Category Archives: Red

Wirra Wirra Church Block 2005

Posted on by
Reply

This wine’s full subtitle is “Cabernet Sauvignon – Shiraz – Merlot;” 47%, 35% and 18% respectively. 


Red-purple in colour, moderately dense. Nose bursts forth with sweet, ripe fruit of the blue and black variety. It’s very ripe, perhaps overripe for some tastes (there’s something almost spirity about it), but there’s no doubting how generous and up front is its flavour. There are also elements of spice and chocolate that squeeze in alongside all that fruit and add some savoury interest. The palate is dominated by more ripe fruit, quite sweet, and again perhaps too big for some tastes. Wines in this style succeed or fail almost entirely on the quality and interest of the fruit’s flavour profile and, in this wine’s favour, there’s at least some complexity of fruit character. But it’s unchallenging and, I suspect, designed for consumption without too much analysis. Acidity is soft and fine. Tannins prickle the finish but aren’t especially prominent or drying. Rather, still more fruit gushes through the after palate and sticks around for a little time on the finish. 

You have to admire a wine style that is so sure of what it is, even if it’s not entirely to your taste. We had this with dinner and it’s not a very food friendly style, lacking the structure to truly complement a meal. Instead, I would drink this on its own, perhaps even after dinner, to warm your insides and satisfy that craving for a McLaren Vale fruit bomb we all feel from time to time…
 
Price: $A21
Closure: Stelvin
Date tasted: January 2008


Vin de Pays d' Oc Rouge Domaine Beau Thorey "Bogus" 2006

Posted on by
1

Time for me to make a confession here: I enjoy trying strange wines. I saw this one at K&L in Hollywood, and thought: what the heck? Biodynamically farmed, no idea what grape it is, vin de pays d’Oc usually doesn’t bode well, and this is fifteen bucks? Well… how bad can it be? Let’s try it!First of all, I’ve never seen a plastic cork printed with mis en bouteille au chateau before. In the glass, this is a strangely colored wine – it looks kind of like watered down chocolate syrup or maybe thin soy sauce. Very strange. On the nose, there’s an odd, grapey note, but mostly it just smells like old school inexpensive French wine… to a point. It seems fairly simple: fraises de bois, maybe a little bit of tar or pepper, but not much more than that. With a little time and air, it began to remind me of a nebbiolo more than anything, somehow. In the mouth, it seemed fairly light in body – almost Beaujolais, but not quite. It’s got definite varietal characteristics, but of what exactly? It’s very appetizing, with kind of a woodsy, dark feeling to it that isn’t exactly wood, but more like what it feels like to be drinking in a mountain cabin with good friends in the dead of winter. In fact, the more I think about this wine, the more it reminds me of German digestifs somehow – it feels almost medicinal, tending towards Becherovka rather than Bordeaux. I do like it, though, and it does get full marks for being entirely sui generis. Would I buy it again? Probably not – it is kind of expensive – but I’m glad I did.Domaine Beau Thorey

Price: US $14.99
Closure: Plastic cork
Date tasted: January 2008

Château Saint-Georges 2002

Posted on by
Reply

This is a Merlot-dominant (60%) blend that also includes some Cabernet Sauvignon (20%) and Cabernet Franc (20%). 2002 isn’t considered an especially stellar vintage for Merlot in Bordeaux, although some consider the vintage generally underrated, producing less fruit forward but classically styled wines. This wine is from the

Dan Aykroyd "Discovery Series" Cabernet-Merlot 2006

Posted on by
4

At my local LCBO, two shelves below the Wayne Gretzky Unoaked Chardonnay, I found Dan Aykroyd’s wines dangerously close to the salt and snow stained floor.
One thing to be understood about Canadians is that essentially we are Marsha from The Brady Bunch. Just as in our cinema, when it comes to wines Canadians have to be coaxed into believing they’re good enough, smart enough and pretty enough. This means selling Canadian wines to Canadians is probably harder than it needs to be. In comes the recent rash of celebrity wines to lend a solution to that problem.
So I put on my Bill Murray Clothing Shirt and cracked a bottle of Dan Aykroyd Discovery Series Cabernet Merlot 2006. At $16.95 (+$0.05 bottle deposit) this prices it just about in the dead centre for an Ontario produced and cellared wine. Other than an iridescent microphone the label isn’t silly or kitsch. This wine wants you to take it seriously, so I did.
The nose has something in it. I think it’s strawberry? It’s faint. It could be blackberry or other berries. But it’s hardly present. Huge oak flavours and way too much sulphur. It’s retarded how sulphuric this stuff is. Afterwards some mouth feel and residual sulphur remains. And that’s about it. It’s like licking an oak tree while somebody farts in your face. The sulphur is very chemical, industrial even. Reminds me of the treated well water at my uncle’s farm.
I waited an hour for the sulphur to off gas. Eureka. Suddenly this is a different animal. The strawberries are gone and a little more typically berry flavoured. The bottle still smells like strawberries and sulphur. The tannic oaky flavour is still a bit strong for my taste but suddenly this is more like a bottle of cab-merlot that should cost $17, probably less. Not horribly remarkable but not bad at all. What was with the initial sulphur? Weird. It finished like a cheap date with that acidic feel on the teeth and not much of a taste other than, well, acid.
I’m glad Dan Aykroyd is investing in the wineries here on the Niagara Peninsula. But I think the whole idea behind the “Discovery Series” is to introduce people to wines they’ve never tried before. That makes sense. But I’m wondering if people who drink wine and buy $17 bottles at the LCBO have never had a really bold cab-merlot before? I guess that’s where lending a celebrity name comes into the picture.
If it had the Ghostbusters logo on it I’d review it better.
Dan Aykroyd [but really Lakeview]Price: C$16.95Closure: SyntheticDate tasted: January 2008

