Wine Review: 2006 Cakebread Cabernet Sauvignon

6 05 2011

Happy birthday to me!

OK, time to get serious and prepare yourself for the most expensive wine in PnP’s young history!  It was my birthday yesterday, which automatically meant a bottle out of the “good” wine fridge.  That turned out to be the 2006 Cakebread Cab, which I got for Christmas a couple years ago from my wonderful in-laws (did your in-laws ever give you high-end wine for Christmas?  I didn’t think so).  Cakebread is a renowned producer from Napa Valley, the vinicultural heart of California, and I’ve been a big fan of theirs for a long time.  One of my first ever epiphany wine experiences that opened my eyes to the world of fine wine involved a Cakebread, and since then I’ve tried a number of their offerings and have even been to visit the winery and taken part in a tasting there (highly recommended if you’re ever in the area).  Like many Napa producers, Cakebread makes a lot of different wines but hangs its hat on its Cabernet Sauvignon; this Cab was made from grapes sourced from a variety of locations within Napa Valley and retails for close to $100 CDN, so I was very interested to see how it fared. Read the rest of this entry »


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Wine Review: 2007 KWV Cathedral Cellar Cabernet Sauvignon

29 04 2011

Welcome to a special all-request edition of PnP!  For a few weeks now, loyal subscriber S has been asking me to find and review a South African wine, particularly one made by producers KWV or Robertson.  I am nothing if not (eventually) responsive, and I cling to blog subscribers like grim death, so last weekend when I was at Highlander North Hill I sauntered over to the South Africa section and jumped on the only KWV I could see, the 2007 Cathedral Cellar Cabernet Sauvignon.  The wine was bargain priced at $15 (including tax!), and since I don’t drink much SA wine, I was curious to see what it would deliver compared to Californian, Australian, Spanish or Italian wines in the same price range. Read the rest of this entry »


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Wine Review: 2003 Villa La Selva Selvamaggio IGT

19 04 2011

Is that old woman or couch on the label?

In order to show Italy that I wasn’t mad at it for my corked Dolcetto last night, I stuck with the red, white and green again tonight, though I moved south to Tuscany, in the centre-west of the country (the upper shin of the boot).  The 2003 Selvamaggio, which I got from the good folks at Highlander Wine & Spirits (thanks Tim & Elliot!), is a Super Tuscan wine, a designation which I described in some detail in this post.   It is 100% Cabernet Sauvignon, which is a non-Italian varietal and thus automatically disqualifies the wine from obtaining the highest official status in the region, though that is by no means an indictment on the Selvamaggio’s underlying quality.  Since the word “Selva” appears in both the producer’s name and the wine’s name, I feel compelled to tell you that “Selva” means “woods” in Italian and refers to the forest growing around the vineyard area.  Now you know.

I shouldn’t ignore the obvious:  this might be the ugliest wine label of all time.  It either looks like an old woman’s sun dress or part of somebody’s sofa (my wife called it “snowbird wine”); either way, some marketing lessons are urgently required in Tuscany. Read the rest of this entry »


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Wine Review: 2006 RedHeads Studio Esule

16 04 2011

Awesome label, domineering wine.

Here we have a wine with a great back story, a fun concept and a kick-ass label, but which is made in a style that just makes me cringe.  It’s from the McLaren Vale, one of the premium wine regions in Australia located immediately south of Adelaide in the dead centre of the country’s southern coast, and it takes the super-ripe, ultra-concentrated Aussie style to crazy, irrational extremes.  It is probably a well-made wine for its style, but I will take a rather harsh stand and say that there shouldn’t BE any wines of this style.

But let’s rewind to the good stuff first.  RedHeads Studio is a garage wine collective located in south-central Australia.  “Garage wine” is a term used to describe high-quality, small-production artisan wines generally made by winemakers who don’t own vineyard land themselves but who buy grapes from growers and make custom wines in small crushing/fermenting facilities.  Some of the first such facilities in Bordeaux, France were actually in garages, which is what coined the term.  RedHeads is home to a number of such custom winemakers, who are often responsible for creating modern, edgy wines. Read the rest of this entry »


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Wine Review: 2007 Mercer Columbia Valley Cabernet Sauvignon

30 03 2011

Beige label, non-beige wine.

Another day, another journey to what is rapidly becoming my favourite New World wine region, Washington State.  Today was one of those days where work was busy, I hit a traffic jam on the way home, the baby wouldn’t sleep, and I didn’t get to sit down to have dinner until almost 8:00; by that time, all I wanted with my meal was a welcoming, easygoing, easy-drinking (no more beer commercial adjectives, I swear) wine, a leather armchair by a fireplace in a glass.  That’s exactly what I got with this Mercer Cabernet. Read the rest of this entry »


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