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August 18 2008
*Ed. Note*
Guest blogging on Good Grape is Arthur Black, who occasionally, with lightheartedness, goes by the nom de plume, Arturo Negro. Arthur is a Master Sommelier candidate well in tune, from his professional life, with Rodney Strong wines, the winery from which this new allocated offering comes. Unbiased, cool with an insane palate, Arthur gives his take on the new Rockaway wine that releases on September 1 from RSV. Find out more information at the web site, or sign up for the list.
Having the opportunity to assess Rockaway, a new endeavor of Rodney Strong, is an honor. Over the past several years I’ve had the pleasure of selling a lot of Rodney Strong in restaurants when I was still on the floor, in wine shops during my off premise retail stint, and I’m happy to say the wholesaler that I am currently a Director of Education for, National Wine & Spirits, is fortunate to be the purveyor of Rodney Strong wines here in Indiana.
Some may assume that I have an obvious bias, considering my history with the brand, but those that know me, would certainly tell you that my sincere appreciation of objective wine assessment has gotten me in trouble a number of times, because I am quick to speak my mind and am usually quite candid. The truth is I do not care about a wine producer’s reputation, whether they are “savvy” or trendy, the prices they may demand, or even if they have wines with multiple 90+ scores. To me, it is all about what is in the glass. Now, that being said, and in my opinion, Rodney Strong has continuously produced great, well-priced wines. They show the pedigree and class that California can yield, while deviating from increased industry trends of outrageous and undeserved price increases (thank you) and the growing tendency of many wineries to produce homogenous and monotonous wines that all taste the same and could very well be made from anything and from any where (thank you, thank you).
Since far too many people fail to appreciate the visual beauty of the things we ingest before swallowing them, let us start with how the Rockaway looks. To the eye, Rockaway, entirely opaque in its concentration, is like looking at a glass of liquid black, with a hue of aubergine (by using “aubergine,” instead of “eggplant,” the reader should assume I know ONE French word) that paints the crystal bulb of your wine glass while you twist the stem with your finger tips. Since the “tears” or “legs” snail pace their way down the inside of the glass and show an obvious blood-purple in their center, you can easily gather that this wine is not only high in alcohol and full in body, but will have plenty of extract, leaving whomever partakes of this bottle with some real purple lips.
On the nose, it shows ripe and fleshy primary aromas of dark currants and cassis with brandied black cherries, as well as soft notes of dark ground espresso, cocoa, and some sweet oak showing as vanilla extract, graham cracker cinnamon, and baking spices. Pretty cool!
Enough visual and odiferous meditation, lets drink this thing; assuming high levels of concentration from the look of the wine, one is certainly not disappointed when tasting this wine. I’m not typically in the school of “bigger is better,” but in this case I’ll make an exception because Rockaway shows what most “big” wines lack…..the concentration is well balanced by appropriate acidity, therefore the wine maintains strong structural integrity, as well as sound representation of fruits that parallel those perceived on the nose, and great tannins; sweet and ripe, coating the palate, as should be expected considering the grape variety’s nature, but not austere, unripe, nor aggressive.
I only have one criticism and it’s that a wine that shows and registers at 15%+ alcohol, whether or not it’s balanced by fruit and acid or is agreeable to this person or that critic’s palate, is not really showing Alexander Valley typicity (it also makes it hard to finish a bottle and walk a straight line….just kidding, in my case, my body’s resilience to ABV is legendary…or so I think).
For the most part, I am very pleased with the Rockaway and those I shared it with instantly noticed its obvious pedigree and multifaceted character. It certainly has layers, “like an onion,” or perhaps, “like a parfait,” depending on whether you like to quote Shrek or Donkey of course, and after all, who doesn’t like parfait! This wine is a solid, full bodied, California wine, that shows some wicked fruit and integrated oak, as well as considerable concentration in the right way {that is phenolically ripe tannins and not the mega-purple or stemish breed (look up adulteration and concentration to see what I mean)}, and definitely needs some aeration time and will most certainly benefit from some cellaring time. Point – buy multiple bottles and try one every 3-5 years to watch it develop. Rodney Strong, in the words of 2-Pac, “you are appreciated!”
Arturo Negro
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July 14 2008
The Feds are moving in to protect the two largest US mortgage lenders so the housing market doesn’t completely cave, President Bush approved offshore drilling, a move that is largely populist pandering to offset the $4 gallon of gas situation that his policies created, Anheuser-Busch, a quintessentially American company if ever one existed, is selling itself to an International company and this is just the hard news for today.
Thank God Brett Favre is joining the list with Roger Clemens as aging sports hero turned narcisstic jerk, otherwise I’d have to force myself to care about the baseball all-star game and A-Rod’s affair with Madonna during the slowest sports news week of the year.
Overall, I’m not sure if I should marvel at the resilience of the American economy and our psyche or start building a bunker in my backyard.
Sounds like a perfect time to start drinking inexpensive wine and start saving my spare change in a manner more organized than overflowing inscribed beer mugs, a wedding gift years ago turned utilitarian holder of pennies.
All of this talk in the wine industry about trading up? Ha. I’m trading down, way down. With love and respect to my friend Deb from Good Wine Under $20, I’m talking about good wine under $5.
Professionally, my wife, an editor at a publisher, is working on a book called, “Living Well in a Down Economy for Dummies.” It publishes next month. I’m not sure what tips the book includes, but doubtlessly it DOES NOT include good wine pick-ups for under $5—a feature that I’ll do here off and on for the next week or so.
