Tag Archives: Pinot Noir

Experts’ weekend wine picks: From South African favorite to Pinot Grigio bargain

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Comparing the picks: A survey of recent selections from popular wine experts and websites, spotlighting bargains and best values among other choices at their websites.

The Wine Cellar: Earthy South African reds evoke the Old World

An update on South African wines, with a notable favorite highlighted, from Frank Sutherland and Kate Sutherland, Gannett News Service:

“In a world of homogenized wine styles, South African reds really stand out. They have remained true to the distinctive style of the region; no other wine in the world tastes like a South African wine.

“They often have a gravelly, dusty quality and flavors of green pepper, olive, and peat. These are true “terroir” wines — they reflect the qualities of the earth in which the grapes were grown. As such, they tend to taste more like a European wine than a New World offering.”

And now to highlight the favorite: 2003 Vergelegen “Mill Race,” $24.99.

Single-Vineyard Russian River Valley Pinot Noir

A review of standouts from a region noted for its Pinot Noirs, from Lynne Char Bennett, San Francisco Chronicle:

“The panel found lots to like among the 57 vineyard-designate Russian River Valley Pinots, which are made from vintners’ best, most distinctive grapes. The wines showed well and are displaying depth, complexity and less noticeable alcohol levels than many from the hot 2004 vintage.”

One of the more-affordable two-and-one-half-star winners: 2006 Hawley Oehlman Vineyard Russian River Valley Pinot Noir, $33.

Stock spring picnic with affordable Washington wines

A dozen selections tuned to different courses for a wine tasting or meal, from Paul Gregutt, The Seattle Times:

“Rather than worry about matching particular wines to particular foods, I put together a group of whites and reds that allowed the guests to mix and match according to their own tastes and whims.”

The terms affordable and outstanding pair quite well in this description: Columbia Crest Two Vines 2006 Sauvignon Blanc, $8

Top 5 Box Wines

Nicely priced boxed wines (and handy food recommendations), from Jeffery Lindenmuth, Epicurious:

“Box wines (a.k.a. boxed wines) have become popular in recent years because they hold more wine than a single bottle, they’re light and recyclable, they’re easy to open and reseal, they chill quickly, and they won’t break if you drop them.”

This one-liter pick is said to show more character than the bottled types: Three Thieves Bandit Pinot Grigio 2006, about $9.

Tip: Print out this list and bring it to your local wine shop — even if a specific favorite isn’t available, ask the salesperson to recommend something similar. Or try browsing the latest wine reports from this custom collection of hundreds of news websites — filtered for bargains, continuously updated, and quick and easy to scan:

  • Reds (from Beaujolais to Zinfandel)
  • Whites (from Chablis to Sauvignon Blanc)
  • Organic (red, white, in between)

To hit closer to home, try WNR’s Smarter Wine Search tool and see what wine finds columnists and wine experts may be writing about in your area. Once there, just type in your city and state (within quotation marks, as in, "Napa, California"), to get results ranked by relevance.

Or scroll down to the bottom of this page and dig into top wine lists from a variety of sources. You’ll also find links to everything from a food-pairing database to websites for comparative wine ratings.

Pinot Noirs ain’t just for movie buffs, and here’s a lucious list of the best

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Hey, it’s not that I’ve been brainwashed by Sideways — I really just like the welcoming taste and body of Pinot Noir. And maybe you do, too.

So, aficionados: a don’t-miss piece by Food&Wine’s Ray Isle with four “star selections,” including a 2006 Innocent Bystander Pinot Noir for $20.

Sure, Chardonnay, Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon still dominate sales. But, as Isle says:

Pinot is undeniably America’s hot grape of the moment. Its sales have risen more than 20 percent a year for the past few years, and most top sommeliers sing its praises as a partner for food.

