Page 35 - Staff Tastings

I've traveled around Europe for about a week now from Paris to Amsterdam to Belgium.  Two nights ago, we arrived in center Bordeaux where we are staying for this final leg of the trip.  Here in Bordeaux, my two travel companions and I will be touring some of the top chateaux of the region for barrel tastings of the 2010 vintage. 

Day 1:
It was an absolutely beautiful day in Bordeaux, 80 degrees and not a cloud in the sky.  On to our first wines of the day, mind you it was 10am local time - tastings start early here.

It was about an hour drive north from center Bordeaux to St. Estephe where we were headed to our first tasting of 2010 at Cos D'Estournel.   The closer we got the more excited I became trying my best not to work myself up.  Dressed to the T in my Sunday best, I pressed the buzzer for the gate to Cos D'Estournel.  "Bonjour, Ca va?" I hear from the speaker, Oui, Ca va bien! 

Robert Parker's highly anticipated reviews of 2010 Bordeaux arrived last night and it's good news all over again. Parker went into such detail about the wines, the comparisons, and the wine and global markets that I'm going to condense his quotes a lot here in order to cut to the chase.

THE WINES
In the article he made reference to his amazement about back-to-back great vintages of 2009 & 2010 and spent time comparing and contrasting them.

"2009 will always be the more "fun" vintage because of its more sumptuous, fruit-forward, lower acid wines with soaring aromatics as well as fleshy, exuberant flavors and plush, succulent personalities. Their style vaguely recalls ripe, precocious vintages such as 1982 and 1990. 2010 exceeds 2009 in record setting alcohols, but, paradoxically, it is the fresh acids, lower pHs and massive tannins

As the years pass, it becomes increasingly more difficult to source great family owned Puligny-Montrachet. Whenever a new generation fails to follow in their father's footsteps large corporations swoop up the vines for their mass-produced blends that are destined for the international market. When Gerard Chavy retired in 2005, he left the family estate to his two sons Alain and Jean-Louis, and their 200 year history was safe for another generation.

This past week, we pulled the cork on their 2007 Puligny-Montrachet. Immediately, I was overwhelmed by the bursting ripe tropical fruits that were complemented by its limey acidity. Normally, I wait and see what the rest of the group has to say and then I add my 2 cents, but this time I couldn't wait. I immediately inquired about the price and was amazed that it was only $39.99. "You'd be hard pressed to find Puligny of this caliber at that price" I said.

As the Spring flowers bloom and the cover comes off your pool,

One of the best parts of trying great wines is finding not just a wine that you love but wine from a specific location.

I love Cabernet Sauvignon from Napa Valley and there is plenty of information about where most "Napa Cabs" come from within Napa.  But the name Napa carries most of the credibility so most of us usually don't dig much deeper.

It's the same thing with the great Tuscan wines of Brunello.  That's often all you need to know - it's a Brunello.

But Burgundy is a different story; as maddening as the break-down of Burgundy can be it is still a thrill to realize that you enjoy not just the whites of Burgundy but that you prefer Chassagne Montrachet to Puligny Montrachet.  I suspect this is why devout Burgundy lovers tend to be a little more, dare-I-say, "particular" than the rest of us.  They may have a point. They don't just have a favorite wine from Burgundy.  They have a favorite wine from a specific region, from

Freisa is a black grape varietal that's been growing in Piedmont for at least a few centuries.  Red wines created from this grape come in dry, sweet, or frizzante styles, and I've even read the varietal can be used in the production of vermouth.  Once an important grape in Piedmont, Freisa has not been very fashionable of late, but there are a few producers that still embrace it, possibly the most important being G.D. Vajra.

