Rarely do wine enthusiasts have a summertime page-turner. There was Sideways, of course, the Pinot-drenched novel by Rex Pickett that became a blockbuster movie, but that hit bookstores nearly ten years ago. Over the past decade, many writers have tried to replicate the success of Sideways with wine-inspired fiction. But
“Happy the man who has been able to learn the causes of things.” Virgil, Georgics (c. 29 BC), II, 490 I have tasted slate. It was on a glittering fall day in 2010, high above the Mosel River in the Juffer Sonnenuhr vineyard. My guide: a representative from Riesling producer Schloss
I first discovered wine at the tender age of nineteen on a trip to Italy -- ostensibly to learn how to sing. I spent that summer learning more about Umbrian and Tuscan reds than I did about singing and have been spoiled rotten ever since. It is a terrible thing
Robert was a visitor to the Napa Valley who was so interested in the region’s wine that he wrote about it in detail. And no, his last name wasn’t Parker. Long before the rise of modern wine writing, Robert Louis Stevenson brought a connoisseur’s eye to California’s nascent wine industry
Oregon's relative lack of Chardonnay is downright weird. And in Portland, rare and weird is good. So you know where this is going. Some of the most exciting wines being made in Oregon today are Chardonnays. These are not your grandma's butter bombs; they're taut, lean wines with terrific mouthfeel.
The nose is rich, with coffee, dark chocolate, smoked meat, tobacco leaf, and blueberries. Upon opening it is lush and sweet, with big blueberry and chocolate flavors. With a couple of hours, though, it seems to move from Barossa to the northern Rhone, showing blackberries, smoked meat, coffee, and olives.
Not a super-young wine, probably at its peak now, it has the distinction of being a Napa Valley red with only 13.7% alcohol: nicely restrained level. And nicely touched up with oak that is barely there – refreshing in a wine from this area (which unfortunately does affect the pricing).
If you find a bottle of this wine lingering in a wine shop, buy it. According to my sources, it averages around $15 – if you can find it. This is a very good red wine made with Bordeaux varieties of grapes, and it won’t get any better so drink