Review Archives - Page 2 of 20

April 21, 2023

Case Paolin Pietra Fine Asolo Prosecco DOCG

The ancient town of Asolo sits about 40 miles northwest of Venice in Italy’s province of Trevino. The Museo Canoviano is situated here, home to some of the works by Antonio Canova (1757-1822). Canova was the son of a stonecutter and grandson of a stone mason, and was an Italian Neoclassical sculptor famous for his marble sculptures. Indeed, he is often regarded as the greatest of the Neoclassical artists. Pietra Fine is Italian for Fine Stone, an homage to the work of Canova housed in Asolo, as well as the grey stones of one of Paolin’s vineyards that was once a riverbed.

In the early 1970s, Emillio Pozzobon, a farmer from a long ling of farmers, bought the estate where his father and his grandfather had worked as sharecroppers. Although the property had largely been used for the cultivation of silkworms, he devoted himself entirely to growing grapes there. Continue reading “Case Paolin Pietra Fine Asolo Prosecco DOCG”

April 16, 2023April 16, 2023

Langtry Brut Rosé

The Guenoc Valley in California is east of San Francisco, and just south of the far eastern edge of the East Bay. Situated in Lake County, grapes were planted there in 1854, and as soon as 1884 it hosted 600 acres under vine. Its fertile fields attracted a number of individuals who dabbled in wine to a greater or lesser extent, including the legendary actress Lillie Langtry.

The 23,000 acre (9,300 ha) Guenoc Valley is a small inland alluvial fan of Arroyo Seco and Conejo loam soils which are isolated from surrounding areas by rocky ridges. Hot days are common in the region and over-ripening is a constant concern. The area also has very cool nights, making it a Climate Region III. The Guenoc Valley AVA was approved in 1981.

Lillie Langtry was born Emilie Charlotte Le Breton in 1853 to William Le Breton, a Church of England minister and his wife, Emilie Davis Martin Le Breton. Lillie was the only daughter in the family of six sons. Her father was a very handsome and cultured man; her mother as beautiful as her daughter would become. They lived on the on the Isle of Jersey, one of the islands that lie in the English Channel . Continue reading “Langtry Brut Rosé”

April 12, 2023

Chateau Minuty M Rosé 2021

Provence in the south of France is the nation’s oldest wine-producing region, dating back more than 2,600 years. It is synonymous with rosé (90% of the region’s production), and one of the leading producers is Chateau Minuty.

Minuty began in the mid-1800s. The estate was originally built during the reign of Napoleon III, as was the small chapel that gave its name to the Cuvée de l’Oratoire, which was the house’s emblematic bottling for a long time.

Things really got going in 1936 when the 170 hectares [420 acres] property was acquired by Gabriel Farnet, whose family has owned and operated it ever since.

Farnet already owned Domaine de Châteauneuf in Vidauban, so he came with winemaking experience. (That physical château still exists, but the vines are long gone.) He began renovations by replanting the entire estate. The effort paid off; in 1955, Minuty was one of the 23 properties to be distinguished as a classified growth (Cru Classé) of the Côtes de Provence (or 14, or 18, or 19; accounts vary, oddly).

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April 10, 2023April 21, 2023

Chalk Hill Estate Sauvignon Blanc Chalk Hill Appellation 2021

One fine spring day in 1972, attorney, private pilot, and wine aficionado Fred Fruth was piloting his plane over the Russian River Valley area. Down below, he hoped he saw what he had been searching for: a property that had the climate and soils to grow first-class wine grapes. Furth and his second wife, Peggy, purchased the land, named the estate Chalk Hill, and started producing wine about a decade later. They gradually planted more than 270 acres of vines. Years later, Furth said, “I have always been interested in wine because my grandfather had vineyards. I’m actually more interested in the working-the-soil aspect, but I have many very talented people in the winery who know how to produce a world-class wine. When I bought this property, I was told it was too hilly to be a vineyard, but I simply planted the grapes in rows going uphill. People said you can’t do that, but I’d seen it done in Germany so I knew it would work.” After a rich and varied life, Furth died in 2018 at the age of 84.

Lawyer Bill Foley acquired Chalk Hill in 2010. Although Foley is titled as “vintner,” I doubt he sees the interior of the winery very often. He is a vintner in the broader sense of “someone who sells wine.” He also owns the National Hockey League’s Vegas Golden Knights, is the Executive Chairman of the Board of Directors for Fidelity National Financial Inc., is Vice Chairman of the Board of Directors for Fidelity National Information Services, Inc., and owns fifteen other wineries.
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April 10, 2023April 21, 2023

Chalk Hill Sauvignon Blanc Windy Ridge 2021

April 9, 2023May 1, 2023

Odonata Malbec 2019

Odonata is a small boutique winery near Salinas, California. It is owned and operated by Denis Hoey, who traveled a winding road from business management, to would-be firefighter, to brewery worker, and finally to winemaker.

