Online Fine Wine Auctions

Champagne Dom Pérignon 2000: RARE AND EXTRAORDINARY ON EBAY UP TO THIS ENCHERES.Commentaires: Beyond the selection of only varietals pinot noir and chardonnay, choice exclusive plots the richest and most vulnerable, Dom Perignon adds coercion absolute best years and a long aging on the lees. In years when the grapes can not express the style, [...]

Read Full Post »

My father was partial to scotch, rather than the restrained subtleties of cabernet sauvignon or grenache. But I am not my father. In the Sierra Foothills, specifically the Shenandoah Valley near Plymouth, CA, generations of farmers have planted grapes for wine since the gold rush times.

read more

Read Full Post »

From this valley comes the wine we are pouring
We really dig the bright fruit and sweet nose
You can taste the Sonoma County sunshine
That makes these exquisite grapes grow

Come and sit by my side, if you’re thirsty
Do not hesitate to drink a little more
Just remember the Russian River Valley
With these Chauteau Souverain Pinot Noirs

We’ve been waiting a long time, my darling
For a Pinot Noir this earthy and rich
Now here’s a glass full of ruby-red contentment
With mild tannins and a lingering finish

Come and sit by my side, if you’re thirsty
One bottle of ‘05 and two of ‘04
Just remember the Russian River Valley
With these Chauteau Souverain Pinot Noirs

Well the ‘04 is ripe and dark and complex
With fruit-driven flavors of berry
But the ‘05 is a just little bit jammier
With spices, plum, and black cherry

Come and sit by my side, if you’re thirsty
Drink all you want – they’ll make some more
Just remember the Russian River Valley
With these Chauteau Souverain Pinot Noirs

2005 Sonoma County Pinot Noir

Appellation: Sonoma County
Blend: 100% Pinot Noir
Harvest: August 31, 2005
Brix: 24.7
Total Acids: 0.63g/100ml
pH: 3.48
Alcohol: 14.5%
Cooperage: Aged 14 months in French oak barrels (80% new)
Release: April 2007
Production: 311 cases

2004 Pinot Noir

Appellation: Russian River Valley
Blend: 96% Pinot Noir, 4% Syrah
Harvest: August 12 to October 10, 2004
Total Acids: 0.61g/100ml
pH: 3.61
Alcohol: 14.7%
Cooperage: Aged 14 months in 97% French oak barrels and 3% Hungarian barrels (54% new oak)
Release: July 1, 2006
Production: 615 cases

Rules and restrictions:

• Wine sold by winery (or a retailer in your state where necessary)
• You must be 21 or older to order
• Whoever receives the package must be 21 or older
• If you’re drunk when the package shows up, you will not be allowed to receive it
• Wine cannot be delivered to a P.O. Box
• We highly recommend you use a business address as your shipping address

Thanks to stick-in-the-mud buzzkilling state legislators, wine may only be delivered to the following states:

• California
• Colorado
• Connecticut
• Florida
• Idaho
• Illinois
• Iowa
• Louisiana
• Minnesota
• Missouri
• Nebraska
• Nevada
• New Hampshire
• New Mexico
• New York
• North Carolina
• North Dakota
• Ohio
• Oregon
• South Carolina
• Texas
• Vermont
• Virginia
• Washington
• West Virginia
• Wisconsin
• Wyoming

If your state’s not on the list, you’re out of luck… for now. Keep up with the ever-changing laws over at ShipCompliantBlog.com, and/or sound the alarms with your state assembly person through FreeTheGrapes.org. Meanwhile, all Federal, state and local laws are complied with in providing this wine.

Read Full Post »

NORTHERN CALIFORNIA WINERIES GO ORGANIC, SUSTAINABLE AND BIODYNAMIC

From large to small, northern California wineries are starting to color their operations green, whether by organically growing their grapes, practicing sustainable activities or creating biodynamic environments.

read more

Read Full Post »

We all understand the power of brands. There was likely a time for most Americans alive to day when we used “Reynolds Wrap” when we meant aluminum foil. Some of us still say Kleenex instead of tissue and Xerox instead of photocopy. When one company pioneers a product that becomes so ubiquitous and common, it’s likely that the name will stick, even when we’re no longer using the original product.

