Food Do we have any oenophiles here?

In the last few years I've really grown my interest in wine. Several months ago I was gifted a nice 42 bottle Frigidaire wine fridge. Up until that time I'd really only kept 5-10 bottles on hand at any one time, and found myself repeating the same handful of wines that I knew I liked. Once I got the wine fridge I found myself picking up a couple extra bottles every week to put away for a rainy day. I've joined a couple local wine clubs and been to quite a few tastings. I'm learning a lot and have really developed a taste for big, bold reds (Old Vine Zins, big Cabs, good Pinot Noirs).

Tonight we visited a local wine bar where I am a wine club member. Every month they bring in four new wines. You get to taste all four, then choose a bottle of whichever wine you like best to take home. So we did our tasting and chose our bottle, then decided to stay for a cheese plate and to open another bottle to share while relaxing there at the wine bar. We had a Belle Glos Pinot Noir that was really, really good. It had a nice big flavor, but wasn't too dry or oaky. It was so good that we bought a second bottle to take home for another time.

Also, as a side note, as I started buying and storing more wines I was trying to figure out a good way to track them. I was going to make a spreadsheet on my own of what I had, when I bought it, what it cost, etc. But fortunately Google saved me the effort. I stumbled upon manageyourcellar.com, which is a great free tool for such things. You can enter the wines you have and it will share other's reviews of them, let you know when they are best to drink, track your wine purchases and consumption, as well as give you tons of specific statistics for your wines (how many, how many of each varietal, vintage, origin, overall value, etc.). I don't think I'll ever be a hard core collector, but it's nice now that I have 75-80 bottles of wine to be able to look at what I have, keep notes on what I've tried, and plan what I want to serve. For a free service I think it's great.

So.........anyone else a fan of wine? What do you drink? What do you have on hand? What do you recommend?

I'll throw out a recommendation beyond the Belle Glos Pinot I had tonight. If you see anything by Klinker Brick Vineyards, and you like nice big reds, grab it. Their "Old Ghost" is one of my all time favorite wines (and not TOO expensive for special occasions at $33-35). Their Old Vine Zinfandel (let it breathe) and Syrah are both great buys IMO at $15-17/bottle. If you can find them locally, and your taste sounds anything like mine, please try them and let me know what you think.

 

I'll have to check it out.

BTW, I've heard it told that you should never cook with a wine that you wouldn't drink. So maybe some tasting is in order for you.

 

Bottle Shock was a good movie. I think it's historical based on the competition of French and New World wines.

I don't drink anymore, but I follow for my wife what she likes. She's currently into Malbecs and always loves Riojas.

 

I only have a couple Malbecs and just drank my last Riojas, but solid choices. I've especially been telling myself I need to grab a few good Malbecs from Argentina or Chile

You know how to fix that, right?

 

Wine is awesome. I live in Oregon, so I'm surrounded by good wine. This last weekend I picked up a bottle of chardonnay from a producer I like. I liked their last chard release, so I'm looking forward to trying this and seeing if this vintage is just as good. I love visiting wineries, tasting, and buying a bottle to take home. Oregon is known for its production of pinot noir, but there are other good wines here too.

I like wine. I don't have any specific preference for one varietal over another. There is a wine shop in town that expands my horizons of French and Italian wines every week, so I drink more than just wine from around here.

Now I'm thirsty.

 

I would love to do an Oregon or Cali wine tour. My mom has similar tastes to me when it comes to wine. We've talked about doing a trip with my parents for a week and doing so.

 

If you really want to learn I have two recommendations, err, maybe three now that I think about it.

1) Read "Wine for Dummies". It actually has a ton of useful information in an easy to read format. Some sections will be more useful than others depending on the exact level of knowledge that you have, but overall I highly recommend it for someone in your position.

2) Find a local wine bar with good staff. IMO the smaller the better. We are wine club members at a local one that literally has 5 staff members. They know most of the wine club members by name and keep track of what we like. They are constantly giving us good recommendations, giving us tastes of wines, and rotating to stocking new wines all the time. It is also a good way to try new wines without having to buy whole bottles.

3) Keep a journal of what wines you try and like. There are apps or various online tools available if you don't want to keep a paper journal. When you go to restaurants, good liquor stores, or a wine bar, let them know what you've tried that you like and ask for recommendations along that line. Or, tell them what you haven't liked about some of the other wines you've tried.

Get out there and try stuff. The more you try, the more you learn, and the more you'll be equipped to find what you like.

 

In all likelihood, I'm a closet oenophile.

I do enjoy wine, but I don't very often because I don't drink much to begin with. I don't have many opportunities to drink (my SO rarely drinks, and doesn't like wine), and often it's beer as a drink of choice wherever I am.

It's funny, though. More recently, I've been thinking about choosing wine over beer when I do have the choice, as I know I haven't had much wine lately. Maybe I should create more opportunities to enjoy wine by inviting people over more often just for that purpose.

I like reds better than whites, but if I have a white it must be dry, dry, dry. Sweeter whites taste too much like wine coolers or adult Kool-Aid to me.

I like a variety, but I have realized that I like Merlot and Shiraz as mainstays. I haven't enough experience outside of those to know by distinction what else I like. Generally, all red wine is enjoyable if it's good enough quality.

I would like to learn more about the nuances.

 

See my post above yours. I am a Shiraz fan too. Not so much Merlot, though I don't dislike it. A good strong red with a steak can be glorious.

Tonight we opened a bottle of Paraduxx. It's by the Duckhorn Wine Company (which I highly recommend, btw) and is a blend of Zin, Cab Sauv, Merlot, and Cab Franc. Very nice.

 

Sipping a Frog's Leap Zinfandel right now. Big and fruity but very smooth and neither sweet nor too dry of a finish.

A couple nights ago we had a Belle Glos Pinot Noir. It was nearly epic. Very highly recommended.

 

Yeah, you are probably being smart there. I have a couple of advantages. One, I have a 48 bottle wine fridge. So I can store quite a few wines at an exact temp and be confidant they will keep well. I also have a basement that was dug an extra 18" deep with a wall mounted wine rack. So it is pretty cool down there year round (especially since we set the A/C at 68* for the upstairs in the summer), which makes it safe for secondary wine storage once the wine fridge is full.

I also found out this week that my father-in-law has a spare mini-fridge that he wants to give us. I'm thinking of throwing it in my basement, turning it to the warmest setting, and using it for white wine storage. So I should soon be able to store somewhere around 100 wines in a pretty good climate controlled setting, aside from just counting on my cool basement.

Right now my collection is somewhere around 80 bottles. I'm slowly growing it, but I don't think I'll need to get too much bigger than that to keep myself happy. I like having good wine, but I'm not going to be one to ever collect wine for more than personal consumption, and there is only so much of that you can do, right?!?!

 

I will keep that in mind.

 

I am not a big drinker of white wines. But Decoy Chardonnay is very easy to drink. Nice and smooth, not too dry, not sweet, but very nice. Had it tonight while relaxing on the patio waiting on the chicken to finish grilling.

http://www.wine.com/V6/Decoy-Sonoma-Chardonnay-2009/wine/107185/detail.aspx