New Year Cellar Purge: Bonnarda & Sparkling Gewurtz!?!

One thing we like to do over the holidays is Cellar Cleaning. We pulled some wines that had been on the shelf long enough to finally come off the shelf. Since we delay keeping notes until after we pull the corks we really are not sure when and where we acquired the wines. Most of the time we know we expect to be pleased so that is enough prep to get things started. So let’s get started. It’s a New Year and a whole new b’ak/tun.

2007 Domaine Michael Lafarge Volnay Vendanges Selectionnées $56: A Becky Wasserman pick and an excellent holiday season wine. Less sophisticated palates taste “seawater, sour.” More Sophisticated palates find this wine light color, delicate Old World all the way. A mouthful of Old World Pinot Noir fruit that separates the novice from the veteran. What she finds to be sour, thin and acidic others would describe as good minerality with gossamer-like forward fruit. U20 deal. 13%

2008 Durigutti Bonarda Mendoza $12: Another from the Southern Wine Group out of Portland. Very tasty, medium bodied. not-Malbec wine. Sophisticated, integrated, cocky. Dark color without the added weight. More fruit forward. 10 months in American oak with native yeasts. Like it and did not expect I would. Other Bonnarda wines tasted in Mendoza were too fruity. This is just right. Tasted this alongside the Givry. Somehow it was like the Volnay with muscle. I’m begging for more samples. 13.9%

2009 Navarro Brut Methode Champenoise $22: Navarro sells this through the winery. It is made from Gewurtztraminer. We are familiar with this vintage and like it. A year ago the wine was more acidic and spiny. Now the fruit is in front like lemon rind. It is the first wine opened at the Xmas party. Really blasts the palate. Tastes like the Mendocino Coast. 12.8%

2008 Forster Pechstein Reichsrat von Buhl Riesling GG $45: Bought this at a Woodland Hills Wine Co tasting covered on this blog. This wine was so special then we bought it at the lofty price. CONFIRMED 24 months later!! Petrol nose from the Pfalz. Bitter, dry, grapefruit and still charming. Apples and berries. Alcohol a bit high for German Riesling and still invisible. Great Riesling has great balance. Think of a tank perched on top a pyramid. [ed. always with the war machine?] As Mouse puts it “easily the best bargain wine going today. I can buy these at half price all week long. People just don’t like them.” Get us some of this half off! The GG translates as Grosses Gewachs which is the recently introduced Deutsches take on Premier or Gran Cru vineyards. 12.5%

2006 Clos Saint Jean Chateauneuf du Pape Vielles Vignes $40: Opens with a cocoa and coffee nose that keeps us coming back. Old World exotic aromas and restraint in the glass combined with New World fruitiness. Perfect mix for the chix. Awfully good. Mostly Grenache blend. Lasts in the glass for an hour and more. 13%

Another array of excellent wines and a good start to the next 394 year cycle.