Cabs Bistro BYOB Wine & Dine Experience

Cabs Bistro BYOB Wine & Dine Experience

We revisited Cab's Bistro and Wine Bar in tony Glen Ellyn, Illinois, for a wine and dine experience. Ownership has changed since the early founding days when the two Dave's combined their wineshop with the adjoining wine bar and bistro. The wineshop is gone, as is the extensive and imaginative award winning winelist, but a new manifestation of Cabs Bistro and Winebar remains, downtown on Main Street just south of the commuter rail-stop.

Looking forward to a wine and dine experience, we took advantage of the BYOB policy and brought a couple of quality sippers. Bill brought from his cellar a Chateau Giscours Margaux 1998. I brought a rare special Premiere Napa bottling of Ladera Two Mountains Cabernet Sauvignon 2000.

Opening with the salad course including the Spinach Pear Walnut Salad with sliced pear, blue cheese, walnuts, raspberry white wine vinaigrette, we selected this Sonoma County blend from the winelist. 

Gundlach Bundschu Sonoma County Mountain Cuvee 2011

We met and had an enjoyable visit with producer Jeff Bundschu back in February 2005 in Chicago at the Silicon Valley Bank hosted wine producer wine tasting and networking event held at the One North Wacker restaurant.

We stopped in at the winery and vineyard during following Sonoma Valley visits. We need to schedule a tour and tasting on an upcoming Sonoma trip.  




This cuvee is a complex blend of 45% Merlot, 36% Cabernet Sauvignon, 8% Zinfandel, 3% Cabernet Franc, 3% Syrah, 3% Petit Verdot, and 2% Malbec, sourced primarily from the estate (72%), but including fruit from other local sources.

Not the least bit subtle and lacking polish, this begs for pairing with expressive food, cheese or dark chocolate. Beth liked this a lot. This was garnet colored, medium-full bodied, bold, forward black cherry, plum, and blackberry fruit with tones of smoke, black tea and hints of anise and subtle mocha on a tangy finish.

RM 88 points. 


https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=1740457

http://www.gunbun.com/


With our entrees Bill & Beth enjoyed the food and wine pairing that matched the Margaux with the daily special beef bourgnogne with garlic mashed. I had the Seared Maple Leaf Farms Raised Breast of Duck with potato melange, red cabbage and grilled asparagus in a delicious sweet red berry wine sauce that paired perfectly with the Ladera.

Linda enjoyed the Scottish Salmon on wild rice, saying it was as good a Salmon entree as any she remembers.

Afterwards we matched both wines with the creme brulee (on a layer of dark chocolate) and the Flourless Dark Chocolate Cake.

Chateau Giscours Margaux 1998

True to its heritage, the Giscours exhibited classic Bordeaux nuances of floral, subtle earth and leather on a core of black berry fruits - dark inky blackish colored, medium bodied, smooth, polished and complex, turning to a lingering tongue coating powder dry soft silky tannin layer that filled the mouth with a berry-floral tone that lingered for minutes on the finish. No signs of diminution in this sixteen year old.

RM 91 points.

Bill's Cellartracker notes - "Dark inky color. Quite surprising for a 16 year old. Only when side by side with a 2000 Napa Cab did the color difference become evident. Typical Margaux floral nose. Earthy and full of minerals but still surprisingly full of blueberry, plum and cassis. Long, lingering, layered finish that slowly reveals layer after layer."

https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=30802

Ladera Two Mountains Premiere Napa Valley Lot 64 Cabernet Sauvignon 2000

We've been fans of Ladera since the Montana rancher Stotsmayers took over the classic old stone barn winery and vineyards of Chateau Wolter high up on Howell Mountain back around the Milennium. 

Ladera Winery was one of the highlights of our Napa Valley Howell Mountain Appellation Wine Experience 2008. We then hosted them here during their Chicago visit the next summer.

One of my favorite picturesque Napa Valley screensaver photos is this one of the old winery building set amongst the estate gardens. 

This was a select bottle from a barrel sourced from fruits from Howell Mountain and Mt Veeder that went into a special bottling donated to the Napa Valley Premiere charitable auction by Ladera Vineyards and Winery. The fruit from the 2000 vintage was bottled and auctioned in the 2002 auction, Lot 64.

My wine tasting notes were consistent with earlier posting at http://unwindwine.blogspot.com/2013/03/ladera-two-mountains-napa-valley.html.

This wine was dark garnet colored, medium full bodied, bold, expressive and aromatic with full forward flavors of classic Howell Mountain terroir predominating - black cherry, currant, black berry fruits with a layer of spice, and hints of earth and tea on the finely integrated smooth tannin finish.


Like last week, my preference for the bolder brighter Napa Cab style was favored over the more polished, subdued and civil Bordeaux style.


