We hoped for more from this Rhône blend

Several months ago, some friends served us a tasty, interesting French wine. Your Two Wine Nuts were very enthusiastic about it and quickly jotted down the label information. We were thrilled to find the wine available at Cost Plus World Market, so we snatched up a couple bottles at the very happy price of $7.99. Weirdest thing -- it hasn't been nearly as good the second or third times.

The 2004 Corbieres Les Deux Rives is a blend of four red Rhône varietals: Grenache (40%), Syrah (30%), Mourvedre (20%), and Carignan (10%). We remember it as being wonderfully earthy with lots of berry fruit. What we have tasted in both bottles we brought home has been lighter and less complex. Surprisingly, the nose is mostly alcohol and unripe blackberries. Sort of a bitter fruity smell. We feared our first bottle was corked (see February 17 post), so we waited until we had the second bottle before taking notes. Either both bottles were corked, or this is just how this wine smells.

As for the taste, we did get some of the expected earthiness as well as some smoke and cigar. But its lightness and somewhat short finish surprised us. Perhaps if we had not had the first bottle at the friends' house, we would be more excited about this wine. And perhaps the lively conversation, good food, and happy times spent with those friends added flavor to the wine that night (a very real possibility since wine is such a sensory experience).

So our recommendation is, if you are looking to try a Rhône blend without breaking the bank, give this one a shot for $7.99. It's not bad; it's just not what we remember it being.

A tasty Syrah at a good price

There are a few wines we like to stock up on when we hit a BevMo during road trips to California. Rock Rabbit Syrah is one of them. We recently opened a 2003 Rock Rabbit Syrah from the Central Coast of California and happily enjoyed it with some calzones.

Rock Rabbit produces just two varietals: a Syrah and a Sauvignon Blanc. Starting with their 2004 release, they started calling their Syrah a Shiraz. This is the same wine and the same grape. Syrah is the French name and Shiraz is the name used mostly in Australia. Sort of like Pinot Gris (the French name) and Pinot Grigio (the Italian name) - same grape, slightly different name just to confuse people.

The Rock Rabbit Syrah was deep rich purple in color and smelled a tiny bit like a Zinfandel. It smelled heavy, of ripe raspberries and dark plum. Interestingly, it smelled heavier and deeper than it tasted. It was medium-bodied (meaning it wasn't wimpy) and had some tannins, giving it a youngish feel. The most prominent flavor was blackberry jam. It was very sippable and held up against our tomatoey calzones.

At $11.99 at BevMo, we think this is a great wine to keep handy as well as a good one to serve for casual meals with friends. In addition to BevMo, also try local wine shops. We have not seen Rock Rabbit at Cost Plus World Market or grocery stores.

For more info about Rock Rabbit, check out their website.

UPDATE (1/31/08):
We just found the 2004 Rock Rabbit Shiraz at Trader Joe's for $9.99!

A bad introduction to Zins

As previously posted, Cost Plus World Market has a new wine gimmick of creatively named varietals at $9.99 each. We reviewed their Chard-on-yeah! on November 8. We recently opened up their Zin-fat-u-a-tion. So far, we’re most impressed by their marketing.

The 2005 Zin-fat-u-a-tion comes from Amador County in California. We have had some great Zins from this area nestled up against the Sierra Nevada mountain range in the northern part of the state. So we were optimistic that Cost Plus had done its homework and found something to adequately represent their label description of “…an intense and irrational passion for Zinfandel.” Unfortunately, we were sadly disappointed.

There wasn’t much to note about the color or smell of Zin-fat-u-a-tion other than we picked up hints of raspberry and alcohol as we swirled the wine before sipping. Similarly, our notes about the taste are all about how little there was to note: “No flavor.” “Very thin.” “Nothing there.” “Very easy to drink since it’s largely watery.” At best, this was a forgettable, bland, boring wine. At worst, we hate to think that folks new to Zinfandel are using this one as an introduction. There was nothing Zinfandel-y about this. No spice, no bell pepper, no rich berry fruit. None of the excitement and fun that should burst from a glass filled with Zinfandel.

We’re a little wary about trying Cost Plus's final entry: a Cabernet Sauvignon. Stay tuned.

