Iowa City Wine Geek

I just received a large order of wine from Wine Library that I am extremely excited about. Here is a link to my "cellar".  By cellar I mean the few shelves in my kitchen cupboards reservered for the wine.

But anyway, moving onto the wine. One of the wines I picked up is the 2006 Hundred Tree Hill Chardonnay from Australia.  I should have known to read the couple of reviews on CellarTracker first, but I completely relied on WLTV's review.  It was a decent wine, but not worth the $16.99 I payed for it.

I thought it had a little butteriness, zero oak (which is fine), a little acidity but all in all was somewhat boring. I bought 2 bottles so I probably keep the other 1 for a year and see what happens next summer. This is just for giggles mind you. I've never cellared a wine before so it will all be part of the grand experiment and I wouldn't want to try this experiment with an expensive wine.

I think next I'll open up the 2007 Foris Pinot from Oregon. All the reviewers say this is dynamite for the price, only $13.98!

Enjoy!

Labels: Chardonnay, Tasting, White

The three white wines from this weekend are in order of appearance:

Labels: Bordeaux Blanc, Chardonnay, Pairing, White

Beaujolais is an underrated and overlooked wine that has a range of quality and a large percentage are relatively affordable for the day to day consumer. The midrange beaujolais will remind you of a Pinot Noir and the super high end when aged for a long time (sometimes up to 10 or 12 years) will rival your favorite heavy wines (like a cabernet).

What are the facts? Well here they are:


1. Beaujolais is from the Burgandy region of France and it happens to be the region that produces the most red wine in Burgandy. Although, there are some white beaujolais wines (predominantly made from the chardonnay or aligote grape). Beaujolais can be found in three levels (besides nouveau). The straight Beaujolais, Beaujolais-Village, and Beaujolais-Cru.

2. Beaujolais comes from the Gamay grape. Historically the Gamay grape origins are with the Pinot Noir grape, thus the similarities in style.

3. Beaujolais has a bad name from when this guy Georges Duboeuf (who does import some darn good wine so don't get down on him) imported Beaujolais Nouveau. The Nouveau is quite sweet and is from the first harvest of the Gamay grape in the fall. Think wine cooler or vodka/cranberry with a quarter of a cup of sugar. So in essence...not that great. Probably leaves you with a wicked hangover too. I don't know though I haven't had one.

4. You should give them another try. I know I really enjoy them (especially in the summer) and they are an excellent wine for the price.

At the tasting I attended I sampled the following Beaujolais. The first 2 were of the younger style while the third and fourth were aged a bit longer with the fourth being from one of the upper cru's. Not the top mind you but close.

2008 Domaine Pral Beaujolais
What I smell: The bouquet I got tons of red licorice...tons.
What I taste: On the palate I found this to be a very light bodied wine with medium acidity.

2007 Domaine Dupeuble Pere et Fils
What I smell: Again, red licorice
What I taste: On the palate I did get some boot leather, cranberries, and it had a medium acidity.

2006 St. Armand Beaujolais-Villages Vieilles Vignes
What I smell: Again red licorice. Get the idea about these younger wines? They're a bit candified.
What I taste: On the taste for being a bit older I found the mid palate to be a little light and short lived. I would have expected more. However, this wine is defintely more complex than the first two. Much more acidity.

2007 Côte de Brouilly Château Thivin
What I smell: Red licorice (but less candy more fruity), oak, and cherries.
What I taste: Complex and well blended flavors. The tannins were great and I would even let this wine lie down for maybe another year or 2.

After note: When I let them sit for a while in their glasses the candified (red licorice) smell dissipated leaving a more cranberry sort of bouquet.

Labels: Beaujolais, Tasting

Let's set a couple of things straight. I am not a professional sommelier. I am not certified in tasting or distributing wine. I don't work in the wine industry. I am strictly a geek. What that means is I am obsessed with wine. I love the smells, the tastes, and the history of the grape. What makes it geeky (or weird) you ask? Well, I love everything about wine except intoxication. I know that may seem to discredit my opinions but it doesn't bother me so if that bothers you noone's forcing you to read this…

Being really into wine is a fairly recent interest for me. However, I always been fascinated by what seems to be the secret world of wine. I don't know about you but when I would go to a restaurant and take a look at the wine list I could never tell you a single thing about the wines. Except maybe that I like cabernet sauvignon. It was something I always wished I knew, but then I would get my meal and the thought would disappear. Food can be magical that way.

What brought this desire back for me was the discovery of the many great audio and video podcasts and blogs out there in the interweb about wine. From Three Wine Guys to Wine Library TV to Dr Vino's Blog. All worth checking out by the way. They helped by making the introduction to wine easy and fun!

While I still follow all these podcasts religiously I have been following my own path for learning about wine. the first question was what would be my path? There are so many different regions and wines it seemed overwhelming to decide what to focus on first. To help my decide I went for a little stroll though a my local wine purveyor. My wine knowledge was limited to what I had consumed in the past which were primarily red wines. I asked myself which regions had I really enjoyed red wines from? Well Spain for one, and there were definitely quite a few good reds from California and South America that I had in the past. France had always scared me because the labels were difficult to decipher.

How was I going to decide?

Then it hit me, I'll let someone else decide for me!

Enter google search for local wine tastings….

I found a local restaurant here in town, Devotay, that does monthly wine tastings. First up on their schedule was Beaujolais, great!!...….but what the heck is Beaujolais?