Kicking it at Kick Ranch

On Day 1 of the Wine Blogger Conference, if you arrived early enough before the first “official” event, you had the opportunity to head out to Kick Ranch Vineyard for lunch and a tasting. The tasting consisted of 12 wineries who source grapes from Kick Ranch pouring some of their current selections. I originally thought this would be an event where each winery would pour the Syrah they make from Kick Ranch grapes, for example, but instead, the wineries seemed to be pouring lots of stuff from both Kick Ranch and from other vineyards. The owners of Kick Ranch provided a delicious lunch for us, which I went straight for, having not eaten a thing but 2 slices of toast when I left Murphys way earlier in the day! I only managed to taste my way through what 8 of the wineries had to offer, I ran out of time and needed to head back to Santa Rosa in time for the “speed dating” tasting, which I already wrote about here.

As it turns out, and as dhonig kindly pointed out, four of the wines I tasted garnered 89 points from various wine media folks! So I've cross posted those 4 wines here, and you can read about the whole Kick Ranch experience here.

2006 Pax Cuvee Christine: Syrah. Bright red fruit, flowers, berries, vanilla, toast, violets, slight chocoalte, spice, pepper, dark, tannic.

2006 Lynmar Russian River Valley Pinot Noir: Smoke, leather, earth, strawberry, raspberry, nice red fruit.

2006 Enkidu Kick Ranch Syrah: Black cherry, floral, spice, toasted oak, brown sugar, tannins earth.

2005 Enkidu Fazekas Petite Sirah: Dark chocolate, black fruit, vanilla, dark, slight red fruit on the edges, tannic. I loved this wine!

Of these, my favorite was the Enkidu Fazekas Petite Sirah. I can't believe this only got an 89, I found it to be gorgeous, and if they were selling it there, I would have easily tucked some into my take home cases. Then again, we all know I adore Petite Sirah, so that may just be my bias showing through! ;)

A wine by any other point, tastes as sweet...

Or does it?

Last night, I attended the first of what I hope will be many Project 89 parties, with The Brix Chicks Liza & Xandria, Ward Kadel of WineLog and others. During our tasting, we tasted matched pairs of American Chardonnay, New Zealand Pinot Noir, and Australian Shiraz. One wine was given an 89 rating and one was given a 90 or above rating by one of the major critics. As we tasted these wines blind, we didn't know as we were drinking them, which was the "better" wine and which was not. I asked our team to give them our own ratings first and then reveal the "expert" opinions afterwards, to see if we agreed.

All wines were purchased from Wine.com and can be found at various sources for less (click the link to search on Vinquire!)

First up, Chardonnay from North America.

• 2006 Columbia Crest Grand Estates Columbia Valley Chardonnay

Medium golden lemon color, with a nose of butterscotch, oak and straw.
I found tons of lemon, custard, and a zingy lemon zest flavor followed by flinty mineral flavors with a bit of chalk and vanilla finish. I did see a little bit of a musty aftertaste, but over all really enjoyed this wine.

I gave it 88 points. Wine Spectator gave it 90.

Even though I'm not typically a chard person, I would buy this wine for it's ease of drinking, particularly for a party.

• 2006 MacRostie Carneros Chardonnay

The MacRostie was again, a very pale yellow color which I love in a Chard. It signals to me that it will not be an overoaked, over malolactic fermentation Sundial type wine. Thank god for that! On the nose, again there were tons of lemon and lemon zest aromas, with a hint of caramel & sandlewood.

This wine had a lot of spritz to it, and was almost bitter with it's citrus flavor. I thought it tasted a lot like flat 7-Up. And not in a good way, since there was a sharp aftertaste on the long finish.

I gave it an 86, primary because of the funky finish, although it was much better with food than without.

Wine Spectator gives it an 89.

Next, the Pinots. Both were from New Zealand, but each from a distinct area known for Piont Noir. Now I love me a NZ Pinot, so I was really excited about this pair.

• 2006 Amisfield Central Otago Pinot Noir

The Amisfield was a gorgeous garnet red color, with earth, cherry kir, ceder and a slight mint nose.