There was a time in Japan’s history when sake was more easily referred to as Oyamazake, for exactly the same reasons. In 1882, the Shogun commanded that a sake brewing operation be established to feed the growing thirst for rice wine at the court, and like most of the time when the Shogun asked for something, he got what he wanted.

At it’s height, the brewing operation that sprang in the town of Oyama occupied almost fifty separate breweries arranged side-by-side on the Shonai plain in northwestern Japan. The amount of sake produced at the height of production is unknown, but it must have been truly staggering.

Today, several sake breweries call he town of Oyama home, but only one brewery can trace its history back to that massive brewing operation begun more than a century ago. Named Ohyama, or “big mountain,” this modest brewery continues to carry on the traditions of sake brewing much as they were established before the turn of the century.

Ohyama makes several sakes, but perhaps one of their best is this very special nigori, or “unfiltered,” sake. Unfiltered in the world of sake means much the same as it does in the world of wine. The process of making sake eventually yields a big soup of mushy fermented rice and alcohol in the same way that the end of fermentation for grapes results in a big tank of grape skins, wine, seeds, etc.

In order to get sake out of the mash, the sake must be pressed off of its lees (the solid bits of rice and yeast that are left). This usually involves putting sake into canvas bags and then squeezing those bags in a pneumatic press so that the sake squirts out and the rice and such is left behind. The resulting sake is a milky, cloudy color as it still contains a lot of rice starch and yeast in suspension.

At this point the sake is usually cold filtered through charcoal or other mediums to clarify the sake, but occasionally, brewers will simply stop here, and this cloudy, sediment filled sake is known as nigori. The rice starch gives the sake a milkier, slightly sweeter flavor which makes nigori a nice aperitif, as well as a good match for stronger flavored foods.

Interestingly, if you were to travel back in time, say, to 1882, when Ohyama was busy making sake for the Shogun, all the sake would have been unfiltered because they hadn’t invented the filters yet. Clear sake is quite a modern phenomenon.

Unfortunately while nigori sake is also an increasingly popular phenomenon, much of it is extremely low in quality. In some sake drinking circles, nigori sake is the equivalent of white zinfandel, an entry level brew that is easy to drink and doesn’t take much to appreciate. As a result most nigori sakes are made from relatively low quality rice, are often fortified with alcohol, and in some cases, are just downright nasty tasting.

Increasingly however, there are some breweries that are making extremely high quality nigori sake, and Ohyama happens to be one of them. This sake is a “tokubetsu” junmai nigori, which means “very special” junmai nigori. The Haenuki rice has been milled to less than 60% of its former mass (enough to qualify for ginjo status), and no additional alcohol has been added in the brewing process. These two facts, coupled with the extra care taken in its production have made for one of the finest, most delicate nigori sakes available on the market today.

Tasting Notes:
This sake looks like watery, fat free milk in the glass, and it smells very pretty, with aromas of rainwater, flowers, and faint hints of bubble gum. In the mouth it is smooth and creamy, with flavors of…well…cream, wet cedar wood, apple, floral notes, and a beautiful stony quality that lasts through a surprisingly long finish. This is one of the most refined, elegant nigori sakes I have ever had.

Food Pairing:
Even though it is refined in quality, this sake has the robustness of the nigori style, which means it is not so easily overwhelmed by stronger flavors (like many delicate sakes are). I’d happily serve this sake with any non-spicy south or east Asian food. It would go beautifully with a mild Vietnamese curry, for instance.

Overall Score: 9/9.5

How Much?: $15

This sake is available for purchase on the Internet.

Read Full Post »

If you want this by July 4th, place your order by
Wednesday. Which shouldn’t be hard, since that’s when this sale will
end. Look for another deal Thursday.

Hey,
remember that weird wave of Francophobia that swept the stupider
corners of our nation a few years ago? We can barely recall what it was
all about – something about Saddam Hussein headbutting the Dixie Chicks
and taking their French fries, maybe. What we do remember is a lot of
grandstanding blowhards huffing and puffing about changing the names of
various items on the menu at the Congressional cafeteria. Ha! Take
that, France! We’ll accept your surrender now – in English!

