Tag Archives: wine

THE BEST WINE OPENER I’VE FOUND

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Which Wine Opener to buy is always a big issue. Like most wine lovers, I have quite a few, not counting the half dozen or so now in the possession of the TSA.

A while back, I was given the Cork Pops Legacy Wine Opener, a gas-operated little gem that includes a foil cutter in its excellent design. Priced around $25 to $30, this gadget makes opening wine a joy, even with tricky corks. This isn’t a corkscrew, as it has no screw – just a straight hollow needle that pierces the cork and puts gas between the cork and the wine to force the cork easily out of the bottle neck.

The Cork Pops Legacy Wine Opener
The Cork Pops Legacy Wine Opener

It works like this. You can use the foil cutter (four sharp disks on the bottom of the legs) to remove the foil cap, then push the needle through the center of the cork. Once the device is fully seated on the bottle, you simply press the top with your thumb. This activates the gas canister and pushes gas into the bottle, easily removing most corks. The taste and aroma of the wine are unaffected. To remove the cork, you twist the opener where the legs join the body, and the cork slides back down the needle.

This has become my go-to wine opener at home, and I have given several as gifts.

Now, let’s look at some drawbacks.

1. This device does not travel well. It comes in a clear plastic case, so taking it to a friend’s home or on a picnic will work. But you can’t take the opener with gas on an airplane, so you will still need a good travel opener if you are flying.

2. The Legacy does not work on large format bottles or with very long corks where the needle cannot get all the way through (a very small percentage of corks, fortunately). Nor will with work with bottles that have a wax cap over the cork – you might bend the needle trying to push it through the wax, and the wax makes the bottle neck too wide to fit the device over it.

3. Some have reported problems using it with plastic corks, although I have never had a problem with this.

4. You have to develop a bit of a “touch” with this opener. Too much force on the top of the canister (which is the “button” you push) and too much gas goes into the bottle causing the cork to fly out of the bottle often followed by some wine. It may take a bottle or two to practice with – start with the “value” wines.

Beyond that, I have nothing but good things to say about this wine opener. If you have any experiences with this one or with an opener that you like better, please comment.

WINE TRAVEL – WHERE TO GO, WHAT TO DRINK?

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I love to travel. Since I was a child, I have always gotten excited about traveling – to the next town or across and ocean.

Dorianne shares this passion and we also are passionate about wine, so we combine the two passions wherever possible. This will begin a series of blogs on wine related travel, leading up to our departure in late February for a few months in Spain, Portugal, and France. I will, of course, blog from the places we visit about the locales, the people, and yes, the wines.

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Wine Travel is Fun and Rewarding – Here we are at Foxen near Santa Ynez, CA.

“We are torn between nostalgia for the familiar and an urge for the foreign and strange. As often as not, we are homesick most for the places we have never known.” ~ Carson McCullers 

A couple of years ago I took a short sabbatical, six weeks, and Dorianne and I went to France. We spent 3 1/2 weeks in an apartment in Paris, then went to Lourdes in the Pyrenees for a conference, the spend about six nights in Bordeaux and six more in the Loire Valley. The year before that, we took our daughters to Paris, Burgundy, and Provence for three weeks. In each of these amazing places, we sampled the local and regional wines and, where possible, visited the vineyards and chateaus where wine was grown and made, and made friends in cafes and tasting rooms with others who love wine.

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A Great Wine Shop in St. Emilion.
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The Good Stuff.

 

“If I were really really ridiculously wealthy, I wouldn’t buy a mansion, just tiny apartments in every city I love.” ~ Mara Wilson 

Combining wine enjoyment and education with travel is something that may not be for everyone, but for some, it is the essence of a quality experience. Those of us who spend time with people who create and sell wines know that they tend to be very interesting people, indeed. People like Wes Hagen of Clos Pepe Estate in the Santa Rita Hills of California’s Central Coast region and Giancarlo at Le Wine Bar in Bordeaux, are just two examples of friendly, knowledgeable, and approachable people who happen to be in the wine business. There are countless others as well. Wine travel lets you meet these people and have the experience of connecting at a much deeper level with the wine itself.

Wine travel can be a day trip, for those fortunate enough to live near wine-producing regions. I will be taking such a trip in a week, to the Santa Ynez, Santa Rita Hills appellations in Santa Barbara County. This will be a group tour, with many people who I know – four wineries and a picnic lunch. A very nice way to spend a day.

