 Primitivo Late Harvest (Monterey County)
Nose - pruney, raisin, red fruit, kirsh.
Raisins, spicy, a bit hot, white pepper, nutmeg. 88 pts

Lillian '06 Syrah "White Hawk Vineyard" (Santa Barbara County)
Nose - warm, spicy, stemmy, dried herb, full fruit.
Intense, woody, stemmy, dense fruit, tight, tannic. Nice. 92 pts

Woodside Vineyards '04 Woodside Port (SCM)
Nose - intense, spicy, vanillin, clove, nutmeg, blueberry jam. So complex and lovely.
Thick, spicy marachino, fudge, complex spiciness. 93 pts
(I brought.)

Woodside Vineyards barrel tasting 12/13/09

2009-12-14T03:11:00.000-08:00

Woodside Vineyards source exclusively from the 26 vineyards they manage within the town of Woodside. Most of their acreage would be considered old vines. Some are quite old.

Their La Questa Vineyard dates back to 1886, the current vines being planted between 1895 and 1905 using cuttings from Chateau Margaux. Emmet Rixford won international acclaim with his La Questa Cabernet. To give an idea of the quality and prestige, in 1915 he charges $2 a bottle, when the typical bottle of wine went for 5 cents. That translates roughly to $200 in today's money. Martin Ray restored the vineyard in the '40s, using cuttings to plant his Mount Eden Vineyard, and using the grapes for the early Martin Ray Cabernets. Around 1960, Bob Mullen and some friends again restored the vineyard and founded Woodside Vineyards. There's only 1 acre left, on three properties, of what was once a much larger vineyard. Occasionally, this wine is deemed distinct enough to bottle separately, otherwise it is blended into their Estate Cabernet.

We were treated to a couple wines before the tour of the barrel room:

'07 Chardonnay Estate (SCM)
Nose - shy, round, spicy.
Heavy brown oak, lemony, some really nice notes, but overpowered by woody oak. Ashamed, but I guess they're throwing a bone to the popular style. 80 pts

'06 Pinot Noir Estate (SCM)
Nose - intense, brambly, foresty, spicy. Wow!
Allspice, zesty, complex, dusty-smooth, pith, sandalwood, lower-key black fruit medley. Needs a year. 91 pts

In the barrel room, these are being offered as futures at a 25% discount:

'08 Pinot Noir Estate (SCM) barrel sample
Nose - round, sweetish, zesty boysenberry, some pink peppercorn and pith, smoky, smooth tannin. (91)

'07 Zinfandel Estate (SCM) barrel sample
These vines were planted in 1897 and yield 1 ton per acre.
Nose - ethereal, smooth, rich, lovely spiced black and blue fruit.
Lovely spiced blackberry, smoke, dark mineral, good acidity, citron, nutmeg, a bit grippy, zesty, some pith, a touch of persimmon. Some zestiness, dusty tannin and vanillin on the finish. (93)

'07 Cabernet Sauvignon Estate (SCM) barrel sample
This includes 20% La Questa Vineyard.
Nose - Rich, dusty, black currant and blackberry, hint of peppercorn.
Grippy. Nice classic black currant and cedar. This is a flawless epitome of classic SCM Cab. Tight structure and not showing a great deal of complexity at the moment, this is a wine that will reward 20 years in the cellar. (93-95)

We then finished up with their just released Zinfandel port, made from those same 1897 vines.

'05 Woodside Port (SCM)
Nose - smooth, warm, marachino and boysenberry, clove, allspice, sandalwood, pecan.
Sweet, marachino liqueur, blueberry and boysenberry jams, nutmeg, clove, some heat. Sweeter and simpler than the '04. 91 pts

'09 Cab Harvest 9/26/09

2009-09-29T13:27:00.000-07:00

For this year, I rounded up some friends to join us, so we were able to pick enough to do a barrel. Paul Romero of Stefania Wine gave me a neutral barrel, and we've bought some extra equipment, so quality and quality control should both step up.

Six of us met at my place at 7am and drove down to San Martin. The vineyard was so immaculate last year that we opted against taking a half day to drive down there and check it out. What we found was a surprise. The owner had turned off the water 2 weeks earlier than normal, and there were a lot of raisins. Also, the canopy was too thick in areas, and the inner clusters in those vines had mildew. Burt and I had coached our crew on the importance of sorting while picking, with an emphasis of keeping leaves out of the picking bins. To that, we had to stress no mildew and minimize the raisins. If anything, our crew were over-vigilant, so I was feeling a little bad about how much we were leaving, but we got good fruit. After a few rows of a lot of effort for little reward, we found the deeper in rows were just fine. So basically, the harm was us having to toil a couple extra hours, those being in the midday sun.

We picked about 965 lbs., which crushed to about 95.75 gallons. My calculation based on last year with this vineyard is that we'll get 69 gallons after the fermented wine is pressed. The barrel is 60 gallons, but we need extra for topping - you lose maybe a gallon a month to evaporation, and need to replace it or the wine will oxidize. So, 9 gallons is probably fine. The worry is there may be more solids this year, which would necessitate using something else to top with.

We measured the sugar level to be 25.6 brix. Correcting for how warm it was, that could really be as high as 26.35 brix. So the alcohol should be 14.1-14.5%.
pH 3.48
Total acidity .81
That works out to what should be a balanced wine.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sunday I helped harvest a couple tons of Chardonnay for Stefania at the Chaine d'Or Vyd.

Monday I helped sort and crush a couple tons of Pinot Noir at Harrington Winery in San Francisco.

SCM tasting @Vino100 Los Altos 8/28/09

2009-08-29T00:35:00.000-07:00

Equinox '97 Chardonnay Blanc de Blanc Sparkling Wine (SCM)
Nose - earthy, lemony, leesy/toasty, an herbal and musty wood character.
Fine bubbles, lemon, lime zest, toasty with a touch of bitterness and green herbs. Good complexity. Very zesty finish. Quite nice, but needs food. 90 pts

Silver Mountain '07 Chardonnay Estate (SCM)
Nose - bright, light on its feet, lemony, deft vanillin spice. Nice!
Round mouthfeel, mushroom, brown woody mustiness, heavy, dull, lemon, lanolin. Tingly mouthfeel develops. 86 pts
Huge disparity between the nose and palate. Without the lovely nose this wouldn't be enjoyable at all.
What I mean by mustiness in these two is like when you over-steep tea, especially notable with a used tea bag. Like putting your tongue on wet long saturated wood.

McHenry '06 Pinot Noir Estate (SCM)
Nose - Wow! Sweet ripe fruit. Super complex, with rhubarb, black cherry, graphite, summer savory and much more. Some red fruit (which I didn't quite grasp what) and a subtle spiciness.
Tingly, round, more restrained than the nose, with darker spice, more rhubarb, a touch of bitter char. Enjoyable now, but not really ready. Drink '11-'21. 91+ pts

Bartolo '07 "Minerva" (Santa Clara Valley)
(47% Grenache, 33% Syrah and 20% Mourvèdre)
Nose - rich, jujubee, toasty spice and tamarind in the foreground, supported by nutmeg, black plum and cranberry.
Complex, with plum, exotic spice, tamarind, cardamon, candied lemon zest, marachino liqueur, jujubee, smooth dusty tannin and a hint of tar. Very different. In a good way. 88 pts

Santa Cruz Mountain Vineyards '06 Durif Sheperd Vyd. (SCM)
Nose - dark, almost tarry purple fruit, soft white wood spice, tobacco, rich, smoky. Black fruit emerges, with sandalwood and a more elegant and distinctive oak spiciness.
Surprisingly perky - boysenberry jam, Himalayan blackberry, a bit of a (good) stinky character, char, nice supporting spice, subtle tobacco. Finishes with a medley of citrus zest and a bit of grip. Drink now-'17. 91 pts

Lack of followthrough

2009-08-01T14:56:00.000-07:00

Recently there's been some discussion again on on of the wineboards about restaurants' online winelists being woefully out of date. It seems to me if you're going to commit to putting up a list, you are obligating yourself to keep it reasonably current. A lot of restaurants show lists that are many months out of date, entirely different than what they have. That reflects very poorly on the business. It should be easy, just a couple extra clicks as part of the process updating the inhouse printed list.

June of last year, during the Vintners' Festival, I made a point of swinging by VinoCruz in Santa Cruz to pick up some wines they listed. They still had some '02 and '03 McHenry Pinots (among other interesting stuff), long sold out elsewhere. Long sold out there too, as it turned out. As was everything else on my list. Ended up not buying anything, when I was prepared to buy a case.

I sent an email and got no response.

I'd checked their site a few times since - no change. Inspired by the thread, I checked again. Knowing some of the release dates, the list now appears to be just shy of 3 years out of date! I sent another email a week ago, with some suggestions, and once again got no response. Pathetic! I guess no one is in charge.

Oh well. I like that they carry local wines, but I don't like that they don't seem to want my business.

Orchard update 7/25/09

2009-07-25T19:15:00.000-07:00

Have about 110 lbs. of black plums harvested so far. But had poor fruit set on the cherry plum tree, so that'll be a negligible contribution this year. (Usually 3-5% and quite significant.) Anyway, looks like there's probably another 40 lbs. on the tree, which would be right in line with last year.

I'm harvesting blue elderberries with making wine in mind. They have a long season and ripen quickly, so I'm harvesting twice a week. Have about 3 gallons so far, but it's early.

Burt had some questions about the '08 plum and apricot wines, thinking maybe they should be sweetened. So, I went over there yesterday. Turns out the plum got about 30% less water added at crush time than previous years. I'd gotten a taste, in passing, a few weeks ago and noticed the intensity and weight it had put on.

After taking notes, I tried adding incremental amounts of sugar. It mellowed the wine out and made it seem simpler. Not better. Then, since it was more concentrated, we tried adding a little water. Water helped the sweetened version, making it more like previous vintages. Just then, Ruth came home and we had her try it. After a disclaimer about how she doesn't know much about wine, she nailed it: Diluted. Not as good as the original.

My conclusion is it's the best yet. If it's too intense for someone, it can take a small ice cube without tasting watery. The only issue is the acidity is a bit high. That comes from the red ripe fruit - something I work to minimize, but feel does contribute to the complexity. This year is, I think, the best yet at maximizing ripeness. As harvest winds down, the temptation to shake the tree to get the last fruit increases. That gets less ripe fruit to drop. I'll try to get some feedback tomorrow about the acidity.

Here's my notes:

'08 Plum Estate
Very dark.
Nose - intense chocolatey plum, bright, SweeTarts, hint of raspberry.
Dark, dusty, SweeTart, intense black plum, lime, grapefruit, dark chocolate, hints of blackberry and raspberry, orange bitters, marachino, cardamon.

'08 Apricot Hesterman Orchard (Los Altos Hills)
Golden hue.
Perfumed dried apricot, peach, hint of white wood resin.
Nutmeg/allspice/treacle/dried apricot, peach, smooth and moderately intense, some golden raisins, passion fruit, grapefruit, slight bitterness on the finish.

Rhys Vineyards tour 6/27/09

2009-07-17T03:44:00.000-07:00

Paul Galli kindly invited a bunch of us to join his annual Rhys tour. Ken Zinns wrote up a very extensive report on his blog. Check it out: http://www.grape-nutz.com/kenz/09_June27.html
Also, Paul's notes: http://dat.erobertparker.com/bboard/showthread.php?t=205144&highlight=rhys+tour
My pics: http://outdoors.webshots.com/album/573331892ZyBVHr

After touring 4 vineyards and checking out the cave, we sat down for a flight of 12 wines.

Rhys '07 Chardonnay Alpine Vyd. (SCM)
Nose - chalky, intense lemon, saline, lemon verbena.
Intense, lemony, zesty, rich, garden herbs, tight, chalky. Excellent. Drink '11-'21. 95 pts

Alesia '07 Pinot Noir Sonoma Coast
Nose - bursting with purple fruit and bay, smoky, roasted plum, exotic wood spice, white flowers.
Intense roasted plum, smoky, with a good mineral structure, nice herbal stemminess. Drink '13-'23. 93 pts

Alesia '07 Pinot Noir Green Valley
Nose - mace, roasted plum, anise, herbs, green peppercorn.
A lot of green peppercorn, peppery, plummy fruit, hints of clove, nutmeg and mace. Peppery mouthfeel. Drink '12-'18. 92 pts

Alesia '07 Pinot Noir Falstaff Road Vyd. (Sonoma Coast)
Nose - shy,a touch of rustic stink, raosted plum and berry pie, minty spice, white wood.
Biting tannin, pert, roasted plum, some green stemminess, glyceriny feel. Drink '13-'20. 91 pts

Rhys '07 Pinot Noir Family Farm (San Francisco Bay)
Nose - light resin, roasted plum, tight.
Earthy, smoky, roasted plum, resin. Just packing, with zest and earth. Needs time to open up. Drink '15-'30. 94 pts

Rhys '07 Pinot Noir Home Vineyard (San Francisco Bay)
Nose - Very shy, black cherry, light oak, hint of blackberry.
Zesty, smoky, raosted plum, tarragon, intense black cherry, some char, white flowers, very firm, smooth/dusty tannin. Nothing like the neighboring Family Farm. Drink '17-'32. 96 pts

Rhys '07 Pinot Noir Skyline Vyd. (SCM)
Nose - intense, savory, iron, white flowers, light resin, shy minty red currants.
Savory, resiny, roasted plum, white floralness. Needs time. Drink '15-'25. 93 pts

Rhys '07 Pinot Noir Horseshoe Vyd. (SCM)
Nose - floral - white flowers, touch of resin, roasted plum.
Forward green tannin, green apple and black plum, grippy tannin, smoky, hints of char, raspberry and blue elderberry. Drink '16-'26. 93 pts

Rhys '07 Pinot Noir Alpine Vyd. (SCM)
Nose - heady, with wood spice, savory, tight, light resin, plum.
Smoky, irony, char and roasted plum, rosemary, strawberry, herbal stemminess, nasturtium. Lots going on. Drink '16-'32. 95 pts

