Posts belonging to Category Los Angeles Culture

Collectible kosher wines? The thought boggles the mind. How could inky purple Manischewitz syrup with a shelf life of 20 minutes get a Parker rating? Next you’ll tell me there are “growth” Bordeaux, as in those classified in 1855, that obey Talmudic law. Every year there are more customers than there are wines for those lucky labels classified under the five levels of Bordeaux Growths: wines such as Château Léoville-Poyferré a 2nd Growth St. Julien; or Château Malartic-Lagravière an unclassified yet coveted Graves; Château Pontet-Canet a 5th Growth Pauillac; and Château Le Crock a Crus Bourgeois Pauillac. Oh yes. Each one of those highly coveted labels has a kosher “edition.” N’kidding. (more…)

Genghis Cohen is one of those industry insider restaurants where IF you knew…you WOULD know…you were IN the midst of some highly seasoned dealmakers and Chinese food. In this case the music biz. We are celebrating the birthday of one of the biggest dealmakers from the height of a now vaporized industry who has recently expanded his wine interests almost as widely as his musical tastes [ed. not to  mention the acts he signed from Janet Jackson to Sheryl Crow to Blues Traveler].  Which is to say he called for Riesling and Gewurtztraminer to go with the spicy fare at GC. In addition to a very lively dinner Papa Fred sampled from the following bottles.
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ME..I WANT A HULA HOOP! Fortunately, Alvin did not help select the offerings of the day-long tBoW Open House. Dotoré and REL were first to arrive and nearly last to leave eight hours later. tBoW team tasters filled the front lines as veterans retreated for fresh glasses. All indulged enthusiastically on Christmas lasagna and an endless loop of corny cool Christmas music that competed for attention with what turned out to be a very nice wine lineup. The wines were especially intriguing because they included a couple of oldies (mid 90s), a pricey recent vintage white wine, and a slew of U20 bargains in white and red. I’ll tell you what – that was more than a party. It was a dang seminar. After all was poured and quaffed, the wines showed up the Chipmunks pretty well. The lasagna and butter cookies held their own. The next day we skipped the sales and headed for Santa Anita for more excitement!

2009 Dauvissat Chablis Vaillons Premier Cru $50: First wine this day so it had to be good. With palates alive we found the wine to be even lovelier than hoped for. Baking soda nose. Butterscotch already there although muted. Should develop with a few more years. Wish we had a few more bottles of this. Truly lovely Chardonnay from a supposedly underwhelming vintage in Burgundy. Hnnh. Supposedly from 50 y.o. vines. Maybe that’s why it costs 50 bucks. 13%

1995 Elio Altare Barolo $70: Carried por mano from La Morra in 2001 by Dotoré. It was just the two of us when Doc Holliday’s “heir-ator” apparent bespoke “pop that cork.” 1995 was a tough vintage followed by two magnificently seductive ones. This wine was rough-hewn right out of the bottle. The deeply lined face of Tommy Lee Jones comes to mind, along with his intriguing charm. All the tar is there. We knew the bouquet would open with time and hoped it would be the tell-tale Barolo roses. 45 minutes later the fruit is beginning to show along with meaty aromas and flavors. The wine did not completely bloom to Piemonte roses but the informed few like PTT8Y and T3 Tootsie-The-Taster, kept coming back for more until it was all gone. Nice work Dotoré. 13.5%

2007 Scott Paul Le Paulee $30: We have linked the two wines because a naive taster noted “these two wines remind me of each other.” We love an innocently stated astitution.

Barolo and Pinot Noir do share qualities and characteristics if not flavors. Usually takes awhile to get it…but not always. Screw top entry level from notable Carlton vintner Scott Paul Wright. 2007 got some negative early press that we now see was based on a misbegotten love affair with the over-ripe 2006 vintage. This wine is delightful and delicious. “Volnay, simply nice” says Dotoré in a good way. Forthright Pinot nose. No mistaking this grape. Not too ripe for which the 2007 vintage from the Willamette Valley is known and unfairly maligned. Really makes the case for the best domestic Pinot Noir coming out of Oregon’s Willamette Valley 40 minutes southwest of Portland. Nice effort. Could easily go another year if you see it anywhere near $25. But why wait? 13.1%

2010 Domaine St Antonin “Lou Cazalet” Faugéres $15: Garagiste posts another winner! With the 2 Rieslings below this brings the G. record to 4-1-1. Much better. This is the Languedoc blend we know we prefer: Syrah, Grenache, maybe some Mourvedre. Big, rough, middleweight red. “Blowsy” declares the suddenly loquacious Dotoré. This wine held up for 90 minutes before it disappeared. Call me hope-ful but I think the November election will go the same way as this day’s tastes. The voters will go back for what they like and forget about what they don’t like. Uuhhh…the wine. Here is an example of high alcohol level balancing out with enough fruit, weight and general presentation so that the alcohol is integrated. A U20 super value. 15%

