Posts belonging to Category Cabernet Sauvignon

If you ever need to just recharge the old D cells you ought to consider Lake Tahoe. A world class alpine lake right here in California – or at least half of it is in California. The attractions include unmovable mountains with snatches of snow, boats bobbing in the lake, and long slow days doing whatever seems most unimportant. Wine also helps. In the afternoon and the evening. Coffee in the AM. Wine reviews follow in a minute. (more…)

Malibu Wine Country. The very thought captivates. How could this be? Domestic wine country suggests thousands of acres and acres of vineyards with names like Rutherford Bench or Navarro River or Sonoma Coast. Even the Paso Westside. The idea that there could be a Malibu Wine Country begs the question…where could it be?

For right now Malibu Wine Country is more an idea than anything else. It is something that COULD BE, or that MIGHT BE, given time and experience. This little blog has been tracking the IDEA and intends to continue tracking it just to see what happens.

Recently, a Malibu restaurant – Charlies in Malibu – hosted a Malibu Wine Tasting dinner and tBoW was able to attend. Four Malibu vintners attended and shared their thoughts on winemaking and their wines. The tBoW team shares our observations and impressions in call and response style. Dotoré takes the lead while tBoW gets to follow.

First a quick review of Charlies: a delightful and welcome stop on Pacific Coast Highway north of Topanga and before the Malibu Pier. Wally Moran manages the staff and keeps everything moving efficiently. The food is very good with three inspired prix fixe choices as well as ala carte. Worth a visit just for the cool vibe. (more…)

It must be the end of the first quarter in the new decade. Expectations for change are high. The White House has found its cojones and set a new tone for in-your-face confrontation. Whatever, it seems like it is time to clear the deck on several items of marginal interest for which discriminating palates have grown exceedingly tired and for whom or which time has run out. Hold on to your Pinot balloon bowl. We’re going head hunting. (more…)

Malibu Wine Country…what makes it so different from anywhere else in the Golden State? Besides the Mediterranean stretch of coastline with the ubiquitous “Tuscan villas”, superb surf breaks, and Hollywood folks…really nothing at all. Especially when it comes to winemaking it’s just another region with the same issues. (more…)

Banished to the corners of the wine cellar; the remains of subscription programs long canceled. Wines too awkward to pull the cork with friends. When did you subscribe to these guys? Why? These are wines that can only be poured with strangers – on holidays with bring-along guests – who do not know better. Like we did not know better when we signed on for blends of Cabernet and Syrah. Now that we have unequivocally declared our slavish devotion to Pinot Noir we strive to find opportunities to drink some of these undrinkables. (more…)

You can see Positano from Don Schmitz’s vineyard 2100 feet above Malibu. Not many peaks are higher than his. He planted 1 acre of Cabernet Sauvignon on the South, West and North slopes surrounding the hilltop with 1200 vines where his 7,000 square foot home is going up. The scene is nothing less than spectacular. Dotoré posited it is the single most incredible home site he has ever seen in Los Angeles; in person or photos. (more…)

One 2009 mega-trend (mega trends being mega trendy) – new local tasting establishments - (El Vino in Venice, 55 Degree in Atwater Village) has come to Santa Monica. Actually tBoW is a bit behind the 8-ball here since Pourtal opened in April 2009. [ed. call us hokey using their web image but it works] We visited the wine tasting bar in January to taste a couple more Malibu wines. Pourtal hosted a Malibu winery series in January. Maybe they will do it again! Of course, some of the Malibu wines are available for tasting any time…because Pourtal has three Enomatic tasting machines. Each machine is geared to a theme such as international, zins and mixed bag. The Enomatic keeps the open bottle fresh using an inert gas to defend against oxidation. (more…)

The ocean of wine and the lineup in it keeps getting bigger. We choose wines like we would choose waves; certain size, as close to perfect conditions as we can presume. What wines will be in the tBoW lineup for 2010? [ed. the surfing lineup is all those people in the water here at Topanga point trying to catch the same wave] With seemingly limitless options we contemplate the wine lineup for the coming year. Keep it simple – good values, great and interesting wines, selecting carefully from the best of the best. Based on the first pours in January we can forecast that Winter through early Spring will feature French white wines and more Malibu discoveries. We can live with that. The local vintners of the Bu continue to defy expectations and definitely have our attention. Here then are several recent turns of the corkscrew. (more…)

I don’t care how rich you are…you can’t grow decent wine in LA. Besides, there are too many other reasons to not even try. The idea already failed 100 years ago when Southern California was the state’s wine center. Most of the planting was northeast of the city in the high desert. Prohibition shut down the locals and the state’s wine capital moved to north to the Central Valley, Sonoma, and Napa. SoCal never recovered…until now.
There are 150 new acres planted to vinifera in the Santa Monica Mountains representing 50 vineyards. Do the math…these are small plots. Who are these mad vintners? Growing vines and making wine is not like putting in a pool with a slide. Acreage under 5 acres makes it very hard to turn a profit since 1 acre will yield only 75 cases of wine. Undeveloped land in Santa Monica Mountains makes developers drool. Planting vineyards where they see condos or gated McMansion “communities” must drive them nuts. Be serious. (more…)

Argentina is U20 nirvana!! This post continues our report on the Argentina wineries tasting hosted by the Argentine Promotion Center in Los Angeles. All six wineries that showed were very good. However, four stood out as especially fine.
La Garde Winery presents itself as the old guard of Mendoza wineries…which it is [ed. pictured below]. They claim and aim to represent the long established tradition of fine winemaking in Argentina where terroir comes first. The winery was founded by a Spanish family in 1897 and sold to an Italian family in 1977. (more…)