Anyway,
that mental illness has mercifully passed. It’s OK again to be friends
with the French. Don’t we all have the same colors in our flag? Didn’t
we both hate the British a couple of centuries ago?

And there’s no better way to salute our reunion with nos amis de grenouille-consommation
than with a fluteful of French-styled sparkling wine from Mumm Napa.
OK, maybe actual French champagne would be a little more appropriate.
But have you seen the exchange rates lately? Besides, Mumm Napa was
founded by French winemaker Guy Devaux in 1983. He brought that
nation’s traditional methods and techniques to the exceptional fruit of
the Napa Valley, the same way his forebears gave us the Statue of
Liberty, croissants, and Audrey Tautou. They’re a generous people.

Red-staters
and Godless Reds alike will rally round the Mumm Napa Cuvée M Red, a
rare true-red sparkling wine. The grapes were initially handled as if
they were going to be part of a rich red wine. Imagine their surprise
when they were whisked away to join yeasts and sugar for sparklization
(note: “sparklization” is not an official wine term). The result is a
sparkling wine of a different color, a deep dark ruby with a red-wine
nose and a bubbly palate. Serve it with anything from hors d’oeuvres to le canard BBQ.

Wave
the white flag and surrender to the exquisite charms of the Mumm Napa
Reserve Brut. Summing up 25 years of superior Mumm Napa wines in one
limited-production masterpiece, this well-structured Brut seems to cram
all of Napa Valley into one little bottle. Its rounded flavors of
toast, spice, biscuit, and mocha will have you looking forward to
breakfast. Not many grapes have what it takes to reach this echelon of
greatness – only the very best Pinot Noir and Chardonnay are allowed to
wear the Reserve Brut label. It’s the must-see feel-good blockbuster
wine of the summer. Miss it at your peril.

Now, the only
thing blue about the Mumm Napa Cuvée M Blue is the label. And you, if
you miss the chance to experience the superlative sparkle of its
quintessential Napa Valley flavors: ripe peach, creamy vanilla, and
rich white chocolate. Fruit from more than 50 vineyards hereby come
together to form a more perfect union, a united state of ecstasy. The
careful, traditional handcrafting of the Mumm Napa Cuvée M Blue is so
authentic you can practically feel the fingertips on your tongue. The
result is as rich and complex as this country of ours.

So
raise a toast to the Marquis de Lafayette on July 4th – without him,
we’d all have awful teeth and call trucks “lorries”. And let Mumm Napa
handle the sparklers. These three bottles will be as dazzling as any
Roman candle, but they won’t leave the acrid odor of sulfur in your
nostrils. And they might blow your mind, but they won’t blow your
fingers off.

Mumm Napa Reserve Brut

Winemaker: Ludovic Dervin
Appellation: Napa Valley
Composition: 60% Pinot Noir 40% Chardonnay
Alcohol: 12.5%
T.A.: 9.7 g/L
pH: 3.00
Dosage: 1.1% (Brut)

Mumm Napa Cuvee M

Winemaker: Ludovic Dervin
Appellation: Napa Valley
Composition: 48% Chardonnay, 43% Pinot Noir, 6% Pinot Gris, 3% Pinot Meunier
Alcohol: 12.5%
T.A.: 9.1 g/L
Dosage Sec: (3.1% RS)

Mumm Napa Cuvee M Red

Winemaker: Ludovic Dervin
Appellation: Napa Valley
Composition: 96% Pinot Noir, 4% Syrah
Alcohol: 12.5%
T.A.: 0.67 g/L
pH: 3.42
Dosage: 3.0%—Sec

Rules and restrictions:

• Wine sold by winery (or a retailer in your state where necessary)
• You must be 21 or older to order
• Whoever receives the package must be 21 or older
• If you’re drunk when the package shows up, you will not be allowed to receive it
• Wine cannot be delivered to a P.O. Box
• We highly recommend you use a business address as your shipping address

Thanks to stick-in-the-mud buzzkilling state legislators, wine may only be delivered to the following states:

• California
• Colorado
• Connecticut
• District Of Columbia
• Florida
• Idaho
• Illinois
• Iowa
• Louisiana
• Michigan
• Minnesota
• Missouri
• Nebraska
• Nevada
• New Hampshire
• New Mexico
• New York
• North Carolina
• North Dakota
• Oregon
• South Carolina
• Texas
• Vermont
• Virginia
• Washington
• West Virginia
• Wisconsin
• Wyoming

If your state’s not on the list, you’re out of luck… for now. Keep up with the ever-changing laws over at ShipCompliantBlog.com, and/or sound the alarms with your state assembly person through FreeTheGrapes.org. Meanwhile, all Federal, state and local laws are complied with in providing this wine.