When I first tasted this wine, there was massive bright red fruit; it was definately a lighter more traditional style of Pinot Noir, and it's juicy cranberry, straweberry and cherry flavors really pop out. There was a long fruit finish, that kept my mouth watering after the wine was gone.

Wine Enthusiast gave this wine a 91, Wine Spectator gave it a 90.

I gave this wine an 89.

• 2006 Te Kairanga Martinbourough Pinot Noir

The Te Kairanga was the first wine that brought out the Venturi, a handy dandy aeration device that forces a wine to act like it has been decanted and opens it up. Before we used the Venturi however, I noticed that this wine had a cloudy deep ruby color, much different from the first Pinot we tasted.

There were strong cherry cola flavors, with dried cherries and strong earth with musty leaves.
On the first taste, I really did not like this wine at all, and gave it an 84. After running it through the Venturi twice, I still found it to be lacking and had a strange finish, although I did increase my score to 85.

Wine Enthusiast and Wine Spectator both gave it an 88.

Finally, we threw in two big boys from Australia to really pack a punch.

• 2005 Wishing Tree Western Australia Shiraz

This was a deep dark and brooding wine. On the nose, I found dark red fruits, and smoked meat.

It was lighter than I expected for the color and style, but was very pleasant with the cherry, raspberry and juicy fruit flavors.

I gave this wine an 89.

Wine Spectator also gave it an 89, while Wine Enthusiast gave it a lowly 86.

• 2005 Jim Barry "The Lodge" Clare Valley Shiraz

The deep blood red color of the Lodge smelled like dusty blackberries.
It was full bodied, but tasted slightly sour to me.

Even after running it through the Venturi, I still didn't care for this Shiraz, and only gave it an 87.

Robert Parker gave it a 90, as did Wine Spectator.

My question is, given that the Amisfield Pinot was $39.99, and the Te Kairanga was $19.79, is one point really worth a 200% price increase? I don't think so. If the Te Kairanga was given a 90 instead of an 89 would it be priced at $39? Probably. Are there other $20 wines that are undervalued? You bet.

I hope to do another 89 Project Party soon to taste more pairs!

The power of points is in marketing, not in enjoyment. So I say, points be damned and go out and drink what you like!

Happy Drinking!

Joseph Drouhin Bourgogne Véro 2005

[Cross-posted from 2 Days per Bottle.]

Wine Advocate (89) David Schildknecht said it had refreshing brightness & called it a victory for consumers.

The little wooden guy, on the other hand, is not pleased with this wine. Read on to find out why.



France
Burgundy
Bourgogne
$19.99
12.5% alcohol

The color is very light clear red. The nose opens tart and fruity, sour cherry and strawberries. The fruit sweetens after the initial tartness, smelling candied with brown sugar or maple. There is also just enough of a whiff of earth to tell you it is likely French.

The palate opens all sour fruit, sour cherries and sour strawberries. That sweetens a little on the finish, adding a sense of red licorice. Tannins were slightly drying but smooth.

Will this close down on night two, or will it soften and open up, revealing something other than red fruit? Let us find out together.

NIGHT TWO

Sour cherries and strawberries still lead the nose, but there is also some caramel and some sage. It actually seems, on the nose, to have closed a bit from night one. The palate is still sour cherries, but deeper, a bit richer, with blackberries throw in instead of the sweeter strawberries of the night before. A little Dr. Pepper followed, then a hint of spice. Overwhelmingly, though the sour cherries and blackberries dominated from start to finish, without significant transition to midpalate or finish.

This is a disappointingly one-dimensional wine. Yes, I know, at $19.99 it is practically free by the standards of 2005 Burgundy, but why bother? There are far more interesting wines from other regions for the same amount of scratch.

This strikes me as a pure QPR 89, a rating based upon its price in relation to the astronomical '05 Burgundy market. I would be willing to bet David Schildknecht would not be able to pick this out of a random case of pinot plonk one time out of ten in a blind tasting.