Book Review - The Art and Science of Wine 2007 – James Halliday and Hugh Johnson

The Art and Science of Wine 2007 – James Halliday and Hugh Johnson

This is like when Paul Mccartney collaborated with Elvis Costello and put out some great songs on a few albums that more people should know about. It’s good for these two to work together. It’s about the How and Why of Wine; starting with Terroir to the different wine styles, cellaring, the machinery, chemistry, regional vs national, maturity of wine. Comprehensive and skillful but not a colossal book. A nice slow read that is really good and thorough.

 

 

Wine Scores and Reviews - It's Good to Keep Notes

Reviewing wines always come with a little trepidation. But generally to keep things straight it is good to jot a few reminders down. Many think it is not viable to talk about a wines worth without some kind of scoring system. Wine tasting is totally subjective.

For Example, wine scoring systems such as Robert parker’s 100 point scale or the 20 point scale that Clive Coates uses can be very detailed and influential to a wines price and success; Yet the ratings are meaningless unless readers actually try some of the wines recommended and see whether their appreciation or enjoyment is similar or not. It only really carries any great weight if there is agreement on certain wines.

Some people are totally against scoring; It is a respected point of view due to the fact that wine shouldn’t just boil down to single number because so much goes into it. The goal is to inform the readers of thoughts on certain wines for the plain reason that tasting experience brings strong insight, information and preferences which can be pretty useful to pass along.


WINE CORRESPONDENT 5 POINT SCALE
5 – GREAT
4– ABOVE AVERAGE TO VERY GOOD
3– AVERAGE WELL MADE WINE
2- EVERYDAY WINE NO MAJOR DISTINCTION
1- UNDESIRABLE
S-SLEEPER WINE
V- EXCELLENT VALUE FOR THE PRICE
L- LAVISH
E- EVERYDAY WINE

To help illustrate, the 2004 Martinat Epicurea – Cotes de Bourg: lush and velvet concentrated, complex, cherries, good body and admirable; scores a “5-VS” as a great wine where there is an excellent value for the price along with being a sleeper wine( which is all around surprise and should be seeked out).

On the other hand, the 2006 Chateau Montviel – Pomerol: which is rich with a lot of minerality, and is vaguely interesting scores a” 2 “because it is questionable and does not really provide a great value.

A good scoring system and some notes to remember what you like is helpful in enjoyment of wine. Eventhough there are arguments that wine critics have preferences for flavors and that wine makers are striving to please the critics for high scores. The joy of wine is to find the one that pleases.

Should you always trust wine rating and scores? How do you know a wine is worth buying? How much should I buy? Is the wine good for a gift? All great questions that can be answered by taking some notes and using wine reviews and scores as a shorthand study of the critics thoughts while tasting.

Spanish Wines and Chorizo Sausages are a great pairing

Spanish wines are all the rage these days. They are well liked not only because they are rich in tradition but their value to quality ratio is just out of sight! All over the Spanish countryside there are all kinds of terrific red wines that stand up to the greatest wines of Bordeaux and the Rhone of France and of course Napa Valley, California.

We all know that Spanish food is very tasty, colorful and very diverse and so are the wines. Sausages are a major staple. There’s lots of good ones especially all those flavorsome Chorizos.

One killer is Sobrasada; a soft semi soft Chorizo with pork, garlic, vinegars, sea salt and paprika. It’s usually spread on crunchy bread and toasted until it melts. Grilled onions only add to this incredible sausage. Sobrasada has a smooth texture and smoky flavor that is hard to match.

Another great one is Butifarra. It looks a little like Bratwurst but Oh boy! It sure has a lot more flavor, probably the most popular sausage. Any restaurant in the countryside, usually serves Butifarra in one form or another.

Often you will find these sausages grilled, accompanied with white beans, mushrooms, onions, apples or sliced into hearty soups or yellow rice dishes. It’s great with eggs and Swiss cheese for breakfast.
Speaking of Cheese; these Chorizo and Spanish sausages pair well with Manchego cheese and blue Roquefort. There’s also a goat cheese called the ‘Drunken Goat’ which is regularly available that is dunked in red wine that is a perfect compliment.

When you serve these sausages some of that great Spanish wine is a must. Rioja has its Tempranillo. It’s sort of the national wine, arguably their greatest grape. It’s juicy, dusty, spicy with loads of strawberry, leather and tobacco notes. Ribera del Duero and Toro have their versions that are concentrated with bigger cherry, spicy and earthy flavors.

