100th Post Special Wine Review: 2006 Pieve Santa Restituta Brunello di Montalcino

14 09 2011

The name at the bottom of the label says it all: Gaja.

Back!

After a stellar trip to British Columbia that included visits to some excellent Okanagan wineries whose wares will be featured here soon, I am again at my computer in Calgary ready to bring PnP out of its brief hiatus.  A HUGE thank you to everyone who made sure this site didn’t lose any of its momentum while I was away — much to my surprise (and sincere gratitude), Pop & Pour actually set a record for daily views a few days after I left town!  Obviously I need to go on vacation more often.

The blog gets rebooted with a bang tonight, since my return post doubles as the 100th post I’ve written for PnP over the last six months.  The fact that I’ve found 100 occasions since the start of March where the baby was sleeping and the house was quiet and I was able to be at the computer for a consecutive hour is clearly cause for celebration, and your poll voting determined that PnP’s centennial would be feted by way of the 2006 Gaja Brunello, more formally known as the Brunello di Montalcino from Pieve Santa Restituta.  Even though I only got this wine three months ago, I’m very happy that it won the poll and that I get to open it, because it was my first ever Father’s Day present from my now-8-month-old son Felix (likely assisted in some substantial capacity by my lovely wife Heather).  Nothing like a proud milestone gift to celebrate a joyous event. Read the rest of this entry »


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Tasting In Stereo with North of 9 Fine Wine: 2008 Sister’s Run Shiraz

30 08 2011

My co-conspirator for Tasting In Stereo -- check him out!

Welcome to the inaugural version of Tasting In Stereo!  By far the most incredible thing that’s happened to me since I started up Pop & Pour back in March is that I’ve met or come in contact with a number of inspiring people from across the world of wine — producers, professional critics, retailers, restauranteurs, and especially other bloggers, who churn out quality content week after week fuelled only by their passion for this thing that connects us all.  The amount of well-researched, well-written free wine information available online is astounding, and it makes me want to keep writing to keep pace with the standard that’s been set before me.  One of the people who I’ve been fortunate enough to come to know is Tyler Philp of North of 9 Fine Wine in Ontario.  Tyler is a commercial pilot by day, flying an Airbus for Air Canada while gaining increasing familiarity with wine shops across AC’s route map.  By night he’s a family man and a burgeoning wine connoisseur, studying formally through The Court of Master Sommeliers and running both a formal tasting group based out of Alliston, Ontario and an insightful blog under the North of 9 banner.  He’s located just north of Highway 9 (hence the name) that divides the city of Toronto from the county immediately above it and can be found on Twitter at @TylerOnWine — give him a follow!  Whether you are a regular PnPer or have just stumbled on this post via some strange Google search and are wondering what the heck is going on, I invite you to click one of the links above and give North of 9 a visit.

As I described briefly yesterday, Tasting In Stereo is two wine reviews for the price of one:  Tyler and I have conspired together to pick an inexpensive bottle that’s widely available in both Ontario and Alberta, have popped and poured it separately, and have independently written up tasting notes which will be revealed to each other and to all of you in two posts that will be published simultaneously — this one, and its counterpart on northof9finewine.blogspot.com.  Once you’ve made your way through this review, you should definitely check and see if the North of 9 review is more or less flattering and then leave us a comment to let us know what you think about the format and the wine!  If all goes well and our mutual reviews don’t lead to some sort of virtual fistfight, hopefully this will become a semi-recurring PnP/Nof9 feature. Read the rest of this entry »


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Coming Tomorrow: Tasting In Stereo!

29 08 2011

It’s been one of those gruelling, soul-crushing Mondays, and yet I remain upbeat and excited about the week.  There are two reasons for this:  (1) I’m going on vacation in three days, and (2) tomorrow I get the honour of being co-host to a pan-Canadian wine tasting adventure of the kind that only the Internet makes possible.  If you’ve ever read a PnP wine review and immediately wished you had an expert second opinion (and don’t lie — I’m sure there are those times), tomorrow your voice of sober second thought will come in the form of Tyler Philp, an Ontario-based wine blogger and tasting group leader who owns and operates North of 9 Fine Wine just beyond the clutches of Toronto.  Tyler has written on a number of vinous topics and has a clear passion for the world of wine, so he’s an ideal counterpart for this tasting experiment.

