Report from ... California Legends at the ROM - March 21, 2013

Taking in the Room at the ROM

Below are highlights from the California Legends tasting held at the Royal Ontario Museum ... the wines were all consider "icon wines" of California ... (pictured in no particular order) - most of the wines were available on this day only through a special order table at the front of the room ... (in Ontario anyway) - here I chose what I considered the best wine the winery poured on that day (each winery had no more than 4 wines at the event).  Ontario prices given where available along with brief notes and a score out of 5 stars.

Beringer 2007 Steinhauer Ranch Cabernet Sauvignon
spiced-cherry vanilla with a chocolate finish
(****+)

Cade 2009 Cabernet Sauvignon, Howell Mountain
beautiful nose - chocolate and cherry on the palate
(****+)

Bonaccorsi 2009 Cargasacchi Pinot Noir
all kinds of spiced aromas and flavours: raspberry, strawberry and big peppery finish
(****)

Cakebread 2006 Benchland Select Cabernet Sauvignon ($139.00)
nice spice and cassis notes
(****)

Calera 2009 de Villiers Vineyard Pinot Noir
loved the power of the red cherry yet there was a sweetness with balanced acidity
(****+)

Dominus 2009 Proprietary Red
nice fruit, dark and robust
(****+)

Duckhorn 2011 Migration Pinot Noir
gentle, easy drinking and really fruity
(****+)

Duckhorn 2010 Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley
firm with plenty of licorice and dark fruit
(****+)

Hartley-Ostini 2009 Hitching Post Hometown Pinot Noir (Vintages April 27)
nice spices and good cherry fruit, easy drinking and tasty
(****+)

Joseph Phelps 2006 Insignia ($234.00)
lovely full on fruit attack with just enough acidity to keep it from being jammy and cloying
(****+)

Kistler 2010 Trenton Roadhouse Chardonnay ($93.00)
nice mouthfeel, creamy but with a balancing of acidity and long finish
(****+)

Merry Edwards 2010 Meredith Estate Pinot Noir
luscious, smooth and silky
(****+)

Merry Edwards 2011 Sauvignon Blanc
grassy with grapefruit cocktail
(****+)

Pahlmeyer 2009 Estate Red ($150.00)
raspberry and strawberry with cherry and red licorice sweetnes before the spice kicks in
(****+)

Robert Mondavi 2010 Pinot Noir, Carneros
spice that goes from start to finish
(****+)

Plumpjack 2010 Merlot, Napa Valley ($73.00)
plump is right, lovely juicy blueberry and raspberry with vanilla - sexy
(**** 1/2)

Ravenswood 2008 Single Vineyard Desinate Icon ($75.00)
Zinfandel, Petite Sirah, Carignan, Alicante Bouchet blend
sweet fruit, elegant and pretty
(**** 1/2)

Ridge 2010 Lytton Spring Zinfandel
juicy, chocolate, raspberry, blueberry and nice spice
(****+)

Sonoma-Cutrer 2008 Sonoma Coast Pinot Noir
lots of cherry fruit
(****)

Shafer 2010 One Point Five Cab
very juicy with fruit, plump and chocolatey
(**** 1/2)

Stags' Leap Winery 2010 Cabernet Sauvignon
spicy dark fruit, quite elegant all on its own
(**** 1/2)

Stag's Leap Wine Cellars 2010 Artemis Cabernet Sauvignon
smooth and supple
(****+)

Stonestreet 2009 Monument Ridge Cabernet Sauvignon
intensity of fruit with really good balancing acidity
(****+)

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Report from ... 2011 Bouchard / Fevre / Ponciago Tasting - March 12, 2013

Light cherry with hints of strawberry and raspberry ($26.00).
*** 1/2+

Touch more robust, darker cherry fruit, light touch of tannins ($33.00)
*** 1/2+

Cherry blossom, rich cherry, silky palate - a sexy Beaujolais ($53.00)
****+

White fruit driven with pleasant apple and lime notes ($52.00)
*** 1/2+

Nice hit of pineapple on the palate and good mineral stoniness ($52.00)
****

Nose of tropical fruit, tangerine and mineral
Flavours of grapefruit cocktail, citrus and green apple ($76.00)
**** 1/2

Pineapple, apple, lemon-lime and mineral all follow on the palate
rich fruit, nice mouth-feel, long finish ($117.00)
****+