Bonus: Isle sipped 147 Pinot Noirs to come up with a longer list of 30 that serve up “complex, intense aromas; textures that are somehow both firm and weightless; and flavors that seem to effortlessly balance the fruity (raspberries, cherries, strawberries) with the savory (earth, mushrooms, pepper).”

Want to find a perfectly priced bottle of wine? Give the Smarter Wine Search a try.

New and notable wine headlines, including starters for bargain-basement wine cellar

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Handpicked wine stories from across the Web…

A wine’s high price, honest or not, adds to its pleasure, study finds
In other words: Outwit yourself – pay less, enjoy more!

Oregon wines continue to grow
Great news for Oregon wine aficionados. Part of the reason for growth: The state’s wineries are “developing a reputation for sustainable practices and organic products, and the state’s pinot noir grapes have been found to contain an unusually high level of the anti-cancer, heart-healthy compound resveratrol.”

A Bargain-Basement Wine Cellar
Robert Parker focuses on a California winery that offers “premium wines at value prices.” Includes five affordable bottles scoring 85 points or more.

America’s Best Spots For Fine Wine
From Forbes, naturally.

Eco-friendly French to ship their wine under sail
An unexpected example of the increasing greening of wines. “French vineyard owners are returning to a slower pace of life by starting to export their wine by sailing boat – a method last used in the 1800s – to reduce their carbon footprint.”

Thirsty for more news? Follow up by digging into continuously updated feeds from national and international news outlets:

  • Reds (from Beaujolais to Zinfandel)
  • Whites (from Chablis to Sauvignon Blanc)
  • Organic (red, white, in between)

To hit closer to home, try WNR’s Smarter Wine Search tool and see what columnists and wine experts may be writing about in your area. Once there, just type in your city and state (within quotation marks, as in, "Napa, California"), to get results ranked by relevance.

The Web’s wine buzz: Including tips to make Chinese New Year more festive

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Tune in to what top wine bloggers and experts are decanting into cyberspace with handpicked highlights of their latest and greatest. In this episode, we find advice for long-unopened bottles, tips for making the coming Year of the Rat more festive and a long list of reasons to think again about Merlot.

If you have a special bottle of wine gathering dust somewhere — the one that’s remained unopened through the years, perhaps with some fond memories sealed inside — start looking for the corkscrew.

Because Saturday night, Feb. 23, is Open That Bottle Night 9, as good an excuse as any to finally have a taste.

Dorothy J. Gaiter and John Brecher at The Wall Street Journal explain:

Imagine if an evil genie took some of your very best memories and hid them in a wine bottle. That’s what so many of us do to ourselves. These dear bottles have a special way of retrieving warm and often-forgotten memories, but you have to pop the cork to release them. That’s why we invented Open That Bottle Night.

A nice read on what various friends of theirs have stashed and swear to finally open. You might be tempted to do the same.

You’ll also find a handy primer on the care and handling on what might be rather fragile vintages.

But that’s not the only wine-benefiting festivity on the horizon, as Karen Page and Andrew Dornenburg at The Washington Post remind us.

The Chinese New Year (Lunar Year 4706) begins on Feb. 7, ringing in the Year of the Rat. This most important of Chinese holidays, celebrated by one-quarter of the world’s population, merits an extended 15-day celebration, and its time-honored food traditions are beautifully enhanced by the right wines.

Perk up the Chinese cuisine with their selections of fruitier wine, ranging from a “beautifully balanced, crisp, fruity and minerally” 2007 Rudolf Muller Riesling Kabinett ($11) to a 100-percent pinot noir-based NV Gruet Methode Champenoise Rose Brut ($16) from New Mexico, “with strawberry notes and a hint of vanilla on the finish … terrific with our Peking duck.”

The article includes a sumptuous pairing chart, to bring out the best in, say, those shrimp dumplings or whole steamed fish.

Meanwhile, at Wine Enthusiast, Tim Patterson offers a smorgasbord of reasons for reacquainting ourselves with that once top-selling red that has fallen from popular grace, Merlot.