Cameron Hughes Lot 44 Rutherford Cabernet Sauvignon 2005

Posted on by
Reply

On the nose, this smells more like fresh, rich cream than anything else, somehow – it’s not what I would have expected from a red wine. There’s also a sharp, dark strawberry note along with black pepper – nearly a balsamic vinegar note, or perhaps shoyu. There seems to be blackberry there as well, and definitely some super smooth French oak. It smells fantastic.In the mouth, what you get is smooth fruit with gently supporting acidity, and then, suddenly, a surprisingly elegant, fairly high toned blackcurrant and damson plum note, something like Guatemalan coffee towards the finish, and then it slinks off to the corner to regroup for the next mouthful. It’s not easy finding a Californian wine this elegant; I imagine it would work incredibly well with pork loin roast or a mushroom ragout.Cameron Hughes

Price: US $15
Closure: Diam
Date tasted: January 2008

Chateau Puynormond 2004

Posted on by
1

This wine is from the Montagne Saint-Emilion appellation in Bordeaux, and consists of 90% Merlot and 10% Cabernet Franc. And it’s cheap. Here goes.


The first thing that strikes one on the nose is what appears to be mild brett, but whether this is an issue depends very much on your tolerance for this particular wine fault. Personally, I don’t mind a bit of brett in the right dose (and the right wine). Here, it comes across as a metallic note that actually blends ok with the earthy, gravelly notes of the wine itself. It’s a subtle wine on the nose, dark in profile, but with some sweet black berry fruits peeping out around all the earth and gravel.

The entry is subtle and slips through to a middle palate where flavours start to register with more intensity. It’s predominantly a savoury wine in flavour profile, with earthy notes dominating a subtle but attractive layer of ripe blackberry fruit. Oak is pretty subliminal (I couldn’t detect much, if any, oak influence at all). Gentle acid is well integrated within the medium bodied palate and keeps the wine moving along nicely. The after palate is quite linear and progresses to a finish of fine, ripe tannins. No great length to speak of, but not short either. The overall impression of this wine is one of structure and elegance rather than ripe or juicy flavour.

If you’re a bit tolerant of brett, like I am, you will find this wine to be a reasonably priced Bordeaux that will accompany your mid-week dinner of beef or pork quite nicely.

Update: I left half the bottle overnight and retasted the next day. Marked improvement. The fruit has gained weight and fragrance, especially on the after palate, marginalising the brett influence to almost zero. Nice drop indeed. Might be best in a couple of years’ time.

Price: $A24
Closure: Cork
Date tasted: January 2008

Silverado Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon 2003

Posted on by
1

My partner saw me dragging this bottle into the kitchen and said “whoa, what is that, forty bucks?” I don’t know how much it cost – I’ll have to look at that up at the end of the review – but yes, the bottle does look fairly impressive in a conservative Napa Cab kind of way, right down to its twenty-fifth anniversary capsule.In the glass, my first thought was nah, maybe thirty bucks? It smells like good, clean, lovely Napa cabernet. More specifically, it smells heavy, dense, mostly fruity, with a fair bit of French oak coming through as well. The color is, however, not as dense as I’ve come to expect, which bodes well. On the palate, it’s brighter than I would have expected, with good supporting acidity and a lovely, fresh taste of ripe fruit (not overripe!), cassis, blackcurrant, and butterscotch, with minimal tannins on the finish… no, wait, there they are; they just take a minute or so to assert themselves. It’s all very California by way of Bordeaux and frankly pretty damned good.Silverado Vineyards

Price: US $35
Closure: Cork
Date tasted: January 2008

T'Gallant Juliet Pinot Noir 2006

Posted on by
Reply

Last night the Pinot Grigio, tonight the Pinot Noir. I was surprised by the drinkability, if not sophistication, of the Grigio, so was interested to see what the Noir is made of. As with the companion wine, this one is priced keenly at $A14.


Pretty, relatively dense ruby red, good clarity. Upon opening, the wine’s nose was almost entirely mute. Some time in glass has helped it to express itself a little, but it’s not exactly screaming out of the glass, even now. The aromas are of sweet Pinot fruit and a little spice, thankfully not confected but also quite simple. The palate is a lot more expressive than the nose. Entry is quite immediate and leads to a middle palate of light to medium weight, showing varietal fruit and some more spice. The fruit itself, though identifiably Pinot Noir in character, has an unattractively