Notes from the Panel Archives - Page 26 of 32 - Wine Blog from The International Wine of the Month Club

Zinfandel: California’s Own Grape

September 12, 2013 by Don Lahey

For more than a century Zinfandel has run the gamut in California from boom to bust and back. Brought to fore during California’s Gold Rush, the hills of Amador County still yield plenty of the luscious, spicy, often chameleon-like grape we call Zinfandel. Zinfandel is widely believed to be descended from Primitivo, a European varietal now cultivated in Italy, which happens to be identical in DNA to the ancient Croatian varietal Crljenak Kaštelanski. This DNA match up confirms Zinfandel as one of the oldest continuously cultivated grape varieties in the world. Yet, it wasn’t until Zinfandel traveled to America that it found its true home – California. Although the first definitive California plantings of Zinfandel took place just prior to the middle of the 19^th century, it didn’t take long for Zinfandel to gain favor in America, first with the 49’ers and then with the waves of Italian immigrants who made their way west.

Today, Zinfandel is widely acknowledged as America’s Heritage wine with more than 50,000 acres under cultivation, nearly all of it in California. Although most important grape varieties have their reference points in Europe, Zinfandel bills itself as an American success story, and its history reads as the classic rags to riches tale. What has no doubt made Zinfandel so popular in America is the grape’s ability to adapt to different climates and treatments. Zinfandel is a grape capable of producing rich intense red wines of more than 15% alcohol as well as light fruity “blush” wines. What more can one ask for? How about a glass and a bottle of Terra d’Oro’s 2010 Amador County Zin?

Salud!
Don Lahey

Don’s August Collector’s Series Top Picks

August 22, 2013 by Don Lahey

This month’s Collector Series Top Picks give me palpitations. Not only are the wines tantalizing, picking just two wines this month makes me uneasy. So, here we go. Miller Wine Works 2007 Sage Canyon Napa Syrah has to be my first Top Pick. It’s a big beautiful wine that highlights the quality and value to be had from one of California’s top garagistes. Not all of the best Napa Valley wines come from big names or corporate conglomerates as Gary Miller’s 2007 Sage Canyon Syrah will attest. One taste of this wine and you’ll know why it gets one of my Top Picks and scored 96 points and earned the Platinum Medal at the Consumer Wine Awards in Lodi, California. My second Top Pick is a split decision. Both the 2011 Colli di Lapio Fiano di Avellino and the 2006 Luis Canas Rioja Reserva Selección de la Familia are at the top of their game, and both have garnered tremendous press and are in very limited supply. Hence, the split decision. Both wines please me immensely, but for different reasons, so take your pick! A votre santé.

Don

Don’s August Premier Series Top Picks

August 19, 2013 by Don Lahey

August offers another diverse group of exciting wines beginning with the 2010 Château Ollieux Romanis Cuvée Classique Corbières, a splendid full-bodied red wine from one of France’s oldest viticultural areas. Cultivation of the vine in Corbières dates back more than 2,500 years to the ancient Phoenicians and Greeks. A product of the exceptional 2010 vintage in the South of France, this dark delicious Corbières offers exceptionally fine drinking with a myriad of foods. It plays equally well with expensive cuts of lamb and beef as it does with hamburgers, pizza, and pork barbecue. Consequently, it earns my vote for this month’s first Top Pick.

My second Top Pick goes to Lungarotti’s splendid 2012 Torre di Giano. Lungarotti has long been known for their wonderful red Rubesco (the 2009 Lungarotti Rubesco is also one of this month’s features), but few have been privileged to taste Lungarotti’s perfect summer time white wine. This prized property’s 2012 Torre di Giano is in my summation the finest Torre di Giano to date. It is wine to slake the thirst or simply to drink all evening long, with or without food. Nonetheless, in an ideal world, one has a bottle of Lungarotti’s 2012 Torre di Giano and a bottle of 2009 Rubesco open on the table with food to match. A votre santé.

Don Lahey

The Best White Wine Under $20.00

August 19, 2013 by Don Lahey

Recently, someone asked me what the best white was under $20.00 per bottle. At first, I didn’t know quite how to respond to the question because truly, there are so many really good white wines for less than $20.00 a bottle. And at any given moment, my honest answer to that question depends upon the type and style of wine I’m in the mood for, what season it is, and what I plan to serve with the wine.

Nevertheless, one wine almost immediately popped into my head – Martinsancho Verdejo. Martinsancho is the handiwork of Angel Rodriguez, Spain’s most iconic producer of Verdejo and the driving force behind the resurrection of the Verdejo grape, one of Spain’s two quintessential white grape varieties. Nearing extinction four decades ago, Verdejo came back to life because a venerable gentleman named Angel Rodriguez made a decision to preserve Verdejo by refusing to rip up the oldest producing wines in his native Rueda. Instead, he grafted the gnarly three hundred year old vine cuttings from his pre-phylloxera Martinsancho Vineyard into a nearby plot. The result is a magnificent dry white wine by Angel Rodriguez named Martinsancho. Martinsancho is hardly the biggest, most complex white wine in the world, but it may very well be the most eminently drinkable.