Read Full Post »

The old, worn wooden trugs that laborers once used to haul in grapes at harvest have been replaced by plastic bins, but these antique vineyard tools still whisper the secrets of times gone by.

Read Full Post »

The wine world increasingly sorts out into two camps, those who believe increasing globalization is good for the wine industry, and those who believe that it ruins everything good about wine. Never mind that it is most certainly happening and impossible to stop. Those who regularly follow my ramblings know that I think globalization is the best thing to happen to wine since someone figured out that stainless steel tanks made for good fermentations.

Leaving aside all the petty and ridiculous arguments about the homogenization of wine, which I think are bollocks, I offer the simplest and most compelling reason that globalization is good for wine:

Slovenia.

The folks in Slovenia have been making wine since even before the region was a part of the Roman empire, of course, but some of the wineries operating today have been in business since the 1500’s. Yet until recently very few people in the United States had even heard of Slovenian wine, let alone tasted any.

Globalization more than anything else means that the market for wine, even ones made in tiny countries, by tiny producers, from slightly obscure grapes have a chance to reach wine lovers all over the world. And if they’re good, they have the chance to reach levels of popularity that would never have been possible based on the local demand of their region, or even neighboring countries. Perhaps the most well known success story of this kind in the region is Movia, whose wines I reviewed yesterday. But Slovenia is much bigger than Movia, and there are a lot of wines worth paying attention to.

Slovenia’s three primary winegrowing regions of Podravje, Primorska, and Posavje are planted to around 60,000 acres of vineyards, representing more than one percent of the nation’s tiny 7,827 square miles of territory. With more than 40,000 registered wineries according to the Oxford Companion to Wine, it’s not hard to believe that the average vineyard size for the country falls somewhere in the 8 to 15 acre zone.

This incredible diversity of producers may partially be responsible for Slovenian wine staying off the radar for so long, as most producers are so small that they wouldn’t have enough wine to sell on the global market even if they could afford to get it there.

Thanks to the work of some dedicated importers and the increasingly global view of many wine lovers, the world is getting more experience with this region and it’s history of producing distinctive wines.

Slovenia was the first republic to declare independence in the dissolution of the former Yugoslavia, but before that nation was cobbled together, it sat at a major crossroads in the Hapsburg empire that, in some form or another, ruled the region even before the collapse of the Holy Roman Empire.

Snuggled as it is between the Mediterranean on the Southwest, Italy on the West, Croatia on the Southeast, and the Austrian Alps to the north (beautifully summarized by the country’s coat of arms, seen above), it will come as no surprise that the region’s major influences when it comes to wine are Italian, German and Hungarian with some French sensibility thrown into the mix.

Nothing is a greater influence on Slovenian wine, however, than the extremely variable climate of the region, which can vary to such a great degree that the size of the country’s wine production regularly fluctuates twenty or thirty percentage points from vintage to vintage.

Like most relatively developed indigenous wine regions, Slovenia produces both red and white wines, but in my experience the white wines are by far the best and most interesting, and in some cases are nothing short of world-class. These whites are either made as single varietals or as blends, using a wide variety of techniques, from the more traditional vinification in large, old oak casks, to modern stainless steel winemaking.

Regardless of the methods used, Slovenian winemakers are producing distinctive wines from familiar grapes like Pinot Gris, Riesling, and Sauvignon Blanc; to less well known varieties such as Ribolla Gialla, Malvasia, Traminer, and Sylvaner; to the downright obscure Kerner, Pikolit, Vitovska, Sipon, and Pinela.

