1991 Lytton Lytton (Lytton Spings black label) Zinfandel. Wow! This wine hasn't exactly been stored in pristine conditions, but I'm not sure it was ready yet. Oh well. It's gone now. Packed full of black raspberry fruit and spice, still plenty of tannins left, not to mention lovely racy acidity. It was a powerful match for a grilled wagyu skirt steak dusted with pimentón dulce.
(Yes, I know I've neglected this blog badly. I'll try to do better.)
Thursday, November 4, 2004
I have nightmares like this.
Wednesday, November 03, 2004
In a tale sure to break the hearts of oenophiles everywhere, thieves stole an expensive wine collection and sold some bottles to a convenience store for $300 and cigarettes, the San Francisco Examiner reports.
San Francisco police say convicted drug dealer Sterling Gerard, 36, and one or more accomplices broke into attorney Adam Belsky's house while it was being renovated this past August.
Cops say Gerard happened upon the basement wine cellar, propped open its door with a bottle and walked out with 250 other bottles -- mostly top Italian and French vintages -- worth a total of $20,000.
Police found Gerard's fingerprint on the bottle left behind and charged him with burglary late last month.
At a nearby deli, cops discovered 52 of Belsky's bottles nestled among the chocolate bars.
The store owner said he'd given $300 in cash and a few cartons of cigarettes for the bottles to a man other than Gerard, who told him it was his recently deceased mother's collection.
Unfortunately, several of the recovered bottles may have been ruined by improper storage in the deli. Still missing are the other 198 bottles.
"These guys were idiots," Belsky told the newspaper. "It's devastating and frustrating because they didn't know what they were taking, but it meant a lot to me."
Belsky's insurance will cover the monetary damages. He's trying to come to grips with the sentimental loss.
Gone for good may be the $500 bottle of 2000 Chateau Lafite Rothschild Bordeaux that he'd bought at his son's birth. He'd planned to open it on the boy's 21st birthday.
Also probably lost is a $100 bottle of 1997 Altesino Brunello Montalcino Di Montosoli that Belsky and his wife bought in Italy.
The SFPD couldn't prove the store owner knew he was buying stolen property, but the state Department of Alcohol Beverage Control may slap him with buying wine from an unlicensed seller.
Sunday, July 25, 2004
Oy! It's changed again. I actually do have a whole bunch of new stuff to post on, but I'm just dropping in right now to say that I'm still tasting, please stay tuned, and also to see if I still know how to work this thing 'cause I heard that they screwed with it yet again. Okay, I'll be back shortly....
Monday, June 14, 2004
Have I mentioned that Ruffino has released a Grappa of its Chianti Classico Riserva Ducale Oro? No? Ooops. Well, finding decent Grappa in my neck of the woods is pretty tough. I was never a Grappa fan, in fact I was quite the opposite until I tried a few of them over in Italy and realized that the tough, astringent, cleaning fluid taste-a-likes I'd had here weren't even poor excuses for the real thing. Since then, I've made it a point to search out anything approximating that thing. The Ruffino, which I found, amazingly enough, in the Pennsylvania State Store, is definitely in the right ballpark. Of course, it's no longer available on the shelves and the special order stock will probably be gone soon. Thankfully, no one reads this blog, so we may have one more shot. We're plowing through our last 6 (375 ml) bottles pretty fast.
Oh, and, in the revised assessment category, BTW, back in February, it seems I said of the 1998 Calera Chardonnay that it was "way short of showing its best stuff yet." That comment was based in large part upon my past experience with other vintages of this wine but was, unfortunately, wrong. The '98 is already showing serious signs of decay. That's a huge bummer, although the good news is that the wine was so good young that I have very little left. I hope this is a foible of the vintage and doesn't reflect a change in Calera's winemaking style, which has always, in the past, produced delicious, long-lived Chardonnays that far outstripped anything else at their price point. Stay tuned.
