Lewis Cellars Sonoma County Russian River Valley Chardonnay

Lewis Cellars Sonoma County Russian River Valley Chardonnay 2004

Perfect complement to Friday night dinner lobster tails. Ideal drinking window for this is five to ten years. At sixteen, this is  past its apex and showing its age turning from golden straw colored to honey brown, and the fruits are starting to take on notes of smoke. This was delightful none-the-less, but time to drink.

This is clearly crafted in the California versus the classic Burgundian style with layers of big rich oak, straw color turning dark to honey, medium bodied, note of of creamy vanilla, otes of nut taking on hints of smoke, nice acidic balance for crisp pleasurable drinking. Its density calls for drinking with food and was perfect with our buttery lobster.

RM 88 points.

Downgraded from 90 points at last tasting to 88 points due to signs of aging diminution.

https://www.cellartracker.com/barcode.asp?iWine=1072448

https://www.lewiscellars.com/ 

https://unwindwine.blogspot.com/2018/06/lewis-sonoma-rrv-chardonnay-2004.html

Bogle Merlot Cugino's Italian Lansing Michigan

Bogle Merlot at Cugino's Italian Dining in Grand Ledge, (Lansing) Michigan

Visiting client State of Michigan in Capital city Lansing, we dined in nearby town of Grand Ledge at local favorite, Cugino’s Italian Restaurant.

I ordered the Fettuccine Florentine,  Fettuccine alfredo sautéed with spinach, combined with mozzarella, ricotta, parmesan cheese, spices and topped with grilled chicken.

From the modest winelist I ordered BTG (by the glass) Bogle Merlot, a classic reliable California high QPR (quality price ratio) Central Valley and it was a perfect complement to the entree. A delightful dining experience in a lively setting and great value pricing.

Bogle California Merlot 2016

From Bogle Vineyards, located in Clarksburg situated minutes from Sacramento in the California Central Valley, this offers great value and good reliable every day drinking at this pricepoint. 

Dark garnet colored, medium-full bodied, moderate berry fruits accented by tones of mocha, tobacco, cedar and hints of oak in this basic moderate pleasant sipper.

Wine Enthusiast and Wine Spectator both give this 86 points.

RM 86 points.


https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=3022763

Cugino’s Italian Restaurants
 

Force Majeure Red Mountain Cabernet Sauvignon at Italian Village Chicago

Force Majeure Red Mountain Cabernet Sauvignon at Italian Village Chicago

Mid-week business dinner with colleague Jeff L, (shown with Jared, left) we dined at my usual dine-site, Italian Village, Chicago.

Jared Gelband, wine buddy and wine director pulled from the cellar this recent acquisition, Force Majeure Red Mountain Cabernet Sauvignon, to which he was introduced by me when we took producers Todd and Carie Alexander to the Italian Village Restaurant in Chicago and introduced them to Jared.

That was during producers Todd and Carrie Alexander release tour to Chicago a couple years ago. Jared has been stocking and offering Force Majeure ever since.

This was especially fitting for this evening as my guest, colleague Jeff L, heralds from Seattle and is an avid collector of Washington State wines. 

Our visit to Force Majeure vineyards was one of the inspirations for and objectives of our Walla Walla Wine Experience 2018. As mentioned above, we first met Force Majeure winemaker Todd Alexander and marketing, distribution and branding exec Carrie Alexander during their Chicago stop of their promotion tour in 2016 when we hosted them at Italian Village in Chicago. Since then we've acquired a respectable collection of Force Majeure wines.

We tasted and acquired this wine when we visited the Force Majeure estate during our Walla Walla Wine Experience year before last.  

FORCE MAJEURE Red Mountain Cabernet Sauvignon 2016

This estate Cabernet Sauvignon is grown primarily along the south-west ridge of the Force Majeure  vineyard, in soils that are deep and loamy but contain many small rocks of fractured basalt, concreted ash and granite from Missoula flood erratics. 

The 11 year old vines produce small berries with lots of power and concentration. This wine spent 22 months in 75% new French oak barrels, 340 cases were produced.  This is a blend of 96% Cabernet Sauvignon, 2% Merlot,1% Cabernet Franc, 1% Petit Verdot.

This wine was awarded 99 points by Jeb Dunnuck who wrote; “The 2016 Cabernet Sauvignon Red Mountain Estate is a thrilling effort from winemaker Todd Alexander that rates with some of the most monumental wines to come out of Washington State.  It reveals a saturated purple color that's followed by a rich, primordial bouquet of crème de cassis, espresso roast, crushed rock, and graphite. It needs considerable air to start to show its potential yet is a full-bodied, powerful wine that has subtle oak, plenty of sweet tannins, and a huge, layered finish that won't quit. It's the tannin management that's truly spectacular. This brilliant wine needs to be forgotten for 4-5 years and will keep for 2-3 decades.”  