My Tasting In Stereo counterpart -- check him out at northof9finewine.blogspot.com.

Tomorrow night Tyler and I will each crack the same bottle, taste it independently, and then simultaneously post our notes, thoughts and impressions on our respective sites at a set time.  You’ll find out at the same time as us whether we felt the same way about the wine or whether we’ll need to have a few words offscreen about it…  🙂  You get two perspectives for the price of one (or, I guess, for the price of a million, since it’s all free), and I get a chance to compare tasting notes with a writer whose thoughts and palate I respect quite a bit.  We’ve picked a bottle that’s easy to find and under $20, so if one or both of us like it, you’ll be able to track it down.  Tasting In Stereo debuts tomorrow — see you then!


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Wine Review: 2009 Tiefenbrunner Pinot Grigio delle Venezie

27 08 2011

Time to quit you, Pinot Grigio. Tiefenbrunner, this isn't your fault.

Dear Pinot Grigio,

I’m sorry.  I try hard to keep an open mind, accept that wine comes in many forms, and expose myself to as many of the world’s different and unique grapes and regions as I can.  But I just can’t do it anymore.  You don’t need me anyway:  you’re enormously popular, synonymous with patios and summer, one of the most successful wine exports to North America of all time, an A-list (well, maybe B-list) grape.  But you’re just so…well, BORING.  When people try to describe you to PG newbies, they inevitably fall back on words like “neutral”, “crisp” and “refreshing”.  You know what else is neutral, crisp and refreshing?  Water.  And it doesn’t cost $20 a bottle.  I had held out hope that you had something of intrigue to offer, that I just hadn’t found the right bottle that would expose me to your inner wonders, but now I don’t think that bottle exists.  I think you are what you are, which is part of your allure — your devotees always know what they’re getting — but is also your greatest shortcoming.  When I can’t bring myself to get excited about opening a bottle of wine, there’s a problem, and in this case that problem is you.  I think I’m moving on. Read the rest of this entry »


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Wine Review: 2009 Pfaffenheim Gewurztraminer (Alsace)

25 08 2011

Pfaffenheim Gewurztraminer -- most Teutonic non-German producer/grape combo ever?

Two points of order before I start.  First, PnP cleared 6,000 hits sometime this afternoon — thanks again for your continued support of this site!  Second, this is post #95 for Pop & Pour, which means you have five more posts to cast your vote for the wine I should review for the PnP 100th Post Celebration Gala (n0te:  no actual Gala will be organized).  Click here to go to the poll and vote for your favourite; if you’ve already voted, vote again!  Currently it’s a dead heat between the 2008 Caymus Napa Cab and the 2006 Gaja Brunello, so help me break the tie…there has to be a defined winner before the 100th post review can take place.

Now, to tonight, and Gewurztraminer.  To me Gewurz is the ultimate love/hate grape:  most people either adore its bold, assertive, unique flavours and rich texture or they despise its lushness, its spiciness, its high alcohol and almost suffocating intensity.  There aren’t too many in between (although, strangely, I’m one of them, which might cast some doubt on my theory); a grape this individual almost forces you to take sides.  It’s not a casual patio sipper or a light crisp refresher that pairs with a ton of foods, and it doesn’t really resemble any of the more well-known varietals like Chardonnay or Sauvignon Blanc or Riesling, so there’s no real way to ease into it.  What it is is a high-octane, enormously-perfumed flavour powerhouse that can be both entrancing and overwhelming. Read the rest of this entry »


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Wine Review: 2009 Jeannine Boutin Crozes-Hermitage “Les Hauts Granites”

22 08 2011

Just ignore the Baby Rainforest Bouncer in the background.