Hoey is a native of Sacramento, and grew up in a family that enjoyed wines of all kinds. In 2004 he graduated from the University of California at Santa Cruz with a degree in Business Management. But before he did any work in that field, he landed a job at Bison Organic Brewery in San Jose, where he learned sanitizing protocols and how to run a bottling line.

More profoundly, he soon met Jeff Emery, who had just taken over as owner and winemaker at Santa Cruz Mountain Vineyard. SCMV was started in 1975 by Ken Burnap, who based his winemaking on Old World approaches such as moderate levels of alcohol and oak, with the goal that the true characteristics of the grape varieties are expressed. Burnap passed that philosophy down to Emery, who in turn guided Hoey in that direction. Once Hoey began his apprenticeship, his life course was permanently altered. He became the production manager for SCMV before starting Odonata Wines in Santa Cruz in 2005. That year production was a mere 65 cases. By 2008 that was up to a still modest 150 cases, mostly Petite Sirah. Production is now about 6,000 cases, of which 1,000 are bubblies.

After 10 years of working with Emery, in 2014 Hoey decided to leave SCMV and devote himself exclusively to Odonata. He and his wife, Claire, were able to buy the short-lived Marilyn Remark Winery in the Santa Lucia Highlands, moving Odonata farther south of Santa Cruz, where they are raising their family and running the winery. Their property includes a two-acre vineyard, production facility, and tasting room.

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March 31, 2023

Buena Vista La Victoire Champagne

There are a number of French champagne producers who have operations in California, such as Roederer (whose California wine I prefer over the French, and it’s half the price). But here’s a twist: a California winery with a genuine French champagne. And this isn’t just any winery; Buena Vista is the second oldest in the state. (The first was D’Agostini winery, established in 1856 by a Swiss immigrant. Buena Vista calls itself the first “premium” winery in California, but that seems to be based more on aspiration than fact.)

Regardless, Buena Vista was founded in 1857 by Agoston Haraszthy de Mokesa, who immigrated from Hungary, first to Wisconsin and then to San Diego, where he was improbably sheriff and then marshal. He attempted a vineyard in Mission Valley, but it failed.

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March 15, 2023March 15, 2023

Proper No. Twelve Irish Apple Whiskey

Proper No. Twelve Irish Whiskey is a brand founded by Mixed Martial Arts Champion Conor McGregor under his Eire Born Spirits company in September 2018. It has in just under five short years become one of the most successful whiskey brands in the world.

Allegedly, the company’s first production run sold out in just under two weeks due to incredible demand. Tesco stores in Ireland began limiting customers to just two bottles per visit. 213,800 cases were shipped in 2019, a figure which represented a 17.8 per cent increase from the previous year. On Instagram, McGregor claimed after their first year they had raked in over $1 billion in sales. He said: “Over $1 billion generated in Whiskey sales in my first year! Like it or not, there is a new King in town! Proper Whiskey, liquid sunshine!”

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March 7, 2023March 26, 2023

Beaulieu Vineyard Georges De Latour Private Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon 2019

Beaulieu Vineyard is one of California’s oldest and most celebrated wineries. It was established by Georges de Latour and his wife Fernande in 1900, and is situated in the Rutherford AVA in Napa Valley.

De Latour was born October 20, 1856, in Bordeaux, France. At the age of twenty-six, he immigrated to San Francisco, where he was employed as a chemist from 1884 to 1888, later settling in San Jose in the early 1890s. He ran a cream of tartar business there for use in baking powder. After neighbors complained of the smell from his factory, he and his wife moved to Healdsburg in Sonoma County, before finally settling in Napa, where the De Latours Initially purchased four acres (1.6 ha) of land. Legend has it that when Fernande first saw the property she exclaimed, “Quel beau lieu!” which translates to English as “What a beautiful place!” And so the place was named.

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March 5, 2023March 5, 2023

Penfolds Bin 389 Cabernet Shiraz 2018

Until Yellow Tail precipitated the boom in “critter wines” in 2000, it can be argued that Penfolds was just about synonymous with Australian wine in the U.S. The label is ubiquitous here, in both grocery stores and fine wine shops. Prices range from about $12 per bottle for the Koonunga Hill Shiraz-Cabernet, to $700 for the legendary Grange, and everything in between. (That $700 is doubly amazing, because just five or six years ago Grange was “only” about $200.) The selections are mostly reds plus a few whites and even a tawny Port.

Founders Dr. Christopher and Mary Penfold immigrated to Australia from England in 1844, bringing their own French vine cuttings. Not long after, their fledgling vineyard was officially established as the Penfolds wine company at the 500-acre Magill Estate in Adelaide.

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February 14, 2023February 3, 2024

The Prisoner 2019

Orin Swift Cellars was a relative newcomer on the California wine scene, having been established in 1998, but not by “Orin Swift,” as I had long assumed. Rather, it was by the now iconic, and iconoclastic, winemaker David Phinney. Orin is Phinney’s father’s middle name and Swift is his mother’s maiden name.