Robert Parker's Wine Advocate gave this 93+ points.

Dark garnet purple colored, rich, concentrated, full bodied, bright expressive ripe sweet black berry and black raspberry fruits, notes of creme de cassis, mineral, spice and dusty sweet oak on a long full flavored finish. Needs a couple years to settle and integrate the bold bright aggressive flavors.

RM 93 points. 

https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=3006827

https://forcemajeurevineyards.com/

@ForceMVineyards
@unwindwine
@italianvlg
@jzgwine 

Chateau Buena Vista Napa Cabernet

Buena Vista Chateau Buena Vista Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 2016

I drove all the way up to the Binny's in Bloomingdale to pick up a case of wine that was out of stock in the other stores. I got into a protracted discussion with wine consultant Don Rauba and one thing lead to another resulting in him sharing a taste of this wine remaining from an earlier tasting. I liked it and bought some but didn't recall at the time until I came home and checked my blogposts that we tasted this wine when visiting out east last summer when I wrote this note.

At that time, Alec has picked this up at the local wineshop in Westport, CT. From the legendary Buena Vista Winery with arguably one of the more colorful histories of the wineries in California with its founder, the self-proclaimed “Count of Buena Vista,” Agoston Haraszthy, an eccentric pioneer of California wines.

We visited the Buena Vista winery estate during one of our first visits to the Napa Sonoma wine country back in the mid-eighties. Founded in 1857, Buena Vista was one of California’s first premium wineries. The legendary brand is being re-born today under the vision of owner Jean-Charles Boisset. The estate and winery is located just outside the town of Sonoma, the original winery is now a California Historic Landmark.

The Count immigrated from Europe in 1840 in pursuit of opportunity in the burgeoning American West. Following the spirit of the forty-niners in search of gold in the hills of Northern California, Haraszthy sought “purple gold” – the perfect ‘terroir’ where he could grow grapes to make exceptional wine. He ultimately settled in Sonoma, birthplace of California and capital of the short-lived California Republic, where he founded Buena Vista Winery in 1857.

In the 1860’s Buena Vista covered more than 6,000 acres that ran up into the foothills and past the Mayacamas Mountain range into what is today Napa County.

In 1861, founder Count Haraszthy journeyed to Europe in search of the finest grapevines. In Bordeaux, he obtained Cabernet Sauvignon and brought choice cuttings back to California where he planted them at Buena Vista, thereby bringing Cabernet Sauvignon to the Napa Valley.

The inaugural release of this new label offering, Chateau Buena Vista Cabernet Sauvignon, was in 2013 as Buena Vista returned to Napa Valley. In recent history, Buena Vista has generally been considered and known for Sonoma Valley wines, based on its popular historic winery and cellar near downtown Sonoma.
 

This new addition to the Buena Vista portfolio is packaged in a large oversize heavy bottle of a premium wine but is moderately priced for a Napa Valley Estate Cabernet thereby offering good QPR (Quality Price Ratio). At $40, this drinks like wines tasting half again to two times more.  

Buena Vista Chateau Buena Vista Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 2016

 

This 2016 release was sourced from Oak Knoll to St. Helena, from vineyards along Napa Valley’s eastern slope. The backbone of this is grapes from 10 acres of the Bartalucci Vineyard just south of St Helena, in Napa Valley near Raymond vineyards, a recent acquisition for Boisset. 

Like this earlier tasting, but sweeter than I recall or reported, this was bright garnet colored, medium full bodied, rich and opulent with intense structure, slightly obtuse, rich aromas and flavors of sweet ripe black berry, black cherry and black currant with notes of milk chocolate and touches of spice and licorice, fine-grained tannins that are soft with a full-bodied mouthfeel and a long, lingering finish.

RM 91 points.

https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=3304073

https://buenavistawinery.com/

Arn's Napa Valley Melanson Vineyard Syrah 2010

Arn's Napa Valley Melanson Vineyard Syrah 2010

Friday might, end of week dinner we went to Angeli's Italian, our favorite neighborhood trattoria and took this, one of our favorite Syrahs BYOB.

As I have written in these pages before, we have been long time fans of Arns and their Napa Cabernets so we arranged a visit and private tasting with producer John Arns at the estate on lower Howell Mountain during our 2013 Napa Wine Experience.

John's wife Sandi Belcher is the winemaker. It was during that visit that we discovered and acquired this single vineyard designated Syrah made with fruit sourced from the Melanson Vineyard on Pritchard Hill which I write about in an earlier blogpost.