After pounding out 1500+ words about five German Rieslings in my last post, I’m going to try to be a little (OK, a lot) more concise tonight.  While Riesling has always been my favourite white grape, my current favourite red has got to be Syrah, a full-bodied, powerful grape capable of many different expressions and often melding fruity and savoury notes in a way that no other varietal can.  Most of the Syrahs that have found their way onto PnP so far have been New World examples, mainly from Washington State or California with the occasional Aussie Shiraz (same grape, different name) thrown in.  Tonight, however, I’m going back to the grape’s roots in the northern Rhone Valley in France, Syrah’s ancestral homeland and (maybe moreso 20 years ago than now, but still) home to its most famous and expensive bottlings.  Some of the most lauded and pricy Syrah in the world is grown in a small appellation called Hermitage, a single hill hovering over the Rhone River containing barely over 300 acres of vines.  If I worked five of my current jobs, I could drink Hermitage every now and then.  Instead, I’m settling for its little brother, Crozes-Hermitage, a much larger region spanning the flatlands surrounding Hermitage Hill on the Rhone’s east bank.  A Crozes may not light your world on fire like an Hermitage can, but it won’t cost you $400 either…this one was a shade over $30. Read the rest of this entry »


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Wine Review: Cameron Hughes Lot 179 (2007)

13 08 2011

I very much regret not writing this review last year (you know, before this blog even existed) so that people could have actually gone out and found this wine.  In the last 12 months I’ve probably bought upwards of 20 bottles of it both for myself and as gifts for others, due partly to its awesomeness and partly to its criminally cheap pricing; after cracking tonight’s bottle, I (tragically) only have 3 left.  It’s the closest my place has had to a house wine in 2010-2011…I’m definitely going to miss it when it’s gone.  Before I jump into the story of how it came to be, a huge shout out is owed to Tim from Highlander Wine & Spirits, who clued me into it on the very first night I met him — let’s just say he set the bar very high for himself right off the bat.

If this was Back to the Future, I would have told you to buy this already.

Cameron Hughes is based out of San Francisco, but he’s not your typical Californian wine producer.  Instead of owning a tract of land in Napa, growing grapes there and making them into wine, he’s a négociant, which means that he buys grapes, juice or even finished/partly-finished wine from other growers/producers and completes, packages and sells it under his own label.  Négociants are much more well known in European wine regions like Burgundy, France (Jadot and Leroy are big-name examples) than in the US, but Hughes is showing that the business model works just as well on this side of the Atlantic.  In many cases, Hughes buys excess grapes/juice from high-end Napa producers; they get quick cash in a capital-intensive industry and get rid of overflow product in a way that doesn’t devalue their own brand (Hughes is generally not permitted to reveal his sources), while Hughes gets high-quality raw materials for pennies on the dollar.  However, with Lot 179, the story is different:  what is in the bottle is actually the finished product of another winery that went out of business before its 2007 vintage was able to hit the market. Read the rest of this entry »


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Wine Review: 2002 Campillo Rioja Reserva

10 08 2011

Grande Prairie, pay attention: go and find this wine. Right now.

I couldn’t resist — after talking at some length in my last post about how the Tempranillo grape was a chameleon that could show very differently depending on how it was made, and after seeing what the fruity, modern style of the grape had to offer with the 2009 Vega Moragona Tempranillo from Ribera del Jucar, Spain, I went down to my wine fridges tonight and this bottle kept calling out to me.  While the Vega Moragona did a decent job at showing off what New Age Tempranillo was all about, there are few better producers than Campillo at illustrating what can be created using the traditional approach to Spanish winemaking with this grape.  As I mentioned a couple days ago, the main difference with the more traditional style of Spanish Tempranillo is that the wines are aged in oak for significantly longer before release, often in new barrels to further enhance the oak flavours, which leads to bottles that tend to be pre-mellowed before they even hit the shelves; it’s like the wineries do most of the aging for you.  It’s an approach that makes very little sense in terms of the modern business model — how many goods retailers do you know that hang onto their inventory for 5+ years before allowing it to be sold? — but maybe that’s what makes it so charming to me.  These Spanish winemakers, especially in Rioja, the country’s traditional vinicultural heartland, are amazingly dedicated to their craft, and given the world’s recent obsession with bigger, riper, ultra-powerful reds, their wines can be found at shocking values. Read the rest of this entry »


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2009 Vega Moragona Tempranillo

8 08 2011

Most neo-minimalist Spanish wine label ever?

