Tag Archives: California

Scholium Project Riquewihr 2008

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It’s Friday evening, and I already finished a bottle of their La severita di Bruto with friends, insisting that I wasn’t going to be blogging anything this evening – but one smell of this and yeah, well, I lied.This wine smells of tinned litchi fruit that someone is eating in the middle of a peat smoke fire on the beach. Seriously. I don’t know what to make of it; I’ve never had a wine that smelled like this before. It smells like someone is dredging rose petals through a smoky sludge of decaying leaves and tar. It smells like someone banging chalky erasers against each other in the middle of dusty warehouse of discarded library books. It smells like ground basalt stirred into a solution of sea water and orange flower water. In short, it smells kind of awesome.In the mouth, it gets even stranger. It tastes slightly oxidized, yet fresh, with all kinds of outré notes ranging from off-brand cling peaches to orange blossom honey from Provence to smoked horse meat to, I don’t know, bruised rambutan mixed with gravel. In short, it’s all over the map, delightfully so. The finish lasts for ages, it’s wonderfully rich and fat in the mouth, and opens up a weirdly panoramic vista of fresh air and sunlight.Yeah, it’s weird, but this wine is both sui generis and a real keeper. By the way, the La severita di Bruto?  Also very good if not as much of a look-at-me-I’m-crazy showstopper of a wine. That being said, it’s probably the best sauvignon blanc I’ve had from California; yes, the finish is a bit hot, but it works well with the peppery aspects of the wine, and the aromatics are in a class of their own – kind of like high end Marlborough sauvignon minus the pneumatic passionfruit aromas + some of the mineral aspects of Sancerre in one big, goofy package. Recommended.The Scholium Project
Price: $30 (500 mL)
Closure: Cork

Bonny Doon Cigare Alternative A 2001

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The marketing materials suggested that this wine would greet 2010 “in fine fashion,” so how is it doing in 2009? I never did try it when originally shipped to wine club members many years ago, but here it is now, after two interstate moves; I’m tired of schlepping it around and now it’s time to slug it back.Immediately after opening the bottle, the smell of this stuff managed to overwhelm the homemade tamales I bought from a door-to-door vendor and has for dinner earlier tonight: this stuff is pungent. Boys and girls, the word of the day is Sauerkirschen: this smells like sour cherries, Moravian I suppose, or whatever those large, cheap glass jars contained back when the USSR still existed and you could buy them cheaply at any American grocery store. Whoa. Really strong, bright, dark, sour cherries. There’s also a hint of something that reminds me of freshly polished shoes: a light leathery note with the sharp tang of shoeshine polish. Pretty cool.What this wine taste like? Again, strong, sour cherries with only the faintest hints of darker flavors. There’s also a rather strange, herbal note here that is something like off-brand spearmint mouthwash; that sounds worse than it is, I know, but it’s very distinctive and not something I’ve encountered before. All of this is tightly grasped by still present, still somewhat hoary tannin, which at first was so unpleasant I considered throwing it out – but over time, it does loosen up enough to get past. Overall, the mouthfeel is pretty strange; it’s like a tug-of-war between not-yet-resolved tannins taking place in the shallow end of a pool. The color of this wine is dark and foreboding, yet it all seems fairly medium-bodied in the mouth, which is I suppose normal for a mature wine like this.All in all, I really don’t know what to make of this wine. Is it too old? Probably not. Was it better young? Who knows? Is the overall disorienting mouthfeel a relic of Bonny Doon’s then-obsessions with spinning cones, microbullage, and other weird winemaker tricks? I’m thinking yes; there’s something just not right about this wine, something getting in the way of the direct transmission from Mother Earth. I get the feeling that if Randall Grahm had made this ten years later it would be OK – but as it is, I imagine that he’d be recherching an awful lot of temps perdu if he were to open this puppy now.To paraphrase Stephen Malkmus: A for effort, B for delivery.Bonny Doon Vineyard
Price: $30
Closure: Cork