Rhys '06 Pinot Noir Alpine Vyd. (SCM)
Nose - nice smooth fruit, some rustic stinkiness, red and black fruit, plum, graphite and iron, sweet pipe tobacco.
Aggressive and intense, smoky, resiny, red plum, green herbs, graphite. Drink '15-'30. 96 pts

Alesia '06 Syrah Fairview Ranch (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - meaty, with white pepper, tar, sandalwood, red plum, sweet basil, mace.
Peppery saturated black fruit, smoky/roasty resin, a bit tart, very dense. Drink '14-'26. 94 pts

Rhys '07 Syrah Skyline Vyd. (SCM)
Nose - very dense and complex! Black plum, fig, mango, touch of boysenberry, frambois, sweet herbs, hint of creme de menthe.
Blackberry, blueberry freezer jam, nutmeg, resin, clove. Very complex. Spicy frambois on the finish. Drink '14-34. 95 pts

Stefania/Chaine d'Or Open House 6/13/09

2009-07-09T04:46:00.000-07:00

Stefania '07 Pinot Noir (Santa Cruz Mountains)
Nose - restrained, minty, some resin and cut grass.
Piney, dark fruit, oak spice and caramel, black currant, black cherry, sandalwood, yerba buena, tarragon, a bit grippy, good acid. Nice spice on the finish. 91 pts

Stefania '06 Syrah Eaglepoint Ranch (Mendocino County)
Nose - intense, with blackberry, yerba buena, litchi, raspberry, sandalwood.
Pert, round, spicy red fruit, blackberry, oak spice, vanillin. Vibrant fruit and resin finish. 91 pts

Stefania '07 Syrah Eaglepoint Ranch (Mendocino County)
Nose - meaty, creamy, red plum, raspberry, jujube.
Smooth, dusty, spicy, tart, full mid-palate, spiced berries, allspice and herbs. 92 pts

Stefania '07 Haut Tubee (California)
Nose - intense, with black currant, some creme de menthe and bay.
Minty, spicy, red and black berries, piney, nutmeg, mahogany. Bright red fruit finish. 92 pts

Stefania '06 Cabernet Sauvignon Uvas Creek Vineyard (Santa Clara Valley)
Nose - Sandalwood, black currant, cedar, touch of resin and mint, blue elderberry.
Cedary, cassis, integrated spice, nutmeg, blue elderberry. 93 pts

Stefania '06 Cabernet Sauvignon Santa Cruz Mountains
Nose - sultry, resin, black fruit and spice.
Intense black fruit, resin, nutmeg and clove, hint of smoked meat, mucho cassis, cedar, oak spice. 93 pts

Chaine d'Or '05 Cabernet Sauvignon (Santa Cruz Mountains)
Nose - mucho tobacco, dark, rustic, black fruit.
Cedar, tobacco, cassis, red plum, lead pencil. 91 pts

Later in the day, I had the recently bottled:

Stefania '08 Chardonnay Chaine d'Or Vineyard (Santa Cruz Mountains)
Nose - shy, with lime, chalk, stone fruit, a bit savory, hint of mango.
Waxy, firm, pithy, stone fruit and lime, touch of roast meat. Tight.
(When I had this in barrel early this year, it was very expressive of stone fruits, with a nice minerality. Very impressive - maybe 94-95 pts. This time the opulence was gone. The bottle shock was expected, but it was quite enjoyable and I kept going back for more - I'd say 91 pts. Not fair to stick that rating on it, though, as it may already be showing better. By its fall release I'm hoping this will again have that opulence.)

La Honda Winery visit 6/30/09

2009-07-07T04:00:00.000-07:00

Ken Wornick invited Dave Tong and me to come by to give him feedback on a few barrel samples. (You can check Dave's blog for his notes.) These are all '07 wines.

First was a 50/50 blend of Sangiovese and Cabernet Sauvignon from Ken's own La Honda vineyard.
Nose - Monte Bello-ish. Cedary, pipe tobacco, red Sangiovese fruit.
Soft, light. Distinctive flavors follow through from the nose. Good acidity. 90 pts
The two grapes are seemlessly integrated. Not overly complex, but I love the character. This would pair well with my heirloom tomato pasta sauce.

'07 "Merit". An even blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc and Malbec from a warm site in Los Altos Hills.
Nose - shy, with dark peppery fruit and some vanillin.
Very concentrated lush, dark fruit, dusty astringent tannin. Very ripe, some vanillin, lovely, needs time. Has a classic Bates Ranch note. Tobacco shows up with time in the glass. Very very nice. 93+ pts

The next wine will be a private bottling, from a client's Los Altos Hills fruit.
'07 Cabernet Sauvignon Silent Hills Vyd.
Nose - dense red and black currant, hint of eucalyptus, dark oaky spice, hint of red plum.
Very tart red fruit, green apple, nutmeg, red currant. Some tobacco mid-palate. Lighter body. Would make a good blending wine. As it is, will have to be paired with something that needs the acid.

'07 Cabernet Sauvignon S.O.N. Vyd., Saratoga
Nose - dark fruit with an interesting floral note and light spicy oak.
Dense dark fruit, firm dusty tannin, black currant, black plum, peppery, touch of vanillin, hint of lemon and zest, some clove and nutmeg. Very nice. 5+ yrs. 91 pts

'07 Lone Hawk Vyd., Saratoga.
Ken noted this is aging in tight-grained 3 yr. air-dried French oak.
Nose - dark, toasty, Mount Eden-like. Sweet oak spice, cedary plum, warm, rich.
Pert, grippy tannin, black plum, raspberry, spicy, tannins dominate - needs time. 92 pts

Ken now manages over 30 vineyards in the Santa Cruz Mountains. With the exception of a Naylor's Dry Hole (Chalone) Cabernet Sauvignon, all of his wines are now from the SCM.

Woodside Vineyards 5/23/09

2009-05-24T15:08:00.000-07:00

'03 Estate Sparkling Wine (SCM)
Nose - rich, with lemon and an oak note, lime, herb garden, mandarin wine.
Chalky lime, lemon, seltzer, slight hint of peach. Asking for oysters. 88 pts

'07 Chardonnay (SCM)
Nose - rich, smooth, tarragon, touches of lemon and peach, sandstone.
Smooth, a bit flabby, musty oak, waxy, lime, peach, lanolin. 85 pts

'05 Pinot Noir Estate (SCM)
Nose - heady, high-toned, intense concentration of fruit and spice - super rich, dark fruit.
Dark, intense fruit, dark minerality, nutmeg, clove, integrated char. 93 pts

'06 Zinfandel Estate (SCM)
Nose - rich, spiced boysenberry, clove, nice French oak.
Smooth, clovey, black plum, cassis and boysenberry, creme brulee, nutmeg, slight hint of green peppercorn, with lime pith, blackberry and balsa on the finish. Drink '10-14 93 pts

'04 Cabernet Sauvignon "Estate" (SCM)
Nose - high-toned cranberry, cassis and blackberry, with sandalwood, cardamon, vanillin, blackberry jam, star anise, and the slightest hint of creme de menthe.
Dusty oak, blackberry, cassis and raspberry, touches of cedar, lime, and lemon verbena, and a hint of tobacco. Good acid. Drink '13-'24. 93+ pts

'04 Zinfandel Port (SCM)
Nose - heady, raisin, prune, and fresh boysenberry, PX-like treacle, nutmeg, anise, exotic wood spice.
Spicy, rich, blackberry, marachino liqueur, nutmeg, clove. Long, sweet, spicy, warm, boysenberry liqueur finish. 93 pts

Rhys/Alesia Pinot Noir blind tasting 5/21/09

2009-05-22T13:07:00.000-07:00

This was a RossBott tasting. 16 people, 8 wines. We tasted blind and individually ranked them. The rankings are compiled and tallied, yielding a group score, ranking and a spread. The score is 1 point for each 1st place vote, 2 for 2nd and so on down to 8 for 8th, so the lower the score the better. The spread shows the number of votes for the following rankings: 1st/2nd/3rd/last.

A) Nose - deep, dark, sappy, herbal, intense dark fruits.
Intense, round, herbal, rich, black plum, lemon marmalade, nice medium toast. 96 pts
My #1, group #5 4/1/1/0 (69)
Alesia '04 Kanzler
Big shocker for me! From what I've read, this is one of their less well received wines. Certainly didn't fit the impression I got. Glad I have a bottle.

B) Nose - cherry, higher toned, black plum, bay.
Smooth. Sneaky entry blossoms into intense, dark, toasty fruit. Deceptively low-key, quite complex. Should improve with time in the cellar. 94 pts
My #2, group #3 1/6/2/1 (64)
Alesia '04 Sonoma Coast

C) Nose - candied, roasted fruit, black plum, sage.
Tight. Spiced plum, dusty, bay, sage, redwood, with a toasty char finish. Drink '11-'21 93+ pts
My #3, group #2 3/2/3/0 (63)
Rhys '06 Alpine Vyd.

D) Nose - dark, sappy, black plum & black currant, rosemary, dried basil.
Piney, with dense, dark fruit. Darker toast. More flash, less substance. San Mateo? Drink now-'13 92 pts
My #4, group #1 1/3/3/1 (54)
Alesia '06 Sonoma Coast

E) Nose - Minty, high toned, herbal, red cherry, raspberry, touch of black plum. A hint of out house appeared after 15 minutes or so.
Minty, toasty, black plum, iodine. Drink now-'11 91+ pts
My #5, group #4 4/1/2/1 (68)
Alesia '05 Falstaff

F) Nose - bright, rhubarb, strawberry, balsam.
Zesty, black plum and raspberry, roasemary. Seems a bit ungiving. Needs time. Drink '13-'18. 91 pts
My #7, group #6 0/3/2/4 (91)
Alesia '05 Chileno Valley

G) Nose - minty, milky, toast, red cherry.
Sappy, dusty, lemon zest, strawberry and red cherry. 89 pts
My #8, group #7 2/1/1/5 (94)
Alesia '06 Green Valley

H) Nose - very very shy, strawberry, bay.
Marsannay-like fruit, pert, mildly grippy tannin, sultry, earthy, raspberry, orange zest. Relatively thin. 91 pts
My #6, group #8 1/0/1/4 (99)
Alesia '06 San Mateo

Interesting that the wines with the most 1st place votes finished 4th and 5th. There was certainly a consistency of style, though a couple showed a heavier toast. A couple people liked them all so much, regardless of the great variation of vineyard expressions, that they had trouble ranking them.

Ridge Monte Bello final-ish assemblage 5/17/09

2009-05-18T01:47:00.000-07:00

'07 Chardonnay Santa Cruz Mountains
Nose - rich spicy oak, lemon, lemon balm
Firm, harsh oak, zesty, waxy, herbal, mushrooms, restrained fruit. Needs 5+ yrs. to settle down. 92 pts

'08 Monte Bello
Well, it wasn't actually the final assemblage. What we got was 71% C.S. and 29% Merlot. Various lots are still being considered. I believe Franc is out for sure and it's about 50/50 if the PV will make it - the employees are split. We loved the PV in March, and felt it would add a lot, so are hoping some makes it in.
Nose - bright full fresh boysenberry, nutmeg, black elderberry jam.
Dusty tannin, black elderberry, firm, grippy, peppery, touches of boysenberry and charcoal. Needs 20+ yrs. 94 pts

'99 Monte Bello (25% Merlot, 2% Cabernet Franc, 1% Petite Verdot)
Nose - very mature fruit, as in '70s, cedar, tobacco.
Mature, dusty, cedar, dragonfruit, hints of prune, black currant. Drink now. 88 pts

'97 Monte Bello (8% Merlot, 4% Petite Verdot, 3% Cabernet Franc)
Nose - warm, roasted fruit, mint, wintergreen, smooth, dusty, black elderberry, black currant, cedar, hint of tobacco, very slight hint of prune om the finish. Drinking well now, should continue to improve for at least 5 years, then hold steady for a long time. 94 pts

'95 Monte Bello (18% Merlot, 10% Petite Verdot, 3% Cabernet Franc)
Nose - Mature, rich, cedary.
Spicy, black plum and black currant, peppery, good structure. Drink now-'24. 93 pts

'05 Monte Bello (22% Merlot, 6% Petite Verdot, 2% Cabernet Franc)
Nose - tight, black fruit, sandalwood, mint.
Dusty, intense black currant, firm, good acid, black plum, hint of lemon zest. Give it 20+ yrs. 94 pts

With lunch we had a '90 Geyserville
Nose - cedary, mature.
Smooth, rich, black currant and orange, zingy, hint of marachino, light prune. Drink now. 92 pts

Stefania Open House 4/18/09

2009-05-01T18:04:00.000-07:00

'07 Pinot Noir (SCM)
Nose - dark, woodsy, smooth, black cherry, sage, rhubarb, raspberry, blackberry, a bit of bramble, graphite, bay.
Pert, sappy blackberry and black plum, smoky and spicy, grapefruit zest, black cherry, truffle, sage, bay, with some char and raspberry on the finish. Needs 2 years. 89++ pts

'06 Haut Tubee (CA)
Grippy, violet, red fruit, sultry, smooth, with some bay and rosemary. Needs a year. 88 pts

'07 Haut Tubee (CA)
Nose - rich, smooth, sultry, black plum, oak spice, sandalwood.
Assertive purple fruit, firm tannins, good acid, tight, spiced cherry, blackberry, raspberry, cassis, nutmeg, resin, tarragon, ollalieberry. Excellent. 92+ pts

'07 Syrah Eaglepoint Ranch (Mendocino County)
Nose - intense, violets and plum
Very concentrated showing good fruit, rose petals, a rustic minerality, some rhubarb and a bit of smoke. Hedonistic. 93 pts

'06 Cabernet Sauvignon Uvas Creek (Santa Clara Valley)
Nose - black plum, blackberry, sandalwood, violet, hint of resin.
Intense black currant, dusty and glyceriny, bay, boysenberry, very smooth, with raspberry and lavender on the finish. 93 pts

Chaine d'Or '05 Cabernet Sauvignon (SCM)
Nose - stinky, sulfury, cedary.
Smooth, black currant, tobacco and cedar, sultry, black plum, blackberry. 91 pts

'08 Pinot Noir Woodruff Vyd. barrel sample - new oak
Nose - pomegranate, lychee, strawberry, raspberry, sandalwood.
Raspberry, strawberry, resin, smooth, pert, very fresh, some smokiness, hint of lemon, mushroom. 93+ pts

'08 Pinot Noir Woodruff Vyd. barrel sample - neutral oak
Nose - raspberry, jujube, quite rich.
Smooth, smoky, sultry, raspberry, bay, smoked meat. 92 pts

Loring @ K&L 4/10/09

2009-04-11T21:58:00.001-07:00

Brian Loring has been making excellent Pinot Noir for the past decade from a vast range of vineyards throughout the State. I've tasted a good sampling over the years. He's been on a bit of a journey over the years. The oldest, a '99 Sharon's Vyd. I had a few years ago, was at what I would call normal ripeness. At 5 years old it was still youthful and quite enjoyable. To Brian, it wasn't good enough. He makes wine for his taste, and strives for excellence. Wines from subsequent years grew riper and fuller. Definitely more impressive to a lot of people. To me, they were the same high quality, but not necessarily any more enjoyable. With the '04 vintage he pushed things a little too far. The sample I tried did nothing for me. In '05 he overreacted, picking a little less ripe than he would like, in retrospect. I'd long been resigned to "the fact" that with his preferences being riper than mine, that I would always just enjoy his wines, but not be really WOW'd by them.

