Celebrating a wedding anniversary and thinking of opening one of our “reserve” bottles of wine. We haven’t been building our inventory for long, so don’t have any really mature bottles. So in some cases it’s a nice bottle, but torn on whether to open it or be patient and let it age further. Here are a few that I could choose from. (Menu for the evening will be grilled filet mignon topped with a little Boursin herb & garlic cheese, baked sweet potato and grilled Brussels sprouts.)
Tamber Bey Vermejo '15 (cab. sauv. based Bordeaux-style blend)
Fisher Mounain Estate Cab '12
Calluna Colonel’s Vineyard Cab '14, '15, or '16
Calluna Estate '15
Kaesler Old Bastard Shiraz '15
Blankiet Estate Proprietary Red '16 (Graeme MacDonald’s first vintage with them. Probably best to age more, but I do have a second bottle of this one.)
I drank a Kaesler several years ago and enjoyed it. No experience with the others except for MACDONALD. If Graham is involved, your choice is made. FYI, the notes on Cellartracker confirm that you’ll enjoy this wine.
Thanks. I’ll probably try the Blankiet Estate. The Kaesler Old Bastard is a really nice one, too, though. It comes from a small vineyard in the Barossa valley with ~125 year old vines. Tamber Bey makes some really nice wines, as well. Their winery and tasting room is in Calistoga, but I think the main vineyards are in Oakville. Calluna is a small Chalk Hill AVA winery that makes some really good stuff, and the price points are lower than similar quality wines from the Napa side. We joined his (owner/winemaker David Jeffrey) club after a visit there, which is why I have a number of different bottles from there.
I’m a huge Calluna fan, I enjoy the estate over the colonel’s cab. Do any of the wines have sentimental value? Tasted there together? Had a bottle at a nice dinner? If so, I’d go with that (or seek one out that does). For our 15 year this year, I plan to get a bottle of Brokenwood Semillion from Hunter Valley, Oz. Not spendy, but we honeymooned there and tasted at the winery while there. It’s all about the people and places… Happy Anniversary!
Hmm. Good points, there, Keith. The Blankiet is probably the least sentimental, as we have not visited there, nor tried the wines yet, other than their Prince of Hearts second-tier wine. We picked up the Kaesler at a local wine tasting. The others are all wineries we visited together. Calluna might be less special, just because we are “Friends of Calluna” club members, so we drink Calluna wines pretty regularly.
That makes me think maybe the Fisher, as we had a lovely visit to that winery, and we haven’t had one of their wines in quite some time… If you are not familiar with Fisher, I would definitely recommend a tasting there, if you get the chance (by appt. only). They are in the mountains between Santa Rosa and St. Helena. They have some beautiful mountain vineyards there at the winery, and also produce wines from some Napa Valley vineyards. (Also have a somewhat lower-priced UNITY label.)
Not familiar with any of the wines but just wanted to wish you Happy Anniversary, since you share the date with us! I do agree that something that has some sentimental value would be more appropriate. Enjoy!
Thanks for all the input. I was not familiar with Vineyard 29, but that would be an interesting idea. Not something I have in inventory, though, so it would require a trip to Total Wine…
I’m still not sure which one I’ll pick, but don’t think I can go too wrong. Will probably go with either the Fisher or the Tamber Bey for the sentimental reasons of nice places we visited together (combined with being wines we haven’t had in a while).
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