Gundlach Bundschu Pinot Noir 2005

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One smell of this and whoa, you’re in California. This doesn’t come across anywhere near as lean and means as Burgundy or Oregon: instead, you’re in distinctly warmer territory here. I can’t quite put that smell into words, but sometimes you smell a pinot and it just isn’t delicate; there’s a hint of varnish hovering over the full, red fruitiness.There’s a distinct earthiness or sappiness here as well, though, so it isn’t all shiny happy berries, which is a relief. There seems to be a dark, bitter chocolate note there as well, so I’m guessing this stuff has seen a fair whack of oak at some point.In the mouth, though, the wine is surprising: nimble and light on its feet, avoiding any sense of stewed fruit or overripeness. The flavor profile isn’t at all what I was expecting, tending towards the fairly sour with a fleshy midpalate, tasting largely of dusty leather, pipe tobacco, and sour raspberry jam. The finish is slightly overly acidic for my liking, but of course all that means is that you’d best drink this one with charcuterie; by itself, it seems just a bit incomplete, but it does offer up a wide range of flavors ranging from standard Pinot all the way through to earthy sap. For my money, this isn’t really a match for Oregon pinot or Burgundy – it’s just a bit too big and top-heavy in some way – but it’s a very fine example of Sonoma pinot noir and easily holds its own with some of the classic, e.g. Gary Farrell. Price-wise it’s fairly priced, too, which is unusual for this part of the state. Oddly enough the wine it reminds me most of is Bass Philips, albeit in kind of a cartoony way – this isn’t anywhere near the wine that is, but it has a similar fullness of profile, I reckon.Gundlach Bundschu
Price: $35
Closure: Cork

Domaine Chandon Carneros Chardonnay 2005

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At first glance, this wine should be roughly the same as the Gloria Ferrer from last week. Both wines cost $14, both wines are from Los Carneros AVA, and both wines are produced by European companies that have a fair amount of history between them (at least in terms of producing sparkling wines).In the glass, everything seems to be the same as last week: this is a very bright, polished wine in the glass, if slightly more pale and less green than the Gloria Ferrer. Thankfully, there was no cork involved, so opening the bottle was a cinch… but I find I’m regretting it.The nose is basically stale movie butter popcorn with just a skosh of floor wax. There’s also just a hint of fresh green apple as well as a musty oakiness lurking around the corners; it smells just a little bit tired and more than a little bit boring.In the mouth, I can’t decide if this just tastes like flat sparkling wine (yuck) or a McDonalds-style sweetened My First Wine type product produced especially for the now-failed wine attraction at Disney’s California Adventure. It’s, well, gross: the sugars hang around in an irritating, louche manner better suited to Jean-Paul Belmondo than the bright California sun. Flavors are not overtly complex; a good jug of Odwalla organic orange juice is more interesting in terms of flavor profile. Worse yet, there’s a feckless whack of acidity that sneaks up on you at the very end of it; it all feels like you’ve just hired an inept hooker who just ran off with your wallet while you were still unlocking the hotel room door.I am not a fan. Avoid.Domaine Chandon
Price: $14
Closure: Stelvin