2007 Schlöss Lieser Lieser Niederberg Helden Riesling Spatlese $19: Show me the apples! Just fab. I thought we were past the white wines and came the call…Riesling? Where’s the Riesling? This is a G. [ed. G. is Garagiste, soon we will have O.G. for Original Garagiste] winner. Just yummy. Light on its feet as we might expect. Dances across the palate. Amazing that after several hours of reds with the Chablis long gone and a Vinho Verde upside down in the ice bucket (excellent $5 Espiral from Trader Joes) this wine would still be able to call attention to itself. 2012 will be a Riesling year. 8.5%

2007 Reichsrat Von Buhl Armand Riesling Kabinett $13: Mouthful of tangy zesty lychee fruit. Kris-B thinks the wine is a bit simple. We got a whollop of tangerines on the finish after another 15 minutes in the glass and are happy Kris-B suggested we grab it. It is from the Pfalz which is a region a Mösel snob would eschew but this proves how biasing auto-preference can be. What’s not to like? A G. and a U20 winner. 9%

1994 Ferreira Port $87: We started the day in the mid 90s and finished there. Ask and ye shall receive a bookend finish on Christmas Day. These are good years to be opening the finest vintage since 1977. These wines are just perfect and still on the upward arc. This is ready to be enjoyed right now. Solid fruit with next to zero tannins showing. Up-and-coming team taster X captures the flavors: “chewy dried mango fruit.” Perfectly balanced. Complemented the cakes and cookies like the 4th horse in the 4th race. Another winner down the stretch. 20%

Sorry to blog and bolt but another year is already here and it is going to require our full attention. Happy New Year. We leave you with the last of the Krisses Mösel tour images, the Zeltinger Sonnenuhr vineyard.

Writing for a major glossy magazine has inspired me to pursue winemakers that have been on the tBoW hot list for some time. The NY Times versions of these interviews, that would be two women winemakers coming into their own at the same time, can be found in the summer issue of Elegant Living. If you do not live in the Conejo Valley or the Far West San Fernando Valley you can get the excellent articles online. Yes, tBoW conducted the interviews and wrote the glossy print pieces.

We have covered Jessica Mozeico-Blair (she got married) on this blog before. She makes wine with her father Howard in the Willamette Valley outside Portland. Her first career was in pharmaceutical marketing; she was quite successful. Her father wanted a partner and I guess he LOVES his daughter so the rest, as they say, will one day be history. Right now they are riding a wave of great success. The et Fille wines are widely regarded as exceptional examples of custom crush label wine.

The Semler story could not be more different. The Semler patriarch is Ron, in his 60s with a gaggle of kids ages pre-teens to 40-plus. Ron is prodigious. He is also a compulsive worker who loves his family. Lisa is the matriarch and a quiet if guiding force. The family prefers to be represented as acting in unison, making joint decisions about just about everything. This is of course a fiction because everyone knows – as Uncle Joe Giumarra used to say – “somebody’s gotta talk first.” Lisa, Ron and Tami make the big decisions. And not always in that order.

The transformation of Tami Semler is remarkable and central to the changes in the works. In previous encounters (admittedly very few) she seemed guarded like she couldn’t wait to be done chatting and back in the vineyards or stables. Today she is very self-assured and confident, as though 13 years of trying to figure it out on her own has disappeared. While Ron likes the idea of a family enterprise in all things Semler we believe this applies more to the other businesses than the wine business. We think Tami has been the driving force here. Lisa may have provided essential support to pull up the avocado trees and plant vinifera but Tami made it happen. We think. The Big Three have made a lot of decisions in the past five years: apply to build a winery onsite, the first in Malibu; put in a new tasting room down the road at Malibu Golf Club; and perhaps the most important of all, bringing in a highly experienced Santa Barbara winemaker to work hand in hand with Tami in blending the juice. The results are starting to come in. We tasted two new wines – this past summer’s Rose and the new Sauvignon Blanc made by Tami and the Unknown Winemaker and they were quite impressive; a significant step up from muddled and inconsistent past vintages.

The Semlers are poised to move. No. They are making all the right moves. We predict they will shortly dominate the other big cats in the jungle and make wines that will put Malibu on the map for quality instead of curiosity.

Three gloriously HOT days. Any wine sipping foo gonna hit the party party party circuit. NowhatImsayin? We did. IGTY had the best babes and the most relaxed scene. But when it came to wine the Krisses ruled the roost at Papa Fred’s Shack. The wines ranged from Northern Italy’s Alto Adige (Lagrein) to two Paso Robles’ Wild Horse whites to several Ros√©s that created a stir. The wine tasters also ranged widely. Necromancer, prodigy, novotiate, tenderfoot, shellback, bashful and laconic. Toss in a garrulous minx and there is the perfect 4th of July bash. Read what they had to say about the wines that washed across their wanting palates. (more…)