One of the things we will be doing on our upcoming European journey is setting up future small group wine tours in France. Working with travel professional Steve Hooks, we will be creating a series of tours that will include time in wine country – initially Bordeaux then Burgundy – followed by some time in the city – either Paris or Lyon. The tours will be geared toward those who are already familiar with fine wines and in separate groups, those who want to learn about fine wines. The focus of the former will be discovery and enjoyment and the focus of the latter will be education and enjoyment.

“We travel, some of us forever, to seek other states, other lives, other souls.” ~ Anaïs Nin 

I really believe that good wine is best enjoyed with others. Our tours will emphasize that point, while offering some really unique opportunities to access some amazing places, enjoy great food paired with fine wines, and exploring the people and places of some of the world’s great wine regions.

We are not certain that there is a viable market for tours of this level. There are not many truly high-end wine tours being offered to North American customers. Some of the major tour companies and some of the cruise lines have tours featuring wine, but they are rather pedestrian, have larger groups, and mix the novice and the expert, which does not often go well in my experience.

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One of the Buildings at Chateau Smith-Haute- Lafitte in the Bordeaux region.
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In the Tasting Room at Smith-Haute-Lafitte

 

Our question is – is there a market for a week-long small group experience with four nights in a premier wine region (Bordeaux, Burgundy) followed by three in a major city (Paris, Lyon), staying in top hotels, with tastings of top wines, dinners in chateaus, connections with locals in the wine trade, special tours of museums (like a private evening tour of  the Musee du Louvre), wine pairing experiences, wine seminars and more?

As the year unfolds, we will be finding out. Share your thoughts in the comment section or email me at DrJim-Lockard@ATT.net

NICE MERLOT WITH A PORK ROAST

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Lat night at dinner, Mary Stec (Link to her cooking school Facebook Page) made an amazing pork roast with roasted potatoes and green beans.

Dorianne and I took a bottle of 2004 Shaffer Napa Valley Merlot (Link) to have with the meal.

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The wine had a very refined nose – dark fruit and a touch of minerality. The flavor was well-crafted and smooth, with cherry, tobacco, and some earthiness on the edges. A very nice wine. This wine retails in the $50 range, so you would expect it to be good – it does not disappoint and I think that it can still age for a few more years and hold up.

Before dinner, with some chevre and hummus, we had a 2009 Clos Pepe Chardonnay – Barrel Fermented (Link). Richard Clark and I had gotten a couple of half bottles on a trip to the Clos Pepe Estate a couple of years ago. The four of us shared the half bottle of this amazing wine – very, very nice, but it’s all gone!

But back to the Shafer Merlot. The wine paired very well with the roasted pork, it had enough structure and tannin to hold up to the dish. I noted some heat, and guessed accurately that it had 14.9% alcohol – which is getting fairly normal for California Merlots. Here is the link to Shafer Wines – (Link).

ALMA SOL WINERY – SMALL PRODUCER GETTING BETTER AND BETTER

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Dorianne and I returned to Alma Sol Winery’s tasting room the other night with three other couples. Alma Sol Winery (Link) is owned and operated by the husband and wife team of John Shaw and Lisa Cuevas Shaw.

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The heading of the tasting list at Alma Sol Tasting Room in Thousand Oak, CA

John Shaw, who serves as winemaker for the couple – really a two-person operation, from the vineyard to the tasting room – met us at the door. Lisa Cuevas Shaw was inside with a bottle of wine in her hand. We began the evening’s tasting, which John had selected from his list of Bordeaux-influenced wines.

“It’s a cool evening,” he said, “so it’s all reds and all full-bodied wines.”

The wines he poured were indeed, red and were generally fuller bodied wines as well. The exception was the first wine, a 2010 Cuevas Cabernet Sauvignon, which was very elegant and a fruit-forward wine. After that, the wines had more of a mineral presence and varied as to the fruit presence. I won’t go into detail, because these wines are produced in such small quantities that they are very unlikely to show up outside of the tasting room. You can obtain some of them at the website (link above).

We first met John and Lisa at the Paso Robles Garagiste Festival a couple of years ago. They told us that they would be opening a tasting room in Thousand Oaks – our neck of the woods – very soon. The location is shared with Sunland Vintage Winery (Link), whose mostly Italian varieties we plan to return to sample soon. Alma Sol, using mostly grapes from the Cuevas Vineyard in Paso Robles and other fruit sourced from Paso and as far north as Napa Valley. In fact, we tasted a blend of five Napa Bordeaux-style grapes in the tasting – it was made in a middle ground between the French and California styles –  fruity and elegant, but higher in alcohol.