This morning I got up just after 5:00 so that I could get into work an hour earlier than normal.  I did this to churn through a rapidly-expanding to-do list so that I could get home before 6:00 to put the baby down while my wife headed off to work.  I will likely do the same tomorrow.  On arriving home, I was definitely not looking for a complex and challenging wine to break down and analyze; I was looking for liquid stress relief, a vinous housecoat and slippers to ease the day into submission.  I’m happy to report that I found it, and it came from an unexpected locale.

The Vega Moragona hails from a fairly new wine region in central Spain, the Ribera del Jucar.  Until recently, RdJ was on the eastern tip of the huge, sprawling and grotesquely hot La Mancha region, located just south of Madrid and home to boatloads of (mostly) cheap, dull, nondescript wine.  However, in 2003, as a result of the unique soils/territory and increased quality prevalent in the area, Ribera del Jucar broke free and became its own DO (Denominacion de Origen), a legal territorial designation officially separating it from the La Mancha pack. Read the rest of this entry »


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Wine Review: 2006 Inniskillin Cabernet Sauvignon

5 08 2011

$15 Canadian Cab...don't get me started.

Oh, Canada…I had been starting to feel a glimmer of optimism about red wines from my home and native land after positive recent experiences with producers like Laughing Stock (Okanagan) and Tawse (Niagara), but just as I began to forget why Canadian reds have until recently been an endless source of frustration for me, tonight happened.  My consternation isn’t that these wines are terrible (though some are); it’s that too much of the wine industry here seems locked in to grapes and wines that we are hard pressed to make better than many other regions around the world.  Cabernet Sauvignon is a case in point.  Why take one of the most heat-loving, slow-ripening, warm-weather grapes out there and try to specialize in making single-varietal wines out of it north of the 49th parallel?  Why especially would you try to target the sub-$20 price range with your Cabs when better-situated producers with hotter weather and cheaper land from Chile, Argentina, Australia and California basically have that market covered?  Where is the global competitive advantage in that approach?  We need a new business plan. Read the rest of this entry »


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Wine Review: 2007 Boedecker Cellars Stewart Pinot Noir

3 08 2011

Just smell this wine once...then keep on smelling.

Oregon!  By now you know that Washington State, especially Washington State Syrah, has a big piece of my wine-loving heart, but my affections actually spread further across the Pacific Northwest, even though Oregon’s wine scene is considerably different from its northern neighbour’s.  Most of Washington’s wines are grown in the southeast part of the state, which is in the rain shadow of the Cascade Mountain range and is almost desert-like:  dry and hot during the day and quite a bit cooler at night.  The heat allows thicker-skinned, warmer-weather grapes like Cabernet Sauvignon and Syrah to ripen fully, while the nightly colder spells give the resulting wines a little restraint and keep them from becoming alcoholic fruit bombs.  Oregon is totally different, with a climate that more closely resembles what you’d expect from the northern Pacific coast (and I lived in Victoria BC for three years, so I know):  cooler, more continental, less sunny and quite a lot rainier.  The big powerful red grapes would struggle to ripen fully here, but their more delicate, thinner-skinned, colder-climate brethren absolutely thrive, especially Pinot Noir.  In my (only partially-informed) opinion and (fairly limited) experience, I would venture to say that Oregon has more promise as a Pinot Noir region than anywhere else on Earth other than Burgundy, France, the grape’s ancestral homeland — it’s better suited for the grape than established Pinot zones like California; more impressive than other up-and-coming areas like Central Otago, New Zealand or Yarra Valley/Mornington Peninsula, Australia; and more intriguing than long-time European growing zones like Germany or Austria.  Oregon has only been noticed as a serious wine region in the last 50 years, but its affinity for Pinot Noir has seen it gain an astronomical amount of international respect in a very short time.  It has since started branching out with some of the white grapes from Alsace, France (Pinot Gris and Pinot Blanc), but Pinot Noir is its meal ticket and its justified claim to fame.  I’m not a huge Pinot fan, but (possibly because I don’t find myself drinking $150+ Burgundy all that often) Oregon’s renditions of the grape are probably my favourite. Read the rest of this entry »


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WSET: Officially Intermediate!!

