The Wine Curmudgeon

Wine of the week: A to Z Chardonnay 2011

From the scores are stupid department: Someone on CellarTracker, the blog’s unofficial wine inventory web app, gave the A to Z chardonnay an 85. If this wine is only an 85, I’m going to start writing rave reviews of over-oaked, too alcoholic California chardonnay.

To be fair, I can can understand why someone would not treat Oregon's A to Z ($10, purchased, 13.5%) with the respect it deserves. It doesn’t have any oak, and if you expect chardonnay to taste like a vanilla milkshake, then this wine will confuse you and you’ll score it lower. Which is just one of the many reasons why scores are stupid, since they don’t account for individual likes and dislikes. In wine, one size does not fit all.

What the A to Z does have: Crisp, juicy green apple fruit, classic for this style of chardonnay; a little richness at the back, which makes up for the lack of oak; and an intensity that is quite refreshing. Serve this chilled on its own, or with any white wine dish that isn’t too rich, and especially grilled seafood. Highly recommended, and a candidate for the 2014 $10 Hall of Fame – unless, of course, you like a lot of oak with your chardonnay.

Expensive wine 48: J Vineyards Pinot Noir 2011

Winemakers like to talk about “difficult” vintages, where the weather was too cold or too dry or too something. We tend to forget, given modern winemaking technology and California’s usually perfect weather, how much of wine involves farming and depends on things that the winemaker can’t control.

I mention this because J winemaker Melissa Stackhouse had one of those too something harvests in 2011. There has been a lot of Winestream Media chatter about how difficult that harvest was (cooler and wetter than normal), most of which isn’t relevant to those of us who are trying to decide if we should spend $37 for a bottle of wine.

In the case of this pinot noir (sample, 14.3%), the answer is yes. Stackhouse turned difficult to her advantage, producing a wine that is much more interesting than the over-ripe, over-alcoholic examples that are the current favorites. It’s not an insult to say that this pinot noir tastes like pinot noir: raspberry fruit, some black pepper and smokiness, and a little oak on the back -- but also the restraint that separates pinot noir from other red wines. I was particularly impressed with the wine’s balance, something sadly lacking in post-modern California pinot noir, regardless of price. It’s both a food wine (lamb, of course, but also roasted pork) and something to sip and enjoy.

The caveat: There are only 7,000 cases, less than half of normal. Chalk it up to the difficult vintage, which reduced grape yield. No doubt it will be gone quickly.

Wine of the week: La Fiera Primitivo 2011

One of the questions we got during our Savor Dallas wine event last week was about price: Is there really all that much good $10 wine?

Several people, knowing the Wine Curmudgeon’s reason for being, chuckled. I was actually quite restrained, since I was in public and did not not want to embarrass myself or the other people on the panel. Throwing things and jumping up and down tends to do that.

In fact, I spoke barely at all, and when I did it was to recommend the La Fiera ($8, purchased, 13%), an Italian red that is everything a cheap wine should be – varietally correct and indicative of its place, all the while treating the consumer with respect.

Primitivo may or may not be zinfandel; I’ve tasted some that had nothing in common, and some, like this, that show that the grapes are related. Look for some black pepper on the nose and more dark red fruit than I expected (zinfandel characteristics). This is not a perfect wine – the vanilla on the back was annoying and the wine would have benefitted from less oak or chips or whatever. But it cost $8 – how much more could I want?

Drink this with takeout pizza, any Italian-American dinner, or even hamburgers on the grill. I just hope the people at the panel take my advice.

Wine of the week: Pacific Rim Dry Riesling 2011

The sweet wine craze, for some reason, has not really included wines that were available before sweet wine got hot. This is particularly true of riesling, which has been the world’s best-known sweet wine for hundreds of years.

This is just another of the things about the wine business that I’ll never understand, given how many quality, cheap rieslings exist. One of my favorites is Pacific Rim, which shows up more often than not in the $10 Hall of Fame.

The 2011 dry riesling ($12, purchased, 13.5%) is not the best of the past several vintages, but it does a workmanlike job of demonstrating why riesling deserves more attention than it gets. It’s a touch sweet, which is true of most dry rieslings (sweet rieslings can have six times as much sugar), but that sweetness is balanced by some zingy lime fruit, a floral hint, and a little riesling oiliness. My only disappointment was that the wine’s finish was too short, leaving me wondering where the rest of it went to. But that’s the difference between a $10 wine and a Hall of Fame wine.

Chill this and pair it with Asian food, grilled seafood, or even cold plates. It’s not so sweet that the manly among us will be offended, but it is sweet enough so that sweet drinkers will be happy.

Wine of the week: Barahonda Monastrell Sin-Madera 2010

The joy of wine – the absolute, most wonderful thing – is tasting something you’ve never had before and knowing that it’s something you want to drink again and again.

Such was the case with the Barahonda ($9, purchased, 14%), a red wine from Spain made with monastrell and from another regions that only Patrick Mata at Ole Imports seems to have hard of.

How impressive was this wine? It’s a previous vintage, and whenever an $10 wine still tastes like this, imagine how wonderful it will be when it’s the current vintage. Look for a funky Spanish aroma -- the wine geeks call it barnyard, but that doesn’t do it justice. It’s an earthy, intriguing smell that always makes me think of Spain. There is also some dark fruit, lots of spiciness and not a bit of oak.

It’s a food wine, as many Spanish wines are, and really needs something like grilled meat to show it at its best. Highly recommended, and a candidate for the 2014 $10 Hall of Fame.

Wine of the week: Dry Creek Dry Chenin Blanc 2011

I’m doing research for an upcoming blog post about U.S. wine sales – what varietals we’re drinking, the brands we’re buying, and so forth. Chardonnay, not surprisingly, is still the white wine of choice for most of us.

This wine and grape are not high on those lists. Which, frankly, is a shame. The Wine Curmudgeon has long been an advocate of chenin blanc, a white wine grape that is fairly well known in France but is known in the U.S., if at all, for indifferently made sweet wine. Chenin blanc is much better than that.

The Dry Creek ($10, purchased) is not indifferently made and is not sweet. In fact, It's one of the few wines in the world that isn’t reisling that lists the residual sugar on the label -- 0.6 percent, which makes it as dry as many red wines. (Though, given that hardly any consumers know what residual sugar is, it’s more a good idea in effort than execution).

Look for lots of white fruit aromas, a little lemon peel fruit, and a sort of slate-like, fruit pit finish. This is a wonderful alternative to chardonnay, especially for salads, grilled vegetables, and cheese courses.

Mini-reviews 45: Penfolds, Caldora, Brancaia, Paul Cheneau

Reviews of wines that don’t need their own post, but are worth noting for one reason or another. Look for it on the final Friday of each month:

• Penfolds Koonunga Hill Shiraz Cabernet 2010 ($12, sample): Perfectly acceptable grocery store red blend from Australia -- simple and fruity, but not flawed or offensive.

• Caldora Montepulciano d'Abruzzo 2011 ($9, purchased): Ordinary Italian red with just a hint of Italian-ness and neither especially funky or fresh. More New World in style than anything else.

• Brancaia Tre Toscana 2010 ($23, sample): Italian red with lots of sweet red fruit and a bit of tannin and acid, but not especially Tuscan in any way

• Paul Cheneau Cava Blanc de Blancs Reserva NV ($10, sample): Very ordinary cava, which would not be a bad thing except that so much cava is so extraordinary. Much better available at this price.