There’s a wine for that:

2009 Anderson’s Conn Valley Prologue

As all good prologues do, it sets the stage for what’s to come. With every sip, it calls attention to the likely themes of the night – richness (of the new man at work), beauty (of your uncle’s 19 year old girlfriend), and the aging process (and how it hasn’t treated Michelle so well).

After you’ve opened it, this wine continues to evolve and get more complex, like the book you were supposed to read. It’s a blend of 80% Cabernet Sauvignon plus Cab Franc, Merlot and Petit Verdot from California’s Central Coast. It reveals different flavors over time. I get ripe blackberries, cherries and even mocha.

So start your next book club meeting off right by serving Anderson’s Conn Valley Prologue.

2007 Jean-Marie Arnoux Vacqueyras

The producer is Arnoux and the region is Vacqueyras.  Vacqueyras is in the Southern Rhone Valley in France very close to Chateauneuf-du-Pape.  You’ve all probably heard of Chateauneuf-du-Pape, but have you heard of Vacqueyras?  Probably not.  The climate and the grapes grown are very similar to Chateauneuf-du-Pape, but it doesn’t have the same brand recognition…So you can get amazing wine from Vacqueyras at affordable prices.  This bottle retails for about $15.

It’s a blend of three grapes: it’s 70% Grenache, 25% Syrah and 5% Mourvedre.  The Grenache adds warmth and candied fruit, the Syrah adds black-pepper spiciness and the Mourvedre adds structure.  The year 2007 was a fantastic year for the Southern Rhone, one of the best in the past decade.  Serve this the next time guests are coming to your house and watch what happens.  They’ll ask for more.  They’ll ask where they can get it.  And, if you tell them a bit of its story, they’ll even feel a bit more cultured.

It is a rather robust wine that can stand on its own if you’re not really serving food.  If you are serving food, I’d suggest something hearty like lamb.  I had this with lamb last Easter and it was great.

Tasting Notes: This wine is rich and opulent.  It has warm red fruit, that black pepper spiciness from the Syrah, some violets. Like velvet on your tongue.  It’s powerful and sexy.  And everybody likes a sexy wine.

So if you want to be remembered as a great host, serve 2007 Jean-Marie Arnoux Vacqueyras at your next party.

You can watch the video on the homepage or below.

2007 Cambiata Tannat

Tannat is a hardcore, in your face grape. So hardcore and tannic it’s been outlawed in Bordeaux. The word “tannat” even comes from the word “tannin”. Tannins are the chemical compounds in red wine from the grape skins that make your mouth pucker up and feel dry. They’re an important component of wine because they add structure that enables wine to age and to go with food. Tannat is usually grown in Southwest France and blended with other grapes to soften it. But for this special pairing I found you a wine made exclusively from this bold, harsh grape AND grown in the US, on Tupac’s side of the country. This wine is from the Santa Lucia Mountains in Monterey and goes for ~$20.

Tasting Notes: This wine is the bomb.  If you’ve never experienced tannat before, you are going to be shocked by the first sip. But it’s the good kind of shocked that leaves you interested and curious for more. Kinda like a kickin’ rhyme on the right beat, this wine has lush berry flavors that pop up at the perfect moment to round out the tannins. There’s even some licorice, some bitter chocolate, and a long smoky finish. This wine begs for a marbled slab of meat or a super stinky cheese.

So open up a bottle of 2007 Cambiata Tannat and enjoy the flow…

You can watch the video on the homepage or below.

Your girlfriend is turning 30, your sister is turning 40, your mother is turning 70…there’s a wine for that.

Veuve Clicquot La Grande Dame 1998

I absolutely love this Champagne.  I love talking about it.  I love the story behind it – it’s such an inspiring story for women!  This is the top bottling, the Tête de Cuvée, from the Champagne House of Veuve Clicquot.  You’ve probably heard of Veuve before, but do you know what Veuve means in French?  Widow.

After her husband died in the 1800s, the 27 year old Widow Clicquot took over the Champagne house instead of putting it in the hands of male relatives, which would have been the normal thing to do at that time.  She grew the house of Clicquot into an international business empire during a time of extreme political unrest.  She convinced the Russian Royalty to drink nothing other than her fine champagne.

She even invented some of the modern day techniques of Champagne making.  For you wine geeks out there, she invented the practice of riddling – where you store the bottle at a downward angle and turn it a bit each day to move the dead yeast to the neck of the bottle.

La Grande Dame translates into The Great Lady in honor of the Widow Clicquot.  This champagne is made from ~2/3 Pinot Noir and 1/3 Chardonnay that comes mostly from a Grand Cru vineyard.  They don’t make La Grande Dame each year – they only make it in years where the grapes are excellent enough to warrant a bottling.

Tasting Notes: This wine is delicious!  It smells like red apples, peaches, honey and toast but it’s not sweet at all.  The mousse, which is the bubbles on the top of the wine, is very small and fine which is the hallmark of a quality champagne.  It has a very refreshing acidity that brightens you up.  The finish is smooth and elegant.

