Recently we enjoyed a wonderful Sunday brunch at The Tasting Room in Houston, TX with some friends and family to celebrate my wife’s birthday. The Tasting Room offers brunch on Sunday’s made by their creative and gifted Chef, Steve Super, and while you are enjoying the wonderful brunch you can linger and listen to the live jazz/classical music. The memorable wine of the day was the 2006 Amon-Ra Shiraz made by winemaker Ben Glaetzer. Ben Glaetzer has a minimalist mindset to making wine doing much of the work by hand, always aiming to preserve the characteristics of the vineyard fruit making elegant wines which are regarded as classics and unmistakably Barossa Valley.
Last night we were privileged to attend a tasting of Meander wines hosted by Cellar-17 in Houston and the distributor of Meander, Red4Wine. Meander is a personal project of winemaker Amy Aiken, who has been crafting wines in Napa Valley since 1989.
Paul and I were recently invited to a 2004 Barolo tasting hosted at Del Frisco’s Double Eagle restaurant in Houston, TX http://www.delfriscos.com/. The tasting event was sponsored by Kobrand Corporation http://www.kobrandwine.comand Stefano Chiarlo of Michele Chiarlo Winery http://www.chiarlo.it/. Michele Chiarlo was founded in 1956 by the sole and present owners, Michele and Giuseppina Chiarlo.
Carol and I had lunch at the newly opened Mia Bella in the Vintage Park center on Louetta in North Houston today. It was a very nice lunch experience. We sat outside and had a wonderful lunch as we talked about our new business.
We had a bottle of Santi which was enjoyable. The wine exhibited a nice nose of plum and spicy dark fruit that made us feel like we where sitting outside in Italy itself.
Underwhelming – Paul
Mediocre – Carol
Obscure- Diana
Messy – Jimmy
I have had this wine twice in the last week only because I couldn’t believe how disappointed I was in this wine the first time, and thought I should try it again to give it a fair shake. Wine Spectator rated the Clos Apalta their #1 wine of 2008 and scored it a 96. I am almost always in agreement with their scores, and am almost never more than a point north or south of their ratings.
In celebration of the US National Day of Wine Drinking on Wednesday the usual gang had a themed evening of Shiraz (Syrah) as our varietal of choice. The 2000 Penfolds “RWT” (Red Winemaking Trial), the name given to the wine internally when development work began on it in 1995 was the last wine of the night and boy did it ever shine. Harvey Steinman of Wine Spectator had a really nice article in the October 18, 2008 issue entitled “Aging Australia’s Reds” and I would have to agree that Australian Shiraz of note is very age worthy. :-)
In case you didn’t know it, but should! Yesterday February 18th in the Year of Our Lord 2009 was National Drink Wine Day as designated by the US Congress. At least they got something right!
In honor of such a fine day we gathered at Paul’s house for a themed night of great Syrah/Shiraz from California and the Barossa Valley in Australia. We started off with a 2004 Red Lava Syrah that was very a very nice place to start for the rest of the evening. The Trevor Jones “Wild Witch” has been in cellar for quite a while and we decided to drink the last bottle of it, and it showed nice improvement from the cellar time I must say.
In these economically trying times, finding a great value wine is sometimes as satisfying as finding that single vinyeard gem that cost three times as much. The Zaca Mesa Z Three is such a wine.
A blend of syrah, mourvedre and Grenache made in the style of a Rhone variety, this wine is produced in the Santa Barbara County of California. My wife and I enjoyed this wine fining at home alone on Sunday night.
On the nose, Carol first mentioned palmegranet and we quickly decided blackberry and plum with some nice spicy element barely peaking through the fruit bomb. Could possibly be the grenache yeilding some rasberry to the overall profile as well.
The mouthfeel is wonderfully complex and full. The terrior really comes through when tasting and gives a little dusty componet that is really nice. The finish is lingering and satisfying.
This wine rocks for the money spent to procure it and is simply priced below it’s worth. Many local shops in Houston have it and it is around $40. Nice indeed.
The winos are at brix wine cellars tonight and one of the blog worthy wines is the 2005 buoncristiani syrah artistico. Only 348 cases were made from this Napa valley producer. I am blogging this post from an Iphone and the keyboard is challenging.
Tasting notes: dark fruit of blackberry, currants, black cherry with a hint of eucalyptus folowed by toasty oak and Forrest floor. On the palate the fruit is vibrant and focused. The tannins are still present but not harsh on the palate.
The finish goes on for some time. It has a minty component that brings the lightning and bring this wine home.
Jimmy- 90
Paul- 92 had it twice – first time open 20 hours
Bobby- 86 – 87 middle falls off
Had this wine with Carol and Anthony on Sunday afternoon. The color of this wine was quite unique. The color is more dark than you would think a Pinot should be.