This wine is so good, I almost don't want to let out the news for fear I'll create more demand and have to compete for it in the marketplace. Supplies are limited as for this vintage of this Syrah, only 80 cases were produced. Arns is available directly from the winery, in select stores in Napa Valley, and at Bassin's MacArthur Wines in Washington DC, (as I explain in separate Arns blogposts) which is where I first discovered it. I pick some up every trip to DC.


We acquired this label at the winery, then reordered more, and actually acquired this bottle when we picked up an entire lot on Winebid.com.

This is serious juice. The 2010 vintage was aged in one year old French oak for three years. The concentrated extracted fruit is apparent as soon as you pour the dark inky purple juice into the glass.

Full bodied, huge aromatics explode from the bottle as soon as the cork is pulled, thick, concentrated black and blue fruits are accented by a pronounced layer of sweet spicy oak laced caramel that turns to black licorice on the rear pallet with smooth sinewy tannins on the lingering finish.

RM 93 points.

https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=1809227

https://unwindwine.blogspot.com/2017/11/arns-melanson-napa-syrah-08.html

http://arnswinery.com/

Beaulieu Vineyards Tapestry Reserve 2013 at Pazzo's Chicago

Beaulieu Vineyards Tapestry Reserve 2013 at Pazzo's

For a team dinner including our specialists in from Australia, Europe and North America, we dined  at Pazzo's Restaurant at what I call the 'wedding cake' building at 311 South Wacker in the south loop adjacent the historic Sears Tower, now called Willis Tower. I call it this due to the distinctive architecture and prominence of the lighted tiered tower at the pinnacle, highly visible in its high profile location and a landmark on the spectacular world class Chicago skyline. This is a convenient location just two blocks from out office.

Pazzo's is a popular daytime lunch restaurant in the elegant and picturesque sunken lobby, but is usually nearly empty at night as it was this evening. As a lunch site rather than dinner site, Pazzo's is  less elegant and not necessarily 'fine' dining but rather more pedestrian. With the standard Italian cuisine, they offer a modest minimalist winelist primarily of basic Italian labels supplemented by a handful of American labels. We selected from the winelist this Beaulieu Vineyards Tapestry Reserve is the premium label offered but an excellent one if you're going offer but a few selections. Its interesting but strange that with such a limited selection, they're pouring a seven year old aged vintage of this label.

Tapestry is a classic Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon based Bordeaux Blend . I consider it a go-to wine, readily available and a safe reliable choice for easy drinking or special occasions, approachable when young but capable for aging. If your overwhelmed or intimidated by the plethora of wines available and not sure what to choose or take to or serve, Tapestry is a safe choice.

Our Cellartracker records indicate we hold more than a dozen vintages of this label dating back to the mid-nineties.  This is a classic Napa Valley label that provides high QPR - Quality Price Ratio for a Bordeaux Blend. Its another one of those high production label that I believe does a remarkable job achieving and maintaining the level of quality in high volumes and is approachable when young but also has significant aging capability for cellaring. James Suckling says this is "A wine that harkens back to its traditions.”

The 2013 release is a Bordeaux Blend anchored by Cabernet Sauvignon half sourced from the famous western benchlands of the Rutherford American Viticultural Area (AVA) and the balance from the Stags Leap District, St. Helena and Calistoga AVAs. The Merlot sourcing was split between BV Estate vineyards in the warmer parts of Carneros and the Rutherford Bench. The Cabernet Franc, Petit Verdot and Malbec came from estate vineyards in St. Helena and Calistoga. 

The blend is produced from select specific blocks of reserve-quality grapes that give Tapestry what they cite as combined attributes of fruit expression but also soft tannins for relatively early approachability.

This vintage release was awarded 94 Points by James Suckling and 90 Points by Robert Parker's Wine Advocate.

Dark garnet colored, medium to full bodied, nicely structured and balanced, complex aromas and flavors of predominant sweet ripe black raspberry and blackcurrant fruits accented by notes of tobacco, cedar, hints of cassis and what Robert Parker calls 'fruitcake and soil undertones', with very fine tannins and a polished, refined, textured finish.

"Vintage Notes The 2013 vintage yielded highly concentrated grapes that became generous, intense wines with muscular tannin structure. A very low-rainfall winter was followed by a dry, warm spring and nearly ideal summer, which led to an early harvest. These factors resulted in balanced vine canopies, excellent fruit set and small, concentrated grapes. Perfect weather throughout the harvest fostered intensely expressive and beautifully balanced wines.'

