Fess Parker Wines
The Fess Parker Winery and Vineyard is located in Santa Barbara County in California. The winery produces diverse, Estate Grown, Burgundian and Rhône wines from 400 acres of vineyards.
Established in 1989 by former actor Fess Parker, the winery is family-run by son, Eli Parker as President, Director of Winemaking and Vineyard Operations, daughter Ashley Parker Snider as Marketing and Public Relations liaison, and son-in-law Tim Snider who is Vice President of Sales and Marketing.
Fess Parker Frontier Red
Red Wine from California
“…as good a California Cotes du Rhone as one is likely to find…”
-Robert Parker
The perfect accompaniment for a grilled steak or Texas-style barbecue, Frontier Red is a well balanced Syrah-based blend with aromas of ripe cherry, red currant, cinnamon, vanilla and herbs. Flavors of dark cherry, smoke, white pepper, vanilla, blackberry and cassis with a hint of spice on the finish. $10
Tags: celebrity, santa barbara
Bev Mo’s Wilfred Wong
When you walk down the wine isles of Beverages and More, you can’t help but notice the majority of wines are rated by Wilfred Wong. On my first visit to the local store, I wondered: Is this a real guy? What does he know about wine, anyway?
Wilfred is a real person who has been BevMo’s wine buyer since 1995. Before that, he was buying wine for his family’s wine shop in Berkeley, CA.
As the e-commerce cellar master for Beverages & More’s 100+ stores in California and Arizona, Wilfred is the man responsible for evaluating every wine on the shelves. That means tasting more than 8000 wines a year.
Besides choosing which wines the stores will carry, Wong has a say in the 50+ custom wines commissioned specifically for BevMo.
One of those wines is a Zolo Winery chardonnay from Mendoza, Argentina.
The 2008 Zolo Gaucho Select Unoaked Chardonnay
Golden yellow color. Tropical fruit and pear aromas. Flavors of ripe apples and white flowers with a hint of honey. Balanced with a clean, crisp finish. Pair with soft white cheese and crusty french loaf. $9.99
Tags: argentina, chardonnay
Mick Fleetwood Private Cellar Collection
When he’s not touring with original band, Fleetwood Mac or his Mick Fleetwood Blues Band or his Island Rumours Band, drummer Mick Fleetwood is blending wine in California’s Lake County. Mick’s latest release is a series of wines made at Langtry Estate & Vineyards, formerly known as Guenoc winery.
Contract winemaking is common in the wine industry, where people who own neither vineyard nor winery can pay someone to make a single wine or an entire line of wines.
When Mick debuted his first wine, Mick Fleetwood 1998 Cuvee, in 2004, he turned to well known Santa Ynez winemaker, Mike Brown to produce his first release. A blend of 75% Merlot, 25% Cabernet Franc, it was noted as an all-occasion wine, and considered an all-American red.
The Wall Street Journal did a blind tasting of more than 50 celebrity wines and awarded Mick Fleetwood Private Cellar “Best Wine by a Living Musician,” stating “Very Good. Smooth, velvety and elegant, with great fruit and nice acidity. Real stature. Great with a rare steak.”
Fleetwood and his wife, Lynn, became interested in wine because Lynn loves to cook and they enjoy trying different wines to match the food. When asked what his favorite wine was, his answer was an emphatic “Merlot. A 2002 Frog’s Leap,” to be exact. At their home in Lahaina, Hawaii, Mick and Lynn have a 3,000 bottle wine cellar. Now that’s a serious collection.
You can find the Private Cellar Collection at Costco $19-$20.
Music to match the wine:
Blue Again (Live) Mick Fleetwood Blues Band
Recorded live at the Sheldon Concert Hall in St. Louis, Missouri in February of 2008.Fleetwood, who has teamed up on this recording with guitarist and lead vocalist Rick Vito, bassist Lenny Castellanos and keyboardist Mark Johnstone.
Tags: fleetwood mac, merlot, music
Chocolate, Cheese and Wine
Okay, so you think it sounds weird, but it’s a great combination. We already know that wine and cheese are wonderful together. Chocolate and dessert wines are great together. What could be better than all three at the same time?
If you have a Port or a nice Sherry that you enjoy sipping, try it with a bitter-sweet dark chocolate. Then add a piece of salty Stilton blue cheese or Chèvre (goat) and your taste buds will go wild.
The Chocolate
Gourmet chocolate bars will cost more than a Hershey’s. Expect to pay anywhere from $2 – $5 per bar. Because the darker chocolate is dry and less sweet, you won’t be scarfing it down and a little goes a long way.
Suggestion:
Valrhona 71% Cacao Dark Bittersweet Chocolate
Find it at Cost Plus or Trader Joe’s.