Recent testing has revealed that Freisa is the genetic parent of Nebbiolo and the two share similar traits like strong tannins, high acidity and floral aromas of violets or roses.  Where Nebbiolo offers tar, truffle and baking spices, Freisa leans more toward herbal, possibly medicinal or digestive-like.  Strawberry is the primary flavor of examples in the market, but Vajra's Kye is bolder featuring black cherry and raspberry, with hints of plum and orange zest.  While tasting this wine I immediately began looking up leg of lamb

Here at Sokolin, our tasting panel samples hundreds of wines monthly and thousands annually to weed out the wines that just don't meet our expectations.  During these frequent tastings we are also looking to uncover those hidden gems that are inexpensive but still taste like the best wines in the world.  The panel must vote unanimously in favor or else we don't sell it - this is how rigorous our process is which is why we are so confident in our inventory and also why we can confidently offer our satisfaction guarantee (details available in our full Terms and Conditions in our Policy section at www.sokolin.com). 

But our staff is much larger than our tasting panel which is why, on special occasions, we put together a full company tasting for the entire organization from sales and marketing to accounting, IT and even our warehouse team.  Much of these are blind tastings which are fun and educational for all.  Last

One of the benchmark producers in Argentina for Malbec is Achaval Ferrer.  Achaval-Ferrer is a small winery producing limited production reds that are a true expression of the terroir.  They use extremely low yields to produce these amazing  complex and concentrated wines that are also very well balanced.  We just recently had the pleasure of tasting one of their single vineyard Malbecs, the 'Bella Vista', which is produced from a vineyard planted in 1910!  As the wine sits in the glass you instantly notice the inky/ black/ purple color and think 'this wine is going to be huge!'  The nose on this wine was ridiculous with tons of cassis, dark chocolate, violets - everything to get you excited to take the  first sip.  Amazingly enough the wine doesn't come across as heavy and is very plush with nice finesse in the mouth.  Definitely one of the best Malbecs I've had and should be on everyone's list if you are searching for a truly unique wine. 

As you probably know, in 1959 we pioneered the Bordeaux futures business in the United States. Since then we have offered almost every vintage produced in Bordeaux with the exception of years we deemed unnecessary to purchase early.

Our No. 1 focus has always been what is best for our clients, and it has always paid off. For the most part that has prompted us to be a cheerleader for buying Bordeaux wines that have provided extreme pleasure and profit for all involved. We are big fans of Bordeaux and their great wines.

In the past decade Bordeaux has seen significant globalization that by nature is more than ever subject to global forces such as: currencies, foreign stock markets, regulation, politics, economies of the world, etc. This year, Americans face a weak dollar buying Bordeaux priced in expensive Euros. It's a tricky vintage in that "Points, Price and Pedigree", our general criteria, are only part of the picture in assessing whether to buy Bordeaux futures.

California vineyards have been making wine long before my time of drinking it.  During their early years, when California wine makers were trying to compete with the French and gain a little market share, avid wine drinkers were focused on imbibing more than they were cellaring these creations from the West.  California had not been producing long enough to know what would happen to these wines a decade or more later.  They did know, however, it was great juice at incredible prices, and the wine makers were using cutting edge hedonistic interpretations of what wine should be.

What does this mean to the wine world?  With small productions, the scarcity of older California Cabernet is real.  Let me be the first to tell you, if you are lucky enough to have some in your cellar consider yourself blessed or if you are one of the fortunate few able to get your hands on some, GRAB IT! 

The great thing about these wines is the price has not

Those were the days.  And we didn't even know it!

One of the obvious perks of working in the wine industry is getting the chance to drink great wine.  We do try a great deal of mediocre wines in our quest to discover new and amazing items to bring to you.  But we also get to try some of the best wines ever made.  And some of those opportunities have bordered on magical.

Back in 2006, before the boom and bust of the real estate market, Bordeaux was fetching a decent price.  Many wines could even, at the time, be considered expensive.  Little did we know that what we were drinking then would explode in demand and price. 

At a wine dinner at Bobby Van's in Bridgehampton back then, there were a handful of wines to try but the star of the dinner, by far, was 1982 Ducru Beaucaillou.  It was just singing on the palate all black fruits and sweet perfectly integrated tannins. It was well-balanced with a long, beautiful