Page 42 - Blog

Wine: 2006 Dominus
Region: California
Sokolin Price: $109/btl
Rating: 96 RP

The highlight of this past weekend for us was a blind tasting that included some wines that really wowed us.  The line-up, in chronological order, went like this: 1975 Mouton Rothschild, 1989 Mondavi Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon, 1989 Mouton Rothschild, 1999 Castelgiocondo Brunello di Montalcino, 2004 Haut Brion & 2006 Dominus.  Since all of these incredible wines were the main act of the night, we served a rather simple meal that started with several cheeses, and ended with barbeque ribs, grilled skirt steak, boiled potatoes and baby snap peas.  Wine lovers will have no problem understanding that wine took center stage, and the food, while delicious, took its place somewhere in the background.

A little about each wine:

--The 1975 Mouton

With this recent SUMMER HEAT, nothing pairs better than a crisp and refreshing Sauvignon Blanc!  What better place to go than to the Loire's Sancerre region!

These great Summer whites go well with everything this season has to offer: 
Pools, Beaches, Parties, Oysters, Clams, BBQs, Friends, and of course Fun!
They dance on your palate with wonderful citrus notes and lively acidity.  These wines are the perfect match with shellfish, ceviche, or even grilled seafood, but also don't need food.  Great sippers all on their own...

We just received an amazing, high-scoring Sancerre for the season!
It's the 2008 Claude Riffault Sancerre les Boucauds.  At only $24.95/bottle and $299./case.  And if you need a second opinion, here's the 92 point review:

"Very light yellow. Complex, floral bouquet combines Meyer lemon, orange peel,

As a Sommelier, I have a couple of main objectives when recommending wines. First and foremost, the issue of quality is at the head of the list. No matter what price point you're looking for, the wine has to be made well. Some people think they must sacrifice quality for the right price, but the good news is you don't have to! There are well-made, high-quality wines at ALL price levels. And here at Sokolin, we excel in finding the very best wines that taste in quality like bottles that are double in price. We taste through many wines on a weekly basis to narrow our selections down to only the wines we ourselves would be happy and excited to drink.

Secondly, I always like to push people out of their "comfort zone" of wine. We all have our go-to bottles which is a good thing, but getting stuck in a rut is not fun. And after all, wine should be fun. So, how do you

Here at Sokolin, we are lucky to have a colleague, Summer Wolff, who travels extensively throughout Italy. She spends some of her time there searching out great new indie wineries for our company to sell exclusively in the US.

One of my favorite 'Summer Wines' so far is the 2005 Eugenio Bocchino Barolo la Serra. Summer rates this wine 95 points (since it is not officially rated) and the bottle sells for $59.95 (compare to the very similar Roberto Voerzio Barolo La Serra in the same vintage, with a score of 94 points from Wine Spectator, which trades up to $250 per bottle!) One of the best aspects of the small, indie wineries is that they are super small production (150 cases made) yet not over priced! It's a small, tenderly cared for cuvee, for a price that cannot be beat.

And this is a 'Summer Wine' in more than one respect- sitting on a rooftop in Manhattan on a warm summer evening last weekend, with a plate of Italian cheeses, some

As most people know, Sokolin sells some of the rarest and most valuable wines in the world.  That is our forte, and we have been successfully pairing wines with our customers for the past 76 years.  What not everyone knows is that we also source out, research, taste, compare, rate and finally bring to the market inexpensive wines that taste like the exclusive ones.

Enter an amazing wine we refer to as "Old Faithful."  This wine is 2005 Waterstone Cabernet Sauvignon from Napa Valley, California - a wine that must be of cult descent.  Our first blind tasting of this wine reminded us of the great hillside terroir of Napa Valley.  An extremely well made wine that had the perfect balance of power, fruit, oak, acidity and great mouth feel.  We were accurate about everything during the blind tasting, except for the price.  We truly thought it was a superbly made cult wine and would sell for over $100+ (It sells for less than $20).  Please keep in

Fan of Nebbiolo and Pinot Noir?  Then I have something perfect for you to try.