"Winemaking Notes We tailored the winemaking for each varietal to best capture the personality of both the vintage and specific vineyard block. Cold soaking of the destemmed grapes, gentle punch-downs in open-top fermentors and in-barrel malolactic fermentation all contributed to this wine’s richly textured flavors. Aging in 50 percent new oak barrels balanced the wine impressive depth varietal expression with toffee and spice nuances."

The winemaker's tasting notes say: "Our 2013 Tapestry reflects the 2013-growing season with its dense, powerful aromas and flavors, with bold structure. This is a wine that shows the artistry of blending five Bordeaux-heritage grape varieties, which contributed layer-upon-layer of flavor complexity. Cabernet Sauvignon gave the wine its generous core of briary blackberry and cassis expression, while we increased the amount of Merlot this year to tame the tannins and add plush mid-palate texture. Malbec contributed deep plum notes, while Cabernet Franc and Petit Verdot completed the blend with nuances of rose, forest loam and graphite.'

RM 92 points.

https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=2198809



https://www.bvwines.com/en-us/wines/reserve-wines/tapestry/2013

https://www.pazzoschicago.com/

Château Gruaud Larose St Julien Bordeaux 1989

Château Gruaud Larose St Julien Bordeaux 1989

Inspired by the aged vintage three decade old St Julien Bordeaux we had last week, I was eager for an encore and pulled from the cellar this 1989 Gruaud Larose to enjoy with Linda's beef stew dinner.  

Linda and Rick at Château Gruaud Larose

Our visit to Château Gruaud Larose was another one of the highlights of our trip to the Bordeaux Medoc region and the St Julien appellation this summer. 

Our Cellartracker records show we still hold seven bottles from the OWC - Original Wood Case of this label we acquired upon release back at the time. 

Thankfully, tonight's experience was equally rewarding, another well preserved and aged fine Bordeaux that was drinking at its apex, even at thirty years of age, showing no diminution whatsoever from age. 

Like the Ducru-Beaucaillou we consumed the other night, we still hold several cases of this label from ten vintages dating back to the birthyear vintages of our kids, 1981, 1982, 1985, and several vintages since, including several in large format magnum (1.5l) and double magnum (30l).

While we hold several older vintages, we chose the 1989 due the multitude of bottles we have from this vintage. As part of cellar management, I pulled the bottle with the lowest fill level however all seven bottles were nearly identical, not surprising since they all came from the same case and had the same provenance.

The fill level was at lower neck level with intact and prime condition foil and label. The cork was very saturated for the lower half but came out intact using an ah-so two pronged cork puller. 

Château Gruaud Larose Grand Cru Classe St Julien Bordeaux 1989

This was dark garnet colored, medium bodied, concentrated, bright, expressive black plum and currant fruits accented by pronounced brilliant violet floral and cigar box notes turning to tangy sharp tongue puckering tannins on the lingering finish. 

RM 92 points.  

https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=5037

https://www.gruaud-larose.com/en/

Chateau St Michelle Harvest Select Sweet Riesling 2017

Chateau St Michelle Harvest Select Sweet Riesling 2017

Sunday night dinner at Angeli's Italian, our favorite neighborhood trattoria, we drank from the winelist this Chateau St Michelle Riesling. We were looking for something simpler and lighter and thought a Riesling would be appropriate. Wrong, this is was not indicated on the winelist as Sweet Riesling which turned out to be quite sweet and much fuller and heavy than a light crisp dry Kabinett style.

Part of our selection was based on the whimsical naming as we were dining with son Sean and daughter-in-law to be, Michelle. Also, we visited the Chateau St Michelle estate in Woodinville during our Seattle Culinary and Washington Wine Tour last year. 

Lastly, I seem to recall that Chateau St Michelle are one of the world's largest producers of Riesling, which may have lead to the naming confusion or lack of precision in labeling this wine (on the winelist) due a preponderance of Riesling selections from this producer.

In any event, it was a suitable and fitting selection for the seafood pasta entree selections and Angeli's delicious Mussels in white wine sauce, the best ever and a favorite selection and regular pick when dining there. But, the sweet riesling is a selection we would not do again next time.

Chateau St Michelle Harvest Select Sweet Riesling 2017

As noted above, not crisp and clean, refreshing and balanced that you might desire but then this is a moderate pricepoint, high acid, high sweetness medium full bodied, notes of peach, citrus, and apple.

The winemaker notes say "Our Harvest Select Riesling is made in a slightly sweeter style than our Columbia Valley Riesling but still shows the classic Chateau Ste. Michelle Riesling character. It offers rich flavors of ripe peaches balanced with crisp Washington Riesling acidity." Notably, they call it Harvest Select Riesling (as listed on the winelist) and omit the word 'Sweet' even though the label says so. 

RM 86 points.

https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=3181855

https://www.ste-michelle.com/