Good fruit and mineral - well balanced ($21.95 - #276436)
****

Palate is the winner here, light buttery-ness and hint of apple crumble ($70.00)
*** 1/2

Very rich buttery, vanilla, caramel apple and a long buttery finish ($103.00)
****

This has got it all: vanilla-caramel, soft butter, floral, apple / peach cobbler,
cinnamon, spice on the finish - easy entry, great mouth-feel ($211.00)
**** 1/2+

nice, Chardonnay with a full mouth-feel and good finish ($15.60 - #51573)
*** 1/2

Nice spiced cranberry and cherry ($62.00)
*** 1/2+

Black cherry and violets on the nose; hints of leather and licorice on the finish ($67.00)
*** 1/2+

Pretty perfumed nose loaded with floral,
palate pulls off a nice spiced cranberry and sour cherry ($97.00)
****

spiced violets and raspberries with a long black cherry finish ($105.00)
****

Black cherry and red licorice with a real sexy mouth-feel ($127.00)
****+

Nice spices, black cherry, and anise; soft and smooth ($130.00)
****

Soft, silky and sexy - nice tannins always with a white pepper note ($149.00)
****

Extremely pretty, violets and vanilla. black cherry, sweet and sour cherry,
lovely mouth-feel and a hint of white pepper on the finish ($248.00)
**** 1/2

 

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Report from ... Lunch at Cucci in Oakville with Raffaele Boscaini - March 4, 2013

Today's lunch is brought to you by Masi and four of their wines (see above) ... each with a story to tell ... but I'll only relate a few of these stories as some of them have been written by me in other places.

Starting with the story of Masianco ...

crisp, mouthfilling, with nice acidity (*** 1/2+)

Masianco is a dry white wine that combines Pinot Grigio with Verduzzo ... the Verduzzo goes through a little bit of drying (3-4 weeks) which adds aromatics, character and structure to the wine, Raffaele called it the "perfect white brother of Campofiorin" ... but it wasn't always this way.  It took Masi 2 years to come up with the proper blending, drying and grape varieties that were to go into Masianico.  At one point Chardonnay was considered and even went as far as trial batches but as Raffaele said, "by adding even a drop of Chardonnay turns the wine into a Chardonnay" so the grape was abandoned as a blending partner for the Pinot Grigio.  They tried green harvesting, different barrel regimes and different grapes, then finally in 2003 they finally had the magic combo with the drying of the Verduzzo - and the rest, as they say, is history.  Today 11,000 cases of this wine comes into Ontario annually, and 30% of those are snapped up by restaurants, so whether at home or out a nice glass of white it never far away.

Find the review and story by clicking here

The 2008 Costasera also has a story to tell, and I have told it in other places in these very pages - it might just be one of the nicest Costasera's I've had in quite some time and that could be because of the declassification of some single vineyard grapes that find their way into this bottle.  Whatever the reason this might not be a considered a classic Masi 5-star vintage, but it sure is close - I'm not sure you're palate will put up much of a fight.

The Story of Riserva Costasera Amarone Classico ...

powerful yet elegant (****+)

The Riserva Costasera's story is one of length and time: aged 48 months  in 600L barrel, and contains the usual suspects as far as grapes, but adds in about 10% Oseletta (this practice started in 2003), a grape rediscovered by Masi in the 80's and first used in a wine in 1992 ... the aging differs from the regular Costasera by 12 months and the drying times are different also.  While the regular is aged up to 120 days, the Riserva is minimum 120 days.  Oseleta translate into bird ... that's because the grape never seem to ripen fully and so the birds end up eating it.  The Riserva had a nose of plum, cherry, creme de cacao and cinnamon, while the palate had powerful acidity and spice with blackberry, plum and chocolate backing, smoothing out on the back palate.  It's ageable another 10 years or more, and shows very little of the 8 years already under its belt.

The 2004 Campolongo di Torbe (pictured above) was much better than the bottle I had at a Vintages tasting back in November.

One more interesting note ... Masi has been establishing wine-making partnerships around the world of late (most recently in Brazil) - when asked if they had looked at something in Ontario Raffaele said, "we've had talks, but nothing has come of it ... but to my thinking, why not?" 

A big thank you to Raffaele Boscaini for big so open and having some great stories to tell - he's as interesting a dining companion as his father - just with less stories - but those will come with age.

The Lunch part at Cucci ... (one word:  delicious)

 

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