Decant Stop Tasting Wine Blog

Last night we had a couple of good friends over for dinner and shared a few wines that were pretty good.  For starters we had the 2005 Columbia Crest Grand Estates Merlot, from the Columbia Valley in Washington.  This was the lightest of the three, which we mostly drank before the meal.  It wasn’t bad, but not impressive.  There was a fairly good balance of oak, red fruit, spice, and acidity.  My “problem” with it was that it was a little weak for my tastes (this is strictly a matter of personal preference), and the fruit was a bit too extracted tasting. 

Since we were serving a grilled roast, we decided to have a little tasting of two Australian wines since I knew they’d be pretty hearty.  To make it fun we used two different wines from the same maker, Marquis Phillips… the 2006 Shiraz and the 2006 “Sarah’s Blend”.  As expected, they were big fruity wines, and per our preference, were pretty dense.  Sarah’s blend, which is a blend of composed of 60% Shiraz, 28% Cabernet Sauvignon, and the rest Merlot and Cabernet Franc.  This was the “smoother” of the two, but less complex, ironically.  The Shiraz, while largely a fruit bomb like the blend, was a bit more complex with a more identifiable tannin structure.  These were both delicious wines. 

Basically, we have to agree with the critics on this one, but with about a point subtraction each.  The critics rated them (in order that I listed the wines above) 90, 91, and 92 points.  We’ll be giving them 89, 90, and 91.  I don’t know if we’re just picky, but it seems we rarely give the same point score as the critics.  But then, same with Gary V. on Wine Library TV.  I’ve seen him up the point score, but this is a very rare occasion.  We probably give the same score as the critics about 3-5% of the time, but typically not that far off otherwise (this is not intentional, we’re just being honest, after all, this blog is for our own “logging” of what we try, for our own purposes).  But I digress.  Prices paid, $10, $13, and $13.

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Another pretty successful tasting party I think.  Of course, for me it would have been better if I didn’t come down with the 24 hr stomach flu that’s going around.  I started feeling it around 8 that night and it quickly took hold.  Luckily I was able to taste all of the wines before retiring, but by that time I was so far gone that I couldn’t do proper reviews for the wines.  But the food was good and the wines everyone brought were all good.  Obviously some better than others, but that’s what its all about, and it was fun finding out which were the best.

The theme this time was 2003 Italian red wines.

Here’s a list of the wines at the tasting (right to lift in the image below):

2003 Il Ducale Tuscana
2003 Fratelli Revello Dolcetto d’Alba
2003 Blason "Vencjar" Friuli Isonzo Rosso
2003 Zonin Amarone della Valpolicella
2003 Castello di Monsanto Chianti Classico Riserva
2003 Ruggeri Corsini Barolo "San Pietro"

The "winning" wine was the Barolo, followed by the Chianti Classico, then the Amarone.  Hopefully I can give you reviews of these wines soon.  I have purchased the Barolo again to do the tastings, but the other two, oddly enough, are proving more difficult to find.  Check back soon!

Thanks to all who came!