The Cheese
Two suggesions:
- Point Reyes blue cheese
- Humboldt Fog
Soft, creamy ripened goat’s milk cheese. Has a mild tangy flavor. This cheese goes with so many different foods. If you didn’t like it with chocolate and sherry, you can enjoy it with pears or spinach drizzled with balsamic vinegar or a little honey, paired with a nice Sancerre or Chenin blanc. Mmm, mmm.
Find it at a cheese shop or Whole Foods. Not cheap, but you don’t need a lot. $20 per lb.
The Wine
2006 Banyuls Rimage Les Clos de Paulilles
Rimage is a Catalan word which means vintage. Therefore a rimage Banyuls is a fortified wine in which all grapes come from a certain vintage, much like a Colheita or vintage Port. Made of 100% black grenache, this Banyuls exhibits a dark black-purple robe, with intense blackberry jam and succulent rich flavors. This is France’s answer to Port, and the absolute best wine to pair with chocolate! $18 at K & L.
Other pairing suggestions:
- Gorgonzola with shaved bitter-sweet chocolate and marmalade
- Blue Cheese with dark chocolate truffles
Bodegas Juan Gil Monastrell 2007
A tasty red wine made from hand-harvested 100% Monastrell grapes. We call it Mourvedre. Purple in color. Dark fruit aromas with a hint of toasted oak and leather. Good balance of fruit and tannins make it easy to drink from the minute it’s poured. Because of the dark, thick skin it takes a little longer for the Monastrell grapes to ripen, so the alcohol level of this wine is a bit high at 15%.
Pairs well with roasted meats, mushrooms, corn, and cheddar cheese. Beef stew would be a good cold weather match. Open it a half hour before serving and enjoy! One of Wine Spectator’s Top 100 Wines for 2009. Currently a great value at Costco for $10. Available Sold out at BevMo. Was $15.
Make Your Own Compost – It’s Easy
Few of us are fortunate enough to live in areas that have rich soil. Plants need a cocktail of nutrients to utilize for maximum growth. If you’ve seen the gardens that some chefs have or a neighbor that seems to have a super green thumb, it’s because they probably use organic fertilizer or compost.
Don’t use animal fertilizers on fruits and vegetables
There are a couple of reasons for this. First, animal waste products can contain salmonella. Second, even though farm animals are vegetarians, many large farms add chopped up animals and antibiotics to their feed. Enough said.
Quality compost can be made from recycled yard and food waste. It will provide valuable organic matter to your soil and increases it’s moisture-holding capacity.
In my previous backyard, I made a compost area next to the vegetable garden. It was a simple raised bed approx. 6′ x 8.’ Basically just an area to throw food scraps, lawn clipping and dried leaves. I made sure it got watered regularly and turned it over every few days. That was it. I had an organic garden.
It usually takes at least 2 or 3 months before the compost begins to smell like a forest floor. You’ll know it’s ready by the clean smell. Continue: Read the rest of this entry »
Tastings
Dorothy Gaiter and John Brescher have been the wine columnists for The Wall Street Journal for 12 years. I always enjoyed the Friday edition of the Journal – one of those reasons was Tastings. When the Journal started putting Tastings videos up several years back, it was fun to watch the two share their enjoyment of wines. Not fussy or concerned about points, it was somewhere between delicious or yucky.
In their travels they discovered exciting, little known wines that have become favorites.
The last edition of Tasting was December 26, 2009. If you haven’t read their column before, read it here: The Mysterious Heart of Deliciousness
June 4, 1973, was a big day. Dorothy Gaiter started her first job as a reporter at the Miami Herald and John Brecher, who would become her husband, also started his first day at the Miami Herald as bureau chief of South Dade County. “It was love at first sight,” Gaiter said.
In 1990, Brecher and Gaiter were hired at The Wall Street Journal, where Gaiter later became urban affairs editor and Brecher became Page One editor.
When Joanne Lipman became founding editor of The Wall Street Journal “Weekend” section in 1998, she asked Brecher and Gaiter to write about wine. “The concept is that they are experts but they are not snobs,” Lipman explains. “They were a hit from day one.”
One of Brecher and Gaiter’s early columns, suggesting that readers open a special bottle they had been saving for years, elicited more 1,000 letters. And, Lipman recalls, “They wrote a column about a Gallo wine that was unexpectedly excellent, and every bottle in the United States [was sold]. The winery wrote to us that it had to call in bottles from Europe. The influence was astonishing. … Everybody was walking into wine stores with that column in hand.”
As full-time columnists, Gaiter and Brecher found time to write several books on wine:
Love by the Glass: Tasting Notes from a Marriage (2003)
They tell their story through the wines they’ve shared from their first date, the birth of their daughter to Gaiter’s struggle with cancer.
