Posts Tagged ‘Cellars of Sonoma’

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Four bottles (2 California Pinot Noirs), one Series 7 exam and making the writing thing more disciplined with NaNoWriMo

November 6, 2011

The Negress has been in the midst of a whirlwind of food poisoning, medication titration, power knitting, yarn shopping, concert going (which led to booty shaking) and some more career whipsawing. There’s been a little time for wine and since she wants to get these empties out of the house, she’ll start there. Ordinarily, the Negress had been avoiding California Pinot Noir for a while since, post-Sideways, many producers got into the Pinot business as though delivering a delicious version of this persnickety grape required the same skill that it takes to make Kool Aid. The Golden State was awash in oceans of indifferent Pinot. It made the Negress want to smack Paul Giamatti in the mouth even though it was not his fault at all. However, thanks to her ongoing association with the Cellars of Sonoma wine club, she was able to quaff a pair of fabulous Pinots recently. The first was 2008 TR Elliott Three Plumes Pinot Noir (abv 14.6%) from the Russian River Valley. Winemaker Teddy Elliott put together five barrels from his Hallberg Vineyard and one barrel from the O’Connell Vineyard. The best Pinot Noirs whisper and the really good ones whisper dirty little nothings to your palate. Three Plumes is one of the good ones and, at $42, is a lovely special occasion wine that doesn’t require a credit default swap.

Johnny Oduya, one of my hockey future ex-husbands, now with the Winnipeg Jets

Johnny Oduya, on the hockey part of the future ex-husband list and my NaNoWriMo inspiration

Before moving on to next Pinot, this is a good spot to announce that I failed the Series 7 securities license exam by 4 points. This ended my pre-employment journey with an excellent financial services company, but it also put me on the road to somewhere very different. More about that as it develops.

You should love the James Family Cellars 2008 Stony Point Vineyard Pinot Noir ($35 but some discounted supplies remain, 13.8% abv) as well. This is a richer Pinot that will likely be enjoyed by those who like big fruit wines. Normally, when Pinot Noir gets artificially engorged by crafty vinification, things can get ugly. The James Family, who should not be mocked for using the words “world-class” and “artisanal” on their labels, walked a tightrope here and landed gracefully.

One of the better-kept secrets among wineaux is the loveliness of Merlots from the North Fork of Long Island. Much of that region suffers a bit from economies of scale — in short, most of the wine is pricier than its quality merits. But exceptions should be made for just about all the Merlots I’ve tried. My favorite is the Bedell Cellars Reserve Merlot. The 2006 vintage (13% abv, only available in minute quantities through the wine club) benefited from it being a warm year. This wine is ripe without being overblown. Think Lena Olin, not Anna Nicole Smith.

The Negress also lucked onto a surprising wine at her local WineStyles (small national chain of wine stores; some of which do online shipping).  The 2009 Finca La Linda Bonarda (14.3% abv) was going for $10 a bottle at last count. This one hails from the Mendoza region of Argentina. Bonarda is a bit like the Petit Verdot of Argentina. It rarely shows up alone. Too bad. This one is a little figgy with some red fruit. It went well with some spicy foods and drank well without food, although the Negress avoids doing that lately.

The blog has been quite of late, and it will remain so for the rest of this month. The Negress has thrown her lot in with the folks at National Novel Writing Month aka NaNoWriMo, so she’s hoping to have a 65,000 word draft for a memoir by Thanksgiving. She and the members of the ChiWriMo region are busy when they aren’t knitting. Stay tuned.

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2008 Bonneau Petit Sirah, 2006 Silverado Merlot, 2006 Fantesca Cabernet Sauvignon and 2007 Krutz Family Cellars Stagecoah Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon

May 20, 2011

The Negress lined up these four wines because she wanted to share a few thoughts about them before she completely forgot she had drunk them. This is how you can tell she writes drinking notes, not tasting notes.  Most these wines met their end when she cooked a Rick Bayless tomatillo salsa verde braised pork loin so note the pairing for those of you who note such things. Anyway, She was charmed by all of the wines for different reasons. First the 2008 Bonneau Petit Sirah is a big but graceful wine that doesn’t pitch off the cliff into jamminess. As is usually the case, you won’t easily find this outside of California but a quick click over to Cellars of Sonoma (full disclosure: I belong to their club) can remedy that.  The Silverado 2006 Merlot is also a club-only wine with a little being sold direct at the winery. The Negress is ferociously partial to the North Fork Merlots and usually finds their Cali counterparts to be blanketed with fleecy tannins and very little structure. Well, not this Merlot. It’s got structure, some blackberry and is, well, a bright and happy wine.

The Negress is nursing shoulder injury (not sure what it is but it seems to be improving thanks). She might have gotten it lifting the Fantesca bottle. The bottle feels full even when it’s empty. Perhaps this weightiness is a good match for a Spring Mountain Napa Cabernet, but methinks it just adds to the price. The Negress brought this wine back from a Wine Writers Symposium a coupe of years ago. A little more bottle age seems to have been OK, but the Negress felt this wine was just OK. She loves some of the wines from the Spring Mountain AVA and expected to love this one. Place it under the usual suspects category.

Lastly, the 2007 Krutz Family Cellars Stagecoach Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon is a bottle from the winery’s limited edition artist’s series. The Negress got hers from Cellars of Sonoma, and it made sense why they would feature this Napa cab in their club. The wine was supple, nimble and exciting with nice but not engorged fruit. Not sure how much of this is left, but it ‘s worth seeking out.