Now, with the '07s he's really nailed it! They are perfectly ripe, expressive, clean, with perfect acid and tannin structure. (Some in the past had felt a bit heavy, with maybe not quite enough acid.) Now, my only complaint is that he doesn't source any Santa Cruz Mountains fruit.

Loring '07 Pinot Noir "Aubaine" (San Luis Obispo)
Nose - bright rich rhubarb, black currant, blackberry and mandarin.
Rich, full, bright, with black currant, mandarin zest, blackberry. Just lovely. Drink now-'15. 94 pts

Loring '07 Pinot Noir "Garys' Vineyard" (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - soft, flinty, full, warm, black plum, black cherry, some earth, zest and nutmeg.
Grippy, zest, pith, mushroom, tingly mouthfeel, black currant, lots of zest, tight, a bit of bitter greenness on the finish. Needs 2 years. 87+ pts
(I've never been a fan of Garys' Vyd. Pinots. Something about the expression just doesn't work for me. From a good range of producers I've never had a bad one and never been impressed by one. But I know a lot of people who are big fans of the site.)

Loring '07 Pinot Noir "Russel Family" (Paso Robles)
Nose - soft, warm purple fruit (almost Petite Verdot-like)
Dusty tannins, full, smooth boysenberry, zest, flint. Ready. 92 pts

Loring '07 Pinot Noir "Keefer Ranch" (Russian River Valley)
Nose - intense, cranberry and lavender, good minerality, rhubarb.Cranberry, blackberry, grapefruit, mushroom, flint, hint of char. Firm, good structure. Give it 2 years. 91+ pts

Loring '07 Pinot Noir "Clos Pepe" (Santa Rita Hills)
Nose - zesty, smooth, tight, warm purple fruit.
Zesty, creamy, mandarin zest, graphite, boysenberry, green tannin, char. Grippy, needs a year to smooth out. 90+ pts

Brian likes his wines on release. To my tastes most benefit from a couple years. Either way, they have the structure to age and a lot going on. This is the type of wine you enjoy as it evolves over the course of an evening.

Big Basin Spring Open House 4/4/09

2009-04-06T15:04:00.000-07:00

What can I say? One of the new stars of the Santa Cruz Mountains. These wines aren't like anyone else's. Note that many of these wines were run through a Venturi, so are showing a bit more than they would otherwise at this point.

'08 "Aura" Rose of Syrah (CA)
Syarh and a bit of Grenache barrel fermented in French Oak.
Nose - rich, raspberry and strawberry, smoky and toasty.
Toasty rich strawberry, lemon zest and truffle. Very nice. 91 pts.

'07 Pinot Noir Branciforte Ridge (SCM)
Nose - tight, smooth, strawberry/rhubarb.
Minerally rhubarb and strawberry, smoky, earthy. 93 pts
Because this was Venturi'd, it was showing more on the palate than what I had last week. Excellent. Vigorous decant or wait a couple years.

'07 Pinot Noir Bald Mountain (SCM)
(This will be a September release.)
Nose - Stony, rustic, tight, cranberry and rhubarb, nutmeg, savory/meaty.
Dark, dense, blackberry, truffle, graphite, smoke and zest, with a touch of rhubarb and cranberry. Wait til 2011. 92 pts

'08 Pinot Noir Alfaro Family Vyd. (SCM) barrel sample
Nose - heavy, persimmon, cassis, tangello, smoke and black cherry.
Lighter than expected from the nose. Rich, raspberry, graphite, red plum and smoke. Wait til late 1010. 91+

'06 Syrah "Sri" (SCM)
Nose - intense, driving blackberry and truffle, graphite, smoke, hint of cranberry.
Cranberry, red plum, truffles and blackberry. Round, earthy, with orange zest on the finish. Needs a year. 90+ pts

'06 Syrah "Mandala" (65% Estate, 35% Fairview Ranch)
Nose - stony dark zesty fruit -> black cherry, blackberry, earthy, pithy, graphite, red currant.
Earthy and bright, blackberry, truffle, pith, mandarin zest. Needs at least a year. 89+ pts
(A matter of preference of expression, as most others like the Mandalas better than me. Just less than the sum of its parts? Or are the presumably younger vines/lesser lots a significant factor?)

'06 Syrah Fairview Ranch (Santa Lucia Highlands)
Nose - full, black fruit and red cherry, black cherry, orange.
Rich, round, earthy, zesty, pure blackberry, truffle, graphite, orange zest, smoky.
Drink now to 2014. 93+ pts

'06 Syrah Rattlesnake Rock (SCM)
Nose - dense, dark minerality, but also bright. With mandarin, blackberry and black cherry, sandalwood, nutmeg and a hint of clove.
Firm tannin, smooth blackberry, very integrated - mushrrom, mandarin, hints of rhubarb, graphite, smoke, tobacco, cedar. Long and easy. Touches of resin and lavender on the finish. Gorgeous! Now to 2024. 95 pts
If you've got to drink a Rattlesnake Rock in the near term, this is the one. Let the other sleep.

'07 Syrah Coastview (Gavilan Mountains) barrel sample Spring 2010 release
Nose - intense jammy blackberry and blueberry, Nilla Wafers, sandalwood, nutmeg, red clay, and a hidden underlying minerality.
Rich full blueberry jam, orange and orange zest, mushroom, boysenberry, a bit grippy. 93 pts

'07 "Odeon" Cabernet Sauvignon/Syrah Black Ridge Vineyard (SCM) barrel sample
Nose - tight, heavy, dark, blackberry, black currant, hints of creme de menthe.
Bright fresh Cab fruit without obvious oak, touch of cedar, boysenberry, some earth, mushrron, zest, smoke. 91 pts

'08 Grenache/Syrah (65%/35%) Estate (SCM) barrel sample
Nose - heady medley of raspberry, rhubarb, strawberry. red currant and red plum, with subtle French oak spice.
Earthy, toasty, red fruit medley, cinnamon, sandalwood, mushroom, touch of orange and a hint of nasturtium. Needs 2 years. 93 pts

'04 Syrah Rattlesnake Rock (SCM)
Nose - Dense black fruit, with heady spice box aromas, cedar, touch of resin. Just plain WOW!
Sultry foresty blackberry - just so complex and gorgeous - structured and packed! At a loss for words. Peppery mouthfeel. Should improve for 15 years. 96+ pts

Tea? Really?

2009-04-05T17:22:00.000-07:00

Yeah, I drink tea sometimes. I go through phases drinking it at home and it's my drink of choice at Asian restaurants. Every once in a while I come across something impressive, but not too often. I like the tea with toasted rice they serve at Green Elephant, for example.

At Pinot Paradise after the technical sessions, Richard and I went for a walk through the Campbell Farmer's Market to find some lunch, as it was just outside the event. We saw an intriguing looking tea stand, which we returned to after some excellent Mexican food. They had an impressive array of blends, they many to taste. Very friendly and enthusiastic, the lady commented that we looked like wine tasters. Well, actually...

We were very impressed. Just outstanding blends. Just so complex, balanced, nuanced, pleasurable. Simply put, everything I tried was as good or better than any tea I've had. If the best tea you can find at Safeway is a 3, some of these were 10s. THAT much better!

Check 'em out: http://www.teasummit.com/who.html

Burgundy vs SCM Challenge

2009-04-01T15:45:00.000-07:00

After Pinot Paradise, I attended the 4th Cronin memorial dinner: Cronin IV - The Best of Cronin. Duane Cronin was a great local winemaker, who made small volumes out of his house in Woodside. He passed away two years ago. I put together the first three, and his friend Rich Gibbons organized this one.

With 18 people in attendance, after socializing and drinking various whites, we sat down for this blind flight of six wines. We knew to varying degrees what they were: 3 were Cronin Pinot Noirs from the Peter Martin Ray Vyd. and 3 were Burgundies, a Nuits-St-Georges, a Musigny and an Echezeaux. Our challenge was to guess which were Burgs and which were SCM, then vote for our favorite two.

A testament to Duane's wines, this challenge proved difficult. Only two of us guessed correctly - Julie and me. Some of the Burgs were fruitier and sweeter, throwing off the Burgophiles. And those Cronins? Earthy and minerally. I was confident in 2 wines (B & C), but the other PMR took more work. After a long day of tasting, my notes here are pretty lousy, as they were just focused on the challenge.

Wine A
Nose - dull, lavender.
Mushroom, mature fruit.
I guessed Musigny, as it reminded me of one I'd had. Burgophiles told me I was crazy and insisted it was the Echezeaux. Regardless, not my fave.
Group's #2
Alain Michelot '00 Nuits-St-Georges 1er Cru Aux Champs Perdrix

Wine B
Nose - earthy, mushroom
Minerally, black cherry, younger.
My #2
Group's #1
Cronin '94 Pinot Noir Peter Martin Ray Vyd.

Wine C
Nose - minerally, black cherry.
Mature, minerally, a bit of a bite.
My #1
Cronin '97 Pinot Noir Peter Martin Ray Vyd.

Wine D
Nose - shy earthy red plum.
Musty, truffle, sweetish red plum.
Dom. Comte Georges de Vogue '94 Musigny Grand Cru

Wine E
Nose - cooked greens
Sweetish, red, lavender.
Group #3
Cronin '96 Pinot Noir Peter Martin Ray Vyd.

Wine F
Nose - black cherry, mineral.
Black cherry, truffle.
This is the one I had to eliminate as a Cronin. I eventually decided Echezeaux.
Dom. Rene Engel '96 Grands-Echezeaux Grand Cru

Pinot Paradise '09

2009-03-31T23:50:00.000-07:00

What an amazing event. 35 Santa Cruz Mountains wineries pouring so many excellent Pinot Noirs. Well, I guess I shouldn't be self-conscious about liking so many wines from my favorite region.

The first six wines were part of the sub-regional seminar.

Cumbre of Vine '06 Raffaelli Vyd.
Nose - restrained, ollalieberry, touches of clove and resin.
Dense black and rhubarb fruit, earthy, some zest, mushroom, white pepper, sage, rosemary, rose hips. Seems muddled. This may come together with time, but I'm not holding my breath. 85++ pts

Storrs '06 Wildcat Ridge Vyd.
Nose - blambly, blackberry, mint, rich.
Rich, full, sultry, integrated. Blackberry, sage, nice spice, smooth dusty tannin, savory, a bit of zest. Very nice and ready to go. 93 pts

Fogarty '07 Estate Rapley Trail Vyd. Block M
Nose - Restrained, earthy, minty, blackberry, resin.
Dark brambly rhubarb, black plum, minty eucalyptus, earthy, with a hint of pith a truffles on the finish. Fairly heavy. 89-90 pts

Beauregard '06 Bald Mountain
Nose - boysenberry, allspice, earthy, red plum, lavender, creme de menthe.
Black plum and bay, sweet red plum, rhubarb, mushroom, blackberry, pinot gris, touch of zest, tingly mouthfeel. 91 pts

Mount Eden '06 Estate
Nose - bright but dark and rich, black plum, blackberry, redwood, and some red fruit.
Elegant but intense, dark earthy minerally savory, truffle, low-key black plum, sandalwood, hint of orange zest, smoked meat. Ethereal finish. Young and tight. 94+ pts

Sonnet '06 Muns Vyd.
Nose - has a light mintiness, basil, chocolate, restrained red and black fruit.
Bay, earth, truffles, mint, black plum in the back seat, with smokiness, sandalwood and a touch of zest and pith on the finish. Needs 2+ years. 89 pts

McHenry '05 Estate
Nose - heady, rustic, floral, strawberry, dark minerality, rhubarb.
Brambly, truffle, black cherry, smoke, zest. Lovely. 93 pts

McHenry '06 Estate "Swan Clone"
Nose - bright, strawberry, rhubarb and black cherry.
Dark minerality, black cherry, smoke, orange, bright glyceriny strawberry. 93 pts

Muccigrosso '05
Nose - warm, mellow, dark fruit.
Dark, toasty, nutmeg, black plum, red cherry. 90 pts

Muccigrosso '06
Nose - restrained, tight, hints of black cherry and red plum.
Smoky, roasted plum, truffle, red cherry, glycerin, lemon zest. 91 pts

Windy Oaks '06 Wild Yeast
Nose - light, elegant, cardamon, star anise, cinnamon, red plum.
Smooth strawberry, red plum, hint of rhubarb. Just lovely. 93 pts

Windy Oaks '06 Diane's Block
Nose - Smooth, zesty, rhubarb, red plum.
Fresh spicy rhubarb, raspberry, nutmeg. 92 pts

Woodside '05 Estate
Nose - heady spicy aromatics, blackberry, black plum, nutmeg, anise, sage...
Extraordinary spice medley, black plum, blackberry, rustic, tingly. 95 pts!
(This was my #2 wine last year and it's really opened up.)