A widespread urban legend says that Merlot was whacked sideways off its pedestal in 2004 by a certain movie set in Santa Barbara’s Pinot Noir country. In fact, according to industry insiders, the leveling off started two or three years earlier. Mark Pucylowski, buying director for Sam’s Wines & Spirits in Chicago, noticed that some of his California producers were grafting over to Syrah well before Merlot became a cinematic expletive.

In some cases, the fall from grace was well deserved, particularly the California Merlot that “was planted on marginal sites and/or asked to bring in too large a crop.”

But there are still plenty of good ones to be had.

And the Wine Enthusiast Tasting Panel brings us a long list of some of the best — originating everywhere from France, Italy and California to Washington State, Australia and New Zealand.

And many of them sit well within the Wine News Review fairly frugal affordability index, including the Banrock Station 2005 Merlot (South Eastern Australia)  at $5 (not a typo).

‘Turkey wine’ and other Thanksgiving wine bargains to the rescue

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Good news and bad news about Thanksgiving.

The good news: such a wide variety of delicious things to eat. 

The bad: such a wide variety of delicious things to eat — which can make pairing the right wine enough to give you mental indigestion.

But don’t despair.

Wine tasters around the nation are graciously coming to the rescue (tough work, but somebody’s got to do it).

Like white?

If you’re thinking of going with a white, for example, an eclectic  cast of tasters in Nashville — including reps of wine distributors, a wine collector, a sommelier and food columnist — came up with a tasty bunch of recommendations while chowing down with turkey, dressing, gravy and cranberry sauce to assure mouth-watering harmony.

Some of their selections fit nicely within the Wine News Review fairly frugal affordability index, or at least the holiday version of it.

Among their selections, Gewürztraminer, aka “turkey wine” because it goes so well with the main dish. One stood out:

2006 Covey Run ($8.99) — serves up a “delightful aroma of cooked cling peaches, white pepper and floral notes.” It was the tasters’ favorite: “The wine withstood competing tastes and was not as sweet as the others.”

Second was a 2006 Columbia Winery Cellarmaster’s Riesling ($13.99) — tasters agreed that its “fruit and perfume ‘rocked’ with the multi-flavored meal.”

Versatile Pinot

Stacy Slinkard, wine guide at About.com, offers a list of 10 Thanksgiving wine suggestions, nine of which are $10 or under.

Her number one recommendation is a California Kendall Jackson Vintner’s Reserve Chardonnay 2005, ($10), finding it a “delicious compilation of fruit and smoke, full-bodied and balanced.”

She also cites a few reds, including another Californian, a Rex Goliath Pinot Noir, ($9), which she finds supple and versatile enough “to go with everything from hors d’oeuvres to the main dish.”

To start off the festivities with some bubbly cheer, she suggests a Korbel Champagne Brut ($10), “a champagne stand by that is perfect for party goers.”

Don’t worry, be happy

While acknowledging the banquet-sized range of flavors to be found on a Thanksgiving table, Peter M. Gianotti at Long Island’s Newsday, takes a don’t-worry-be-happy approach: ” … drink what you like, whether it’s apple cider, brown ale or bourbon.”

But if wine is your Thanksgiving drink of choice, he recommends a diverse collection of whites and reds, including a nicely priced, “berry-driven” 2006 Kendall-Jackson Vintner’s Reserve Pinot Noir ($14).

Speaking of nicely priced, he suggests a couple Italian Proseccos for the celebratory sparkling wine selection: La Vendemmia ($10), Lunetta ($13).

Of course, there are many other wine tasters standing graciously by to take the wine anxiety out of Thanksgiving. Stay tuned to Wine News Review in coming days for more of their suggestions.

Tip: Print out this list, and for that matter the lists from the links above, when you head to your local wine shop. If none is available, ask the salesperson to recommend something similar, and similarly priced.