Let me just say that I took a chance on a screw top…and it paid off.

The “Big Tattoo Red” is a Chilean cab-syrah blend that was created by two brothers, a wine importer and a tattoo artist to honor their mother.  I would say that she should be very proud indeed, as this is an excellent wine for which I would pay more than twice the asking price of $10.99.

Mild plum scents first attract your nose to the glass on this blend, and then you are lambasted with a very smooth, very refined wine that is strong through the finish (yet silky throughout).

Were this a blind-tasting, and I had not purchased the wine, I would have put a $25-30 guess as to this bottle’s price point, and I would have guessed a California origin.  I say California as I have not yet had a Chilean wine that is quite so smooth (and high alcohol at 13.7%).

Big Tattoo Red - 2006 Cab-Syrah

I find it very difficult to believe that you could enjoy a wine at all through description alone, so please run out a pick up a bottle at your earliest convenience.  I stumbled upon this gem at the local Fresh Market, however, I do hope that they have (at least) national distribution.  Check out these guys out at www.bigtattoowines.com.

-Ryan

It has been a few weeks since I have enjoyed a bottle of wine that was deemed “post worthy”, but this one ranks right up there.

While the bottle may look a little cartoonish (likely because of the cartoons), Michael and David Phillips in Lodi have really released an excellent bottle in this “Petite Petit”.

On the nose, it’s very jammy with hints of grilled fruit and figs.  Awesome.

On first sip, gorgeous.  Wickedly lovely. Wow. I love this wine.

I’m not sure how the elephants on the bottle come into play, or if we are supposed to think that this “Petite Petit” is some sort of freakshow - but this wine is really, really good.  I’ve seen it on the shelves a few times, but I had a hard time buying an un-tried, un-reviewed wine for $18.  My wife made this decision much easier for me by bringing it home on a Saturday afternoon, and I wasn’t disappointed.

To my thinking, this one is a good candidate for a case discount.

Cheers, and enjoy the circus.

-Ryan

Petite Petit - Petite Sirah / Petit Verdot

I haven’t had a post in a while, but it’s likely that I hadn’t had any good wine….until now.

We found this Broadside cab at a wine tasting at our local wine bar, and we were really impressed.  We actually picked up half a case of these bad boys, and so far, we haven’t been disappointed.

It’s an 07 from Paso Robles and nothing that I had ever heard of before.  Ohio wine laws are strange - only one distributor can sell a wine to retailers and restaurants/bars within the state, thus creating a local wine monopoly (please be patient, for I do have a point).  What this means for Ohio wine consumers is that if I find a bottle in the Cincinnati area that has been distributed by a small, Cincinnati-based distributor, you will likely not be able to find this bottle elsewhere in the state, or even as far North as Columbus.  The rest of the world will likely not be affected, but people in Northern Ohio are definitely missing out, this wine is killer.

Whether it be buyer’s remorse, or a genuine love for a good cab - this smooth, mellow cab is a nice alternative to many of the high-alcohol California-style cabs that I’ve become accustomed to.  While it’s no light weight at 14.1% alcohol, it does have a more refined and well-rounded flavor than many of its peers.  If you have the opportunity, I promise that this cabernet will not disappoint.  I can’t back that up with anything meaningful, but I really enjoyed it.

Please keep rockin’ in the free world,

Ryan

Check out the Broadside, it

This bottle was sweet - I dearly lament its recent demise and I’m already going through withdrawal.

Tonight’s Barbera was picked up at Fresh Market for $13, and was a complete Hail-Mary.  Why so dramatic? I’ve never heard of the vineyard, had only limited experience with barberas (less than 10 - 15 in my life) - I really didn’t know what to expect.

As it turns out, I was very pleasantly surprised.  Out of the bottle, the wine appeared fairly thin as it was being poured into the decanter.  After being decanted, undisturbed for 45 minutes, the wine was liberated and dinner was served.  The barbera was happily paired with homemade “gnocchetti all’ amatriciana”, or to the layman, gnocchi with pancetta in a red sauce.

This turned out to be an awesome dinner.

The gnocchi was so light, I felt like I was devouring a cloud.  The wine complemented the gnocchi very well…so well that I started to think about how spoiled I really am, for one fleeting moment.

On the nose, I picked up strong scents of cherries and vanilla, and down the hatch all I got was bright red berries…and it’s so smooth.  Sooooooo smooth.  The flavor is very vibrant, while still remaining a lighter wine.  I am really impressed with this one - nine-ish out of ten would be my rating.

I would be interested to hear if anyone else has had any other wines by Michele Chiarlo.  Do let me know if you’ve run across any others worth trying.

Ciao!
Ryan

With Thanksgiving only a few days away, many of you may be wondering: “What wine should I drink with the turkey this year?”  Enter the French: Georges DuBoeuf  vs. Louis Latour in a Beaujolais-Villages showdown.  While this may not be the battle of the century, or even that hard-hitting of a fight (I haven’t met the pinot that was able to take me out), many would agree that a pinot noir is decent pairing for one of the largest turkey slayings of the year.  And with good reason.  The lighter style of the pinot is agreeable with most people’s palettes and pairs well with many of this holiday’s traditional dishes.

(I should note that both wines have been training since 2006 for this fight, and were allowed to breathe for one hour before consumption.)