Woodside '06 Estate
Nose - warm, smooth, tighter rustic black fruit.
Blackberry, orange zest and orange, smoky, cherry, char, citron. 93+ pts

Clos LaChance '06 SCM
Nose - tangy rhubarb, dark minerality, strawberry, earth.
Zesty, black plum, truffle, cranberry, smooth, ready. 90 pts

Clos LaChance '05 Biagini Vyd.
Nose - stinky, earthy, rich, red plum, hint of resin. The stink blew off completely after a minute in the glass and some sandalwood appeared.
Cranberry, red plum, dark spice, good minerality. 92 pts

Clos Tita '05 SCM Cuvee
Nose - dark, sweet, spicy, brooding, VA, cinnamon.
Smooth, dark, spicy, nutmeg, clove, cinnamon, black plum. 92 pts

Clos Tita '05 Estate
Nose - super dark, tight, with resin and spice, balsa and VA
Dark and resiny, with elegant spices, sweetish red finish. 91 pts

Domenico '08 SCM barrel sample
Nose - light strawberry freezer jam, anise, nutmeg.
Strawberry, blackberry, glycerin. 89 pts

Domenico '07 SCM barrel sample
Nose - resiny balsa, blackberry.
Cranberry, blackberry, lemon zest, cardamon. 87 pts

Domenico '06 SCM
Nose - smoky, roasted plum
Boysenberry, orange, rich, allspice, smooth, peppery, with blackberry and black plum on the tail end. 91 pts
(I remember from my visit, this has 2.5% Barbera & .5% Petite Verdot.)

Hallcrest '05 Terra Serena Vyd.
Nose - creamy, minty, bay, cran-raspberry.
Smooth sweet red fruit, mint. 86 pts
(This is the Woodruff property, before the vineyard was fully restored.)

Hallcrest '06 Vista del Mare Vyd.
Nose - integrated raspberry, blackberry, sweet anise, creme de menthe, hoisin.
Sweet black plum with five spice. Very nice. 91 pts

Heart O' The Mountain '06 Estate
Nose - Rich, smooth, hoisin, plum, french oak.
Smooth, integrated, savory, spiced plum, blackberry, with a peppery clove finish. 90 pts

Hunter Hill '07 Estate
Nose - spiced plum, heather, hint of resin, strawberry, mint.
Raspberry jam, nutmeg, strawbery, anise. 88-89 pts

King's Mountain '05 Estate
Nose - (reminds me of GBH) smooth blue fruit, creamy mint, sandalwood.
Spicy plum, blueberry, blackberry, smooth mint, hint of barnyard, black plum. 88 pts

Ahlgren '07 Veranda Vyd.
Nose - rhubarb, cranberry, oak spice.
Sweet glyceriny raspberry, red plum. Nice, but fairly simple. 87 pts

Alfaro '07 Estate (blend of 3 estate vineyards)
Nose - plum, light oak resin.
Dark oak, plum, savory and smoky. Needs time. 87+ pts

Alfaro '06 Lindsay Paige Vyd.
Nose - redwood, black and red plum, creamy, minty.
Black plum, tart, grippy dusty tannin, red and black plum. 89+ pts

Black Ridge '06 Estate
Nose - dense black fruit, dusty resin, tight.
Delicate, smooth, spicy, raspberry, red plum, good acid, dusty tannin. Needs 2 years. 91 pts

Black Ridge '07 Estate
Nose - tight!
Dense, complex, spicy plum, raspberry, bay, rosemary. Needs a few years. 92 pts

Big Basin '07 Branciforte Ridge
Nose - pure boysenberry, hints of resin and black plum.
Blackberry, orange, boysenberry, nutmeg, bay. Needs 2 years. 92+ pts

Big Basin '07 Alfaro Family Vyd.
Nose - blueberry, spiced plum, rosemary.
Sage, spiced plum, boysenberry, allspice. Heavenly and ready. 94 pts

Beauregard '06 Trout Gulch Vyd.
Nose - creamy, red and black fruit, smooth, mint.
Creamy, minty, bursting with boysenberry, nutmeg, peppery finish. 90 pts

Bargetto '06 Reserve
Nose - rustic plum, bay.
Pert, sweetish red plum, rustic minerality, nutmeg, rhubarb. 90 pts

Trout Gulch '07 "La Source"
Nose - rhubarb, cranberry, cherry.
Pert raspberry and rhubarb, glycerin, good minerality, boysenberry, some green. 89 pts

Fogarty '07 SCM (from estate, Regan and Camel Hill vineyards)
Nose - tight grippy blackberry, rich, hint of blueberry.
Pure, zest, boysenberry, some truffle, smoky, bright. 90+ pts

Fogarty '07 Windy Hill Estate
Nose - orange blossom, resin, black plum, mint, pineapple sage.
Black plum, boysenberry and sage, smoky and savory. 92 pts

Soquel '07 Saveria Vyd.
Nose - Sweetish red plum, hint of mint, nutmeg.
Dark spice, bright raspberry, smoke, sweet. 90 pts

Mount Eden '05 Estate
Nose - smoky, minerally, rhubarb, black plum and mint.
Black plum, sage, red plum, mint, dark minerality, smoke. Very elegant. 93++ pts
(This was my #1 wine last year. I think it's a bit closed, despite how well it's drinking. It should peak in about 10 years and could easily end up a 96 pt wine.)

Cinnabar '06 SCM
Nose - warm, black plum, hints of anise and mint.
Sweet smooth smoky red fruit. 84 pts

SCMV '06 Branciforte Creek
Nose - bay, black plum, zest.
Meaty, smoky, plum, rhubarb, blackberry. 91 pts

SCMV '05 Bailey's
Nose - bay, black plum, rose hips.
Smooth, red plum, orange zest. 91 pts

Paul Galli, Richard Jennings, Ray Walker

Jeff Emery (SCMV), Ray Walker (Domaine Ilan)

Ashley Dubois (Black Ridge)

Bradley Brown (Big Basin)

Henry and Linda McHenry

Downhill Winery 3/22/09

2009-03-28T22:10:00.000-07:00

Downhill is a low-key operation. The kind where the person pouring is the winemaker. Frank makes his wines in rented space at Byington Winery. Tasting room? Well, that's a table set up in the barrel room. I like that. Friendly and without pretension. The wines are vibrant, expressive and ready to drink. Complex without being heavy or tannic. This is the type of wine I'd like to see more of on restaurant wine lists. Too often it's either boring plonk or current releases of stuff that needs a few years (or more) to be enjoyable. Oh, and the prices are very reasonable.

'08 Torrontes (California)
This is from a Lodi vineyard with a lot of interesting varieties planted. We'll see some Downhill reds from here down the road a bit.
Nose - bright and fresh stony white peach, with honeydew melon and yellow peach.
Lemon, zesty and waxy, honeydew, peach, lanolin, savory, lime. 91 pts

'07 Chardonnay Sleepy Hollow Vyd.
This saw 20% new oak and half malo-lactic fermentation.
Nose - warm and stony.
Fuzzy/waxy feel, rustic savory lemon and lime. 89 pts

'08 Barbera Rosato (California)
From Sierra Foothills fruit.
Nose - amazing fresh light jammy strawberry, very rich.
Zesty waxy strawberry, hint of smokiness. 89 pts.

'07 Barbera Cooper Vyds. (Amador County)
Nose - rustic, minerally McHenry character
Boysenberry, rustic and smoky, minerally, orange, with nice clove and a hint of rhubarb on the finish. 91 pts.

'06 Pinot Noir Peter Martin Ray Vyd. (SCM)
Nose - stony, rustic, rhubarb and plum.
Soft, rich, rustic, rhubarb, plum, strawberry, smoke, dark spice, lemon zest. 92+ pts
This has really opened up.

'05 Cabernet Sauvignon Giuliani Vyd. (Napa Valley)
Nose - blackberry, mint and smokiness.
Bursting with boysenberry, orange, black plum, dusty tannin. 92 pts.

"05 "Slippery Slope" Syrah/Grenache (SCM)
Nose - barnyardy
Smooth, glyceriny, blackberry, blueberry and zest. 90 pts.

Black Ridge Vineyards 3/22/09

2009-03-23T20:26:00.000-07:00

This was their grand opening weekend. It was fun to stop back by, chat a bit, retaste a couple wines, taste a couple new ones and some barrel samples. The winery is above Lexington Reservoir (which you can see in the above pic). They have 22 acres planted and all their wines are from estate grapes. They are also selling grapes to some nearby wineries, including Big Basin, Testarosa and Fleming-Jenkins. The wines are made by Bill Brosseau with assistant winemaker Ashley Dubois.
BRV will now be open the third weekend every month. Well worth a visit.

'07 Viognier
Nose - stony pear, with hints of peach, litchee, citrus.
Waxy, with lemon pith, snoked meat, mandarin and peach. 89 pts

'05 Cabernet Sauvignon (with 5% Merlot, 5% Cabernet Franc)
Nose - Reminds me of Bates Ranch. Black currant, cedar and spice.
The black currant fruit is well framed by cedar, smoke and nutmeg. Middle weight, with a rustic minerality, it shows red plum and a touch of char on the finish. This is filling out and just starting to show secondary character. Should be really nice in about 2 years. 90 pts

'06 San Andreas Red (69% Cabernet Sauvignon, 15% Merlot, 15% Cabernet Franc, 1 % Petite Verdot)
Nose - spice red fruit and a hint of VA(?)
Rich, with clove and nutmeg, cassis, red plum, hint of green, and a dusty peppery mouthfeel. Coming together well, but needs another year. 91 pts
...and no hint of VA on the palate.

'06 Cabernet Franc (100%) Club only release
Nose - freshly cut oak, balsa, shy fruit, hint of resin.
Dark, spicy, sultry, hint of resin, black plum, cassis, cedar, smoke. Smooth, with a peppery bite on the finish. 91 pts

The barrel samples are a Cabernet Ashley is making. Two barrels - one is new oak and one is 3 year old oak:

'07 Cabernet Sauvignon barrel sample - 3 year old oak
Nose - exuberant pure purple fruit, hints of sandalwood and orange zest.
Pomegranate and black plum, leading to nutmeg and cassis, then cedar and lime, with a meaty, zesty, smoky finish. 92 pts

'07 Cabernet Sauvignon barrel sample - new oak
Nose - balsa, plum, cardamon, lemon zest.
Smooth purple fruit, with a touch of resin and spice. Black plum, cassis, touches of strawberry and raspberry, with cedar and smoke on the tail end. Very intense! 93+ pts

These two should blend really well. I'm impressed.

More pics: http://good-times.webshots.com/photo/2699642740102270864nFaDwa

'08 Monte Bello Components Tasting 3/7/09

2009-03-09T13:28:00.000-07:00

'06 Chardonnay "Santa Cruz Mountains"
Nose - very rich, full, lemon, kiwi, cardamon, with a hint of vanilla.
Very spicy, nutmeg, lemon, persimmon. Very complex. Excellent. Should improve over the next two years. 93 pts

'08 Merlot - Bowl Vines
Nose - mellow, complex, soft, black elderberry, with a touch of creme de menthe.
Firm, tart, black plum, resin, grapefruit and spice. Somewhat harsh. High acid.

'08 Cabernet Franc/Cabernet Sauvignon 50/50 - Upper North Gate Vyd.
Nose - bright, light, ethereal, black currant, sandalwood.
Cedary, dusty/gritty tannins, tight, showing black berry, plum, excellent vanilla spice, nice char/smoke.

'08 Cabernet Sauvignon - South Twin Peak Parcel
Nose - super-ripe black plum (as in black and soft), fermenting plum wine.
Very plummy, pure. Touches of blueberry and pineapple guava, reminding me of San Martin fruit. Very nice.

'08 Petite Verdot - Olivos and Levassuer Parcels, co-fermented
Nose - smoked ham, tobacco.
Follows through on the palate, plus some black fruit and chalky tannin. Grippy finish.

First Assemblage 81% Cabernet Sauvignon/19% Merlot
Nose - black and red plum, cardamon, a touch of creme de menthe.
Saturated plummy fruit well framed by dusty tannin, some orange, hint of zest. Nice spice.
Seemed a bit simple, but considering what has yet to be added, it should turn out quite good.

'06 Monte Bello - 68% Cabernet Sauvignon, 20% Merlot, 10 Petite Verdot, 2% Cabernet Franc
Nose - heady, rich, cedary tobacco, nice plum, vanillin oak.
Lots of tobacco, cassis, cedar, plum. Classic aged CA Cab Character. Ready now and for the next decade. (This from someone who prefers most MBs at 20-30 years.) 93 pts

Some pics: http://home-and-garden.webshots.com/photo/2038663270102270864GeLTRS

Dave Tong's notes: http://scmwine.blogspot.com/2009/03/2008-ridge-monte-bello-varietal.html

Baby Tomatoes!

2009-02-20T18:49:00.000-08:00

My babies! All but two of the toms have sprouted. The peps haven't yet, but that's to be expected.

My raised bed in winter. Broccoli, mache, onion, red giant mustard, California Golden Poppy, pine needles, shade.

This is the plum tree. Blossoms on the lower part only. I suppose that's because it's more protected from the cool breeze. Same thing happens on the cherry tree (to the left). In front, that's a California Hazelnut sporting chubby buds. Lots of oxalis.