We finished the tasting with their dessert wine: 2012 Almazan Dessert Wine, Paso Robles ($34.00)

From their website: This Portuguese Port-style wine uses both Tempranillo and Touriga Nacional grapes from the east side of Paso Robles.  The beautiful nose is made up of cherries and cranberries and follows through with a very fruit forward, elegant mouth feel. The finish is long with a touch of fortified wine that lightly warms your mouth. This wine pairs great with your favorite dessert, Dark chocolate raspberry truffles, or a cigar (if you like them, of course).

Production: 70 cases   

We bought a bottle. Very nice!

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It is really nice to see more tasting rooms open in the Thousand Oaks area. Alma Sol is a great addition to the local line up – I look forward to seeing how John and Lisa continue to develop as winemakers.

A 2001 RANCHO SISQUOC CABERNET SAUVIGNON.

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Dorianne and I opened a 2001 Rancho Sisquoc Cabernet Sauvignon(LINK) last night – a bottle that we got at the winery (LINK) in about 2006. The wine had been stored in our small wine refrigerator. We are thinning out our cellar in anticipation of moving (that will be covered in other posts) and having no fixed address for some time, so the Rancho Sisquoc was opened.

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The first thing I noticed was that the cork was completely dried out – the extraction process took a while and a couple of implements, and most of the cork came out in tiny pieces. This, I thought, does not bode well. I had really made a mess on the counter top – most of the cork was dust. Finally, I got to the bottom of the cork, and those pieces fell into the wine (of course).

The first sniff of the bottle was promising, so I poured a bit through a screen in my Vinturi Wine Aerator (LINK), which caught most of the cork bits.

Well, the wine was wonderful – rich, dark purple in color, with nice fruit (dark cherry mostly) on the nose and palate, and just a touch of minerality and leather. The wine was well-balanced and drank beautifully. There was enough integrity to that devastated cork to keep things in good shape in the bottle, for which we are very grateful. We had the wine with a snack dinner of chevre, smoked salmon, prosciutto, and crackers. Life is good!

BIRTHDAY DINNER AT A RESTAURANT – SOME INTERESTING WINE EXPERIENCES

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Words in BOLD BROWN are links.

Last night, we celebrated Richard Clark’s birthday – Richard is the winemaker of the Conejo Valley Wine Co-op, which I have blogged about in the past. So six of us went  to Cafe 14 in Agoura Hills, CA, a restaurant known for good food and good wine.

Richard brought a bottle of Clos Pepe Pinot Noir 2012, a very nice wine made by one of the better craftsmen in Santa Barbara County, Wes Hagen. The wine did not disappoint, as Wes’ wines never do. His Pinots are rich, made in the Burgundian style, with some creep toward the fuller California style in recent years.

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The 2012 Clos Pepe Estate Pinot Noir and the 2012 Rombauer Zinfandel

Next, we ordered a bottle of 2012 Rombauer Zinfandel. The last Rombauer Zin I had was the 2010. Rombauer makes big wines and is probably best known for their Chardonnay, which is a classic rich, buttery version of that varietal. I also am a fan of their Merlot, which is often a bargain in restaurants.

This Zinfandel was a surprise – very rich, almost syrupy, with strong overtones of caramel and vanilla. Everyone at the table agreed that it was too sweet for dinner. Oh, and it weighed in at 15.9% alcohol. The heat of the alcohol came through, even with all the sweetness. I was surprised because I remembered the 2010 Zin as being more restrained. We set it aside to save to have with dessert.

So on to a third bottle, a 2008 Chateau la Caminadi La Commandery Malbec from Cahors, France.

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The 2008 Chateau la Caminadi La Commandery Malbec

The Malbec was a perfect compliment to the dinner. Dry with hints of dark fruit, it balanced well, even though a couple of our party were having fish. Not a great wine, but a very drinkable wine.

The food at Cafe 14 is very good. The service tonight was a bit slow – hard to tell exactly why. The wine was delivered to the table after a delay because, apparently, only the bar tender can go to the wine storage area to get wine and the bar was busy (?), a questionable policy. As a result, the waiter ended up taking the $20 corkage fee for the Clos Pepe off of the bill to apologize for the slow wine service.

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Bouillabaisse at Cafe 14
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The amazing Braised Short Ribs

Dessert was a caramel pot-au-feu with creme fraische – so rich that we could only eat a bite or two each – but delicious. The Rombauer Zinfandel was a good accompaniment to this rich dessert.