It is quite unwise of me to broadly characterize the wines of an entire country, as there are great variations, from the sweet dessert wines of the southeast, to the crisp whites of the western region that falls within the unique extension of Italy’s Collio appellation. However, I will say that I find Slovenian whites to be extremely distinctive, and quite unlike white wines from anywhere else, save some of the producers in Italy’s neighboring Friuli region. The best Slovenian wines, even those with residual sugar, seem to offer amazing combinations of floral, tropical fruit, and more earthy qualities, often with a touch of oxidation that gives them somewhat of an “ancient” quality.

Any wine lover who enjoys white wines I strongly urge to seek out some Slovenian wine and give it a try.

Here are some tasting notes from some of the best Slovenian whites I have had recently.

Full disclosure: I received these wines as press samples.

2003 Kogl M.D. Albus “Magna Domenica” White Wine, Podravje, Slovenia
Pale, greenish gold in color, this blend of Riesling, Yellow Muscat, and Auxerrois has a nose that combines slightly funky aromas of wet wool and wet wood with beautiful scents of white blossoms and ripe melon. In the mouth it tastes of paraffin, pear, and white flowers wrapped around a core of tart melon flavor. The decent (though perhaps not sharp enough for my taste) acidity brings a lightly mineral, even metallic quality to the long, intriguing finish. Score: between 8.5 and 9. Cost: $17.00. Where to buy?

2005 Kogl “Mea Culpa” White Wine, Podravje, Slovenia
Greenish gold in the glass, this wine has a gorgeous nose of acacia flowers, juicy peaches, and paraffin, which hints at the Riesling that makes up the majority of the wine. In the mouth the wine is beautifully balanced and offers a gorgeously complex pastiche of chamomile, lemon zest, and mineral qualities that are electrified by excellent acids and textured with silky smoothness. The flavors blend and swirl into a long, satisfying finish. In a word, “yum.” Score: between 9 and 9.5. Cost: $19.99. Where to buy?

1999 Batic Reserve Pinot Gris, Vipava Valley, Slovenia
This wine pours a beautiful medium gold, even slightly orange in the glass. Orange wine is nearly always a good sign! It smells of honey and freshly shelled nuts. The nutty qualities continue into the waxy body of the wine which has a lightly oxidized quality that I find utterly compelling. The nuts and rainwater flavors carry through a long finish that seems to defiantly challenge anyone who says aged Pinot Gris can’t turn into something special if made in the right way. Score: around 9. Cost: $29.95. Where to buy?

2004 Batic Pinot Gris Riserva, Vipava Valley, Slovenia
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a wine quite this color before — gorgeously orange-pink in the glass it reads visually more as a rose than a white wine, making me wonder if it didn’t have a period of extended contact with the skins to extract such a hue. It’s nose is equally wondrous - a jewel-like confection of candied apple, red apple skin, and exotic spices. In the mouth it is nicely balanced with good acid and a weighty presence on the tongue that dances flavors of paraffin, red apple skin, and those same hard-to-pin-down spices across the palate. The wine’s finish is unusually short, but despite this deficit, it is most certainly one of the most distinctive wines I have ever had in my mouth. Score: between 9 and 9.5. Cost: $26.95. Where to buy?

2004 Santomas Malvasia, Primorje - Koper, Slovenia
Light gold in the glass, this wine smells of melon and honey. In the mouth it seduces with a silky texture and a waxy pear and melon mix of flavors that swirl pleasingly with good acid into a moderate finish. Score: between 8.5 and 9. Cost: $16. Where to buy?

2006 Crnko “Rumeni Muskat” Yellow Muscat, Maribor, Slovenia
Pale green-gold in color, this wine has an intoxicating nose of melon, kiwi, and other exotic tropical fruits. It’s hard not to simply want to sit and smell this wine for several minutes. In the mouth, the wine offers bright flavors of sultanas and hints of the melon in the nose. A slightly waxy quality tangos with a light spritz on the tongue as the wine finishes without quite living up to the promise of the nose. This Slovenian rendition of the Austrian “Gelber Muskateller” grape is good for drinking, but even better for smelling. Score: around 8.5. Cost: $21.95. Where to buy?