Oh, and, in the revised assessment category, BTW, back in February, it seems I said of the 1998 Calera Chardonnay that it was "way short of showing its best stuff yet." That comment was based in large part upon my past experience with other vintages of this wine but was, unfortunately, wrong. The '98 is already showing serious signs of decay. That's a huge bummer, although the good news is that the wine was so good young that I have very little left. I hope this is a foible of the vintage and doesn't reflect a change in Calera's winemaking style, which has always, in the past, produced delicious, long-lived Chardonnays that far outstripped anything else at their price point. Stay tuned.
Saturday, May 29, 2004
Once again, Blogger has changed formats. If I could get my act together to post here more often, I'd go elsewhere. But until then, ah well. Here I am.
So while I'm here, singing the blues about Blogger (but hmmm, this new format actually seems pretty ok), I'll mention, again, the amazing consistency and quality of one of my very favorite California Cabernets. Philip Togni 1991 Cabernet with buffalo tenderloin tonight, partly because I've been noticing some fatigue on a number of '91s I've been opening lately. No danger of that here. In fact, I suspect it's not quite come into its own yet. Yummy.
(Since I'm in gripe mode, though, a word on the insidious influence of restaurant hegemony in today's world of food and wine. First it was true prime beef. No longer available to you and me, it's been reclassified to hide the dirty deed and what you now see on supermarket shelves labeled "prime" is what our mothers bought under the label "choice." The good stuff goes to the restaurants. Same with the better wines, as you probably already know if you're interested enough in wine to be reading this blog. So now the plague has spread to fish (the incredibly delicious pacific black cod a/k/a sable, which I used to enjoy weekly, is now reserved for restaurants, so sorry) and game (the better cuts of eland, buffalo and venison are becoming increasingly hard to come by). Next to go: fresh vegetables, such as they are. Yeah, well. . . )
And while I'm on the subject of surprises, Michele Chiarlo is a producer that gets little glory, but I stumbled upon the Barbera d'Asti La Court last year, and have been picking up what I can of it because, frankly, I love Piedmont wines but don't love paying the rapidly escalating prices for them. Right now, I'm finding the 1998 more available and very ready to drink, so if the '99 had a bit more nuance, I don't really miss it. For some reason, I seem to be finding the Barberas from Asti more interesting than those from Alba recently. And I've been finding them at better prices, generally, so there you go.
Everything from Europe is going up dramatically, so if you're looking to stock up, try to find stuff that was imported last year. The dollar/euro thing is just putting too many affordable wines out of reasonable reach. So, in the meantime, if the folks out in California don't get too greedy and figure they can get a free price hike out of the situation, westward ho, I say.
So while I'm here, singing the blues about Blogger (but hmmm, this new format actually seems pretty ok), I'll mention, again, the amazing consistency and quality of one of my very favorite California Cabernets. Philip Togni 1991 Cabernet with buffalo tenderloin tonight, partly because I've been noticing some fatigue on a number of '91s I've been opening lately. No danger of that here. In fact, I suspect it's not quite come into its own yet. Yummy.
(Since I'm in gripe mode, though, a word on the insidious influence of restaurant hegemony in today's world of food and wine. First it was true prime beef. No longer available to you and me, it's been reclassified to hide the dirty deed and what you now see on supermarket shelves labeled "prime" is what our mothers bought under the label "choice." The good stuff goes to the restaurants. Same with the better wines, as you probably already know if you're interested enough in wine to be reading this blog. So now the plague has spread to fish (the incredibly delicious pacific black cod a/k/a sable, which I used to enjoy weekly, is now reserved for restaurants, so sorry) and game (the better cuts of eland, buffalo and venison are becoming increasingly hard to come by). Next to go: fresh vegetables, such as they are. Yeah, well. . . )
And while I'm on the subject of surprises, Michele Chiarlo is a producer that gets little glory, but I stumbled upon the Barbera d'Asti La Court last year, and have been picking up what I can of it because, frankly, I love Piedmont wines but don't love paying the rapidly escalating prices for them. Right now, I'm finding the 1998 more available and very ready to drink, so if the '99 had a bit more nuance, I don't really miss it. For some reason, I seem to be finding the Barberas from Asti more interesting than those from Alba recently. And I've been finding them at better prices, generally, so there you go.