So Happy Birthday, Richard!

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THE PLEASURES OF WINE – EVERYONE CAN ENJOY IT

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As a new year begins, I have been browsing Twitter and some wine blogs and seeing, for the most part, the results of New Years Eve celebrations – pictures of very nice labels, people having fun, even features about opulent wine cellars. Wine is definitely a catalyst for good time and a good lifestyle, isn’t it?

That being said, I have to admit that I am somewhat put off by the displays of opulence. I guess I fall somewhere between those drinking old Chateau Margeaux  and those drinking Yellow Tail. (Full disclosure – I stayed in and did not imbibe last night – a case of food poisoning.) I disparage neither end of the spectrum, for they represent parts of a very wide spectrum of wine enjoyment. Now, I have had both Chateau Margeaux and Yellow Tail, and I hope to have the former again; and I am pretty sure that I will have the latter again. This is more about what wine enjoyment can be and how it is often portrayed in the wine media.

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The emphasis of much of the wine media, including the Twitterverse, is that true wine enjoyment only happens at the high end – by those with better palates, more money, and greater access than most of us will ever enjoy. I know that this is true of many aspects of life – cars, houses, etc. – but with wine, it is, I think, a bit more universal. This deprives many of the true enjoyment that a more modest degree of the three items mentioned above – quality of palate, financial assets, and access to great wines and the places where they are made and consumed – can bring.

I do not wish to disparage the high end of the wine world, but I do want to celebrate the other aspects more than we do. I want to let people, especially young people new to wine, know that a visit to the tasting rooms of Paso Robles or Santa Ynez can be as much or more fun than a visit to the Chateaus of Bordeaux. For one example, you will likely taste wines that are ready to drink in Paso or Santa Ynez, whereas the Bordeauxs that you will taste in Chateaus will mostly be years away from their peak. Also, the people pouring your wines in Paso will be much more accessible and patient with the newcomer than most of the equivalent people in Bordeaux, or in many of the other “premium” places.

I want people new to wine to know that there are many, many AMAZING wines that cost less than $25, and that most of the wines that cost under $50 are really good. That there is a significant drop off in quality to value ratios when you get above $50 per bottle. I want them to know that pairing a wine with a pizza can bring as much pleasure as pairing one with caviar; that screw caps are a better sealing device than corks for wines not meant to age for a long time (and even that is debatable).

Personally, I want everyone who is interested in wine to enjoy their interest without feeling that they are “missing something” due to some lack of knowledge or money or access. I realize that this is probably an impossible desire, but that doesn’t mean that I won’t pursue it. I want this blog and my wine-related activities to speak to people who love wines in all kinds of ways.

During 2015, I will be traveling to Europe and to South America and will blog about wine experiences at all levels. I will be starting to offer wine travel experiences, first in France – Bordeaux and Paris – in two formats – for those who know wine well and for those who want to learn about wine. Later, tours to Burgundy and Lyon and possibly to other world locations will be initiated. The idea is to enjoy travel and to experience the joy of a wine related lifestyle at whatever level works for you.

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Wine is for anyone who wants to enjoy it and we need to keep a broad perspective for the industry, and it’s customers, to thrive. I look forward to exploring more of the world of wine and to sharing it with as many people as want to partake of its many great experiences.

A VERY PLEASANT MERLOT WITH GOOD PIZZA

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NOTE- Links are in BLUE.

Dorianne and I had dinner at NAPA TAVERN  in Westlake Village, CA, last night. It is a good restaurant with mostly Italian food, but no pastas – lots of grilled meats, fish, tapas, pizza, etc., in a fairly upscale setting.

The wine list is good, but not extensive. I would say it is well-chosen, although with the name NAPA TAVERN, one might expect a larger list.

We were each ordering a pizza – Margarita for me and Veggies and Goat Cheese for her – so we thought a lighter red would do the trick. We ordered the 2012 TOAD HOLLOW MERLOT, a single vineyard wine from the Russian River Valley the second least-expensive Merlot on the list at $43.

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The wine was fruit-forward with a very nice nose and a very pleasant feel on the palate. Dorianne, of the amazing palate, liked the wine very much and declared that it was 14.5% alcohol, which was verified on the bottle.

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By the way, you can get this wine via AMAZON.COM (LINK)!

So a nice wine with some very good pizza in a restaurant with a very good atmosphere – I’ll call that a good evening!