SEE ALSO: Some of my other Slovenian wine reviews:

Read Full Post »

I drink wine from as many different countries as I can, as often as I can. I firmly believe that the only way I keep learning anything as a wine lover will be through continued exploration.

There are times, though, when searching out new countries, grape varieties, and appellations just takes too much energy. At times like these, usually after a long week, I just want a nice meal and a good glass of wine to go with it. Like most people in these situations of part-exhaustion, I tend to stick to the predictable — the least risky choice that is most likely to yield the most pleasurable result.

So when I found myself dining alone the other night, and not wanting to think much about which white wine I wanted, I reached for a safety wine. I had never had it before, but I knew it was: white, a blend of different grapes, French, and it was from Provence.

There aren’t many sure bets in the wine world. There’s a lot of crap out there to be sure. But if you’re gonna order wine, sight unseen and untasted, I think it’s pretty hard to go wrong with most of the wines in the Cotes de Provence. At least the ones that end up getting imported here.

So there I was, sitting alone at the big communal table, watching the chefs do their thing from behind the pass. I was reading some notes I had taken from a meeting earlier in the day, and only barely noticed when the waitress put the glass down by my plate. I reached out between sentences and took a sip, and in the kind of moment that keeps me drinking wine, I was forced to pause, to savor, and to say a silent prayer of thanks for my luck at living a life in which I get to enjoy good things like this glass of wine.

Don’t get me wrong, this wine was not epiphany-creating-stuff-of-the-gods. It was just darn good, and it really hit the spot.

The family that currently owns Chateau du Rouët purchased the property in 1840 with the intention of harvesting cork from the trees on the property, and selling some of the pine wood that was particularly in demand for shipbuilding at the nearby ports of the Mediterranean. The property encompassed more than 1000 acres of forest, as well as the grounds of a sizable manor that was erected by the new owners in 1880.

Around 1920, a fire ravaged the estate, as well as some of the forest, and the current owner decided to plant a vineyard between the scrubby, fire prone hills and the forest of the estate. Though it was only a secondary consideration at the time, this began the history of wine cultivation at the estate.

Today the descendants of the original three families that purchased the property farm approximately 170 acres of vineyards at the foot of a set of hills known as the Gorges de Pennafort that rise with their red volcanic rocks and ancient caves about 1500 feet above the property. The mostly sandstone terraced vineyards are wedged between the flatlands, the hills, and a swath of Mediterranean forest of cedar, bamboo, cork oaks, maritime pines, and even palm trees. The vineyards run mostly north to south to shelter the grapes from the fierce Mistral winds that whip over the hills at certain times of the year. These winds are not all bad, however. Combined with the warmer breezes off the Mediterranean, they combine to create the cool, dry climate that allows the Cotes de Provence to create wines of great personality.

On the grounds of the winery sits a small chapel that is worthy of mention only because of the unusual doors which adorn its modest facade. These doors were taken from a sailing ship named the Le Belle Poule, which at one time was well known for one of its last voyages — a trip it made to carry home the ashes of Napoleon Bonaparte. In 1888, Lucien Savatier, who contributed greatly to the development of Chateau du Rouet’s vineyards, as part of his duties to dismantle the ship, took the doors from the cabin that housed Bonaparte’s ashes during the voyage and installed them on the chapel where they remain today.

In memory of the ship (which adorns the label even today) the winery produces a red, a white and a rose wine, all called “Cuvee Belle Poule.” The white wine is a blend of three grapes: Ugni Blanc (30%), Sémillon (20%) and Rolle (50%) from what the winery refers to as “old vines” but I’m not clear on just how old they are. 1250 cases are made.

Tasting Notes:
Pale gold in the glass, this wine has an appealing nose of pears, rainwater, and very faint melon aromas. In the mouth it is crisp, and light, and bouncy. Great acidity and mineral qualities underlie green melon and pear flavors that along with the chalky stone quality to the wine make it fantastically refreshing. Everything I want in a white wine with dinner.

Food Pairing:
I drank this with a lobster bisque the other night and thoroughly enjoyed it.

Overall Score: 9

How Much?: $18

The 2004 may be tricky to find, but the 2005 and 2006 are readily available for purchase on the internet.