Priorat also has excellent wines that are Garnacha based that go well with the sausages that are incredibly rich, rustic, full bodied with fruit cake, licorice and plum flavors that compare to France’s Chateauneuf-du-Pape or even Pomerol wines.

Try to seek out these great Spanish wines to serve with the sausages and cheese that are among the best in quality and value. They are high scoring on many best of lists and give a great representation of what is awesome about Spanish wines these days. Las Rocas Vinas Viejas (from San Alejandro), Marge(from Priorat) and Termes by Bodegas Numanthia (from Toro). Another really good one is Lan, a Rioja Tempranillo in a classic style old world style. So dig in and enjoy!
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A Taste for Wine 2006 – Vincent Gasnier

A Taste for Wine 2006 – Vincent Gasnier

Another high end DK Book with great graphics. Gasnier has made a very busy book that is a great primer to a WSET level 1 test. The typical wine drinker will be hard pressed to find his wines though. Which annoyed me. So you need to think about it in terms of regions. Which is still good but not the way a CMS thinks. But I guess only someone like me would care about that. I hope the update will address this; Otherwise it’s very informative.

2009 Holiday Tasting brings out the classics, A special Report by Ralph Del Rio, Wine Correspondent

 By Ralph Del Rio, Wine Correspondent

Some quick tasting notes on a classic night of tasting wines in December 2009 over my good friend and fellow wine buff's home. Wil put together quite a spread a brought out some excellent wines that were ready for some serious drinking.
These are in the order we tasted. Among many things; we had ribs, Iberico ham and eel from Spain and great cheeses, sausages and cakes.

**These can essentially viewed as re-tasting of great wines on a great night!

1995 Silver Oak - sweet deep blackberries, crisp, fragrant, good fruit

1996 Hertz Cellars Martha's Vinyard - Firm and fleshy, fullish body Licorice with a citrusy twist, good tannins surprising

1997 Justin Isoceles - Vert balanced, very supple, black fruits, currants soft entry with rounded mid palate and nice landing on finish

1996 Schafer Hillside Select - Nice nose, solid backberry core, rich and balanced wine chewy and beautiful

1996 Mouton Rothchild - Barnyard, black fruits, peppery mocha, pretty intense seems like it can go a while longer

1996 Opus One - lots of blackberries and earthy aromas, still plenty of oak, full body and clean

1997 Insignia Joseph Phelps - lean, black plums, black fruits and bit of smoke and sweetness

1996 Penfolds 707 - Eucalyptus, bright, dusty, blackfruits and intense

2005 Torre Muga - rich flavors great acidity, firm and rich

Book Review - Bottlenotes Guide to Wine – Around the World in 80 Sips - 2008 – Alyssa Rapp

Bottlenotes Guide to Wine – Around the World in 80 Sips - 2008 – Alyssa Rapp

Although it borrows heavily from The Everything Wine Book by Barbara Nowak and Beverly Wichman; this well connected entrepreneur has crafted one of the best guides in the last few years. The book covers Napa, California; Italy; Chile, Argentina, Australia; Lebanon; Israel; China; South Africa and more! Wine is global!

Who is really the best judge of wine?

Who is really the best judge of wine? Is it Robert Parker? Is it Janice Robinson?  Is it the Wine Spectator or Wine Enthusiast magazines? Is it the wine experts at the 5 star restaurants?

Probably none of them!

The reason why is that when you look at them… most all of them disagree with each other.

One recent year there was this big wine tasting and with 40 wines and 2 of the world’s most heralded wine tasters. They were rating on a 100 point scale.  When it was all said and done they disagreed on 90 percent of the 40 wines. Some of the disagreements were minor but 25 percent of them, they disagreed by more than 5 points.

What to make of this…

I say there can be only one true wine expert…and that is you!

Even if you think that you do not know enough about wines…Sure there are a lot of folks that know a lot more about tasting wines.

…and remember nobody has ‘your’ preference for certain flavors.  

Look...all your life you've smelled all kinds of fruits, vegetables, flowers so it's feasible that you may have developed a knack. Think about quality.... Is it balanced? Is there acidity? Is it dry? How does it finish? Is it a clean finish? Is it a bitter finish? Is it intense? Do you want to drink some more? Think of these while considering the overall 'profile' of the wine. So these are some of the relevant questions that you might encounter.

Remember this too, a wine buff can help you find wines; educate you on why things are acclaimed or particularly attractive.  Heck!  Some wines are so delicious; it’s a no-brainer. The wine buff may surely help you enjoy a wine and fill you with all the nuances and details about what you are tasting.

….but they can’t tell you what you should enjoy. You are the expert!