Good Morning!

So much is going on right now in the wine world that you will benefit from in the near future! Grapes are being harvested all over the Northern Hemisphere and some new laws are changing so you can buy wines over the internet (in some states). I hope my grapes for TJR Select are maturing and the Brix (sugar levels are raising) I am hoping to pick at around 23.0-25.0….we are as of this morning at 21.4, and I would like to see a ph level of 3.1-3.3. It should happen in the next couple of weeks. Until then, I am keeping busy helping other wine makers with their harvest and I have to say everyday, I learn something new from all of them I get to work with.

As a winemaker it is very similar to cooking, if you are not classically trained, you go with your gut intution on when to pick, press, crush, add yeast, etc… But the more times you make wine you teach yourself the reasons why you pick at 23.0 Brix or why you would wait until the sugar levels were higher. I did not take chemistry or even biology in High School so, I started self educating at home with books and internet years ago. I still wish I had a degree from UC Davis every vintage! I will keep you posted as this harvest progresses.

The best wines I had this weekend…Yes, I said wines, normally I pick just one, but I had two great wines and wanted to share them with you, because they were both so good! It is getting cooler out and I got my red wines on this weekend, trying about 17 reds in total. Saturday night I found in my wine cellar a bottle of Cakebread Cellars Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 2007. I opened it up and poured it in the decanter and after about 45 minutes poured two glasses and we chatted about the 3 times we have toured and tasted at the Cakebread Cellars winery. This wine is big, this wine has 14.4% Alcohol by volume and it tastes wealthy…if that is a word for wine. I say wealthy because my wine drinking friend said this tastes like what I think rich people would drink. I liked that corralation, no wine description is ever wrong, it you mean it and it’s honest and as I took another sip, I thought about really thick and lush feeling velvet across my palate. I love this wine, it is a bit more on the expensive side for everyday drinking at my crib, about $59.99 at the wine store, but it did make me feel…wealthy and happy. The flavors and aromas I got from this wine was yeasty, dark raspberries and blackberries, some smokey, leather on the finish and the balance of this wine felt beautiful and wealthy.

Cakebread Cellars are a well known wine brand of high quality and in Napa it is a go to tour for visitors. Make a reservation before you go and enjoy the history of the vineyard and cellars. We were in Napa once and tried to go for a tasting on a busy Saturday and we were turned away because we did not make a reservation, so don’t make our mistake and not get to enjoy their place.

Second wine, this one surprised me, I have never had, or heard of this wine. We met some friends at Wine 101 for an afternoon in the sun/shade and they ordered the wine. The wine was a Malbec from Mendoza, Argentina 2006, it was Comendador De Viluco Reserva. When I picked up my glass, and the wine was at least 6-8 inches from my face, I said whoa, this guy is super cherry…my friends started laughing and I said try it for yourself. This wine was a beautiful an elegant cherry bomb! It was like the combination of these two aromas at the same time…Deep Dish Cherry pie and a meat smoker it was gorgeous! I did not even take a drink for the longest time because I loved the aromas so much I just kept going back to my glass and sniffing around to see if it lost the aromas as the oxygen started to do it’s thing on the wine.

This Viluco Reserva was not a super heavy wine, it was a medium bodied wine with a full mouth feel. It was not as cherry on flavor as it was on the nose, but it was a lively, bright and polished on the tongue, this was a young energetic wine. This wine was like a fun puppy at full speed, very vibrant but it did not misbehave or go too far. It was restrained and finish long and lovely, like a purebred. This wine at the wine bar was $34 a bottle, so I will look for it in the store and purchase a few bottles and try them at home and see if I enjoy them as much here as I did at Wine 101.

I hope you had some great wines this weekend, please feel free to share with me what you enjoyed and I will see if I can find your favorites as well.

Much LOVE and wine,

Tammi