A Mediocre Merlot

Years ago, the first wine your Two Wine Nuts bought in quantity was a 1990 Clos du Bois Merlot. That Merlot was the first wine we liked enough to stock up on, so we splurged and bought six bottles. Being rather new to wine, six bottles was quite a commitment. Unfortunately, we had very little knowledge about properly storing wine, so we made several vital mistakes:

▼ First, we stored the wine in a room that got a lot of sun. Wine likes darkness.

▼ Second, we stored the wine in a room whose temperature fluctuated. Wines like consistent coolness (we now have a wine fridge that we keep at 52 degrees).

▼ And third, we stored the wine in a rack that sat on the floor. We vacuumed the floor often enough, there was quite a lot of vibration under the wine. Wine likes to be still.

Sadly, we only enjoyed two of those bottles. By the time we found a third special occasion calling for our coveted Merlot, the wine was ruined. It was a sudden lesson in the importance of storing wine properly. If you don't have a cave or a wine cellar or a wine fridge, the best place to house your wine is often something like a dark, quiet closet. Refrigerators are too cold, and garages often fluctuate in temperature too much.

We were reminded of our first bulk purchase when we spotted a bottle of 2004 Clos du Bois Merlot while shopping at Beverages and More on a recent trip to California. On sale for just $8.99 (regularly priced at $9.99), we decided to see how this "historical" wine has held up. Sadly, it really hasn't. Or our tastes have changed measurably over the past 15 years, which is very likely.

We shared this Merlot over dinner with a couple new to wine. As your Two Wine Nuts were smelling mild hints of raisin and heavy fruit, the wife of the couple had one of the best wine descriptions ever. She said, "This smells like Communion." There you have it.

Although the Clos du Bois Merlot opened up its plummy flavor a bit as the meal progressed, it was mostly thin in the mouth and had quite a bit of tannins, reflected by the astringent puckery feeling. So, overall we were not all that impressed with this wine. We would not recommend it, even at the consumer-friendly price of being less than ten bucks. There are much better Merlots out there. Have some fun finding them and skip Clos du Bois's version.

A white pizza wine

While flipping through the Sunday supplements last weekend, one of your Wine Nuts came across an ad for the newest wine marketing ploy by Cost Plus World Market. Seemingly interested in joining the Trader’s Joe bandwagon of store-specific wine offerings, World Market is now touting three varietals creatively named as fun twists on said varietals. Being dedicated wine tasters – and suckers for a good marketing scheme – we dutifully purchased the three offerings and will review them as we sample them. Tonight our dinner suggested a nice Chardonnay was in order so we opened up our newly acquired bottle of 2006 Chard-on-yeah!. Here’s what we found.

In short, this wine is a great example of a white pizza wine. By that we mean an affordable, drinkable, unassuming, inexpensive wine to enjoy everyday. No special occasion needed. Typically, since pizza has tomato sauce, our favorite pizza wines are red wines. Tonight we found the white equivalent.

The label defines Chard-on-yeah! as “…an expression of joy upon discovering the pleasures of unoaked Chardonnay!” Since your Two Wine Nuts are not big fans of traditionally oaked, buttery California Chardonnays, we were hopeful that we’d find lots of crisp fruitiness in this unoaked version. And upon sniffing, that’s exactly what we found. But upon tasting, we were left sort of wanting more. While it definitely lacked the heavy butter and oak we tend to steer away from, this 2006 Chardonnay from Monterey County was largely flat and limp. It had some hints of fruit but mostly this wine was unobtrusive and inoffensive. It showed a bit more interest when paired with our pesto chicken, but mostly it was just a casual easy wine that didn’t get in the way nor distract from the conversation or the meal.

Would we buy it again? Probably. At $9.99, it’s a good wine to keep on hand for casual meals that call for a white wine. But we’re unlikely to bring it out when we have company or when we want a good example of a nice, fruity, complex, unoaked Chardonnay. Certainly worth a try but keep your expectations in check.

Thank goodness for Internet shopping

Over the years, we have discovered a few of what we consider simply awesome winery finds. One favorite – St. Amant Winery in Lodi, CA – was discovered on a wine tasting trip. The tasting room hidden in an industrial complex belied the fantastic Italian-style wines we found inside.

