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When first getting into wine, my wife and I found that we loved wines that had a strong "earthy" character. We were going to a lot of tastings, and a certain husband and wife team was importing a bunch of wines that had this interesting and somewhat enigmatic trait. Those people told us about how th...

Logically, I would think that corks will dry out in a dry environment and won't in a humid environment, regardless of bottle orientation. A bunch of anecdotal experience that I have (storing many bottles upright and many on their sides, some in a quite dry basement and some in a quite humid basement...

It was alluded to somewhere above (great discussion, BTW), but I'll ask it here. I wonder what the answer would be if you asked a decidedly-natural winemaker who, let's say, just a "natural" Chardonnay, "Do you hope that your natural wine tastes like top white Burgundy?" If his/her answer is, "Yes,...

This is a style where Bordeaux takes Napa to the hoop for value and flavor. Others would be Frombauge, Moulin St. George, Fonplegade, Badette, Mathilde, Couspaude. I totally agree. Better balance, better value by far. The style does not appeal to me, but I think the value walks all over Napa at thi...

I would say Musar is the most obvious. Didier Dagueneau when Didier was making the wines (Pouilly Fume specifically; I think all Loire SB, but I know others disagree). What about Tempier (for reds)? D'Esclans Garrus for Provence Rose, for sure, but the style is different from any other. Emidio Pepe...

I can think of no other region where one producer (Rougeard) stands so far above all the others. Damn Yankees? Damn Rougeard. D'Yquem Egon Muller(sweet) / Keller (dry) Petrus ? Interesting supposition It is. As much as I love Keller, I really don't think their wines are that much better than those ...

To my understanding, the way she describes how tannins evolve is how people commonly think the case is, but to my understanding, what actually happens in a bottle as wine evolves is very different. Research shows that a) tannins both split up into smaller molecules and group together into bigger mo...

Guiberteau - I've never tried it and I agree it's expensive - maybe a Fourth? For reds, maybe, but if this included whites I would raise them to 1st or 2nd. I don't have much experience, but it seems to me that the top bottling warrants 2nd (probably) or 3rd rather than 4th. I'd love to hear from p...

I should start by saying I think Kelli is one of the few good wine writers. There's a ton of assumption and "common knowledge" in the article that isn't well supported by any facts, though. I think the best point is made by Maggie Harrison: Harrison’s point emphasizes a deeper truth, “People sometim...

David K o l i n wrote: ↑
January 17th, 2020, 9:03 am
Personally, for me, I don’t see a reason to give accommodations for wines I don’t prefer

Same here.

I haven’t, but I appreciate the detailed note. I will probably get a bottle to try in the near future, plus maybe a couple more. This sounds like it might be one of the earlier drinking vintages, which I’ve been realizing recently that I shouldn’t ignore as I generally have.

YLee wrote: ↑
January 14th, 2020, 2:22 pm
From your experience approximately how many years after the vintage did your start sensing brett?

This would not be anywhere near consistent.

AndrewH wrote: ↑
January 13th, 2020, 10:00 am
That, or the crap-wine drinkers are opting for White Claw.

That’s part of it.

Right. Enjoyable now is not the definition of mature. It’s nice to hear this has opened up, though.

Turley Zins do age. Not sure they gain a lot, but they don't lose anything - at least when it comes to single vineyard releases. I just had an 08 Mead Ranch and it was great. Big and brambly blackberry fruit. No heat to speak of even though it's right around 16% ABV. I've heard that Carlisle and Be...

Fred Bower wrote: ↑
January 7th, 2020, 5:53 am
I will sound a voice of enthusiasm for the wines. The crus are often the best available option on a grocery store shelf and are a good entree into why Beaujolais isn't Nouveau.

Cheers,
fred

Yes, the crus can be very good in the right vintages.

Yeah, I think we would all like to see a cooler, later vintage in the Beaujolais... I think if you re-taste the 15 side by side with the 17, making allowances for age, you'll think the '15 is more ripe - though chez Lapierre there isn't much in it. I drank a couple of good bottles, but then my '15s...

A big champion of his home region and its wines, and unfortunately sometimes dismissed too easily. Like Mondavi, he made a real difference . RIP. Yup, Greg....he made a real difference in Beaujolais. Not because of the quality of his wines, but for the tireless/unabashedly enthusiastic promotion of...

Beaujolais has had a lot of really ripe vintages lately. I'm hoping for a nice, classic vintage like 2011 soon. Even some of the classics (like Lapierre) have been too ripe for my taste in multiple recent years. I now understand why some people say they are Rhone-like in these years.

It's just wine. I want to enjoy it.

Jay Miller wrote: ↑
January 6th, 2020, 3:07 pm
Personally I prefer the 06 Comtes to the 08 Dom

Same here. I haven't had the Ruinart, but I'd be happier with '06 Comtes over the other choices.

ha, better check that current Blanton’s price and recalibrate! It’s more, but not much more. $80-90 is a good price now and hard to find in LA under $150-200. $80-$90 is NOT a good price. There's stupid secondary market stuff happening, but regular retail has not gone up nearly that much. Nor shoul...