Everything from Europe is going up dramatically, so if you're looking to stock up, try to find stuff that was imported last year. The dollar/euro thing is just putting too many affordable wines out of reasonable reach. So, in the meantime, if the folks out in California don't get too greedy and figure they can get a free price hike out of the situation, westward ho, I say.
Tuesday, April 20, 2004
Unfortunately, I haven't been able to find much time for wine blogging lately, though, fortunately, the same can't be said of wine drinking. Unfortunately, there haven't been a whole lot of memorable bottles to post about. Fortunately, there have been one or two.
Once upon a time I bought at least a few bottles of Silver Oak Alexander Valley Cabernet every year and, when I could find it, a bottle or two of the Napa, as well. On trips out to the winery, I even managed to score a few of the now-defunct Bonny's Vineyard. Then they started getting snooty with their pricing and there were just too many better bottles out there for less money, so there went another vertical. I can't say that I'm too sorry, either, because as luscious as these wines have always been on release, too many of them haven't aged as well as I would have expected. Once the primary fruit subsides, it seems there's not a whole lot there other than that dill-scented American oak which, while it's a great accompaniment to fruit, just doesn't play well as a solo. My last purchase of the Napa, though, was the '92, which also happened to be first year that the Bonny's was added to the Napa blend. So far from a disappointment, this wine just blew me away. The fruit was still there, still ripe but developed and well balanced with the oak and what remains of the tannins. Unfortunately (back to that again), I took no notes and now can't even remember what we had to eat with it. It's been sitting on the buffet as a reminder to blog it for several weeks now while its memory has faded to little more than a determination to open another one soon while I know the getting's good.
My other pleasant surprise (and now for something completely different) was a 1980 Robert Ampeau Meursault Perrieres. As much as I've heard about the legendary longevity of Ampeau's whites, I really expected this bottle to be little more than drain-o by now, especially as it had spent some years in less than ideal cellar conditions. Not only wasn't it shot, it was truly lovely, with elegant fruit and a sort of grace about it that commanded . . . respect. Again, I have no notes to jog my memory as to the particulars but suffice it to say that I was reminded, again, of why great Burgundies are held in such high esteem. I'm certain that this bottle was not treated with the care it deserved and yet, more than 23 years past its vintage date was showing beautifully.
Have I raved here about the Arrowood Malbec before? Yes, I see that I have. Well, it was time to try one of the '94s, and I don't know about being less massive than the '93s but, again, it's still a baby. A delicious baby, but a baby. I just love this wine and haven't been able to find it for years, so maybe it's a good thing that they're taking forever to come around. This time we tried it with a grilled flank steak marinated in chimichurri. Yeah, it was sort of an Argentinian theme. Worked, though.
Ok, one last quickie. 1995 Contino Rioja Crianza. This wine has just been consistently fabulous ever since I first bought it, so I kept going back and buying as much as I could find. Last year, I came across a batch of the '96 Reserva. The one I tried needed time to integrate. But the '95 Crianza was wonderful right out of the gate and it's never closed up or shut down since. Large, dark, smooth and supple with beautiful balance and dark, earthy fruit, it's really sort of out of its own league. This is by no means a classic Rioja. It's dressed up for the international stage. But like the '95 Artadi Vinas de Gain (which hasn't held up nearly as well, IMO), it delivers a boatload of flavor and drinking pleasure with a definite Tempranillo twist. Highly recommended.