Another big find was River Run Vintners near Aromas, CA (north of Monterey). We discovered River Run at a Rhone Wine Festival in San Francisco several years ago and quickly became huge fans. Typical with small wineries, River Run wines are hard to find outside its local Monterey Bay area. In fact, the wines are not all that easy to find there, either! The winery is open just 6 days per year and by appointment otherwise. Fortunately, their wines are available via their website.

When we first met the winemaker, he was standing by himself behind his table at the festival. We sampled his wine, nearly fell over in surprise, and gushed how wonderful his creations were. We asked him a number of questions, including price and availability. Way back then, when he was undiscovered, he was charging a ridiculously low $10 per bottle. We honestly – and stupidly – told him he could charge at least double, perhaps triple that. Today, according to the website, he was listening. Any bottle across the board will set you back $29. Is it still worth it? Is it still a find? We opened a bottle of a 2000 River Run Malbec the other night to find out.

The verdict: Yep, it’s still good and it’s still a find. And while we really wish it were cheaper, we will still buy a few $29 bottles now and then.

As mentioned in a previous post, Malbec is most recognized as a French blending grape, added to red wines to give texture and color. Some folks, though, like River Run, have been experimenting by letting this grape stand on its own. The River Run version was simply tasty. It was just a good, solid wine. It was deep dark purple and had a lightly earthy plum flavor. It went great with our Canadian bacon pizza, although we could have successfully paired it with any number of more elegant dishes. It also had an average alcohol content of 13% which left it feeling refreshing and sippable instead of heavy and headache-inducing. All in all, we are still big fans and are kicking ourselves by being too honest that day at the festival.

A fantastic Cabernet Franc

Our closest wine country of any real note is Oregon's Willamette Valley. We've had a chance to discover some big, well-known wineries (Erath) in the area as well as some small, boutique-y wineries. One of our favorite stops during a Willamette Valley wine festival a few years ago was an industrial barn shared by two small producers. Both turned out excellent wines and we walked away with numerous bottles from each. A few nights ago, we dug into our stash and opened a bottle of 2004 Dalla Vina Cabernet Franc. Oh, my.

Cabernet Franc is a red Bordeaux grape which is typically used as a blending grape. Winemakers often add it to their red varietals in order to impart acidity and aroma. However, more and more, winemakers are pulling out Cabernet Franc to stand on its own. This happened with Merlot a number of years ago. And it's just starting to happen with another grape called Malbec.

(As a side note, by law, a wine needs to contain only 75% of a grape to be called that type of wine. So, it is not uncommon for a Cabernet Sauvignon to also contain a little Cabernet Franc or Merlot or any number of other grape varietals and still be legally called a Cabernet Sauvignon.)

Cabernet Franc grapes are considered a genetic forefather of Cabernet Sauvignon. In fact, recent DNA research revealed that Cabernet Sauvignon is actually a cross between Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon Blanc. Your Two Wine Nuts think that's a pretty cool piece of wine trivia.

Cabernet Franc wines are thought to be lighter and fruitier than Cabernet Sauvignons, and that's just what we found with the 2004 Dalla Vina.

The Dalla Vina was a beautiful deep dark purple. Its aroma of dark rich berries was very similar to that of a Cabernet Sauvignon. It felt full and velvety in the mouth, something wine folks ingeniously call "mouthfeel." Overall, the Dalla Vina tasted just a touch lighter than a Cabernet Sauvignon but easily stood on its own.

While tasty to sip, we were totally blown away by this wine when we paired it with some food. We had the Cabernet Franc with a flat iron steak marinated in a huckleberry sauce. When paired with the steak, the wine suddenly came alive and burst with fruit. This is one of the things that can be such fun about wine: food can make a huge impact. One of your Wine Nuts is much better than the other at food and wine pairing. Surprisingly, this pairing was made totally by luck by the other Wine Nut. Jackpot!

Sadly, according to their website, the 2004 Dalla Vina Cabernet Franc is sold out. Judging from their other offerings, we probably paid $20-$25 for this bottle. If so, it was well priced and worth it. Keep an eye out for Cabernet Franc wines if you are wine tasting. If you are interested in buying one, visit a wine shop and ask for a recommendation. Don't be shy about saying you've never tried one; that always gets wine folks excited and eager to help.

For more info about Cabernet Franc, click here. For info about Dalla Vina, check out their website.