2 08 2011

I’m back from a long weekend trip to the splendours of northern Alberta (note to all those who live in Grande Prairie:  buy your wine from the Costco there, and only from Costco…some crazy good deals even beyond the big labels!) and I’m ready to make up for lost blogging time.  I had planned to dive right into a new wine review tonight, but that all changed when I got a special delivery in the mail this afternoon from the Wine & Spirits Education Trust — my Intermediate exam results!  I am pleased to report that my registration for the Advanced course this October was not in vain…for some reason I’m officially forbidden from posting any image of my actual WSET certificate on the Internet, but I can post this:

Booya! Tuition money not wasted!

Admittedly, the Intermediate exam was just a multiple-choice test without a tasting component, but still, I’m pretty psyched about this.  Now all future reviews will be backed by that sliver of moral authority you get when you’re moderately qualified at something!

Actual wine talk will return tomorrow, when Oregon will have its PnP debut…I’m amazed I haven’t written it up yet, but that will soon be remedied.  Until then!


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Botani Cork Mystery – Solved!

28 07 2011

OK,  yes I said I was going on vacation, and I am, but I had to post this quickly before I left.  I reviewed the 2010 Jorge Ordonez Botani white from Christopher Stewart Wine & Spirits Imports a couple weeks ago and was a huge fan, but I couldn’t figure out the elaborate graphics on the cork.  Here’s what I saw and the Cork Rating I doled out:

Cork Rating: 6.5/10 (I'm a huge fan of cork graphics, but what is this? A cruise ship and some mountain-castles? I don't get it.)

I had almost forgotten about my confusion over what this cork art represented until this morning, when a comment showed up under my Botani post…from Victoria Ordonez, Jorge Ordonez’s sister and official blogger of Jorge Ordonez & Co.!  Victoria wrote a great piece on the Jorge Ordonez site clarifying what the actual image is on the JO corks (it’s a three-masted ship, not a no-masted ship with mountains behind it, as I myopically guessed) and, more importantly, what it represents of the history of wine-making in Malaga, Spain…check it out here:

http://jorge-ordonez.es/blog/2011/07/28/ship-in-a-bottle/

As a result of this response, I have booked an eye exam and have also retroactively bumped the Botani Cork Rating up to a stellar 8.5/10 — anytime a cork can combine substantial graphics with historical significance, it’s an absolute winner.  If only every producer put this kind of thought and effort into its bottle closures…the world would be a better place.

Officially on vacation now…see you next week!


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5,000 Club & Vacation

27 07 2011

If you don’t see another PnP review for a few days, fear not:  I haven’t sworn off wine forever, I’m just heading out of town for the long weekend.  More bottles will be opened and more write-ups will be posted next week, I promise.

Based on the site’s hit counter, it looks exceedingly likely that Pop & Pour will break the 5,000-hit barrier sometime in the next day.  Since I won’t be around then to say anything about it, I wanted to take the time now to thank everyone reading this and everyone who has subscribed or clicked over to PnP for their support of the blog over the past few months.  Most recently, thanks to Forrest Wines in New Zealand and Christopher Stewart Wine & Spirits Imports in Calgary for posting links to Pop & Pour reviews on Facebook/Twitter earlier today.  It means a lot and is very much appreciated!  See you next week!


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Wine Review: 2010 Forrest Wines The Doctors’ Riesling

26 07 2011

If you have ever read this blog before, it will likely not shock you to learn that I love Riesling.  It is probably my all-time favourite grape, and even though I drink more red wine than white, I probably drink more Riesling than any other varietal.  I’ve had Rieslings from Germany and Austria, France and Australia, Canada and the US…but never from New Zealand, until tonight.  I wasn’t even aware that any meaningful focus was being placed on Riesling in NZ until last week; even though it’s a cold climate wine country that seems particularly well-suited to grow the grape, the world’s (and my) focus on New Zealand wine has been locked squarely on the country’s star vinous attraction, Sauvignon Blanc, with Pinot Noir starting to make rumblings far behind.  At the moment, Riesling barely registers.  But I think it makes such food-friendly, versatile, intriguing and profound wines that the right people growing Riesling in the right spots in the country could open a lot of eyes, sow the seeds of a new NZ white wine revolution and start budging the Sauv Blanc monolith.  Forrest Wines could well be one of the producers at the forefront of this kind of movement. Read the rest of this entry »


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