So celebrate that wonderful woman in your life with this celebration of a wonderful woman.

Video originally posted on 03/14/2011.  You can also watch the video on the homepage.

English Bulldogs – there’s a wine for that, a wine that we humans can thoroughly enjoy.

2006 Ridgeview Merret Grosvenor

A sparkling wine from England!  This wine isn’t distributed in the US so I wasn’t able to get a bottle.  Even though I don’t have the wine to show you and to taste, I still wanted to tell you about it.  First of all, it’s clearly the right pairing for English Bulldogs! And, more importantly, you should have English sparkling wine on your radar screen.

If you haven’t noticed the world is getting warmer overall and this is having an effect on viticulture.  New areas that used to be too cold for quality wine production are becoming better suited to growing grapes.  I predict that in a short amount of time Southern England is going to be known for fine sparkling wine.  Don’t be surprised if world-renowned French champagne houses start buying land there!

Ridgeview Estates is in Sussex which sits on the same geological formation as the Champagne region of France.  So it’s no big surprise that the three traditional Champagne grapes grow well there.  In the UK there are already more than 100 wineries and many of them make sparkling wine.

I picked Ridgeview because they’ve received some pretty hefty international acclaim. The 2006 Ridgeview Merret Grosvenor was deemed the “Best Sparkling Wine in the World over 10 pounds” by Decanter Magazine in 2010!  Yes, it’s a British publication, but still – this wine stood up to world-class Champagne in taste tests and won.  Speaking of pounds, Tyrus weighs 60 pounds and, yes, he pulls me down the street.

Tasting Notes: Since I don’t have the wine, I can’t taste it, but it’s supposed to have strong bread aromas, citrus fruit and even a bit of tropical fruit.  Those of you in England let me know how it tastes on Facebook or Twitter.  Cheers to slobber!

Video originally posted on 03/07/2011.  You can watch the video on the homepage or below.

2007 Grgich Hills Zinfandel

This wine has tons of interesting facts that you can use to distract your family over the long dinner.  When Grandma starts asking when you’re going to get married you can reply:  Do you know about the 1976 Paris tasting where a California Chardonnay was ranked the best white wine in the world?  The same winemaker of that Chardonnay made that wine you’re drinking right now.

When your sister brings up that time you crashed the car in high school you can start talking about how all of Grgich Hills wines are biodynamic, which means they use no pesticides or fertilizers and they treat the vineyard as a living, self-sustaining organism.  When Mom breaks out your naked baby pictures to show your long-lost cousin, you can interrupt – hey did you know that Mr. Grgich is Croatian and was the first person to think Zinfandel was from Croatia?  And that DNA grape studies proved he was right?  They may not care but at least they’ll be distracted.  And maybe drunk.

Tasting Notes: This Zinfandel has nice fruit – strawberries, plums, black cherries, fresh earth.  It definitely has enough weight to stand up to Thanksgiving side dishes.  The tannins are pretty soft though so it won’t dominate the meal.  It’s not overoaked either – has just a touch of oak that adds some nice clove notes.  The perfect natural, American wine to remind us why we give thanks at harvest time.

Video originally posted on 11/07/2010.  You can watch the video on the homepage or below.

Now that you have learned what wines pair best with Thanksgiving foods, consider having a wine gift delivered to your loved ones.   (Partnered)

2009 Botani

This is a really unusual, interesting wine!  It’s made from a grape called Moscatel which is a variety of Muscat.  Muscat grapes are usually made into sweet, dessert wines. Think of Moscato d’Asti from Italy.  This wine, however, is unique because it is completely dry!  It’s amazingly aromatic but not sweet.  If you’ve never had a dry Muscat wine before, you’re in for a surprising treat.  It’s grown in southern Spain, high up in the mountains in the province of Malaga.  It’s pretty hot there so grapes have traditionally been grown just to make raisins.

The vines are 70 years old and all organically farmed.   The red slate soil doesn’t offer much in the way of nutrients.  And they don’t get a lot of rainfall.  Machines can’t really navigate the terrain so the grapes are all harvested by hand.  Man that seems like a lot of work.  But because of all of these factors – the old vines, the arid climate, the low nutrient content – only a limited number of grapes make it to harvest.  And the ones that do make it are jam-packed with concentrated flavor.

It takes a world-class team to make high-quality wine in these conditions.  Botani is a collaboration between the Ordoñez and Kracher families.  Jorge Ordoñez is one of the leading Spanish importers in the US and the Kracher family are highly regarded Austrian winemakers.

This is the perfect wine for spring because of it’s freshness and it’s verve.  There is so much life in this wine – it just bursts forth out of the glass like the whole world does at springtime.  Even the bottle reminds of me spring with the grass shoots growing.

Tasting Notes: This wine is so beautifully fragrant.  It smells like spring flowers! It has strong fruit too like lychees and oranges.  On the palate it’s dry but really full and dense, almost oily.  It finishes crisp and clean but the perfume lingers on…You could pair this with fresh fish, lightly grilled meat, even sushi.  But my favorite pairing for the 2009 Botani is with a hopeful, blooming spring day.  Cheers!

