Searching for Syrah

Lately I've been craving meaty, smoky Syrahs - the kind that remind you of bacon at Sunday brunch. It started when I first moved out here and visited a wine bar in my neighborhood where we got a glass of 2009 Emmanuel Darnaud Crozes-Hermitage Mise en Bouche, a classic Northern Rhone French Syrah. I've been looking for something similar ever since. Recently I encountered 2 that fit the bill. The first one materialized at an event we co-hosted last Friday night at the San Francisco Wine Center with Wine Gavel, an online wine auctioneer. We invited our storage clients, and someone ran down to their storage locker during the event and grabbed a bottle of this to share with everyone:

Alesia Santa Lucia Highlands Fairview Ranch Vineyard 2006

Unfortunately I didn't see the person and no one I asked could tell me who it was. But it was really delicious, and I'm glad this mystery person donated it!

Then, this week, one of the guys at work was making a delivery for a storage client and they gave him a couple bottles of wine as a thank-you. He brought them back to SFWC and shared them with us. The storage couple made the wine at Crushpad, a custom crush facility in Sonoma. I loved their 2006 Syrah "The Bailout." Really smoky and meaty with a touch of dark fruit. Full bodied, really smooth. I'm going to look into getting some of this - I hear they are looking to sell some bottles.

Both these wines are from Santa Barbara county, which I've heard is a great place for Syrah. Clearly I already have a preference for this area. Maybe I better plan a weekend trip down there.

Just in time for Memorial Day - Grilling Wines!

This week at SFWC we hosted a class on Grilling Wines. We purposely left out Cabernet Sauvignon, Zinfandel and Chardonnay so that we were forced to explore other BBQ wines. I love food and wine pairing, so this was really fun and educational. I actually found a Gruner Veltliner that I like - usually I am underwhelmed by this varietal. I discovered an awesome Italian Lagrein that was really enjoyable on its own and with each of the foods we had.

Unfortunately, the software on my Blackberry updated recently and now my camera takes really blurry pictures. They used to be so good! I don't know what happened. So the labels on these wines aren't clear but you can catch the full names on the SFWC blog.

Happy Memorial Day Weekend! Let me know if you do any interesting wine/grill pairings.

Lagrein Wine

A couple months ago there was an article in the New York Times about Lagrein, a red grape varietal from northeastern Italy. I read the article and instantly wanted to try this wine, which Eric Asimov described as "deliciously plummy, earthy and chewy, dark and full-bodied but not heavy, with a pronounced minerally edge." Shortly thereafter, I was in Napa with a couple visiting friends and we came across a Lagrein at Imagery Estate Winery. I was primed to like it, and I did. Maybe because I wanted to, because of the article. I got a bottle to take home to my boyfriend, who had sent me the article. We drank it one night with dinner, and we noticed the high alcohol. It was jammy in the California style, and I'm not sure I liked it as much as when I tasted it at the winery. The next morning we were both hungover.

This week at SFWC's Grilling Wines class, I tried one of the well-known Italian Lagrein producers, Hofstätter, and I loved their Lagrein. It was balanced, rich, spicy, and full-bodied without being heavy. The alcohol was probably around 2% lower than the California had been. It was interesting to see the new world vs. old world comparison. I admit I am getting more used to California wine, my tolerance for alcohol and tannin is getting stronger and I have found a lot to like. But in this case I prefer the old world version.











New York Times article: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/30/dining/reviews/30wine.html?_r=1&emc=eta1

Old World vs. New World

This week's class at San Francisco Wine Center was a comparison of Old World (Europe) and New World (everywhere else) wines, and I donated a sample of Hermann J. Wiemer Dry Riesling 2009 to the cause! The 2009 Dry Riesling was recently released, and I am very proud of this wine because I helped make it during my time working at Wiemer. I sorted the grapes, monitored the fermentation, racked the wine, contributed my sensory opinion in putting together the final blend from our 3 Riesling vineyard sites, filtered, bottled and labeled it. Last night, we pinned it against a German Kabinett Riesling from the Rheingau and I thought the Wiemer showed fantastically. I was excited to share this wine with the other employees at the SFWC and the students in the class.

The rest of the comparisons were interesting and intriguing:

Elegant white Burgundy led the way for creamy California Chardonnay:
Olivier Leflaive Puligny Montrachet Les Folatières 1er Cru 2009 (Cote de Beaune, Burgundy) vs. Deovlet Soloman Hills Vineyard Santa Maria Valley Chardonnay 2009 (Santa Barbara, CA)

Delicate Pinots from Burgundy and Oregon stumped many:
Erath Estate Selection Willamette Valley Pinot Noir 2008 (Oregon) vs. Domaine Jacques Prieur Beaune Champs-Pimont 1er Cru 2008 (Cote de Beaune, Burgundy)

Popular Argentine Malbec found its roots in Cahors, France:
Château du Cèdre Cahors 2007 (Cahors, Southwest France) vs. Norton Malbec Reserva 2007 (Mendoza, Argentina)

Cabernet-dominated Margaux confused the California Cab drinker:
Blason D’Issan Margaux 2007 (Bordeaux, France) vs. Meteor Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon 2007 (Napa Valley, CA)

Burgundy-land

On Monday at SFWC Mary Burnham was using the space to taste a bunch of wines that she is reviewing for Food & Wine Magazine's 2012 wine buying guide. She had tons of samples open, so she said I could taste them. After I finished work I went through the lineup. Mary was evaluating 2009 white Chablis and Burgundy with a few red Burgs at the end. There were so many to like! I tasted through the whites multiple times, trying to find my favorites.

2009 was a warm vintage in Chablis, a sub-appellation of Burgundy, so these wines are less austere and minerally than usual, but what it means is they are very ready to drink now. I liked the offerings from Domaine Billaud-Simon and Domaine Christian Moreau:

These 2 Burgundy's were awesome. It was the Latour family who transformed the now-famed Corton Charlemagne vineyard from dead Aligote and Pinot Noir vines after prohibition to the coveted Chardonnay that grows there today. The one on the right is a tank sample of Domaine Jacques Prieur. My guess is the wine hadn't been filtered and bottled in time to submit the sample, so they grabbed a tank sample for submission, and therefore it was cloudy. But how delicious it was! Creamy but tart at the same time, lots of layers and complexity.

The few reds sampled were also really awesome expressions of Burgundy. I hadn't had red Burgundy in a while, and after tasting California Pinot Noir for the last few weeks I had forgotten how much I love Burgundy. My palate remembers now, but my wallet does not.

The travesty of a wine reviewer - too many samples!
So I got to take some home :)