Once upon a time I bought at least a few bottles of Silver Oak Alexander Valley Cabernet every year and, when I could find it, a bottle or two of the Napa, as well. On trips out to the winery, I even managed to score a few of the now-defunct Bonny's Vineyard. Then they started getting snooty with their pricing and there were just too many better bottles out there for less money, so there went another vertical. I can't say that I'm too sorry, either, because as luscious as these wines have always been on release, too many of them haven't aged as well as I would have expected. Once the primary fruit subsides, it seems there's not a whole lot there other than that dill-scented American oak which, while it's a great accompaniment to fruit, just doesn't play well as a solo. My last purchase of the Napa, though, was the '92, which also happened to be first year that the Bonny's was added to the Napa blend. So far from a disappointment, this wine just blew me away. The fruit was still there, still ripe but developed and well balanced with the oak and what remains of the tannins. Unfortunately (back to that again), I took no notes and now can't even remember what we had to eat with it. It's been sitting on the buffet as a reminder to blog it for several weeks now while its memory has faded to little more than a determination to open another one soon while I know the getting's good.
My other pleasant surprise (and now for something completely different) was a 1980 Robert Ampeau Meursault Perrieres. As much as I've heard about the legendary longevity of Ampeau's whites, I really expected this bottle to be little more than drain-o by now, especially as it had spent some years in less than ideal cellar conditions. Not only wasn't it shot, it was truly lovely, with elegant fruit and a sort of grace about it that commanded . . . respect. Again, I have no notes to jog my memory as to the particulars but suffice it to say that I was reminded, again, of why great Burgundies are held in such high esteem. I'm certain that this bottle was not treated with the care it deserved and yet, more than 23 years past its vintage date was showing beautifully.
Have I raved here about the Arrowood Malbec before? Yes, I see that I have. Well, it was time to try one of the '94s, and I don't know about being less massive than the '93s but, again, it's still a baby. A delicious baby, but a baby. I just love this wine and haven't been able to find it for years, so maybe it's a good thing that they're taking forever to come around. This time we tried it with a grilled flank steak marinated in chimichurri. Yeah, it was sort of an Argentinian theme. Worked, though.
Ok, one last quickie. 1995 Contino Rioja Crianza. This wine has just been consistently fabulous ever since I first bought it, so I kept going back and buying as much as I could find. Last year, I came across a batch of the '96 Reserva. The one I tried needed time to integrate. But the '95 Crianza was wonderful right out of the gate and it's never closed up or shut down since. Large, dark, smooth and supple with beautiful balance and dark, earthy fruit, it's really sort of out of its own league. This is by no means a classic Rioja. It's dressed up for the international stage. But like the '95 Artadi Vinas de Gain (which hasn't held up nearly as well, IMO), it delivers a boatload of flavor and drinking pleasure with a definite Tempranillo twist. Highly recommended.
Monday, March 8, 2004
Frescobaldi Pomino Rosso 1997. This wine has really come into its own. I started buying this stuff back in the '86 vintage and I've remained a fan ever since. It's always been a good deal, but just as I'm running out of the '97s, I'm finding a lusciousness I never noticed before. I'll be on the prowl for some '99s if they're still around. And I'll keep them a little longer.
There's not a lot of information out there on this wine, but it appears that it's mostly Sangiovese with a little Pinot Nero and a smidge of Merlot thrown in. At least that's what more recent vintages (starting with 1998) are composed of. The '97 is deep and earthy and rich, if not particularly complex. Fabulous with pasta with tomatoes and onions and kalamata olives.
Excuse me. My glass appears to be empty.
There's not a lot of information out there on this wine, but it appears that it's mostly Sangiovese with a little Pinot Nero and a smidge of Merlot thrown in. At least that's what more recent vintages (starting with 1998) are composed of. The '97 is deep and earthy and rich, if not particularly complex. Fabulous with pasta with tomatoes and onions and kalamata olives.
Excuse me. My glass appears to be empty.
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