Ridge Zinfandel Stone Ranch 2004

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Rich and dusty, there’s also the suggestion of medicine here, medicine that’s hiding something darker underneath an allegedly friendly façade. To me, it’s suggestive of dusty, decaying leather and no longer fashionable roses, a perfume that’s not friendly enough to sell well at Target. But that’s fine by me; a famous Frenchman once said that a perfume should smell of a woman who neglects herself, and this wine is heading in that same direction. It’s the smell of a wine that doesn’t particularly care what you think – kind of punk rock, I suppose.Deeply purple, youthful, and unapologetically alcoholic (if the jambes are to go by), it begins to give it up for fruitiness after a few minutes’ worth of exposure to air. Still, the fruity jam is nicely framed by that savory, dusty edge of dirt and restraint.Brighter than you’d expect in the mouth, what you get is a very floral, bright wine with hints of an aged character. In fact, it almost seems like there’s a skosh of volatile acidity lurking here; it just seems to… well, perky. It’s all moderately good… and yet it seems like there’s something every so slightly out of balance here. Even so, the character of the wine sneaks to the foreground from time to time, with a dusty, frankly kind of generically Zin-ny characteristic that’s good enough… almost. I’d be lying if I said I weren’t disappointed by this; all of the elements of a good Ridge zinfandel appear to be here; the problem is that they aren’t coherent, interrupted as they are by that acidic brightness and the odd sharpness of the wine. If I have anything particularly nice to say about this wine, it’s probably simply that it’s relatively inexpensive for a Ridge.Tannins, by the way, seemed missing in action for me, but my friend Mark says “wow, it’s all chunky tannins!” It could be simply that my taste buds have gone walkabout for the evening!Update: Ten minutes on, it’s warmed up a bit from the cellar, and now it’s going a sort of cassia bark path, devolving into a sort of vanillin spice box character. Interesting.Ridge
Price: $24
Closure: Cork

Kent Rasmussen Sousão

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There’s a curious class of wines that just smell grapey – not particularly like wine. At first, this wine seems like one of those; it’s a rich, fruity smell that smells just fine, if not particularly sophisticated. The nose is odd: there’s something vaguely volatile there, not bad though, and just a whiff of something unripe, almost like a New Zealand merlot with that faint hint of capsicum (green bell pepper). It’s weirdly like unripe tropical fruit of some kind – I’m thinking green papaya salad. Don’t misunderstand: it’s not “wrong” or “bad” – it’s just really different.Hugely tannic and wildly acidic, my first thought after having a sip was “bad idea.” It’s fairly hot, not particularly flavorful, and taste something like burned coffee grounds mixed with overripe papaya. The trick seems to be to not take such a big sip; with less in the mouth, it’s somewhat more palatable – but even so, I am decidedly not a fan of this wine, alas. Sure, there’s some pleasure in trying to suss out what components of Port derive from this, but otherwise? There’s probably a reason you don’t see varietal wines from this grape.Kent Rasmussen
Price: $20
Closure: Cork

Sarah's Vineyard Pinot Noir Estate 2004

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The nose on this guy is very smooth, fruity, and somehow worked (if that makes any sense). It doesn’t seem terribly complex; however, this is an undercurrent of something like molasses or burnt sugar which lends some interest to the proceedings.

Initially frankly dull, the wine quickly rears up with a blast of ripe Pinot fruit – and then quickly finds itself buried under alcohol; at just under 15%, this is kind of a bruiser. The finish is short – or, rather, you think it’s going to be. Suddenly, the flavors come back and then ride out on a note of rich strawberry fruit and toasty oak. The tannins aren’t noticeable; this wine seems generally built as a New World fruit bomb.

Overall, how is it? I’m afraid I’m not a good judge of this: it seems fairly well constructed, but it’s all to ends that I don’t particularly care for. There’s no funk, no subtlety, no strangeness, no real beauty here – at least not to me. If you’re a fan of rich, fruity California wines, you might very well like this one. Me, though, I’ll pass.

Sarah’s Vineyard
Price: $26
Closure: Cork

Bonny Doon Vineyard Syrah Cuvée Splendide 2006

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This one slipped in under the radar somehow; not a wine club selection from Bonny Doon, this was a one-off purchase from last summer. I’m a sucker for Randall Grahm’s wolf-cries; just as his Heart Has Its Rieslings was said to be the veritable bomb back in the fall of 2001 (word to the wise: there are still a number of bottles of that for sale at the main Glengarry shop in Auckland to this day), this was another one of Mr Grahm’s “OMG yum” mentions to wine club members; as a result, it’s open in front of me now.