You can watch the video on the homepage or below.

2008 Dr. Loosen Wehlener Sonnenuhr Spatlese Riesling

German Riesling is one of my favorite wines in the world and this is a fantastic Riesling from the Mosel valley in Germany.  I really think that Riesling is the most noble grape and becomes glorious when grown on German soil.  Dr. Loosen is a very respected producer and the grapes for this wine come from the Wehlener Sonnenuhr vineyard, which is considered a Grand Cru vineyard, one of the best vineyard sites in all of Germany.  The soil is all blue slate that gives the wine a zippy minerality.  The vines are more than 70 years old which imparts complexity to the wine.  Riesling is a great match for Indian food – it has enough flavor and body to match the heavy sauces.  Also, sweet beats heat.  The sweetness of this Riesling works to tame the spiciness of the food.  This wine is Spatlese quality level, which means “late-harvest” – the grapes are picked in mid-September when they’re riper with higher potential sweetness.

Tasting Notes: This wine is glorious – canned mandarin oranges, vanilla and honey notes, white flowers, fresh apples.  There is a hint of petrol on it that you will get in the best Rieslings.  Very refreshing acidity that cleanses your palate and will make you want another bite of that Indian food.  It’s like the richest, brightest light in a glass.  Definitely a representation of everything good in the world, just in time for Diwali.  Happy Diwali!

Video originally posted on 11/01/2010.  You can watch the video on the homepage or below.

Halloween is the perfect excuse to have a big, crazy party with lots of booze.  Don’t be boring with your booze. Don’t just drink a rum and coke or something.  Instead, drink a spooky wine…

2007 Bogle Phantom

The Phantom is a scary mixture of three grapes:  Petite Sirah, old vine Zinfandel and old vine Mourvèdre.  The grapes come from three areas in California – Clarksburg, Lodi and Amador.  This ghost is not one that’s going to fly away – the wine is heavy, rich and dense.  A big, juicy, jammy statement of a wine that makes its presence known.  The leading grape, Petite Sirah, has a confusing name – most people think that it is a lighter, more petite version of Syrah.  But that is the opposite of the truth.  The only thing petite about Petite Sirah is the size of the grape berries on the vine.  The resulting wine is big, bold, and structured with high tannins and acidity.  It’s a giant among grapes.  The Frankenstein to regular Syrah.  The two remaining grapes in this blend, Zinfandel and Mourvèdre soften the wine and add complexity.  The Phantom is partially made in American oak barrels.

Tasting Notes: This wine is definitely fruit forward with dark ripe fruit:  plums, blackberries, blueberries.  It’s jammy and chewy.  There are all sorts of wonderful spices going on – baking spices like cinnamon and nutmeg alongside some black pepper.  The American oak gives the wine scrumptious cocoa and vanilla flavors.  It’s very smooth on your tongue, like soft velvet.  My prediction is that this Phantom will vanish quickly off the table!  So put on your French Maid outfit and put a glass into the hands of your adult trick-or-treaters.

You can watch the video on the homepage too.

Your good friend is getting married.  She’s joyous, she’s so happy, she found the perfect guy!  Life is so great!  And what do you get to do?  Plan her a big fat party.  There are so many options – you could plan a relaxing day at the spa, a whirlwind weekend in Vegas, an evening of live dancing entertainment…Either way, you should make sure you pop open lots of this:

2009 Chateau du Rouet Rosé Cuvee Tradition

There are so many things about this wine that make it the perfect choice for a bachelorette party.  First of all, it’s pink.  It’s a classic rosé from Provence in Southern France.  Rosé is a wonderful wine that harnesses the strong fruit of a red with the crisp refreshment of a white.  In France, rosé outsells white wine.  This particular rose is a blend of 60% Grenache and 40% Syrah.  So why isn’t it red?  The main difference between a red wine and a rosé is the length of time the juice is allowed to sit with the grape skins.  The longer the time, the darker the color of the wine.  So a rosé sits with the skins for only a couple of days whereas a red wine sits with the skins through fermentation.

Second reason this works for a bachelorette party – the bottle is shaped like a sultry woman!  This is actually the traditional rosé bottle shape from the late 1800’s.  Most producers have abandoned it in favor of a more modern bottle shape, but Chateau du Rouet has stuck with the hourglass shape.

Third, it’s a great value at under $15 a bottle.  You can keep the wine flowing all night to make sure the bachelorette stays happy.  You could even give every party-goer her own bottle in a gift-bag.

Tasting Notes: It has bright fresh strawberry aromas with a hint of grapefruit and white flowers.  It’s not sweet at all – very dry and focused on the palate with refreshing acidity and good minerality, kind of like wet stones.  It has a long lingering citrus finish.  This is a classic rosé from a classic region in a classic bottle.  A great find!  I can’t promise that the stripper will be classy, but at least the wine will be.