All of these wines weigh in at between 14.5 and 14.8 percent alcohol bu volume. As has often been said, 14 is the new 12.

Not long after you read this, the Negress is heading off to the National Restaurant Association show here in Chicago. You can follow her doings there over at FoodserviceDailyNews on their Twitter feed @FoodTalkToday.

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The annual Thanksgiving Zinfandel blog post

November 22, 2010

At Thanksgiving thoughts turn to Zinfandel. You’ve read all the dead-tree media stories about serving this American wine with the most American of meals. Well, as is usually the case with any American legend, some pertinent facts have been omitted. First of all, like the Pilgrims, Zinfandel is an immigrant to these bounteous shores. It’s pretty much the same as the Primitivo grape from Italy. In Italy, there are something like 500 varietals that someone somewhere is making wine from. So you can see why Primitivo emigrated and changed its name, by passing Ellis Island for California and various other parts of the country. Frankly, the Negress loves Zinfandel though she

Two Dry Creek Zinfandels we love

The blog research aftermath

does finds some of the overly alcoholic ones don’t go well with food, but they do pair nicely with achieving a comatose state. She’s also not sure that with the bewildering flavors of Thanksgiving that Zin is the best wine to serve on that day. However, she recently tasted a pair of Zins that might fit the profile for a Thanksgiving wine better than most. All of the information about them is available at Cellars of Sonoma, which is where I got them in the first place. The two things that the 2007 Bonneau Dry Creek Valley Zinfandel ($26) and the 2008 James Family Cellars Dry Creek Mounts Vineyards Zinfandel ($30) have in common is a relatively low ABV (14.1 each) and the Dry Creek Valley location. The Bonneau is robust, with some nice black fruit and a light, plum scent and shouldn’t overwhelm food even some of the Thanksgiving heavy hitters (thanks a recent “Glee” episode, the Negress is thinking about adding Tots to her menu). The James Family is young and is almost transparent. The Negress suspects she could have cellared it a little longer, since it drank with a decided lack of heft. There was also more red fruit on the palate and a very short finish. This wine will get better but it’s drinkable now.

The Negress does wish to recommend Life’s A Cabernet, a Wicker Park wine store with some lovely value wines and a slightly crazy proprietor. The store supplied the wines for a Thai food cooking class at Naveen’s, a catering and cooking class establishment about three blocks from the store. Naveen is a recovering engineerer who gave up the life of startups and burn rates to cook full-time. He prepared with the help of several MIT and CalTech alums, chicken and vegetarian Thai springs, Thai vegetarian and ground chicken stir fries. The evening opened with Chateau Renni demi-sec cava ($18.99) followed by Castro Reggio white blend that was 80 percent palomino($14.99). The light musk went well with the spice and heat of the food.  Lastly, Casamatta ($14.99), a blend of Nebbolio and Sangiovese was poured to go with the chicken. The Casamatta was a hit with good body but not so much tannin as to club the chicken into submission. Also, thanks to Julie for pouring me that 6.

The Negress is roasting a chicken for Turkey Day and is planning to put sausage in a lot of stuff by way of accompaniment. Have a great Turkey Day and don’t forget to think outside the Zin.

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The wines that followed me home. I’m going to keep them.

July 24, 2010

While taking time to walk part of the Napa to Sonoma half marathon,  the Negress amassed wine for shipping back to the boiling East. She ate at Cyrus (much more about that later) and went to some places she doesn’t usually go and discovered one-stop shopping for some less prominent but delicious vintners. She mentioned Cellars of Sonoma in a previous post. Some 11 bottles of wine — from Bonneau, Gann Family Cellars and a few other spots are finding their way to the usual undisclosed location from this store in Santa Rosa. They recently hosted winemaker Heidi Barrett (La Sirena Syrah) for one of their weekly live video streams. The Negress also ran into fellow wine blogger Mike Madigan (read his blog here and it’s being added to the newly trimmed and update blogroll) at Cellars and pouring at St. Francis. She capped her stay in wine country by touring the caves at Schramsberg and buying and shipping back some more bubbly. With the candles and bottles, the tasting was amazing but the Negress is doing a little test.

Where bubbly goes to live and die

Occasionally some of these explode. Inside Schramsberg's caves.

Rather than make notes during this tour and tasting (she got some vintage bubbly at Gloria Ferrer too), she’ll do all that when she opens the wines in the future near or far. Frankly, a lot of wine tastes glorious on a sunny terrace relaxing with friends. But once you’re back home with some usual and unusual stressors, how does the wine hold up? The Negress isn’t too worried about the wines she bought (she is of the mind that there is little wrong with Petit Sirah) but it will be interesting.

Also, it’s appropriate to add here that while she took advantage of trade discounts and courtesies at various places, the Negress took no samples. Part of her travel was paid for by CCFA Team Challenge (or some of it will be. Stay tuned. The DC chapter has to meet its fund-raising goal by Sept. 1 and we need some serious help). No junketing or sampling here. To be blunt, she thinks not paying for wine makes you too forgiving in your assessments. The Negress is well aware she doesn’t fit in with the prevailing winds in wine blogging, but she was raised a print journalist and like to hold on to some shred of that dignity.

Also, with the Tour de France ending tomorrow, bring out the bubbly, no? With Contador’s victory all but certain, it would have been nice to have some cava on hand, but Lamarca  Prosecco di Conegliano Valdobbiadene NV will do the trick.

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