Nothing surprising about color here; what is surprising is the smell. It’s a witness to the change in philosophy at the winery in Santa Cruz, I reckon: no more weird, microbullage-d to death velveteen aromas. Instead, there’s a sour dust lazily orbiting the wine in in the glass. It’s a surprise, a good surprise. Hell, I’ll even go out on a limb here and say that there’s something like Slim Jims and truckstop chili: a stale meatiness with the suggestion of warm asphalt.

Appealingly restrained, upright, dry in the mouth, the finish is solidly tannic, shot through with uptight French fruit. Overall, the effect is one of unexpected minerality: the fruits are very much sitting at the back of the room, patient, yielding the stage to structure worth of an Irish nun’s lesson plan. The overall effect is deliriously delicious and would surely benefit from a fresh joint (of lamb, not Humboldt County’s finest) on the side.

Surprisingly, I think this one might actually last a long, long time: it’d be interesting to see what happens with the arthritic grip of the wine’s bones loosens and lets some of that California fruit steal the spotlight.

Delicious.

Bonny Doon
Price: $24
Closure: Stelvin

Ridge Dusi Ranch Zinfandel 2002

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Honestly, I didn’t mean to keep this bottle for so long – it’s just that Ridge’s wine club sends nearly two cases of wine a year, and I just can’t keep up. This is a members only bottling from a while back that someone got lost in the back of the wine chiller; upon pouring it’s clear that some of the normally dense color has gone missing over the last six years or so.

I’m not making this up – this wine smells almost exactly like gingerbread. At first, a softness of raspberries and then boom, gingerbread just like your Bubbie used to make. It mutates into blueberry at some point, but the spice and ginger hang in there.I’ve had more than my fair share of Zinfandel, and this one really does stand out.

At first threatening to be elegant and medium bodied, the wine quickly fans out in the mouth to a more varietally appropriate stance; it’s fairly rich, somewhat jagged (the acids and the tannins are all jostling for place here), and offers a surprising range of flavors, ranging from something like candied damson to Rainier cherry to Christmas pudding to sage honey and cedar wood. The only fault I can find (if indeed it is one) is a slight tendency for the acidity to surge up on the finish – but of course if you’re raising a wine (as opposed to making a wine) this is entirely to be expected.

Even at its advanced age, I don’t detect any aged notes; the wine is fresh and lovely and quite a pleasure to drink at this stage. Just add meatloaf and roasted veg and you’re good to go.

Ridge
Price: $30
Closure: Cork

Bonny Doon Splendido Segaro 2001

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It’s been over a year since I moved to San Diego, and the pile of wine bottles in the bedroom doesn’t seem to be getting any smaller, even though I’ve done my best to drink, drain, or distribute it. Ah well. This bottle was set aside long ago for a charity event called Have a Cigare that never materialized: a vertical tasting of Bonny Doon Le Cigare Volant and related wines for the Microsoft employee charity auction; sadly, no one bid on the opportunity to taste a dozen Cigares, so it wound up gathering dust under my bed for a year. Anyhow!

Still fairly youthful in the glass – visually, it looks like a medium-weight Zinfandel – this has a decidedly aged nose, the tell-tale stink of time overriding much of anything else. To be honest, it smells an awful lot like a greasy hamburger (and I don’t mean that pejoratively): very meaty, a little bit smoky, and kind of fatty. It’s kind of like a cherry cough drop that fell into the bacon fat jar next to your grandmother’s stove, actually.

Once you drink some, there’s an immediate hit of cherry followed by fairly thick, dusty tannins with high, nearly Italianate acidity. The complexity is surprising, tending towards bright red fruits with a supporting hint of porty chocolate; all in all, it strikes me as weirdly Italian (I know, I know).

God only knows what’s in this or how much it cost; I suppose I’d have to go find the packing slip from the wine club shipment to find out, but right now all I want to do is finish this bottle and order a pizza.

Bonny Doon
Price: $?
Closure: Cork
Date tasted: November 2008