Thanks to the efforts of importer Marc De Grazia, wine lovers can now look forward to enjoying vino from the northern slopes of Mt. Etna in Sicily.  His Tenuta delle Terre Nere estate is producing wonderfully perfumed and palate pleasing reds from the indigenous Nerello Mascalese and Nerello Capuccio varietals. 

Planted in soil composed of mostly volcanic ash and rock with a sprinkle of black pumice, and at elevations as high or higher than any other red-grape vineyard in Europe, the vines experience dramatic temperature variations between night and day and are exposed to drying and cooling winds.  These factors all help contribute to a collection of wines that are complex and rich, yet elegant and not overripe.

Marc not only recognized the potential of these nearly forgotten varietals and vineyards, ranging from 40 to 140 years old, but he had the vision to bottle

After anyone finds out what I do for a living I often hear "Wow - it must be great getting to try all that wine."  And for the most part it is.  However, we try a lot of wine it can be exhausting sifting through the subpar wines to find the gems.  I often say we have to kiss an awful lot of frogs to find that Prince(ss) Charming.

Great Pinot Noir can be especially difficult to discover because when it's good it's great, but when it's not it can be dreadful. 

Below are my top six Pinot Noir Prince(ss) Charmings.  Three from California and three from New Zealand:

CALIFORNIA
2005 Roessler Peregrine Sta. Rita Hills Pinot Noir - 91 DS - $19.99/ bottle: Now we knew the Roessler name already and we hadn't carried many of their wines due to the limited production (700-800 cases) but landed this one and some of their 2007s.  This is one of the best Californian Pinot Noir deals we've ever had. 

My colleagues and I have noticed a very unlikely trend this summer popping up in various publications and online - Champagnes with gourmet hot dogs!  I have to admit, we were a bit skeptical, but we're all huge bubbly fans and are never afraid to enjoy a good dog now and then.  So we decided to try it out for ourselves here at the Sokolin offices.  We wanted to look at Champagnes and sparkling wines of varying prices paired with some really creative and interesting dogs that we could quite easily replicate on our home (or office) grill. And with the end of summer fast-approaching what better way to close it out than by doing a killer tasting.

We were really surprised at how well the different qualities in the bubbly truly complimented the meaty, sometimes spicy and definitely unconventional toppings we chose.  In the interest of full disclosure, we recreated these dishes from various sources after scouring restaurant menus from across the country.  We were

I was excited when I heard that we would be popping one of my favorite varietals at our Sokolin tasting this evening, a Riesling. I was even more excited when I learned that it would be a 2008 Zind Humbrecht, one of the most well known and highly respected producers of Alsacian wines.

The Humbrecht family has been producing outstanding Riesling, Gewurztraminer and Pinot Gris wines since 1959. It is run by a father and son team, however in recent years the accomplished son Olivier has taken more control of the estate. The men focus on producing wines that are an extraordinary example of the unique terroir in the region.

The family owns plots in some of the most famous parcels in the region: the Brand, the Hengst, the Goldert, the Herrenweg, the Clos Hauserer, the Clos Windsbuhl and the Clos St-Urbain.

Zind Humbrecht wines are perhaps the most 'user friendly' of the sometimes intimidatingly confusing Alsacian wines, which span the range from very dry to very sweet.

When you think of Pinot Noir you may not associate it with Slovenia.  This should all change after you try the amazing Sutor Pinot Noir

My co-worker Summer spends her days traveling around Italy and surrounding countries looking for independent, organic and biodynamic wineries that are of the highest quality but because of their tiny production quantities, remain relatively unknown in the USA.  Sutor is one of these wineries.  Amongst wine producers "in the know" in Italy, they call Sutor the 'Gaja of Slovenia.'

I've been looking for the perfect setting to try this amazing wine.  My family had been planning a trip to the shore in Rhode Island and I thought this would be a great way to try the Sutor Pinot Noir.  Well, my trip was this past weekend so I grabbed a bottle.  We popped it while sitting on the patio overlooking the bay at the Boathouse restaurant in Newport while we enjoyed some delicious seafood!  This wine was medium bodied