RM 92 points.

https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=959982

Neiman Napa Valley Red Wine 2000

Neiman Napa Valley Caldwell Vineyard Red Wine 2000

With son Ryan visiting, we opened this for an impromptu tasting with artisan cheese and crackers. We've held these wines for a decade and aside four or five vintages I picked up at auction, I am not sure where I initially discovered this label. We have a half dozen vintages of this wine in the cellar and I selected one we've not yet tried from a vintage I thought would be the least age-worthy that needed to be consumed. Learn more about the Caldwell Vineyard in my earlier post of this label.
 

Pulling the 2000 vintage, I was imagining a wine where the fruit would be subdued and overtaken by leather, tobacco and perhaps tea. Wow, what a nice surprise as this vastly exceeded my expectations. There's still life left in this and there should be no hurry to drink up.

As soon as Ryan opened this, the kitchen exploded with full aromas of ripe berry fruits and floral.

Dark garnet colored, medium-full bodied, there was a huge berry fruit and forest floral nose on opening. Pleasant, balanced and modestly polished with tangy mouth puckering acid and smooth tannin texture, it opens to slightly astringent plum, dark berries, slight hints of caramel, mocha and a touch of cassis with a layer of smooth oak on an acidic clove tannin finish that lingers for many minutes.

RM 90-91 points.

https://www.cellartracker.com/barcode.asp?iWine=27470

Snowden Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 2000

Snowden Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 2000

We met Scott Snowden during one of our first Napa Valley excursions back in the mid-nineties. It was shortly after Snowden was featured in the Wine Spectator "A Dozen to Watch" chronicling twelve emerging hot producers of Napa Valley wines. He was a lawyer and former judge before taking over the family wine business with his brother Randy and their wives. Their father had acquired the Napa Valley property to move his family out of the congestion of city life in Oakland where he was a professor at U Cal at the time.

Over the ensuring years we met with and featured each one of the twelve in our Napa Wine Experience dinners and tastings. On this day, we met Randy at Brix Restaurant and tasted his wines over lunch. Over the following years we collected Snowden Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon including this 2000 vintage offering. We still hold in our cellar a vertical of vintages of Snowden dating back to their early 1993 vintage.

I recall hearing him recounting his story of the design of their unique label design by his wife Joanne Ortega Snowden, whom if I recall correctly, also designed the labels for Marilyn Merlot at that time.

Tonight we enjoyed Snowden at home over a perfectly matched dinner of T-bone steak, rice pilaf, and asparagus spears.

Eric Snowden and all the recent press about his betrayal of our government aside, there is no connection between him and Scott or his brother Randy of Napa Valley wine fame.

The Snowden was dark ruby colored, starting to show a tinge of brownish rust color, however it didn't reveal any diminution of its bright vibrant cherry, currant and berry fruits, accented by a layer of eucalyptus before giving way to leather and earth with tones of anise on the tangy tight tannin finish.

RM 90 points.

Cellartracker listed the drinking window of this vintage through 2012 and based on tonight's tasting I revised it to 2016. My records show we still have two more bottles and I'm not feeling rushed to consume them. In fact, we still hold four older vintages and I chose this one tonight based on it having the 'expired' drinking window.

https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=220837

http://www.snowdenvineyards.com/

Venge Vineyards Penny Lane Family Reserve Sangiovese 2000

Venge Vineyards Oakville Napa Valley Penny Lane Family Reserve Sangiovese 2000

Christmas Day family dinner ... eight degrees outside, Linda made hearty lasagna so I pulled a Family Reserve Sangiovese from the cellar. It was a perfect combination.

We discovered, first tasted and purchased this wine during our winery visit and at a lunch tasting with winemaker Nils Venge as part of our Napa Valley Wine Experience 2002. At lunch with Nils Venge, he spoke of the Family Reserve label being a testament to an annual gathering of the extended family coming together to harvest the Penny Lane Vineyard for this and a few other select wines. In earlier blog posts I've written about that visit and previous tasting notes,  other vintage tasting notes, and Nils Venge, his work with the Sangiovese grape varietal and its history.Venge's label series also features a collection of original art work labels.

Continuing to show its age, approaching the last chapter of its aging profile, its time to consume these thirteen year olds, we're nearing the end of our assorted case of these Sangiovese's.

As with earlier tasting notes, the 2000 Venge Vineyards Sangiovese is grown on the Venge Family Estate Penny Lane Vineyard in Oakville. Ripe and smooth for a Sangiovese, the 2000 is dark inky color but starting to show a tinge of rust and brown edges at this stage of life. Medium bodied, it still presents pretty, ripe black cherry and blackberry fruit flavors at its core highlighted by a layer of herb and anise notes and touch of leather and tobacco. It has a flavorful lush long finish. 

RM 90 points.



https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=17566

http://www.vengevineyards.com/