Georges DuBoeuf: 2006 Beaujolais-Villages

While Georges’ offering appears to be the underdog of this battle with a floral-themed label, he has weighed in at a healthy $12 and has a nose that arguably smells of fresh-cut flowers, possibly even dandelions.  It’s a very light wine, with a quick finish that’s chased by a faint jab of citrus.

While I will openly admit that I tend to enjoy the heavyweight matches a little more, it’s always fun to see what the lightweights can bring to the table.

Louis Latour: 2006 Beaujolais-Villages

Also weighing in at a spry $12 is Latour’s offering, which has a wicked cranberry-right cross.  With a short, soft finish, this wine would also be a good choice for Thanksgiving dinner.  And this may be a ridiculous critique, but I would feel much better about bringing a bottle of Louis Latour’s Beaujolais-Villages to a gathering of friends and family, the bottle just screams old school French style.

The decision:

Latour by a knockout.  DuBoeuf simply lacked the refinement and experience that Latour brought to this match.  While both wines fell safely within the pinot style, Latour was a slightly heavier, more refined wine than the DuBoeuf.  And the DuBoeuf just felt young and unprepared for this battle.

Post-fight analysis:

At the end of the day, pairing wine with anything (especially Thanksgiving) just comes down to what you enjoy.  If you would enjoy a gin and tonic with your Thanksgiving dinner, then by all means, please enjoy a tumbler of your favorite.  And if you really worked at it, you could probably even convince me that it would be a reasonable pairing, as wild turkeys are often found roosting in pine trees.  While this may or may not be utter nonsense, I hope that it serves to prove my point - drink what you like and enjoy the company.  The holiday season is one of the few times a year that I get to raid my father’s cellar, and get away with it.

Happy Holidays!
-Ryan

Guest Review:

Armed with an exciting new recipe in hand, my wife and I tromped off to the grocery store to gather up the yummy ingredients in preparation for a hopefully nice meal. As is usually the case when we food shop together, I become impatient so I get my little assignments and scurry off to find items, only to return for a new assignment. My first stop was to get the wine! The meal actually called for a white, but my eye fixed on a wine produced, as it turns out, by one of the oldest wineries in the states, Concannon. I had never tasted any of their wines and for that matter never really heard about them. I’ll get to the wine itself later but I thought it interesting to share some info about the winery first. Thanks to the wonders of the internet, and of course the web site on the bottle, I found the winery and read thru the site to see what was what. Turns out, Concannon is celebrating 125 years of operation this year, the vines being planted by an Irish immigrant in 1883. Located in Livermore Valley , which is west of the San Francisco area, James Concannon figured that the grapes would flourish with warm days and cool nights, given winds moving inland from the adjacent bay. In life’s unending quest for knowledge, it is always refreshing to learn something interesting and somewhat obscure for strategic use later on. So I have neatly tucked away the fact that the Concannon Vineyard produced the worlds first Petit Syrah from its 1961 harvest, a wine they still produce today. So enough background info and, onto the wine. So I picked up a 2006 Pinot Noir, Limited Release, price $16. Packaged in a cool bottle with a trademark gate embossed on the bottle, I decanted it before sitting down to eat. While the professional tasting notes sport a long list of adjectives (as always), I caught dark fruit right away and a solid earthy aroma. The first glass was good but not great. We finished dinner and then sat on the couch to finish the bottle. The second glass was much better with a smoother finish and was far less biting than the first, indicating that maybe the wine is still a bit young and could be aged a bit longer. This wine would serve better paired with some nice grilled lamb chops and that will be the plan when I go back to cop a few more bottles.

-Scott

Concannon - 2006 Pinot Noir

New York wines are back in the game.

Everytime I drink a bottle of old vine zin from California, I tell myself that I am going to hate the wines that I grew up with from New York.  And everytime I drink a bottle from Seneca Shore, my faith is restored.  In a totally no-nonsense review, this is an excellent red from Seneca Lake in upstate NY.

Composition: 50% Cabernet Franc, 46% Cabernet Sauvignon, 4% Merlot

This is a big red from NY that simply defies reason…I’m just not sure how they do it.  It has an old, refined taste that is not typical of many of the reds from NY.  While at first, the Medieval Red tastes like a well-cellared cab sauvignon, it comes alive on the finish with hints of cinnamon and cherries.

Cabernet Franc tends to grow quite well in the Finger Lakes, and happens to be one of my favorite NY varietals.  While NY state is hustling to unify the region as a being a producer of premium riesling, I have a really hard time getting on board.  From what I can tell, the Riesling in NY tends to be quite good.  However, is a good Riesling really enough to establish a reason?  Oregon has Pinot Noir, California seems to have everything, why can’t NY have Cabernet Franc?  If anyone else has any thoughts on this subject, please post a comment - I’d like some validation either way.

Moving on…

What is truly most bizarre about this winery is that they have seahorses on their label and signage, which to be honest, was a reason that I had put off visiting this winery.

As the saying goes, don’t judge a winery by its seahorses.  They have really good wine at Seneca Shore, if you can find it (which is tough outside of the Finger Lakes), please do give it a shot.  Behind the seahorses lie a really excellent wine.  And in front of the seahorses are pirate ships.

-Ryan