I don’t think any good Southern Rhône fails to show its charm when young. “Needs time” strikes me as an excuse for a wine that either isn’t very good or someone simply doesn’t like.

My clos st jean aging experience has been a dumpster fire of undrinkable wines. 2005, 2006, 2007 is the cohort I experimented with. https://www.wineberserkers.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=142476&p=2310665&hilit=Clos+st+jean+scott#p2309739 ...and I expect that's exactly where this '16 will go. I th...

I wonder why they listed it all as one lot instead of breaking it up. I guess there are some things in there that were not nearly as attractive as the bulk of it, but still... Does anyone know why they would have sold it that way?

I would definitely not do that.

Edmunds St John Syrahs. Part of quality for me is the ability to improve with age. ESJ Syrahs can improve for 20+ years, turning into something truly special (far more than almost anything else in their price range), and they're still very inexpensive on release.

Chris Seiber wrote: ↑
December 29th, 2019, 10:04 pm
Isn't wine consumption overall (not just Champagne) trending downward in France? Particularly with the ultra-low DUI standard there.

Yes, and the government keeps telling people that alcohol is evil.

Wine and food pairing is so complicated. I don't think you're using a good source for information on that. This being the first rule makes the whole thing highly questionable (even though I agree with some of the points made). (I) The body of the wine should roughly match the body of the food. Also,...

Amazing prices! Sadly, they won't ship to me.

Awesome! The Bartlett was not even a Reserve?

Clos Mont Olivet, once a true stalwart and still old school by CdP standards are recently as 07 (at which point I gave up on CdP in general). Yes, they make some of the most balanced, restrained (for CdP) wines in the region (the base wine, NOT the higher end cuvee) They definitely belong on both l...

What you're trying to do is a lot more complicated than you think. The person's level of experience with wine has a lot to do with deciding what sorts of questions will be meaningful. Also, the way people answer certain questions (tone, etc.) can be more telling than the answers themselves. In my ex...

That's about what I'd expect from this '04 right now. '06 Villero was surprisingly open this year, though.

Doug, I have not tasted the 2016 but it appears to be a great vintage. I will be looking to source some. I tasted it a couple of months ago. It's as good as I expected, and it will need time. The only recent and very good vintage that I've found to be surprisingly open since release is the '13.

Agree. With 12-bottle purchase, my expectation is free shipping. Period. Do you know of many retailers that still do this? Or are you mainly talking about wineries? It seems that this is not common anymore at the retail level, and I totally understand why. The places with the prices we all want are...

This thread reminded me that I hadn't bought the 2016 yet. Just fixed that. At $25+, this is still an amazing value.

When you folks say you stand the bottle up and then take a taste aren't you stirring up sediment? If I do the stand-up rather than use a basket to decant (which is way better IMO) I go strait at it and will taste form the decanter before returning to the bottle. The whole point is that the sediment...

Great thread, by the way. I've been wondering about the same thing for a while.

‘Strong approximation’ is the question, and I think the answer is no. For very young and tannic nebbs, I’ve found that decanting for 2 or 3, even 4 days can soften the wine enough so you can taste the fruit behind the tannin wall. But the rest of aging transformation doesn’t happen at least in my e...

I will be noting which of my regular suppliers are gouging and which are not. When all of this madness ends, I will concentrate my buying accordingly. Seems like a bit of a tricky situation. If a retailer raises prices on in stock wines, foreseeing that they may go through a rough period of not bei...

I didn't see any facts backing up this assertion or opinion. Mike gives us data concerning 1 bottle of unidentified wine that is obviously tainted by brett and I agreed with that. Eric, you said wines with those given levels of 4-EP and 4-EG would show varying degrees of noticeable brett. That is a...

So they can stop selling the wines now rather than later. Buying will slow, and customers have a memory. seems like it's a good way for the retailers to see if people are willing to pay the higher price before they commit to replacement stock. If people don't pay, then just lower the price back and...

I agree that this is a particularly good release. Pricing in my home market has gotten a bit crazy, but I suspect that might be a localized problem and not a general one.

I assume Arv is talking about ciders that have funky aromas similar to sour beers. I definitely get some funky yeast related aromas in Basque ciders. If there is also something bacterial going on, maybe it's possible that the cider becomes more sour than the base material was, but I don't know if th...

James Billy wrote: ↑
December 20th, 2019, 8:56 pm
Brett isn't an issue for 99% of Northern Rhone IME.

You must either have an unbelievably high recognition threshold or love brett.

There are two kinds of displacement from the tariffs - first is substitution to non-tariffed products. That's easier for a large retailer to deal with because for $20 bordeaux they can sell $20 wine from Argentina, Australia, US, etc. But the other kind of displacement is reduced sales - folks who ...

Jason, You keep using hyperbole that undermines your entire arguments. Barilla pasta is regularly available for $1 in grocery store. $2 could hurt the brand, but it won’t be your farcical $7. Use normal analysis, and I might take you seriously. Barilla in our neck of the woods isn’t $1... but ok.. ...

Maybe wine headache sufferers could try green light?

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-sho ... reen-light

Mike Kuller wrote: ↑
December 16th, 2019, 8:03 am
Perhaps it's the placebo effect.

Exactly what the creators of this wand are counting on!

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