Cronin Cab blind tasting 1/15/09

2009-02-13T23:26:00.000-08:00

This was a RossBott tasting. 8 people, 8 wines. We tasted blind and individually ranked them. The rankings are compiled and tallied, yielding a group score, ranking and a spread. The score is 1 point for each 1st place vote, 2 for 2nd and so on down to 8 for 8th, so the lower the score the better. The spread shows the number of votes for the following rankings: 1st/2nd/3rd/last. Oh, and I took notes on the aromas of all the wines, then tasted, then sometimes added additional notes as they evolved.

A) A touch of orange in the hue.
Nose - warm, cedary, mature, whole wheat toast.
Tart cherry, mature, black olives, light fruit, smooth. 87 pts
Later: improving - showing a heavenly light nose of cedar, iodine, tea. Like if McHenry made a Cab. Make that 89 pts. My #4
Group #4, 0/1/1/0, 32 pts.
'98 Merlot (San Ysidro)

B) Nose - deep, hint of frosting, olive, VA.
Sweetish, stinky, olive, red plum, simple expression. 83 pts. My #6
Group #6, 1/0/1/1, 44 pts
'85 Robinson Vyd. Cab(65%)/Merlot(35%) (Stag's Leap)

C) Nose - lighter, cedary, Ridge Monte Bello-like.
Dark, tobacco, cedar, a tad bitter on the finish, with some iodine. '94 SCM? 90 pts. My #2
Group #7, 0/1/0/2, 48 pts
'96 Santa Cruz Mountains
(The two crackheads who ranked this last really sank this.)

D) Hue - hint of orange, less than A.
Nose - white flowers, hint of frosting, light.
Very tart, olive, frosting, touch of char, comes off a wee bit sickly. The '83? 81 pts. My #7
Group #5, 1/2/1/1, 35 pts.
'83 Napa (Robinson Vyd., but doesn't say so on the label)

E) Nose - green cocktail pimento stuffed olives, musty, bitters.
Round, cedary, fairly tart, light fruit, olives on the finish.
Declining. 84 pts. My #5
Group #8, 0/0/0/3, 52 pts.
'86 Shaw and Cronin Cuvee Cab/Merlot(14%)

F) Nose - spicy, SCM-like, rich, sweetish.
Younger, intense, iodine, cedar, a bit savory. Very nice. '96 SCM? 91 pts. My #1
Group #2, 1/3/2/0, 25 pts.
'94 Santa Cruz Mountains

G) Nose - flat, a bit oxidized, olive, cherry.
Dry, dusty, green olive, sweetish finish. Tastes okay, but aroma is off-putting. Would be better with food. 78 pts. My #8
Group #3, 2/1/1/1, 30 pts.
'90 Concerto (Stag's Leap)

H) Nose - warm, deep, straight forward, a bit soft.
Young, cedary, tobacco, could be SCM, olive and Brie. Young Robinson? 88 pts. at first, improving to 90 pts. My #3
Group #1, 3/0/2/0, 22 pts.
'93 Concerto (Stag's Leap)

Domenico Wines 1/17/09

2009-02-13T21:35:00.000-08:00

(Richard and Ginny)

They are located in an industrial area of San Carlos, not far north of La Honda Winery. I've had their wines at at tastings a few times before. The real standout was a previous vintage of Aglianico, was was really really good. Most of what I'd had were French varietals and I'd heard quite a buzz that their best wines were the ones made from Italian grapes. I ended up disappointed, as I expected a couple standout wines.

'05 Chardonnay (Santa Cruz Mountains) $24
Nose - bright warm citrus and soft spice.
Round, tart, tangello, mandarin zest, chalky tannin, hints of peach and fig, soft spice. (87-88 pts)

'05 "La Famiglia Rosso" (California) $30
(82% Sangiovese, 9% Petite Sirah, 9% Merlot)
Nose - bright, light red fruit, maybe some VA, rustic, dark spice, hint of frosting.
Rustic, muddled, black and red plum, dark spice, pasty mouthfeel, tart finish. (86 pts)

'05 "Bella Rouge" (California) $22
(40% Grenache, 37% Mourvedre, 17% Cabernet Sauvignon, 2% Syrah, 2% Zinfandel, 1% Alicante)
Nose - black plum, touch of heat, brown spice, pfeffernusse.
Forward, smooth, dark fruit, exotic spice, peppery mouthfeel, touch of orange peel. (87-88 pts)

'06 Pinot Noir (Santa Cruz Mountains - Mount Madonna) $35
(Contains 2.5% Barbera & .5% Petite Verdot)
Nose - black cherry soda, oak resin.
Resiny, black cherry, viscous, wood spice. (86 pts)

'05 Nebbiolo (Amador County) $26
(Contains 9% Cabernet Sauvignon & 4% Merlot)
Nose - sweet red fruit, anise, cream.
Spicy, tart, red plum, black cherry, VA. Finishes with woody tannin, orange zest, green tannins and a touch of heat. (83 pts)

'05 Aglianico (Amador County) $30
(Contains 8.3% Petite Sirah)
Nose - hint of VA, spiced plum, touch of heat.
Luscious spiced fruit, gritty tannin, black plum, glycerin. (86 pts)

'05 Pinotage (Amador County) $23
Nose - porty blackberry
Smooth, warm, pure blackberry, glycerin, allspice, delicately sweet and porty, orange zest. (88 pts)

They also tasted 4 custom crush wines, two out of bottle and two barrel samples, from 3 different customers. The bottles were fairly crappy, but the barrel samples (both "Ama") were pretty good. I think it all came down to customer choices.

La Honda Winery 1/17/09

2009-02-13T19:49:00.000-08:00

Open for Passport Day for the first time.

'05 Chardonnay "Wappo Loam" Lake County $18
Nose - dark, rich, earthy, cardamon spice, hints of vanilla and lemon.
Smooth, soft, low acid, nice nutmeg, tangello, hint of pear, lingering spice. (87 pts)

'06 Pinot Noir "Red Capsule" (Santa Cruz Mountains) $36
This is from several vineyards they manage from Saratoga to Los Altos Hills.
Nose - warm black currant, with a touch of creme de menthe, sandalwood, cardamon.
Grippy tannin up front, blackberry, eucalyptus, orange zest, hint of vanilla, cardamon, black currant, elder flowers. Dusty tannins, lemon zest and woody spice on the finish. (87 pts)

'06 Merlot (Oakville) $28
Nose - bright red fruit, creamy, sandalwood, dark spice.
Soft, nice toast, light elegant spice matches the lighter bodied Merlot fruit, background medley of citrus, soft tannins, delicately sweet "smoky" finish. (89 pts)

'06 Syrah (Santa Cruz Mountains) $19
Nose - rich, dark, balsa, high toned note, blackberry.
Savory, "smoky", blackberry, mandarin, clove, dark spice, redwood bark, pine needles, sappy glycerin-y finish. Very Nice. (91 pts)

'02 Cabernet Sauvignon "Reserve" (Napa Valley) $38
Nose - intense blackberry, soft sandalwood, creme de menthe, hint of Petite Verdot (though there isn't any).
Soft luscious mouthfeel, warm creamy spice, candied lemon zest, touch of resin, savory berry finish. Drink soon. (90 pts)

Pruning 1/17/09

2009-02-13T19:37:00.000-08:00

Took some pics after pruning for a few hours at Chaine d'Or. Then zipped off to meet some friends at La Honda Winery.

More pics: http://good-times.webshots.com/photo/2495825890102270864usauTC

Racking 1/13/09

2009-02-13T18:17:00.001-08:00

Racking is basically siphoning the wine off settled sediment of dead yeast cells and fruit solids that fell out of solution, known as lees. There's a few more pics here: http://good-times.webshots.com/photo/2170162160102270864nFlKON

'08 Concord
These grapes come from Burt's daughter and son-in-law's property (somewhere around Vacaville, I think..?) This is the third vintage I've tried. He's never been able to extract much color, so they are rose in appearance. They've never been the least bit foxy (a strange wet fur characteristic you get from most American grapes). The '06 was dry and rustic - a dead ringer for a southern French rose. With the '07, he decided to add a little sugar at bottling. It's rich in fruit, round mouthfeel and quite good. This one is quite different again. (I took some notes at press time you can look for.)
Still a bit cloudy, light orangish pink.
Nose - strawberry guava.
Tasting also shows some lime juice and lemon zest. Nice.

'08 Apricot
This is from the Hesterman property in Los Altos Hills. The '07 was very fresh and complex. Spectacular and Burt's best wine, so far.
Nose - warmer, darker apricot aroma, very rich carmelized character.
Dry, rich, dried apricot, plus a touch of orange marmalade.

'08 Plum "Barton Orchard"
This is our third vintage. Again, it's mostly these black fruited plums from my back yard, with a range of ripeness levels (red to black), plus about 5% cherry plum from my front yard, which have a thick, tart, rustic skin, and contribute a lot to the blend.
Nose - ethereal, sweetish red plum, raspberry, peach, mango. Much more complex than previous versions.
Quite tart. To the above, add lemon, orange, grapefruit.

'08 Merlot "Late Picked" (Saratoga)
Nose - rich blackberry, ethanol, soft, round.
Bright acid, dark tannin, a bit green. Fruit is in the background - very soft plum, raspberry, slightest hint of persimmon on the finish.

Our '08 Cab comes from the GarLind Vyd. in San Martin. I tasted each carboy/container separately. You'll see why.

Free Run I & II
Nose I- SO2. Sulfury, gun powder and egg shell dominating soft blackberry-raspberry.
Nose II - much less intense SO2 (but still a lot)
Tart, with soft complex fruit - raspberry, pineapple guava, etc.

Press I (5 gal carboy - earliest)
Nose - no sulfur. Subtle, delicate, soft.
Boysenberry, orange zest, grapefruit.

Press II (these were smaller containers)
Nose - richer, mellow.
More pert, less zest.

Press III
Nose - softer, delicate, more pineapple guava, raspberry.
A bit savory.

Press IV
Nose - mellow, restrained.
Pineapple guava, boysenberry-raspberry, smooth, minimal zest, just a hint of savoriness, and a hint of black Sevillano olive.

I'm starting to get a sense of a San Martin Cab signature. A delicate complexity of pineapple guava, raspberry and fresh blueberry. I've noticed this in others, most recently the Creekview, which they ruined with harsh oak treatment. '08 is the first vintage of the Stefania Crimson Clover Vyd. Their elegant oak regimen should marry well with that wine.

Anyway, we added oak chips to the Merlot and free run Cab. The press is so much more complex and interesting, we decided to leave it alone. That might make it a younger drinker, but I think that's the best we can do with it.

As to the SO2, our theory is it relates to oxygen exposure at press time. The free run got very little and the press got enough.

'09 Tomatoes

2009-02-12T15:57:00.000-08:00

Started my tomatoes today. I use a mini-greenhouse with a heater that keeps it about 75 degrees. Had a couple extra cells, so I started some Aji Dulce and Tequila Sunrise peppers. I'll start more peppers later. Here's the list:

Aunt Gertie's Gold
Berkeley Tie Dye
Black Cherry
Black Krim
Black Prince
Black Sea Man
Brad's Black Heart
Brown Cherry (cross)
Calabacito Rojo
Camino Real
Cherokee Purple
Chocolate Cherry
Earl of Edgecombe
Golden Dwarf Champion
Golden Queen
Green Grape
Green Sausage
Green Zebra
Japanese Oxheart
Jaune Flamme
Kosovo
Lemon Boy
Lemon Drop
New Big Dwarf
Nyagous
Oaxacan Jewel
Oregon Cherry
Pruden's Purple
Purple Russian
Rose Quartz Multiflora
Sarnowski Polish Plum
Siletz
Texas Star
Yellow Zebra

Downhill '06 Pinot Noir Peter Martin Ray Vyd.

2009-02-11T01:12:00.000-08:00

Tried one of these on release, last June. It was tight, and only hinting at what it was:
Dark spiced plum nose. Smoky roast plum, firm tannin, forest, cinnamon, tar. Needs time. 91+

Decided to open one last week, and it's opened up and showing a lot:
Nose - warm, smoky, zesty, roasted plum, graphite, iodine, forest floor.
Round, zesty, cranberry, grapefruit, orange zest, smooth tannins, smoky, strawberry, iodine, tea, cardamon, rosemary, tarragon. Very enjoyable. This shows the site well, but is stylistically a bit different than the Cronins, or the neighboring Mount Eden. 92+

Mount Eden '80s Retrospective Dinner 6/14/08

2009-02-09T02:52:00.000-08:00

This was an '80s Chard and Pinot themed dinner that Paul Homchick organized as a follow-up to a '70s dinner held previously. An absolute honor to have been invited. Held at the fabulous Plumed Horse in Saratoga (which now has a Michelin Star) and featuring wines brought mostly by Mount Eden winemaker Jeffrey Patterson.

Richard Jennings' photos are here: http://home-and-garden.webshots.com/album/563797619EcDymL And you can find his tasting notes by searching the wines at http://www.cellartracker.com/pickproducer.asp Our group's preference varied greatly, which I'll highlight by listing his scores. And note that I'm a harsh rater.

Opener:

'86 Chateau d'Yquem (Sauternes)
Nose - sulfury botrytis, subtle mandarin.
Orange marmalade, waxy, clove, mandarin, cinnamon. Very concentrated. Lingering tingling sensation, very rich, not particularly sweet. (94pts) RJ95

1st flight:

'82 Chardonnay Estate
Nose - delicate brown spice, hint of botrytis?
Watery red delicious apple, brown spice. (90 pts) RJ93

'83 Chardonnay Estate
Nose - thin, lemony.
Brown woodsy lemon. (89 pts) RJ94
(I believe this was the group's favorite Chard.)

'84 Chardonnay Estate
Nose - rich, spiced frosting.
Delicate, viscous. (89 pts) RJ92

Okay, so those 3 were well balanced and enjoyable, but didn't thrill me, but the Burgundy fans loved 'em.

2nd flight:

'85 Chardonnay Estate
Nose - rich, brown spice, hints of lemon, some cardamon.
Rich red delicious, cardamon, good intensity and acidity. Nice. (93pts) RJ92

'86 Chardonnay Estate
Nose - Corked! Musty, some barnyard.
Concentrated, rich, musty lemon. This would have been excellent, maybe 93-94.