Phinney, a native Californian, was born in Gilroy (the “Garlic Capitol of the World”), the son of a botanist and a college professor. However, within a week he was in Los Angeles, where he spent his childhood, and finally an adolescence in Squaw Valley. He enrolled in the Political Science program at the University of Arizona, with an eye towards a law degree, but before long became disillusioned with both. At this juncture, a friend invited him on a trip to Italy, and while in Florence he was introduced to the joys of wine, and soon became obsessed.

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February 12, 2023March 7, 2023

H. Billiot Brut Rosé

Ambonnay, one of the top five Grand Crus in Champagne, is located in the heart of the Côte des Noirs, on the southern slopes of the Montagne de Reims. Its hillsides are renowned for the richness of their Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, the two essential Champagne grapes.

In 1896 Eugene Billiot, a miller by profession in Ambonnay, purchased five acres of land and planted vines. The grapes were sold to major Champagne brands throughout the region. Today, the grape varieties of the vines are around 75% Pinot Noir and 25% Chardonnay.

Champagne Billiot was established in 1937 by Louis Billiot as more of a side hustle than a real Champagne house. But after the war, his son Henri founded Champagne H.Billiot & Fils at 1 place de la Fontaine in the center of the village to realize his dream of becoming a winemaker rather than just a grower. Henri was succeeded by his son Serge, and now fifth-generation Laetitia runs the operation.

Current production is about 32,000 bottles a year, with all of the work being done by the family. Continue reading “H. Billiot Brut Rosé”

February 2, 2023

Ridge Lytton Springs Red Blend 2019

Ridge Vineyards is actually two distinct wineries, the original and more prestigious one is south of San Francisco and east of San Jose, and the other in Sonoma county is just north of Healdsburg.

Since this wine is from Sonoma, here’s just a brief history of the older San Francisco operation. In 1885, Osea Perrone, a prominent doctor in San Francisco, bought 180 acres near the top of Monte Bello ridge. He built a winery and released his first vintage in 1892. At some point the winery was abandoned (my guess is that Prohibition caused its demise, along with almost every other US winery).

In the 1940s, theologian William Short bought the property, and extensively planted Cabernet Sauvignon. In 1959, Short sold to three Stanford Research Institute engineers. They were joined in 1969 by the iconic Paul Draper, a philosophy graduate turned winemaker. Under his guidance and “hands off” approach, the quality and reputation of Ridge wines was established. Draper made the wine until 2016.

The Lytton Springs property was acquired in 1991, although Ridge had been sourcing fruit from there as far back as 1972. Where the southern operation focuses on Cabernet Sauvignon, in Lytton Springs Zinfandel holds court. Some of the ancient vines date as far back as 1901. The grapes from the vineyard are a true field blend; the vines are mixed varietals, planted right next to each other. Some of the vines were only recently correctly identified after DNA testing.

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January 29, 2023February 2, 2023

Waypoint Vineyards Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 2015

I couldn’t find anything about this wine. Their website is nonexistent, and there is even a totally different Waypoint line from Napa now on the market. Too bad, because this wine was really good. Pick up a few bottles if you stumble across them.

Waypoint Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 2015

This Cabernet is the correct dark red color, with just a tinge of brick; it is seven years old, after all. The nose opens with dark, rich fruit. On the palate, there is a full mouthfeel, with flavors of blackberry, baked plum, dark cocoa, and tart red currant. The well-structured tannins, oak backbone, and just-so acidity offer great balance, making for a really appealing glass of Cabernet. ABV is a robust 15.4%.

January 27, 2023February 3, 2023

Rémy Martin 1738 Accord Royal Cognac

Rémy Martin is one of the world’s oldest and best known cognac brands, with selections that range, at my local liquor store at least, from the $13 St. Remy French brandy to the $9000 Rémy Martin Louis XIII Time Collection: City of Lights – 1900. (I have tried one of these, but not both.)

Rémy Martin was founded in 1724 in the Cognac region of France by Paul-Emile Rémy Martin. He was born in 1695 near Rouillac in southwestern France, the son of a vine grower. At 19, he married the daughter of a local notary, and 10 years later, in 1724, he established a cognac trading house. On his death in 1773, the business passed to his grandson, also named Rémy, who was also the local tax collector. In time, his son inherited the business, which saw a four-fold increase in the region’s trade between 1810 and the early 1820s. In 1841, Paul-Emile-Rémy Martin (the family gave just about every male heir the same name, apparently) assumed control and oversaw even greater growth. He introduced the innovation of selling in bottles as well as the traditional casks. An early skilled marketer, he added a logo to the bottles and cases; a centaur after Sagittarius, Martin’s zodiac sign, and registered the firm’s first trademarks in 1874. Following him, as so often happens in dynastic families, the fifth-generation proprietor nearly bankrupted the operation.
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