In every vintage, Martinsancho Verdejo exudes supreme grace and exhibits a purity almost never seen or tasted in other white wines. Made from organically grown grapes, with no added sulfites, Martinsancho Rueda Verdejo always pleases me. Moreover, it stands as testimony to the quality of the Verdejo varietal and the faith and perseverance of one honorable man – Angel Rodriguez.

Salud!
Don Lahey

Where to Find the World’s Best Wine Values

July 18, 2013 by Don Lahey

Where do you find the world’s best wine values? I think that depends on one’s tastes and how adept a person is at ferreting out wines from relatively unknown viticultural areas. It never ceases to amaze me how much good wine remains undiscovered and appreciated, simply because they hail from relatively obscure wine regions and undiscovered wineries and wines makers. Many of the world’s good wines, even some of the world’s great wines, flow from places not exactly on the tip of everyone’s tongue.

Let’s take Uruguay for example. Yes, I do mean that tiny prosperous South American country with a stable democratic government, a temperate climate, and a centuries’ old tradition of winemaking – all of which remain hidden from most wine lovers in North America. Why? Two reasons appear as culprits. First, the folks in Uruguay truly enjoy wine and drink most of what they make themselves and secondly, we in the U.S. tend to be mistrustful or at least oblivious to anything we haven’t seen highly advertised or rated by a dozen or more critics, whom we tend to believe are more adept at determining our tastes than we are.

Happily, Uruguay is no longer content to keep its best wines to itself. And Artesana, an ultra-premium producer from Uruguay, is another example of a very good wine producer from a relatively obscure locale. Artesana recently featured some of their estate wines at the International Wine Bloggers’ Conference to considerable acclaim. Artesana’s 2011 Tannat/Merlot comes across as a crowd pleaser, though the winery’s more traditional and tannic 2011Tannat (a French grape, which lends its name to the word tannin) shows well, too. And Artesana is just one of a growing number of producers of fine wines from Uruguay whose wares can now be found in the U.S. Artesana’s wines are well worth seeking out.

Cheers!
Don

Don’s July Collector’s Series Top Picks

July 16, 2013 by Don Lahey

Collectors July California wines earn both of my Top Picks this month beginning with Pietra Santa’s 2006 Signature Collection Cabernet Sauvignon, a packed, powerful, yet charming Cabernet Sauvignon with nearly seven years of bottle age. Cabernet doesn’t get much better than Pietra Santa’s Signature Collection at less than $100.00 a bottle. My second Top Pick goes to Girard’s beautiful 2010 Russian River Chardonnay.

For my taste, this Chardonnay offers the ideal combination of fruit, butter, spice, and everything else that’s nice about California Chardonnay. In short, Girard’s Russian River Chardonnay comes across as impeccably balanced. However, I must confess that had it been a different month, I could easily have chosen Girard’s 2010 Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon as my second Top Pick. This youthful Napa Cabernet from a truly great vintage appears to have many great years of drinking pleasure ahead of it.

A votre santé.
Don

Don’s July Premier Series Top Picks

July 15, 2013 by Don Lahey

July offers an especially fine summer line-up that spans three continents. For starters, Tridente’s 2009 Tempranillo from Spain garners my first Top Pick. It’s a smooth, full-bodied, crowd pleasing red wine that works equally well at a barbecue as it does at an elegant dinner party, which is no doubt why it has earned many 90 plus point ratings. Moreover, it makes many more expensive Tempranillo wines from Ribera del Duero look like simpletons.

My next Top Pick is a tough one. Why? Painted Wolf’s 2010 Guillermo Pinotage from South Africa is an outstanding Pinotage that has earned all the high praise it’s received. And most importantly, it drinks great. Pinotage isn’t very well known or represented in the United States, but Painted Wolf’s Guillermo Pinotage could change that. Yet, Yali’s 2012 Sauvignon Blanc from Chile’s Lolol Valley captures the essence of Sauvignon Blanc with the just the right balance between fruit, acidity, and minerality. Besides, I’m a sucker for Sauvignon Blanc, especially in summer. And then there’s Domaine Wachau’s 2011 Federspiel Terrassen Riesling, another wonderful effort. Domaine Wachau has a penchant for producing exceptional Austrian Riesling and Gruner Veltliner and their 2011 Federspiel Riesling may be the finest of its type to date.

So, what’s this month’s Second Top Pick? As much as I love Sauvignon Blanc and I could easily pull the trigger on the Yali, and Domaine Wachau’s Riesling is a real winner, I have to go with Painted Wolf’s Guillermo Pinotage as my second Top Pick, simply because Pinotage is a hard wine to make and no other Pinotage we’ve tasted on this side of the Atlantic can beat it. A votre santé.

Salud!
Don

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