huevos con vino

I stopped by the Bellevue Whole Foods tonight and, as always, I checked to see whether they still had Alexandria Nicole Lemberger in their special temperature-controlled area.  They did not, after months of carrying the same 3 bottles of Lemberger.  That was a bit surprising.

Instead, though, they had some bottles of Sea Smoke Southing for $52.99.  That was quite surprising, although I shouldn’t be too shocked.  After all, the Southing took longest to sell out this year, it’s much more available than either the Botella or the Ten judging by my allocation and the aftermarket, and it’s less valuable than the others in terms of aftermarket prices.  Three bottles of this wine just sold for $126, which equates to $42/bottle…which is $8 less than the original asking price per bottle.  Hmm.

So, how did Whole Foods come by an allocation-only Pinot Noir?  Good question.  I want to call them tomorrow, talk to the Wine Department, and find out!  Stay tuned….

As you know, my dear faithful readers, I have a bizarre interest in developing a more quantitative system for rating wines.  Well, what could be more quantitative, and authoritative, than chemical analysis?

The dedicated folks at Enologix helped Global Vintage Quaterly magazine develop a new rating system that aims to provide the chemistry behind the points.  I have been thinking about this topic for weeks now, actually; I began my college career in genetics.  UC Davis was, in fact, on my list of schools to consider, but I got in-state tuition at the U. of Washington, which I regard as a shame and a good thing (a shame because I would have had the chance to get into oenology at UC Davis, but a good thing because I like technical communication).  Anyway, genetics was my early passion in high school and college.  That quickly ended when I took Intro to Organic Chemistry with about 200 other people at the UW.  Ugh.

Anyway, here’s a link to the rating system.  A quick search for Domaine Drouhin turns up something interesting: They have one wine listed, the ‘98 Classique Pinot Noir, and apparently the wine is better than people gave it credit for.  Another search for Diamond Creek shows that perhaps the Lake release is worth the money.  Yet another search shows that some Kendall-Jackson wines might be overrated…which matches my experience, actually.  Interesting.

All of these ratings beg the question: Does anyone get to drink the wine after it has been tested, or does the testing somehow render it undrinkable?  Because I’d hate to lose a bottle of Diamond Creek Lake Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon to a chemical analysis that determined it’s really tasty.

The fiance, the MIL, and I went to Ray’s Boathouse for a splendid salmon (and halibut, with squid ink risotto, in my case) dinner.  We had some wine as well:

• 2005 Copain “Le Printemps” Rosé - Nice minerality and acid, a bit thin on the finish, relatively refreshing but not worth $14/glass
• 2001 Siduri Pisoni Pinot Noir - Lots of oak, cherry, and kirsch flavors.  Thick and rich, but seemingly past its prime in the half-bottle.  Disappointing.
• 1983 Porto Rocha Colheita Tawny Port - Nice glass of tawny port.  More lively and fruity, less refined than the ‘76 or ‘66.  Nice, but I prefer the older releases.

They were out of the Clear Creek grappa, so I went for the ‘83 tawny.  I wanted the ‘66, but not at $27 US for one small glass!  That’s highway robbery. However, $45 for the Siduri seemed like a good idea at the time.  It was nice, but not as good as some other pinot releases I’ve had lately.

Sigh.

If anything, I have learned lately that my brief interlude with Porto Rocha tawny back in 2004 was not a fluke: They make my favorite tawny port.  At $125/bottle, though, the 1966 release is a bit expensive right now.  Even at $90/half bottle, it’s too expensive.  That’s probably a good thing because otherwise I’d be drinking half a bottle of the stuff every night…sort of like 2004.  I was wrapping up the last quarter of grad school and I had some time to kill, so I began drinking tawny port at night.  It’s all a blur at this point.

The Siduri was pretty good, but I want to try some of their other releases…the kirsch flavor threw me off a bit.  The Copain was pretty bland for a rosé, honestly…and at $14 per glass, it was way too expensive.

I checked today to see when I could expect to receive my bottle of Botella.  It’s somewhere in the vicinity of my office, so I should get it tomorrow.  I hope.  We’ll see.

On an exciting note: It took a while, but Sea Smoke sold all of their Southing.  That means their 2004 vintage is officially sold out!  Wow…they must be happy.  I know I’m happy because I’ve had 2 of their 3 2004 wines, and they were both great.  I look forward to drinking the Ten release.

I know I’ve been harping on Sea Smoke lately, but I like to see a small winery with only 3 Pinot Noirs become this successful.  It makes me think that other wineries with similar styles of sales and winemaking can also be successful.  And I’m all for more wineries that are family-run affairs, such as Fort Ross.  When I signed up for their newsletter, they wrote to me personally to say “welcome” and to ask where I heard about them.  I gave them the link to Wines and Vines where I read about their Pinot Noir.  They were quite appreciative.  The entire exchange just makes me feel good about their winery, and I haven’t even bought anything from them yet!  Very smart on their part.

Josh over at PinotBlogger (who still has my link spelled wrong, but that’s okay because I’m happy to have the link in the first place) lists this concept as a key takeaway from a talk at UC Davis.  “Know your customer and build a real relationship with them.”  I think that’s dead on.  I know I’m a lot more likely to buy wine from a friendly, outgoing winemaker who does things right in the vineyard and in the tasting room.  I’m far less likely to keep buying wine, even if it’s good wine, from a total jerk who acts like his or her wine is superior, worth the extra $50/bottle because of what’s written on the label, etc., etc.  No thanks!

I grew up (mostly) in Seattle during the 1980s and 1990s…and 2000s.  So I watched the music scene change dramatically from year to year as I went to more live shows, starting in 1996 or so.  After a while, the bands I really liked (Spoon is a good example) went from nobody to somebody to music for TV commercials.  Wow.

I experienced a personal backlash against music that went mainstream.  Once I heard Modest Mouse playing in a Chevy commercial, for example, I sort of lost interest in their music because it had been discovered.  Same with Death Cab for Cutie and a couple of other bands.  There’s something elitist in me, I guess: I prefer to listen to new music that has yet to become mainstream and played out.

I see a similarity in the wine industry.  One of the most appealing aspects of becoming a wine connoisseur is the ability to interact with small-scale producers who may never get their bottles onto the shelves of a store.  I think that’s part of the allure for me, though: I know a guy who knows a guy who makes great wine, the kind of wine that beats Sea Smoke Botella in a tasting.

In this case, I don’t really know the guy, but Josh at Pinotblogger connected me with Linda at Ketelsen Vineyard.  She in turn is going to sell me 6 bottles of their 2002 Tudor House Reserve release, which I’m excited to try.  My friend and I are going to split the half case equally.  I’ve been right before about other beverages (mostly beer, such as La Trappe and Kasteel), but I tasted those drinks before I bought a case.  This time, I’m going on faith, and it’s kind of fun!

As I’ve written here before, I love the exclusivity associated with wines that “only” have 128 cases made, for example.  When you combine that limited edition concept with the fact that no stores sell the wine, no Web site exists for the vineyard (from what I can tell), and the only way to buy the wine is to get the contact information from someone in the know…well, it’s a bit like Fight Club, but I can’t talk about that here.

By the way, this is not the Web site for Ketelsen Vineyard and Winery.