My first pick is the 2006 Covey Run Columbia Valley Gewurtraminer—a pleasant quaffer with more mojo than is deserved at $5, and the package finish is quality too, an area that gets short shrift on the bottom shelf in the grocery aisle. Drink this with the bagged stir-fry from Costco that replaces the $40 Thai carryout you might have otherwise purchased.
My review can be found here.
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June 11 2008
Ah, my love affair with my wine mistress. She is sweet, but dryly intriguing, well-perfumed, mercurial with subtly and power; sometimes fleshy, but always with pleasant dimension.
I love Rhone whites and I particularly love my mistress Viognier which makes this Wine Blogging Wednesday all the more fun.
And, fun though it may be, my luck in picking wines for Wine Blogging Wednesday is not nearly as good as Viognier generally is.
I picked up an inexpensive Argentinean that proved to be a clunker. Next time, I’ll heed my own advice, as below.
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June 10 2008
Have you ever wondered why the writers of “Sideways” chose Merlot as the unfortunate benefactor of a pop culture phenomenon?
I think I have unraveled the mystery.
As Miles famously ranted in the movie, “If anyone orders Merlot, I’m leaving. I am not drinking any f—Merlot.”
Almost instantaneously, a nation of wine drinkers set down their glass.
Aside from the small inconsistency of Miles’ prized wine being a Merlot-based Chateau Cheval Blanc, the thing that I’ve wondered most is why Merlot? Why not choose Zinfandel or Pinot Grigio or Chardonnay or any number of other varietals?
Based on the conversation I had this past weekend, I think I have the essential truth, or at least the 6th hand anecdotal, twisted truth. Paul Harvey might not say, “Now you know the rest of the story.” He might, however, say, “now you know the gossipy back-alley truth,” though.
I went to a wine tasting on Saturday with some friends at Lush Wine & Spirits in Chicago. Lush specializes in carrying wines that are not carried anywhere else in Chicago.
As a side note, the recent changes in Illinois law that allows a retailer to buy Direct-to-Trade should be a boon for Lush.
As an additional side note, I was completely dumbstruck when Twisted Oak’s “The Spaniard” was a part of our tasting. Apparently, Twisted Oak and the folks at Lush are fast friends.
As a third side note, you want to talk about an ego boost: The person that conducted our wine tasting reads my site.
All that aside, the store is what a wine shop should be, or at least what I would do if I had a wine shop—obscure, high-end bottles in a point’s free environment.
One of the winery’s Lush carries is Carhartt. The winery, located in the Santa Ynez Valley in Santa Barbara County, is a small producer with a strikingly distinctive label. With six varietals in the wine shop, Carhartt stood out based on variety, moreso than any other winery present in the store.
Carhartt is a well-noted winery with some very positive accolades to their credit. Somewhere in the family of the same folks that bring working class folks the Carhartt line of clothing, these guys are cattle ranchers turned vintners and their flagship wine is Merlot. It is their bread and butter.
Supposedly, when the production team for Sideways was scouting out locations for the movie, they stopped by Carhartt with a very strong desire to use the Carhartt location.
The Carhartt folks thought about it, thought about it some more and said, “no thanks, we don’t want you to film at our winery.”
The film people said, “But, we’re from Hollywood. Think about the fame that will come to your winery.”
And, the Carhartt’s still said, “no.” They wanted to privately tend to their 10 acres of vines and their flagship Merlot.
In a bit insider’s upshot, the writers famously wrote in the famous derision towards Merlot as a shot at the winery that turned them down.
Is this true? Hell, I have no idea, but the story went over well when Erin our tasting hostess was schmoozing with us—and it went over especially well after hording the bottle of El Jefe’s The Spaniard for my sixth generous pour.
My review of the 2003 Carhartt Merlot can be found here.
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May 28 2008
So, if you were Alex Trebek and you posed the question, “Scott Dixon.” My answer might be, “The winner of the 2008 Indianapolis 500” and mimicking Cliff Clavin from “Cheers” fame, I might also add, “An Indy Car driver who has not been in my kitchen.”
I could not, however, answer, “An Indy Car driver who has not been in my mother-in-law’s kitchen” because, well, he has been in her kitchen on two Thanksgivings as the former love interest for a family member on my wife’s side. He even ate the green bean casserole. Nice guy, too, besides being polite about filling his plate. He is a bit quiet, but he is a Kiwi, if not by birth (Aussie) then by homeland proxy, and they are not known for a lot of artifice (read: b.s.).
This quote from the Indianapolis Star sums it up:
Dixon, 27, is so difficult to read that team owner Chip Ganassi, who fielded Montoya’s Indy-winning car, initially didn’t know what he was getting when he plucked Dixon from the folding PacWest team in the middle of the 2002 season.
“He’s been like that since I’ve known him,” Ganassi said. “At first, I didn’t think he was that excited about racing. “People confuse that with caring about things. You know, it’s a relief to know it was a quiet confidence that sort of is his trademark. That’s a powerful tool.”
You will excuse me for going on about Indy Car racing, a sport that is very niche-y (and the ceremonious winners circle drink is milk), but with my town being Indianapolis and Danica Patrick making magazine covers and Helio Castroneves winning “Dancing with the Stars,” I’ve gotta make hay while the sun is shining.
Speaking of New Zealand and sunshine, I think Eric Arnold, who chronicled a year in the life at Allan Scott, a Marlborough winery, will attest to the down home, rootsy and to-the-point nature of the Kiwi’s, as well.
In honor of the 2008 winner of the Indianapolis 500, Scott Dixon, and as an homage to Eric’s chronicle (Arnold left Wine Spectator for Bloomberg recently, as well), I’m reviewing the 2004 Allan Scott Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc.
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