'87 Chardonnay Estate
Nose - spicy, woodsy, austere fruit.
Tight, concentrated, lemon, mature fruit, cardamon. Lovely! (95 pts) RJ93

This flight was more to my liking and there was less disparity of opinion on them.

3rd flight:

'80 Pinot Noir Estate
Nose - dark, balsa, austere.
Soy and rice vinegar, stemmy, cherry, egg shell, toasty oak, thin finish. (90 pts) RJ82

'81 Pinot Noir Estate
Nose - Rich, iodine.
Brown, musty dusty tannins, cardamon, roast plum, cranberry, watery finish. (87 pts) RJ86

'82 Pinot Noir Estate
Nose - lighter, redder, balsa.
Tart, pert red cherry, dusty, cherry plum, sandalwood, a little musty. (88 pts) RJ87

'83 Pinot Noir Estate
Nose - outhouse, iodine, warm, rich.
Rustic, rhubarb, dark, toasty, heavenly, long finish. (95 pts) RJ93

4th flight, tasted blind:

'84 Pinot Noir Estate
Nose - light bretty Burgundy.
Thin, tart, musty, lemon, cranberry, dusty tannins. (86 pts) RJ92

'85 Forey Pere et Fils Vosne Romanee
Nose - rich, warm, portapotty.
Really nice velvety red fruit, strawberry, cranberry, some sweetness. (90 pts) RJ91

'86 Pinot Noir Estate
Nose - warm, frosting, red fruit.
Simpler, but rich, round, balanced. (88 pts) RJ90

'86 Faiveley Clos de la Roche
Nose - Light, sweet, VA, sickly.
Cooked, tart. (76 pts) RJ87

5th flight:

'87 Pinot Noir Estate
Nose - warm, dark, portapotty.
Awesome, dark, rich, velvety, roast plum, quite tart, smoky. (94 pts) RJ92

'88 Pinot Noir Estate
Nose - rustic, rich dark fruit, frosting.
Lighter body, dark roast fruit. (91 pts) RJ95

'90 Pinot Noir Estate
Nose - warm, rich, concentrated, barnyard.
Rich, tart, dark fruit. (92 pts) RJ93

'81 Congress Springs Pinot Noir (St. Charles Vyd.)
Nose - warm, high-toned, hint of solvent, sweetish.
Tart, dusty, red fruit, solvent, a bit astringent, balsa. (80 pts) RJ88
I brought this. This winery was owned by Daniel Gehrs and Merry Edwards, and is in the same area as Mount Eden. The location is now Savannah-Chanelle. The vineyard was one of the old Novitiate properties in Los Gatos. I think most people agreed with my assessment - well past its prime.

Cabernet flight:

'73 Gemello
Nose - smoky, flinty, roasted plum.
Dusty, dark, mature fruit, tobacco, iodine. (90 pts) RJ83
I brought this, too. Most or all Saratoga fruit, previous vintages also contained Monte Bello fruit, but I didn't taste any here. The Ridge partners sold Gemello all their fruit until they were bonded, then continued in diminishing quantities for at least a decade. A few old-timer eBobbers each have listed the '60 & '70 as the best California Cabernet they've ever had.

'78 Mount Eden Cabernet Estate
Nose - Lighter, but more ethereal.
Roasted plum, lavender, smoke, velvety, rose, breaking up a bit on the finish. (87 pts) RJ94

With desert:

'76 Doisy Vedrines
Nose - Round moderate botrytis, apricot, white peach.
Austere, orange marmalade, bitter finish. Well past its prime. (82 pts) RJ92

Sorry about the embarrassingly sparse notes, but the conversation and the food took precedence. The notes were more highlighting the contrasts of the Mounte Eden wine, while ignoring the given qualities.

Olive update 1/17/09

2009-01-24T04:23:00.000-08:00

The Manzanillas are done. Well pretty much. It's recommended to give them about three weeks, where they actually gain weight in flavor, then hold. Last year, the Sevillanos I put cuts in were particularly dilute watery tasting at this point, but really picked up the richness with some time. Odd. The only change is to a weaker brine solution (half the strength). I'm guessing the higher salt concentration blocks some sort of break down, that the weaker solution allows, up to a certain equilibrium.

The quality of fruit wasn't as good this year. (As I said before, harvest was 85% below normal!) The Sevillanos were mostly just smaller, with a minor degree of imperfections. The Manzanillas were much worse with lots of imperfections. Had to cull a bit before and after curing. Also separated a quart of salvageable ones for personal consumption, where I'll have to cut about half off of. Ended up with 13 pints of good ones.

Another difference is there's a wide range of ripeness levels. There's a small number of black ones, some of which remind me of these salt cured blacks I've gotten at Whole Foods (yummy), others were a bit like kalamatas. The vast majority are purple. Most of those still have that Petite Verdot note, though toned down and integrated with the savoriness. A couple reminded me of some rustic Pinot Noir, with a slight metallic note. Maybe 10% are greyish, firmer and still a bit bitter, with a notable high tone. They do remind me of some commercial ones I've had and ae pretty good. I think a little more time will remove the last of the bitterness in those.

So all-in-all I'm pleased. Happy with the new variety. Happy I got any olives at all from this horrible year. Happy with the quality of both varieties that just shines with minimal handling. They're so good and complete I think trying to enhance them with herbs or whatever would make them worse.

Olive update 1/6/09

2009-01-06T16:40:00.000-08:00

The Sevillanos are done, yielding 13 pints and 1 quart. They're smaller than last year, but taste just as good.

The Manzanillas were still pretty bitter. They still have that odd and distinctive Petite Verdot sort of taste. It'll be interesting to see how they turn out. I changed the brine and will check back in 10 days. I guessing they still won't be ready then.

A Taste of Monterey - Wine Visitor Center

2008-12-23T02:17:00.000-08:00

A group of us stopped in yesterday, as we had some time before our dinner reservation after visiting the Monterey Bay Aquarium. Between us, we tried both flights and shared, so I got to try 11 wines. I got the premium flight of 5 wines. Most of the wines were okay to pretty good, but nothing was impressive. I kind of hoped something would turn me on. Nope. My 4th wine was very structured and dense, but was a bit musty, with muted fruit. Corked. I was going to say something, but never got around to it because of the 5th wine:

'05 Antiqv2s Syrah Gary's Vineyard $60
Nose - moderate barnyard with some burnt rubber. Unpleasant.

First, they just tried to dismiss my comment saying that's just how the wine is, and walking away as if it wasn't a big deal. Then, when they saw we weren't drinking it and were still talking about it, I was able to explain exactly what it was. Then, they admitted they didn't like it. But it was consistently like that, and apparently some customers do like it, while many hate it.

Of all the customers in the shop, I didn't see any buying wine or give any indication they intended to. I expect underwhelming and over-priced wines. I expect the basic flight to be mediocre. But, this place is supposed to be a showcase for the region's wine. There should be something impressive to taste.

Apple Piety

2008-12-15T09:48:00.000-08:00

Burt and I stopped by Fermentation Frenzy on our way home from the Woodside tasting, as they were having a sale event. We didn't have much time, but there were a bunch of home brewers sharing their stuff, and there were these guys from Oak Ash & Thorn Brewing Company in Redwood City pouring their Apple Piety cordial. It is a spiced apple mistelle, which I found stunning. In talking to them, they clearly know what they're doing, and it's evidenced in this product. They clearly chose the right apples. It's 17.5% alcohol, but tastes like 11%. Clean rich fresh apple, with a sort of light feel, delicately sweet, just the right amount of cinnamon, clove, nutmeg. Very nice, perfect balance.
They are a new operation, making meads, ciders and cordials. I look forward to trying some of their other products.
http://www.oakashthornbrewing.com/products/products.htm

Black Ridge Vineyard 12/12/08

2008-12-15T08:42:00.000-08:00

Ashley came and poured at Vino Locale. I didn't take notes. The new ('07) Viognier is clean, floral with a nice grapefruit rind structure. Maybe slightly better than the '06, but very similar. (91 pts)
The '06 Pinot has smoothed out and now into it's drinking window. Very nice. (91+ pts)
I'm not so much a fan of the Cab-based wines ('05 Cab & '06 San Andreas Red). Kinda the same way I feel about most Saratoga Cabs - they just seem a little indistinct to me. I feel the same about Mount Eden, even, so your mileage may vary. Along those lines, it was wise of Mountain Winery to not bother planting Cab.

She did talk about there being quite a variation in climate and elevation over the 22 acres they have planted. The cab and Syrah are in the lower warmer sections.

She also mentioned Testarosa bought both Syrah and Pinot from them this year. I look forward to trying these. Also looking forward to trying Big Basin BRV Syrah. Fun to compare what different people do with the same fruit. It'll also be interesting to see how it compares to Bradley's other Syrahs.

Woodside Vineyards futures tasting 12/13/08

2008-12-14T09:12:00.000-08:00

'03 Brut Sparkling Wine (new release) $36
Nice bead, dry, lemony, yeasty, clean. Very nice. A little chalky on the finish.
This is a huge improvement over what they've done before. (92 pts)

'05 Pinot Noir Estate $36
Nose - Warm, rich, earthy, spicy, blackberry-rhubarb.
Grippy acid, zesty, brambly olallieberry, elusive hint of vanilla, boysenberry. Grapefruit zest and clove on the finish. (93 pts)

'07 Pinot Noir Estate barrel sample $36 ($27 as futures)
Very dark.
Nose - Sweetish nutmeg, ethereal, a bit tight, boysenberry, raspberry.
Lime and mandarin zest, blackberry, orange, black plum, hint of char, pasty mouth feel. (92 pts)
This has about 6 months to go in oak, for a total of about 18 months. Should be interesting to see how this evolves.

'06 Zinfandel Estate barrel sample $30 ($24 as futures)
These vines were planted in 1897 in a warm pocket of sandy loam near Sand Hill Road.
Nose - Wow! Bright, smooth, boysenberry, medley of black and blue fruit, elegant light spice.
Soft dusty tannin, well framed blackberry, balsa, allspice, hint of spice. Very nice. A touch of Draper perfume. (93 pts)
This is nothing like any Zin I've had before, including their previous vintages. I was very pleasantly surprised. Like all their wines it is 100% varietal. This should drink well over the first 5 years after release.

'06 Cabernet Sauvignon Estate barrel sample $40 ($32 as futures)
Nose - Restrained, light-sweet, blackberry.
Tart, watery, exotic spice, grippy tannin, orange zest, heavenly spice finish. (88+ pts)
This should integrate and pick up some weight. It'll be interesting to see how much it improves.

'04 Woodside Port $30 (new release)
100% Zinfandel. 3 years in barrel.
Nose - Warm saturated blackberry and blueberry.
Bright pure fresh blackberry and clove. Not particularly complex, but so pure and hedonistic, I love it! (92 pts)

From Ground to Glass

2008-12-12T05:46:00.000-08:00

I highly recommend this wine documentary. It is just absolutely beautifully shot and features many of the State's top winemakers talking about their philosophies, while following the filmmaker's first winemaking experience, from ground to glass.

http://www.fromgroundtoglass.com

Mountain Winery 11/22/08

2008-11-23T01:47:00.000-08:00

Jayaram, Julie and I met up at the vineyard in the sky to try the inaugural releases of their estate wines. It's been decades since grapes were grown at this historic estate, so it was great to hear they had replanted. David House is the Mountain Winery partner who's guiding the wine program. He's the type of guy that doesn't go half way. He hired none other than Mount Eden's Jeffrey Patterson to make the wines! Turns out both Jay and Julie did stints working for him at Intel.

'06 Chardonnay "Estate" (SCM)
Nose - warm, light, exotic spices, sandalwood.
Bursting with white peach, tangerine, nutmeg. Exotic, tart, subtle dusty tannin, lingering spice. Great now to 15 years. (94 pts)

'06 Pinot Noir "Estate" (SCM)
Nose - deep, rich, warm, intense red fruit, hint of resin, sandalwood, green peppercorn.
Tart, smoky, exuberant red fruit, well integrated green tannin, mandarin zest, green grape tomato, roasted red plum, cranberry. Needs time. (92+ pts)
It is reminiscent of Musigny. There was a consensus that the fruit isn't as complex as what the vines will yield with more age, but they certainly made the best wine they could with what they had. It's framed so well, and I love it. I also think there's some possibility it will show more with time, but I'm not confident, so 92 for now.

More pics: http://good-times.webshots.com/photo/2658353700102270864LaVGML

Purple Basil Jelly 11/21/08

2008-11-23T01:23:00.000-08:00

Here is the herb blend in apple juice, all estate.

After heating, the juice is dark.

Heating and stirring in the sugar.

Ready for the jars.

All done. Just short of 11 jars, so 10 were canned and one went into the fridge for me.

'08 Olives have arrived

2008-11-19T14:14:00.000-08:00

The grower I buy from had their crop devastated this year by frosts and other unseasonable weather. Harvest was about 15% of last year. Got my order in about 45 minutes after their black olives became available. I ordered both Sevillano and Manzanilla. The latter is already sold out.

Black olives are just much riper than green, by about 2 months.

Last year was my first year. I ordered a field run (not sized) of Sevillanos and they were huge! This year they're much smaller. I tried two methods of dry curing and two of brine curing. The dry cured ones are very intense, and I still have plenty. Should try using them as ingredients in dishes... The brine cured were really good. The only difference between those two methods was cutting a slit. The slit would help herbs infuse into the olives, but they were so good I chose not to - I couldn't think of how they could be improved, so why muck with a good thing? The slit also resulted in slightly weaker flavors.

The first step is to keep them submerged in water, changed daily, for ten days. This starts the process of leeching out the bitter glucoside (oleuropein). After that, a couple long sessions in brine. Keeping them submerged prevents spoilage. When done, I put them in jars, add a brine solution plus a little olive oil on the surface. Simple. That's the point where you'd add herbs n such, so I'll taste to see if they need anything. Since I have so much, I may decide to experiment with a few jars.

