As the weather has gotten cooler, I have slowly gravitated from rosé to red wine, and for the first time in years, I am drawn to the Bordeaux varietals and Bordeaux-style red blends. There is something about their boldness and their power that can warm the cockles of your heart. Chill, be gone! What is Bordeaux-Style Red Blends? I say Bordeaux-style because Bordeaux is a wine region in France known for growing specific grape varietals. Thus Bordeaux-style wines use the same varieties of those produced in Bordeaux. A Bordeaux red blend usually combines two or more of these classic varieties: Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc,…
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Wines weekly are the wine selections that we have tried and enjoyed so much we needed to share them with you.
Fall Roundup – New Styles of Two Familiar Varieties This post is part two of my fall wine roundup. Different than the last post, you will undoubtedly recognize the two grapes referenced in the post, but you may not have tasted wine like these. The grapes are Pinot Grigio and Pinot Noir. These two cousins make incredible wine but depending on where the grapes grow and how the wine is made changes everything. And remember the comments will be short and to the point and end with a LOVE, LIKE, NMS (not my style), or GLove (Gary loves it) Pinot Grigio/Gris …
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Time flies way too fast. As I look back at the various new wines I have tried, I can see empty bottles with handwritten notes overtook my desk and found their way onto the bookshelf. That’s not good. But what that means is that means it is time for the Fall Wine Roundup. A roundup means the comments will be short and to the point and end with a LOVE, LIKE, NMS (not my style), or GLove (Gary loves it, but it’s NMS) I am breaking this roundup into a couple different posts. This is Roundup #1 which includes two…
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Welcome to Part Two from my visit to Ehlers Estate in Napa Valley. If you missed the first post about this experience, you would find it here. Today, I am continuing the Tasting portion of the visit, followed by a chat with the new winemaker and after that, the bonus. But you are going to need to keep reading to find out what it is. Ehlers Estate * Tasting of the Reds Cabernet Franc, Say what? Cabernet Franc is a grape variety that the casual wine drinker may not be familiar. It is an old grape variety and is a…
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Ehlers Estate Wine with a Purpose When on a wine tasting trip in Napa Valley, it is easy to get lost in the blur of so much wine. There are vineyards at every turn and tasting rooms for wineries dotting the valley from top to bottom. It is so easy for several wine tasting experiences to blend into a single event. That was not the case for the tasting we had Ehlers Estate. They knocked it out of the park. Our experience at Ehlers Estate was the first one of the day at ten o’clock in the morning. I am…
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The Russian River Valley is a designated AVA* that resides within the larger Northern Sonoma AVA. AVAs located with a larger AVA share the characteristics of that AVA but also have a more unique set of attributes that further define that specific smaller portion of the region. It could be the soil type, the weather patterns or any number of things. The AVA that appears on the bottle is always the one that represents where the vineyards are precisely located. As such, the smaller AVA will always trump the larger if the vines all reside within the smaller (or sub)…
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This post about Kelly Fleming Wines is a collaboration with my friend and fellow blogger Amber Burke of www.winetraveleats.com. She is based in Napa and well connected. Our friendship was online based for months before we actually met, but once we did at the Wine Writers Education Conference (WWET), we quickly went from online friends to family. Gary and I could not have had the magical experiences that we did without her, and we are forever grateful. Now we talk all the time, so it only made sense to share this experience jointly. Amber Comments: One of the things that…
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If you are a wine enthusiast (eh-hem Steven) and you are on Instagram, you will be very familiar with #wiyg. It stands for “what’s in your glass” which is frequently posited on that social media platform along with your post of a glass or bottle of wine. Hopefully, your “peeps” will respond, and your Instagram engagement goes through the roof. So what’s in my glass? I am so glad you asked. Luna Vineyards in the Oak Knoll District of Napa Valley Luna Vineyards was one of the wineries that Gary and I visited when we were in Napa last May. It…
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