Oeno Files

This is a wine review I wrote in January 2005 at Knowledge Problem, just to give you a sense of some of the kind of information I hope we capture here.

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After our knife skills class at The Chopping Block, we stuck around for the free monthly wine tasting. The instructor, John Fuente, was amazing; he has incredible depth of knowledge about wine, a good sense of humor and down-to-earth attitude toward wine, and a great teaching style.

We tasted four wines: a 100% Sangiovese from Tuscany that had undergone carbonic maceration, so we got to learn all about the controversy around using carbonic maceration; a Syrah/Carignane blend from Corbieres in France, a Fox Hollow Shiraz from California, and The Chopping Block's wine of the month: Edna Valley Paragon Vineyard Syrah 2002. Edna Valley is one of the long-standing wineries in the Central Coast of California, halfway between Los Angeles and San Francisco. They are best known for their chardonnay, but they also make very good pinot noir and syrah, as well as pinot gris, sauvignon blanc, and vigonier.

We learned a lot in the course of this tasting (in addition to the carbonic maceration thing). On the nose of the Edna Valley syrah were prominent caramel/toasted sugar and vanilla notes. As John pointed out, caramel and vanilla on the nose mean new oak, and probably new French oak at that. Sure 'nuff, when you look at the winemaker's notes it says

Aged 10 Months 85% French Oak 15% American Oak 32% New Oak

The French/American oak difference is that French oak has smaller grain, so there is more wood surface area in contact with the wine. The toasty/caramely notes come from the toasting and charring of the interior of the barrel before the wine is put into it to age. As an aside, note that bourbon manufacturing follows the same charring and aging process.

The fruit was there on the nose, but very subtle. Pronounced blackberry.

Then the taste ... and again my reaction was wumph. The taste was lush, full of the dark blackberry and plum fruit flavors. The caramel and vanilla from the nose were much more subdued in the flavor, but they were there. There was some tannin there (and indeed this wine can cellar for another 3 years or so), but it was subtle. The first adjective that came to mind was velvety; the wine actually gave me a sensation of texture in the mouth.

At $24/bottle this is not a weeknight quaff, but I'd say for an occasional treat this wine is good value for money. The vineyard recommends pairing it with rack of lamb, which makes me hungry just thinking about it.

We had dinner Friday night at Graze, a new restaurant that serve small plates and has a pretty cool decor. The food was very good, ranging from salad to monkfish to lamb, so we wanted a versatile wine that would stand up to bigger dishes but not overpower the more delicate ones.

We chose Meditrina 2004 from the Sokol-Blosser winery in Oregon. Part of the story:

Everyone knows about Bacchus, the Roman god of wine and intoxication. Who knew there was also Meditrina, Roman goddess of wine and health! We couldn't believe that thousands of years ago the Romans had enough savvy to connect wine and health and name a goddess to oversee the two. What happened? Overshadowed for too long by Bacchus's flamboyance, Meditrina deserves to take her rightful place in the wine world. We decided to help her get there by creating a heart healthy red wine in her honor.

Meditrina is a blend of pinot noir (S-B's signature grape), syrah, and just a touch of zinfandel. Its garnet color reflects those varietals. Its nose was very strange; it started with a buttery, almost chardonnay tone (and the friend dining with us also got some mown grass notes on the nose), but then after it opened up for about 10 minutes it developed a more traditional pinot noir nose (dry, fruity, not much alcohol, some floral notes, low tannin). Later, especially with food, the nose had some of the typical peppery syrah stuff going on too.

Similarly, the taste changed and reflected either pinot noir or syrah features. In general the flavors were well-balanced. It was a very dry wine but not overly tannic.

Depending on what you ate with it, you could pull out more or less of the characteristics of each varietal; the lamb pulled out the syrah, the monkfish the pinot noir. This feature made this a really good wine for sharing at a restaurant where you are ordering a variety of dishes.

It was $38 at the restaurant, but is $16 on their web site. I'd give it a B+/87-88 rating.

What else could I think but, "I hope I like it." My wife had bought a case of a Shiraz-Viognier blend based solely on the enthusiastic description in an email from a salesperson at a local wine shop.

Ruddy shiraz blended with the floral viognier?

What??

I was happy to discover that the store had a bottle of the Black Chook available for tasting when we went to pick the case up. The wine was paid for, but at least I'd know what I was taking home.

Wow, was it nice. Tonight, opening the first bottle of the case for dinner (Spice painted salmon and some ginger-sesame broccoli) it was even better. The first three flavor notes that came to my mind when initially tasting were cherry, oak, and black currant. After a while a got of sort of buried floral character that I dubbed "flowers in the cellar." The wine mellowed a bit with the food and was pleasant all evening.

Later I tracked down more information from the U.S. importer's website. Notes there suggested that the 5% viognier adds "a wonderful apricot perfume." Okay, let's call those flowers in the cellar "apricot blossoms."

Good stuff, and we have eleven more to go....

Another trip to our favorite wine store turned up this inexpensive gem, Château Jouclary Cabardès 2005. Lots of fruitiness without being jammy or sweet, very approachable, good with steak. Cabardes require a blending of wines, and the wine shows it by being very even in flavor and a smooth finish. The wine retails at just under $10 at the store.

I couldn't find a Château Jouclary website, but this French wine site had the background on Cabardès: "the only French appellation to associate 40% minimum of atlantic grape varieties (Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and Franc, Cot and Fer Servadou) with 40% minimum of mediterranean grape varieties (Syrah and Grenache), completion of blends possible with 20% of Cot and Fer Servadou."

I believe the wine distributor told us this wine was predominently Merlot, Cabernet Franc, and Syrah, but we tasted six wines and I could be mixing things up a bit. (This U.S. wine distributor, turned up via google, mentions Merlot, Grenache and Syrah.)