'08 Limoncello

2008-11-19T13:56:00.000-08:00

Finished the final blend and bottled a little bit.

My version is made by infusing vodka with estate Meyer Lemon rinds for a very long time. Blending is done by adding simple syrup and more vodka to find a good balance of sweetness, alcoholic strength and citrus intensity.

I decided to try candying the rinds. They're a bit boozey and, of course, much mellower than rinds that haven't had most of their oils leeched out. Pretty good. Last night a put some in with the rice I served with petrale sole. Perfect, but should have used more.

Mount Eden 11/14/08

2008-11-15T15:44:00.000-08:00

Jeffrey Patterson came to K&L and poured some current releases. Met up with a few friends for the tasting, and brought Jeff a Purple Basil Jelly.

'07 Chardonnay (Arroyo Seco) ($18)
Nose - minerally, rich, full, citrusy.
Pert, melting, mild intensity, exotic oak, lemon zest, slightest hint of apricot. (88 pts)
This is a really enjoyable drink now wine at a reasonable price.

'05 Chardonnay "Estate" (SCM) ($55)
Nose - "cool", lychee, restrained lemon and a good degree of that hard to explain SCM character.
Brown oak frame, lemon, zest, lychee, good acid, good intensity, but tight and shy. Long zesty finish. Needs cellaring - this will be spectacular in 15+ years. (94+ pts)

'05 Pinot Noir "Saratoga Cuvee" (SCM) ($30)
Nose - sweet red fruit, there's a rustic note and a touch of rhubarb, strawberry jam.
Minerally, pert, ripe strawberry, red plum, flint, rhubarb, soft dusty tannin, round feel. Very enjoyable now and should show good maturity in about 5 years. (92 pts)
I was surprised how good this was!

'06 Pinot Noir "Estate" (SCM) ($45)
Nose - Shy, brooding, intense, dark.
Hits the palate with a wall of intensity - dark plum, lemon and orange zest, green grape tomato "smokiness" and fruit, glycerin, red currant. Good soft dusty tannin structure, pert acidity. Love it! Should peak in about 8-10 years. (94 pts)
Has a little bit of the signature common to all the Cronin Peter Martin Ray Vyd. Pinots, which I really have a fetish for.

'04 Cabernet Sauvignon "Saratoga Cuvee" (SCM) ($25)
Nose - Rich, round, soft, red clay, cassis.
"Smoky", rustic, cassis, mandarin zest, dark spice, dusty tannin. Ready now. (90 pts)
I think Dave Tong would really dig this one.

'05 Cabernet Sauvignon "Estate" (SCM) ($55)
Nose - very dark, brambly, zesty blackberry.
Rich, dark, tart, smoke, sandalwood, grippy tannin, lemon zest, gritty coal, touch of sweet oak, cedar. Could use 10 years. (92 pts)

Cabernet press 10/16/08

2008-11-10T17:11:00.000-08:00

I arrived as Burt was finishing pressing his Hesterman Estate Concord wine. The press tasted of well rounded pineapple guava. Yummy.

Cabernet free run
Light, bright fresh nose - blackberry and plum wine.
Prominent acid, dusty tannin. Has the "smoky" quality of green-when-ripe tomatoes. (Yes, tomato geeks have their own set of descriptors.) Blackberry, red plum, hint of tangerine, sawdusty finish.

Midpress
Nose - darker, fuller dark fruit with a citrusy edge.
Sharp bite, dark rich fruit, moderate tannin. Good balance, perky, excellent!

End of press
Nose - feisty cherry plum.
Forward acid and tannin. Very complex fruit: blackberry, red plum, lime, pineapple guava, mandarin, raspberry, mango, guava. Very floral: orange blossom, white flowers, slight touch of lavender, purple basil, rosemary, marjoram and thyme.

The end of press is just fantastic! Looking forward to this wine. Hope we don't screw it up.

Burt and I had been discussing, in general, extending maceration (the time of skin contact) to maximize the skin characteristics. May have been a good idea with this wine. Another way to accomplish this goal would be to simply remove some juice at crush time, which would increase the skin:juice ratio. Or this can be done during early fermentation, with that excess fermenting juice producing a rose (this process is called saignee). Maybe next year...

Cabernet harvest 10/3/08

2008-11-10T16:51:00.000-08:00

Burt and I drove down to San Martin and picked 240 lbs. of Cab from the Garlind Vyd. The vines are trained using a quadrilateral cordon trellis system and are well maintained. The quality of the grapes was outstanding. This site appears to be warm enough that this method isn't a problem. In fact, these were the easiest to harvest grapes I've yet encountered.

We yielded 25 gallons of "must", which should result in around 17 gals. of wine. Measured 25 brix, 3.37 ph, .78% TA.

Merlot press 10-2-08

2008-11-10T16:10:00.001-08:00

I took a ton of pictures. Here's a slideshow: http://good-times.webshots.com/photo/2500198970102270864cErYHm

You can see we used a mesh bag to keep things neat. Pressing starts off easy, but by the end you are using your whole body and bracing yourself to muscle the ratchet back and forth. The juice that just runs through before we press is called the "free run", which was over 70% of the juice we got. The rest is the "press wine". The press wine has more character from the skins, being richer and more complex. It's character graduates with the pressure applied to extract it. It's important to taste as you go, as you may reach a point where it is no longer a positive addition. The latter end can be harsh and astringent.

Here's my tasting notes:

Free run
Harsh, acidic, some tannin and heat, olallieberry, has the tart rustic character of cherry plum skins.

Early press
More of a pure blackberry taste, smoother, lighter.

End of press
Firm, but pleasant tannin, Merlot fruit, lemon juice.

I'm glad there's no raisiny taste. The harshness is a little disconcerting, but it's a fairly normal feature at this point.

Bottling 10-2-08

2008-11-10T14:44:00.000-08:00

I helped Burt bottle one of his wines prior to our pressing the Merlot. One the end of the siphon tube is a devise that when pressed down allows the wine to flow. When you withdraw the tube, just the right amount of wine had been displaced. We used a hand operated corker.

We then cleaned the carboys and used them for the Merlot.

Here's some pics:

Chaine d'Or Cab harvest 10/25/08

2008-10-30T03:55:00.000-07:00

A bunch of us friends helped harvest, which went really fast. The volume was maybe a third of last year. Then we lounged around as the real crew did the crush. So I took about a billion photos, and momentarily helped Jerry take down the hose, as the rest of the crew were cleaning. There's also some vineyard shots I took before leaving. Here's the slide show: http://good-times.webshots.com/photo/2386957800102270864roupyx

Rhys article

2008-10-30T03:51:00.001-07:00

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/10/10/WIUB135IVT.DTL&hw=kevin+harvey&sn=001&sc=1000

Mountain Winery article

2008-10-30T03:33:00.000-07:00

http://www.mercurynews.com/lauriedaniel/ci_10837177?nclick_check=1

Crimson Clover Harvest 9/28/08

2008-09-30T00:46:00.000-07:00

(See the Stefania blog for more detail.) I joined the Stefania crew and some friends for this Cabernet harvest. The fruit looked really good, with brittle seeds. Their standards are impressively high. Try and find a leaf in that bin, i dare you... Anyway, it took us 5 1/2 hours to yield 3200 lbs.

A few bees and hornets came around when it warmed up, but not a lot. They got pretty shy when I pulled the camera out. Maybe most had already hitched a ride to Big Basin...

Big Basin Vineyards Harvest Celebration 9/27/08

2008-09-29T20:07:00.000-07:00

'06 Sri Syrah
Nose - Would guess Pinot Noir. Rich, warm, spicy, hint of ***, black & red fruit.
Integrated resin, cranberry, blackberry, green peppercorn. (88 pts.)

'06 Fairview Syrah
Nose - Blackberry, black plum, green peppercorn, slightly sweetish, hint of vanillin.
Lavender, red plum, blackberry, grapefruit. (90 pts.)

'06 Mandala Syrah
Nose - Dark wood, black plum.
Hint of resin, clove, black fruit, rhubarb, sulfur zing, lavender, cranberry. (89 pts.)

'05 Mandala Syrah
Nose - Darker, rustic McHenry-like, sandalwood.
Wonderful, zingy, rich, black plum, mandarin, some glycerin, blackberry. (93 pts.)

Four barrel samples:

'07 Alfaro Vineyard Pinot Noir
Nose - Light, gorgeous, black plum, strawberry, purple basil.
Wood spice, blackberry, rhubarb, red elderberry, some sweetness, cranberry, with allspice lingering on the finish. (92 pts.)

'07 Black Ridge Vineyard Cab/Syrah (~50/50)
Nose - Blue fruit, vanillin, pine tar.
Saturated, resiny, blackberry, blueberry, tingly. (90 pts.)

'07 Coast View Vineyard Syrah
Nose - Heady, intense, oak spice, blackberry, hint of butterscotch, vanilla cream.
Zesty, blackberry, dusty tannin, touch of spice and resin. (90 pts.)

'07 Rattlesnake Rock Syrah
Nose - Boysenberry, pine, spice, vanilla cream.
Saturated boysenberry, resin, firm dusty oak tannin, mandaring, meyer lemon zest, blackberry. Needs 3 years. (92+ pts.)

The kicker:

'03 Rattlesnake Rock Syrah
Nose - Wow! Heady elegant spice, complex rustic black fruit, vanilla cream.
Saturated, resiny, blackberry, a bit rustic, lovely, tight. This needs more age or a couple hours decanting to open up. (95 pts.)

Merlot update 9/23/08

2008-09-24T17:09:00.000-07:00

Stopped by Burt's to check on the Merlot. Did a punch down, took some measurements and had a taste. It's down to 8 brix, 3.46ph and has roughly .7% acidity.
It's all fresh fruit: blackberry, pear and rangpur lime. The acidity tastes about right. No raisiny/pruney taste and no hint of excessive tannin, which were my two worries. So far very happy...

He also opened an '07 Apricot wine. The nose is pure fresh apricot. It has a smooth glyceriny mouthfeel and features a medley of apricot, peach, pear, mandarin and lime zest. Excellent.

Merlot Harvest 9/12/08

2008-09-23T02:02:00.000-07:00

Burt and I spent about 6 hours, joined by Patrick for about 3 hours, in the blazing sun on an incredibly steep slope picking overripe Merlot at a home vineyard in Saratoga. Most of the clusters were rejected out of hand. The fairly good ones we had to pluck off raisinated and bird pecked grapes before putting them in the bucket. It was often difficult to find flat spots within reach to put the buckets. When the buckets were full we had to carry them way way down to the road at the bottom of the steep hill. Very exhausting. The state of the grapes alone meant it took several times as long to harvest, for what we got.

The crush was straight-forward. Burt's manually operated crusher/destemmer works quickly. Our estimate is this will result in an optimistic 6 cases.

Ridge Fall Release Tasting 9/6/08

2008-09-23T01:37:00.000-07:00

Note that this was a very hot day and the wines were served rather warm! Grrr!

'05 Chardonnay "Home Ranch"
Nose - rich, brown spice, tropical fruit.
Soft toasty oak, citric zing, complex, complete, notes of various stone fruit, good minerality, lingering spice. (93 pts.)

'06 Lytton Springs (16% Petite Sirah, 4% carignane)
Nose - warm red fruit, a little hot. The Zin and Carig really show. Hint of fudge, raspberry.
A touch of heat, zest, chalky mineral, roasted plum, boysenberry, dusty tannin, smoke. Needs time. (90+ pts.)

'06 York Creek (1% Petite Sirah)
Nose - warm dark berries, some plum.
Clean black fruit, grapefruit, grippy tannin. Seems well rounded, but served too warm! (89+ pts.)

'06 Pagani (7% Alicante Bouschet, 3% Petite Sirah)
Nose - pure purple fruit, hints of ethyl.
Draper oak, boysenberry, blueberry, orange, tart finish. (90 pts.)

'05 Monte Bello (70% Cabernet Sauvignon, 22% Merlot, 6% Petite Verdot, 2% Cabernet Franc)
Signature Monte Bello nose, with boysenberry, blueberry, Petite Verdot.
Smooth blue fruit. Sneak attack from dusty/gritty tannin. Tart and gritty on the finish with a complex spiciness. Seems very closed. (In March this was very fruit forward and showed incredible complexity.) I'd give it 5-7 years for the tannins to settle down, and wait 30 years for it to peak. (95 pts.)

Plum update 9/8/08

2008-09-23T01:27:00.000-07:00

We strained the fermented plum wine and transferred it to carboys. The aroma was enticing - the signature plum, plus a prominent Beaujolais Nouveau character.

Ridge/Woodside/GBH - 8/30/08

2008-09-04T10:45:00.000-07:00

Excited by the release of the new Woodside Vineyards Pinot, I organized this tour around one of their open house dates. My friend Dave Tong was able to get us an appointment at Great Blue Heron Vineyard (also in Woodside) - something I was curious to try.

We met up at Ridge for their "Taste of Monte Bello" themed tasting. I inferred that this would be a tasting of 5 or more estate wines and include the '05 Monte Bello. Nope. The $10 fee for non-members was for just 3 estate wines, no Monte Bello. There were also 2 free non-themed wines. As most of our group had already tried these wines, it was a bit disappointing. But the wines are good, our pourer was fun, and we had a good time.

I did learn the "Estate" now tacked onto some of the SCM wines does mean something, and isn't just some arbitrary change. I knew the SCM wines were all from grapes grown on the Monte Bello ridge, but not all the vineyards are owned by Ridge. The "Estate" wines are from 100% Ridge owned vineyards.

'06 Chardonnay SCM Estate
Nose - a bit tight, warm minerally pear, apple, lemon.
Tingly, zippy, lots of mineral, soft zest, mucho pear, tropical notes. (91 pts.)

