Tag Archives: $10 wine

Wine of the week: Domaine du Tariquet Classic 2009

Sept. 2, 2011 update: Tasted the 2010 at The Esquire in San Antonio, where it was surreal to see Tariquet on the wine list, and for only $21. The wine was everything it should be. There was a bit of grapey fruit, lots of citrus, and that wonderful, fresh, clean style. And it paired well with fried dill pickles.

The good news: This is still great cheap wine, and a member of the $10 Hall of Fame.

The bad news: The 2009 isn’t as interesting as the 2007 and 2008. I’m not sure if it’s because the vintage was lacking or if the 2009 is too old. As wonderful as the Tariquet is, it’s not made to age more than a year or two; hopefully, the 2010 will be here soon. There’s less green apple and more grapiness in the 2009 than in other vintages.

Having said all of that, the Tariquet ($10, purchased) shows what can be done when a producer cares about making quality cheap wine. It’s a white blend composed of ugni blanc and colombard, two grapes held in lesser repute most everywhere else in the world. But in Gascony, where the Tariquet is made, they are as important as chardonnay is elsewhere, and it shows in the wine. And the winery has been around since the late 17th century, so the winemakers know a thing or two about what they’re doing.

Tariquet, as a winery, has become hip over the past couple of years, and its wines show up in all sorts of fashionable French bistros. Why can’t that happen in the U.S.?

More about Domaine du Tariquet:
? Wine of the week: Domaine Tariquet Classic 2008
? Wine of the week: Domaine Tariquet Classic 2007
? An Internet toast to Domaine du Tariquet

$200 worth of wine

$200 worth of wineDon’t fear, regular visitors. That’s not one bottle of wine, but the result of a recent Wine Curmudgeon shopping expedition — 13 bottles, only two of which cost more than $16. And there wasn’t a stinker in the bunch.

The occasion for this spree? A chance to shop at Spec’s, probably the best liquor retailer in Texas. Spec’s doesn’t have any stores in Dallas, but I was in Austin for a wedding and Spec’s has several stores there. So that gave me a chance to check out Spec’s vast inventory (at 80,000 square feet, it’s bigger than most grocery stores) and its very competitive pricing. I was not disappointed.

More, after the jump:

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Wine and Tax Day

image from t1.gstatic.com Monday is April 18, the deadline this year for Americans to pay their state and federal income taxes. Which we are famous for whining about (pun fully intended). So, as a public service, here are a few thoughts about wine and how it can improve tax day.

? Drink a bottle of regional wine. Most U.S. states are suffering horrendous budget crises — New York had to close a $10 billion gap. Illinois' was $4.9 billion. Texas' is $27 billion. So if you buy a bottle of local wine, you're supporting local jobs. Each of us can help reduce those deficits, one bottle at time, and it's a lot more pleasant than listening to the complaining and bellyaching that goes on this time of year.

? Visit Michael Franz's annual Tax Day wine column at Wine Reports Online, which he has done for almost 20 years. As someone who specializes in cheap wine, the Wine Curmudgeon applauds Franz's perseverance. Plus, he and colleague Paul Lukacs wade through more than 1,000 wines to make their recommendations.

? Try a cheap wine you've never tried before. Don't worry about reviews or scores or what other people will think. Go to the store, buy it, and taste it. If you like it, you've found a new wine. If you don't, throw it out. I promise not to tell anyone.

? My wine recommendation? Anything from the $10 Hall of Fame would do nicely, but I'd also suggest Cuvee Cep d'Or 2010 ($10, purchased), a rose from Provence. Availability may be limited, but it's a beautiful wine that is well worth looking for. There is just a touch of fruit (watermelon?), and it's bone dry with a long mineral finish. This is everything a Provencal rose should be, and is one of the best-made $10 wines I've had in a long while.

Wine of the week: Ipsum 2010

image from ei.isnooth.com Sometimes, wine doesn't taste the way we want it to taste. When the Wine Curmudgeon first tried the Ipsum, a Spanish white blend, two years ago, it was a revelation — fruit forward in a New World style, but crisp and with lots of minerality. It was a sure thing Hall of Fame selection.