Read Full Post »

MLive.com

Ontario, Canada, bound: Niagara-on-the-Lake has fine wine, dining … MLive.com, MI - 4 hours ago This rich agricultural area is more southerly than Bordeaux and other famous wine regions, and offers the ideal atmosphere for grapes. …

Read Full Post »

The Wine Press: Washington wines hold their own against California’s Kansas City Star, MO - 9 minutes ago This pioneer vineyard was planted in 1973, and owner Mike Sauer has helped guide the Washington wine industry toward its most successful grapes: Cabernet …

Read Full Post »

They’d all told me about the warm California climate, but once I
made it out to the Golden State, the weather felt awful chilly for an
Okie on the bum like me. The kids threw rocks in Bakersfield, the
sheriffs swung clubs in Barstow, and Los Angeles? Well, the less said
the better, but I got scars that could tell you stories. The railroad
bulls were chasing me around the trainyard when I scrambled into a
boxcar for safety, and who should I meet there but Abilene Slim? I
never before or since seen a bindlestiff who could stay fat on cold
beans once a day, but Abilene done it, with pounds to spare.

“Where you off to, Abilene?”

“Same place as this train, I reckon.”

Abilene’s idea of a joke. “And where’s that?”

“Up around Lodi. Around the Sacramento River delta. Mighty pretty country. There’s work, too. Gonna pick grapes.”

Me, I’d rather pick a guitar than a grape. But conversation’s conversation. “That right? Not a grape-eater myself.”

“Oh, you don’t eat these grapes. You drink ‘em. They make wine from ‘em, heard tell.”

Well, that perked me right up. Grapes is one thing; wine is another, better thing. “That so? What sort?”

“All
sorts. Lodi grapes show up in just about every California wine you can
think of, and lots more besides. Me, I’m partial to the Peltier Station
2005 Petite Sirah myself. I appreciate the complex, yet fruit-forward
style, that intense berry flavor laced with caramel, pepper, and
earth.”

My mouth was watering just thinking about it. The
train jerked into life and started chuffing down the track. So long,
city of angels, been good to know ya. “What about the body? And the
finish?”

“Full body. Long finish. One bottle I had, I took
a swig just outside Modesto, and honest to Pete, I was still tasting it
when we rolled into Fresno.”

Even figgering Abilene Slim’s
tendency to tell his tales tall, that Peltier Station 2005 Petite Sirah
sounded like the kind of tipple a man could wrap his tongue around. “I
think I might just head up to Lodi myself, you don’t mind the comp’ny.”

“Not a bit,” Abilene replied, and started to drift off to sleep. We’re bound for that glorious Peltier Station 2005 Petite Sirah, I thought as the train chunkled along. That wine was made for you and me.

Peltier Station 2005 Petite Sirah Lodi

• Petite Sirah grapes, fermemneted in whole clusters
• Acid: 3.76 pH
• Brix: 25.8 degrees at harvest
• Harvest Date: October 16th, 2005
• Fermentation: two weeks at a constant 80 degrees F
• Best of class, best of appellation at the 2006 and 2007 California State Fair

Rules and restrictions:

• Wine sold by winery (or a retailer in your state where necessary)
• You must be 21 or older to order
• Whoever receives the package must be 21 or older
• If you’re drunk when the package shows up, you will not be allowed to receive it
• Wine cannot be delivered to a P.O. Box
• We highly recommend you use a business address as your shipping address

Thanks to stick-in-the-mud buzzkilling state legislators, wine may only be delivered to the following states:

• California
• Colorado
• Connecticut
• District Of Columbia
• Florida
• Idaho
• Illinois
• Iowa
• Louisiana
• Michigan
• Minnesota
• Missouri
• Nebraska
• Nevada
• New Mexico
• New York
• North Carolina
• North Dakota
• Ohio
• Oregon
• South Carolina
• Texas
• Vermont
• Virginia
• Washington
• West Virginia
• Wisconsin
• Wyoming

If your state’s not on the list, you’re out of luck… for now. Keep up with the ever-changing laws over at ShipCompliantBlog.com, and/or sound the alarms with your state assembly person through FreeTheGrapes.org. Meanwhile, all Federal, state and local laws are complied with in providing this wine.

Read Full Post »