Wine for Every Day and Every Occasion (2004)
From Thanksgiving and Super Bowl Sunday to wedding days, anniversaries, and birthdays, ‘the first couple of wine’ (Charles Osgood, ‘CBS Sunday Morning’) offers advice on choosing the best wines for life’s memorable moments, big and small.
The Wall Street Journal Guide to Wine (1999)
They share everything you need to know about buying, drinking, and enjoying wine, along with listings of 300 great wine values to get you started.
Tags: books
La Caudrina Moscato D’Asti 2007
The single most dessert-friendly wine around is arguably Moscato d’Asti. Serve this slightly sweet, semi-sparkling, low-alcohol wine chilled with a favorite fruit or baked dessert. Aromas of peach, pineapple and citrus. Flavors of freshly baked brioche with hints of citrus and almond. Well balanced. It pairs well with Pannettone or a fresh pear upside-down cake. Serve the cake warm with the chilled wine. Yum. $17
Recipe: Pear Upside-Down Cake With Pecans
Tags: cake, dessert, moscato d'asti, pear
Time to Stock Up on Champagne
According to the New York Times wine critic, Eric Asimov, there are now some pretty good Champagnes in the $30 to $40 range. A panel of experts, including Asimov, set up blind tasting of 20 Champagnes under $40 and found some seriously good wine. This is quite a change from last year.
What has changed? As James Carville said back in 1992, “It’s the economy, stupid.”
When the bottom fell out of the economy, it took the wine industry with it. In 2007 shipments of Champagne were at close to 22 million bottles. In 2008 they fell to 17 million bottles. This year, as previously noted here at Twisting Vines, Champagne shipments dropped more than 41%.
“I think a lot of the importers got very nervous and this fall lowered prices for the big houses, especially in November and December,” said Lorena Ascencios, wine buyer for Astor Wines and Spirits in Greenwich Village.
Asimov said he was the most excited by the smaller producers who make Champagne from grapes they grow themselves. 4 of the top 10 were selections were from small producers.
The Winners:
The Falmet Brut Tradition
The top-rated wine in the tasting. “We found it full of lively energy, with complex flavors of flowers, minerals, citrus and herbs, and with more finesse than you generally find in Champagnes dominated by the pinot noir grape.” $30
Brut Tradition from Christian Etienne
No. 5 bottle in the tasting, was rich, round and full of fruit, yet beautifully balanced. $30
NV Grande Cuvée from Moutard
No. 8 Champagne showed its 100 percent pinot noir character in its rich, full-bodied texture and ripe fruit flavors. $30
Les 7 Crus from Agrapart & Fils
Rated best value was another grower-producer. Agrapart is in the Côte des Blancs, which is chardonnay country, so naturally this was a blanc de blancs, made entirely out of chardonnay. It is fresh and balanced, with just the sort of finesse you would expect to see in a good blanc de blancs. A great deal at $28.
From Asimov: “Personally, I love the individuality and distinctiveness I find in many grower-producer Champagnes. But I recognize that unless you live near a wine shop with a deep Champagne selection, or have access to one through the Internet, these labels can be hard to find. Fortunately, some of the bigger names did very well, too.”
Louis Roederer Brut Premier
The No. 2 bottle. “It is a perennial favorite of mine, though this is the first time in a few years that I’m seeing it for under $40. It was ripe and rich, yet showed the balance and elegance I’ve come to expect in Roederer Champagnes.” $35
Henriot Brut Souverain
No. 4 bottle was full, rich and creamy, with surprisingly ripe tropical fruit flavors. Yet it was dry and balanced. $34
Taittinger Brut La Française
No. 7 bottle was from Taittinger, an often underrated producer. It was both fine and elegant, if that’s not redundant, with a mellow mineral and citrus flavor. $35
The Nicolas Feuillatte Brut
No. 9 bottle. It’s by no means a complex Champagne, but it was fresh and lively. $30
Pol Roger Brut Réserve NV – White Foil
The No. 10.” It’s a far cry from a vintage Pol Roger, but a decent bottle nonetheless, with lightness and elegance.”
Notes: A cuvée, with gold straw yellow hue, fine bubbles, a bouquet of floral and fruity aromas. Ripe and thirst-quenching on the palate, with a superb taste of brioche. $36
Rosenblum Desiree Chocolate Dessert Wine
An exotic blend of Zinfandel and Syrah, along with an infusion of rich, natural chocolate. Sipped, poured over ice cream or in coffee, it’ a delightful treat!
“It’s dark ruby and purple, and the aroma is like creamy cherry chocolate pie. The taste is crazy. It’s a candy bar in a bottle with a little alcohol. Pour it over some ice cream and have some fun. 90,000 points!” – Mark Tarbell, Arizona Republic, Feb. 14, 2007. $17