'05 SCM Estate (58% C.S., 43% Merlot)
Nose - blackberry with minerally Merlot character.
Tight, grippy, signature Monte Bello, Merlot dominant, dusty, some char. (90+ pts.)

'02 Home Ranch (50% C.S., 48% Merlot, 2% Petite Verdot)
Nose - boysenberry, earthy.
Very tight, grippy, closed, dusty, needs to open up, blackberry, char. As it opens, there's cassis, some P.V. flair and a MB signature. (91+ pts)
Note: When we had this with our picnic up there in March, they insisted on decanting it for us and it was much more open.

'02 Syrah Lytton Estate (21% Grenache, 3% Carignane)
Nose - dark, with blackberry, char and mandarin.
Firm mineral structure, blackberry, red plum, sandalwood. (88 pts)

'02 Syrah II Lytton Estate (22% Grenache, 2% Viognier)
Less giving nose.
Rounder, softer, tarter, smooth dusty tannin, blackberry with peach and vanilla, some char, violets. Grippy mouthfeel, but heavenly essence. (92 pts.)

Woodside Vineyard featured 4 new releases, plus their spring release King's and the sparkler. These are all from Woodside fruit.

'97 Estate Sparkling Wine (50/50 Pinot Noir/Chardonnay)
Yeasty, lemony, tangy, musty, with the slightest wisp of rancidity. (83 pts.)

'06 Chardonnay
Nose - mellow lemon, mesquite smoke, meaty.
Signature SCM Chard fruit, meaty, round, good acidity. Nice. Ready. (88 pts.)

'05 Pinot noir
Gorgeous nose - rich, intense, a plethora of black and red fruit, light florality, rustic.
Complex array of roasted fruit, lingering touch of rhubarb, hint of integrated sulfur, finishes with brambly berries. (94 pts.)

'05 Zinfandel Estate
Nose - warm, pasty red brambly berry and black plum.
Sweetish, sharp, tangy, touch of heat, intense brambly blackberry. (88 pts.)

'05 King's Mountain Cabernet
Nose - blackberry, cassis, violet, hints of cedar and pine.
Blackberry, orange and orange zest, fine tannin, the slightest hint of sulfur, a touch of eucalyptus. (89+ pts.)

'04 Cabernet Sauvignon Estate
Nose - blackberry, blueberry, camphor.
Prominent acid dominates olallieberry fruit, assertive dusty tannin.
The acid will always dominate, and the fruit will only fade. Good now with the right food. Don't age. (87 pts.)

Dave was only able to join us at Great Blue Heron, and he made a later visit to Woodside. See his notes: http://scmwine.blogspot.com/ These are all 100% estate grapes. The vineyard is off Portola Rd., so I drive by there regularly going to and from Chaine d'Or.

'06 Pinot Noir
Nose - white chocolate, black cherry, cardamon, sweetness.
Blackberry, raspberry, cardamon, sandalwood, cherry. Nose is strange and off putting. (80 pts.)

'07 Pinot Noir
Nose - dark, rich fruit qualities, with some red.
Black plum, red berries, some rhubarb, chalky tannin, cardamon, sandalwood. Shows a glimpse of what I love about eastside SCM PN. (86+ pts)

I should note that of our group of 7, I probably liked these the least. Most people purchased. I noticed a real Cinsault-like quality to these wines and some in our group are big fans of Ch. Musar and southern Rhones.

Fruit wine

2008-08-28T19:37:00.000-07:00

My friend Burt Endsley has been making wine from fruit off of friends and families' properties for quite a while. When I got to try some a few years ago, I was impressed. It then occurred to me that he could do something better with my plums than me. I'd been drying some and making some jam. Yawn!

My plums are amazing. I don't know the variety, but they turn almost black when fully ripe and are delicious. I thought they'd make a great wine. By harvest time I'd decided my cherry plums would make a good addition, as their thick skins are tart, tannic and a bit rustic. There make up about 5% of the wine, but make a significant contribution (a bit like Petite Verdot that way). Also, a good amount of plums come off the main tree at the crunchy red-ripe stage. There's no astrigency, so there's no down-side to that. It adds to the complexity.

The following spring, Burt delivered a bunch of bottles labelled "Barton Orchard '06 Plum Wine". The name stuck, and I've been using it on my jams, jellies and limoncellos, too. This plum wine turned out to be better than any commercial ones I've tried.

Winter '06/'07 I saved a bunch of juice my Meyer Lemons and Rangpur limes that he made wines with. I made limoncello and mandarincello with their zest. After that I started helping out a bit with bottling and crush.

I also helped harvest apricots from the Hesterman Estate this year. Freezing helps both plums and apricots soften up, so they'll break down better in the winemaking. Burt has started making vinis vinifera wines, so we needed to get these started, so the equipment will be free in time for harvest. Plus, we both needed the space in our freezers back. So, today was the day...

No pruning this year, so my biggest harvest yet, netting 151 lbs. of cleaned up, stone-free fruit. That translated to about 18 gallons of "crushed" fruit, which after sugar and water additions, turned into 25 gallons at 25 brix. (Wine grapes are harvested insanely sweet, a world apart from table grapes or plums.) We also got 15 gallons of apricot at 25 brix.

Let's see if I can post some pics:

Bottling 8/27

2008-08-28T17:03:00.000-07:00

I've done small scale bottling with Burt before, with a siphon and hand operated corker, but this was very different...

Paul and Stef invited a bunch of their friends to help out on the industrial scale, up at Chaine d'Or. There were at least 10 of us in addition to the crew of 3 that came with the bottling truck. There were 3 different Cabernet Sauvignon's to be bottling, totaling about 400 cases. Inside the winery, Paul and Ingrid combined the barrels into a tank. From there, it got pumped to the truck.

The production line: A forklift holds a pallet of cases of empty bottles up to the level of the truck bed, on the left side. The bottles are in upside-down, so Millie would take the case, hold onto two flaps, flip it over, and deftly release the bottles. 400 times. The empty boxes go on an over head rack for the people on the back end to grab. The bottles are then taken onto a system of conveyor belts and diversionary loops. The bottles are filled by an automated system, then taken down to the corker, then to the capsule-o-matic at the u-turn. On the way back they are squeezed by the label thingamabopper, where the edge of a label catches onto a bottle which rotates until the label is on, then released. They then travel down to where two people reload the boxes. The full cases the go through an automatic taper doohickey and down coasters where they are stamped, labeled, then carried over to a pallet. Full pallets get wrapped up and labeled - ready to be trucked to storage.

The truck's crew watch to make sure everything is running right, slowing or stopping the line if there's an issue, making adjustments, helping with quality control, etc.

The first batch was the Chaine d'Or. I was at the bottom end, stamping cases and loading the pallet. It seemed to go smoothly, though I heard later our two people at the capsulator had a heck of a time, as it had a significant failure rate and they had to pull those off the line, remove the bad capsules and put them through again.

Lucky, the Stefania wines don't get capsules. Luckily, as in that freed up 2 people to help out with the looming disaster...

The second wine was the Stefania Uvas Creek Cab. I was again at the bottom end, with just me stamping and labeling and Jerry loading pallets, with a couple more people set to rejoin when they finished their tasks of the moment. It started fairly slow. Adjustments were being made and I didn't know what. After maybe 10 or 12 cases the line stopped. The labels weren't coming off the coil regularly. Paul asked a couple of us to go to that side of the truck to pull label-less bottles to be put through again. When the line started again, hardly any were getting labels. Now I'm reaching over machinery to grab these bottles and there's very little room to put them. The other person had to grab those and put them about 6' up the line. The line was quickly stopped again. I Love Lucy.

I've never seen Paul mad before. The crew guy basically told him that since the problem wasn't theirs, but the labels (the printer screwed up) they might as well pack it up and come back another time! Or they could leave a logistical nightmare of 110 cases of unlabeled wine. No way! Everything is set up, friends took a day off work, etc. etc. We are doing this today! The crew didn't seem too happy, but the line started again, though with many stops and adjustments. We had 2 people inside the u-turn manually labeling. I had to get stern a couple times because I'd have my hands full with up to 6 bottles and no place to put them. There was a shelf at the loading area where they could put the ones I missed, but that filled up quickly and the line would have to be stopped. I needed the little surface cleared as fast as I was loading it.

After a bit, 3 more were able to join us. The was a deck out the side entrance. We ended up with two people sitting and labeling, I was snagging, one person was putting bottles back on the line and the other passing some down. We worked out a circular pattern, so we wouldn't get in each other's way. Finished bottles were put at my feet, so I could put them up when the line stopped or a group were coming through labeled. Stef joined in, labeling down at the packing station, and some of the time one of the crew was able to snag on the inside. So, with the line at full speed, two of us maxxed out snagging, five labeling and two others moving bottles, we had success. And those crew guys had their morale back.

With the third wine, the SCM Cab, we were ready and primed. But the labeler was working. Emory and I stayed at our station just in case...

Case. After a bit a few were missing. No biggie, just needed to be put through again. Later on the failure rate increased a bit, but nowhere near before. Master labeler Tracy rejoined us. The situation was in hand.

Good thing we were "overstaffed". One person fewer and that second batch would've taken lots longer. Several fewer may have added hours. Excellent save!

Verjus experiment

2008-08-27T20:17:00.000-07:00

Came home from the La Honda tasting a picked my vitis californica (California Native Grape) at the point of veraison, more or less. Some of the grapes were wall past it and some were quite green. Crushed in a food mill. There's just a couple quarts in the fridge, letting the solids settle out. I'm thinking, since it's a small amount, of freezing it in icecube trays to save in a ziplock until use. Bottling I'd have to worry about fermantation and spoilage. Plus it doesn't keep long after opening, so small "units" are preferable.

La Honda Winery 8/26

2008-08-27T18:48:00.000-07:00

My friend Dave Tong invited me to join him in his appointment at this "new" winery. Dave blogs about local wines at http://scmwine.blogspot.com/ and has built up a database of local wineries and vineyards (http://scmwine.wikispaces.com/), to which I contribute a very small amount.

They also have a sister business, doing vineyard management for 25 vineyards, all on the eastern side of the mountains. They are located in an industrial area of Redwood City and have actually been there quite a while. What's new is they have begun participating in public events and placing their wines in a few restaurants and retailers.

This place is huge, gorgeous, functional and state of the art. For crush, they actually drive the truck in the front door and out the back. With the layout it seems Ken Wornick was able to design his ideal winemaking facility. Ken also has his philosophy well thought out. I kept hearing him say things I've thought ideal. From pricing based on quality, to making wines to his taste, in a style that best reflects the grapes, to focusing on local customers, starting small and feeling out the market, and just plain having fun.

Only one of the current releases on their website is from the SCM, but there's a few more available at the winery and a couple more to be released this winter. Going forward, the vast majority of their wines will be local. We tasted four wines:

'06 Syrah (SCM) $19
This is entirely Los Altos Hills fruit, mostly from the Quarter Moon Vyd. (Apparently it's very common for LAH vyds. to be on extremely sleep slopes.) 13.2% alc.
The nose is shy with rich dark fruit, a hint of vanilla and a savory character. This is brambly, meaty, smoky, with black lum, blackberry and mandarin zest. Excellent.

'06 Pinot Noir (SCM) "Black Capsule" $34
This is a blend from 4 vineyards, from Los Altos Hills to Woodside.
Nose has a rich McHenry-esque earthy character, dark fruit and some sweetish red plum. This has tight, grippy tannin and grapefruit zest dominatingthe smoky, brambly blackberry that's in the background at this point.
I got to take this bottle home. 28 hours later the black fruit is showing better. The is a good structure of dusty tannin and acid. There's still a lot of zest, a lot of extraction is showing, but now there's char, tobacco, rosemary and violets. (A bit of this appeared at 4 hours, but not so well, and there was a prominent pine resin and astrigency.)
I got the impression they picked this a little later than they'd like and are a little uncomfortable with it. My uncertainty is gone. This is a good wine, needs several years or a lot of air to show it's best. Pick a little earlier and this can be right up the with Woodside and Mount Eden, as a great dark fruited east-side Pinot.

'06 Cabernet Sauvignon (Chalone) "Naylor's Dry Hole" $26
Nose shows warm, rich Cab fruit, a hint of red clay, and maybe a little VA.
Smooth redder fruit, mouth watering, very fine dusty tannin, clove, some blackberry and black plum. I liked it (and think that's a fair price), but wasn't thrilled the way Dave was.
Maybe I'm jaded. My benchmark for the Chalone red clay character was the '95 Graff Mourvedre. There was a pretty good intensity to the best Pinots I've had from this region, too. I suspect the '07 version of this will have darker fruit and call louder to me.

'05 Viognier (Napa Valley) "3.8% residual sugar"
Nose is grassy, with white peach, very tight.
Wow! An explosion of sweet peach, vanilla and apricot. Very intense. Hints of tangerine and zest on the finish.

Sarah's Vineyard 8/21 @ Vino Locale

2008-08-27T18:34:00.000-07:00

This estate is located just inland of the southern part of the Santa Cruz Mountains (as is the nearby Besson Vyd, where the source many of the grapes). Originally planted in 1978 and expanded in 1989. This winery has long had the reputation as on of the best in the Santa Clara Valley.

'06 Roussanne Estate (SCV) - Nose of lemon, peach and rich brown spice. Oaky frame, flabby round fruit, mostly white peach. I liked the fruit. My thoughts were if they picked maybe a quarter of it earlier, and did that portion in stainless with no malo, this would have been great.

'06 Chard Estate (SCV) - Soft, striking nose, showing lemon curd. Nice spicy oak, lush and round, good acid. Quite good.

'05 Merlot "des Grands Hommes" (SCV) - Nose is warm, rich, a bit minty, pine, custard. Rich, lush, rustic, showing some green peppercorn. This is an excellent expression of Merlot.

'04 Syrah "Besson Vyd." (SCV) - Nose is piney with olallieberry. Sharp blackberry, tangerine,black currant, sandalwood, rosemary, cassis, fresh peas, rosehips, lavender. I like. Could maybe use another year or two.