The 2010 vintage, sadly, is not up to that standard. The Ipsum ($10, purchased) is still a more than adequate wine, and there is still lots of tropical fruit. You could do a whole lot worse, and the Wine Curmudgeon has. But the extra something that pushed previous vintages over the top is gone. The minerality isn't there, and this year's wine doesn't have the freshness and clarity that the others did.

How does this happen? Who knows? The winemaker had an off day, the weather didn't cooperate, the grapes weren't up to snuff. So drink this, well chilled, with seafood or grilled chicken, and hope that the 2011 Ipsum returns to its previous standard.

? Ipsum 2008 review: "… much better than I expected it to be."

Wine review: Dancing Bull Zinfandel 2009

Want to see how wine changes over time, taking into account things like vintage difference and consumer preferences, and especially how the big wine companies see consumer preference?

Then taste the Dancing Bull ($9, purchased), which is one of the most popular wines among visitors to the blog. In my review of the 2007 vintage, I wrote that it wasn’t “quite as spicy or brambly” as it was when the wine debuted a decade ago, but that it was still more or less a traditional zinfandel. The current vintage has changed even more. It still has some zinfandel character, with pepper on the nose and spice at the back, but there is a huge dollop of sweet red fruit in the middle that wasn’t there in the 2007 or when I first tasted it.

Which is where consumer preference — or what companies like E&J Gallo, which makes Dancing Bull, see as consumer preference — comes in. One of the big changes in U.S. grocery store wine over the past several years is, for lack of a better term, the addition of sweet fruit. It’s not that the wines are sweet, and the Dancing Bull is bone dry. Rather, it’s what Eric Asimov of the New York Times describes as not the “actual sugar in the wine, but also (more often) of the impression of sweetness. This impression can be provided by dominant fruit flavors and high concentrations of glycerol, a product of fermentation that is heavy, oily and slightly sweet.” And, he writes, California zinfandel exactly fits that description.

Gallo’s market research, apparently, has determined that consumers want that sweet fruit in their wine. So the company makes the wine that way, and the Dancing Bull is the result. Is this good or bad? Neither. As the Wine Curmudgeon has said many times, good and bad doesn’t apply to wine. It’s what each person wants to drink.

Wine of the week: Falesco Est! Est! Est!!! 2009

The Wine Curmudgeon does not approve of exclamation marks. If Hemingway didn’t need them, no one else does either. Which should give everyone an idea about the quality of this wine, since it has five exclamation points in its name.

The Est ($9, purchased) is a white blend of trebbiano, malvasia and roscetto (yet another obscure Italian grape, something that it seems all interesting Italian wines must have). In less capable hands, that grape combination can produce a wine that is all sweet and fruity. But Falesco, the producer behind Est, is one of the most capable hands in the world, and the Est lives up to Falesco’s long-standing tradition of cheap and well-made wine.

Look for a lemon/lime zest sort of flavor, more structure than a $9 wine should have, and some spice on the finish. Drink this chilled on its own, or with anything resembling fish. This wine would make even tuna casserole, made with cream of mushroom soup, taste better. And look for this in the 2012 $10 Hall of Fame, with Falesco’s Vitiano wines.

Wine of the week: Coteaux d’Ancenis La Clotiere 2009

Here is why the Wine Curmudgeon loves wine. I was cutting through the wine department at my local Whole Foods, on my way to somewhere else, when I saw the La Clotiere on display. The label was unimpressive, it was stacked with a bunch of other $10 wines, and there was absolutely no reason to stop and look at it.

So of course I did, and the result was a Wine of the Week and an almost certain new member of the $10 Hall of Fame. Highly recommended, though availability may be a problem if there are no Whole Foods in your area.

This is cheap wine as it should be — professionally made, balanced, and with low alcohol. It comes from the Loire region of France and is made with gamay, which is not as odd as it sounds (though we don't see many of those wines in this country). But it has very little to do with $10 gamay from Beaujolais, where the wines are often very fruity, don't have much in the way of tannins, and are much simpler than this.

The La Clotiere ($9, purchased) is a surprisingly un-simple wine. There is red fruit in the front, a bit of a middle, and a mineral-like finish common to red wines from the Loire. I chilled it, because that's what I do with $10 Beaujolais, but that made the wine worse. Serve this at room temperature with any simple, middle-of-the-week dinner, and it would also be perfect for French Bistro night (steak frites, anyone?)