Every week, we select a wine from the store as our Insider's Pick. We send out tasting notes to our email customers the evening before, and have the wine open to taste at the store Thursday and Friday from 12:00 until closing. If you purchase the wine on the days it is tasted, you receive a 10% discount from the bottle price, and a 15% discount if the wine is part of a mixed case (no further discount on 1 item cases).  Below are the tasting notes from the most recent Insider's Picks.

March 11, 2010
2005 BODEGA BENEGAS FINCA LIBERTAD
(Wine Advoca te 91points)
$21.99, $18.69/case
Here’s another great reminder that Argentinean wines are not all just about Malbec, and few other wineries could make this statement as well as Bodegas Benegas. The winery and its vineyards date back to the earliest days of Argentine winemaking and the late 1800s, when family members first brought French varieties in to plant in Mendoza. While many vineyards were planted to the more popular grapes like Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, and Malbec, these vineyards also contained some of the first Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, Syrah, Petit Verdot and Cabernet Franc vines in the entire country. Up until the late 1970s when the original Benegas family winery was broken up and sold, they held the only plantings of those varieties in all of Argentina. This ‘new’ rendition of the old winery makes wines from some of those older sites; the Cabernet Sauvignon vines average 40-60 years of age, and the Cabernet Franc that goes into this wine is some of the oldest outside of France at almost 100 years. These older vines give the wines added complexity in a structure that is more Bordeaux-like than most things we have tried from Argentina. From the first whiff the Cabernet Franc component is immediately evident with notes of flowers and higher toned red fruits above the strong blackcurrant notes of Cabernet Sauvignon. While many bigger Argentine wines would be released fairly young to emphasize their intense but raw ripeness of fruit, the extra few years in the bottle has allowed this one to come together with more elegance. It’s still a fairly big wine to be sure, but not heavy or cloying. The texture is very polished across your mouth, giving the dark red fruits and cocoa notes easy access to your palate as opposed to bullying their way in, and allowing the tannins to show their dusty yet forceful grip only across the finish. Because of the liberal use of Cabernet Franc and the bottle age, this is a wine that may hold more promise for Bordeaux fans than most Californian Cabs.

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March 04, 2010
2007 DOMAINE DES ENTREFAUX CROZES-HERMITAGE
$19.99, $16.99/case
When we first tasted this wine about a year ago, we thought it was going to be one of the big winners of the vintage. Good value can be difficult to find in the Northern Rhone, where Syrah is the dominant grape, growing conditions are cooler and a bit irregular, and vineyard sites are at a premium. But this wine has received strong press in the past, especially in high quality vintages, and even in the middle of a tasting with a strong lineup of Grenache based wines from the Southern Rhone ad Chateauneuf-du-Pape, we thought this had great potential. It’s been a pet wine of ours of ours ever since, and even though there were no reviews to speak of we know this is still so full of win. We trusted our palates, and now you will reap the reward. From the first whiff, you know that somebody must have just forgotten to get the samples out there, because the nose is classic French Syrah, a mercurial combination of black fruits and wild game. Both gain in intensity as the wine opens up, but neither becomes overwhelming or heady. On the first sip, you notice a fullness of fruit and silky red fruits, but what is most fascinating is what is NOT there; a total and absolute absence of and sweet or glycerol texture, and zero heady alcohol burn. At just under 13%abv, it has a structure more similar to a Bordeaux than to what many have become accustomed to from the Syrah grape. And yet there is absolutely nothing under-ripe or lacking here, no green or vegetal notes to suggest a less than successful vintage, nothing thin or harsh anywhere to be found. If anything, the wine picks up richness the longer it’s open, building layers of cocoa and tart cherry skin through the finish. This is very old school Syrah, more about sinew than pure size. In a way, it’s a good thing there wasn’t huge press on this, because then we wouldn’t get to enjoy this wine here in the store while it is in such a great drinking place right now.


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February 25, 2010
2008 BODEGAS ATECA ATTECA OLD VINES
$16.99, $14.44/case
Wine scores can be a tricky thing. They can help steer you to great new wines, especially if you trust the palate of the person writing the reviews. But you don’t want to become overly dependent on them, waiting for one of the more respected names to put their stamp of approval on something before you buy it. For example, fans of Spanish Garnacha will immediately recognize this bottling as it has been a media darling over the last several vintages. Since its inception as a collaboration between importer Jorge Ordonez and Jumilla based winery Juan Gil, this limited production selection from vines averaging 80-100 years of age has been landing squarely on the magic 90 point button from all three of the more prominent and respected American wine reviewers (Wine Spectator, Wine Advocate, and International Wine Cellar). While individual consumers may heed the advice of one more than the other, the fact that they have been so consistently in agreement with their praise speaks volumes. But wine reviews have a tendency to not align very well with when the wines become available, especially when the publication has an issue devoted to covering the region in total, delaying the review weeks or even months after the wine is on the shelves. If you wait too long for the reviews, those that take it upon themselves to try it and form their own opinions and beat you to little gems like this. Deep, almost opaque purple color in the glass are signs of minimal filtration and very low yields, which help to intensify the body and flavor of the wine. The aromas are initially mostly smoky black fruits and notes of oaky vanilla, but fairly quickly show spicy raspberry and hints of earth as well. In the mouth the texture is impressively lush with almost invisible fine tannins and low acidity very common in Spanish Grenache, allowing the silky red and black fruit flavors to be the dominant feature of the finish. Don’t wait for someone else to tell you how good this is (including us), get a taste for yourself.

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February 18, 2010
2008 CHATEAU BIANCA PINOT NOIR WILLAMETTE VALLEY
$15.99, $13.59/case
The Pinot Noir grape rides the tides of the changing seasons more tightly than any other in the fine wine world, amplifying every positive and negative event that occurs in the final wine. You would think it logical, then, that growers would plant Pinot Noir in the sunniest, warmest, and most consistent areas to alleviate that problem. Unfortunately, when life is made easy for it, Pinot responds with lazy, soft, uninspiring wines or is too easily damaged by extreme heat. It likes its life lived on the fringes of existence where it sees just enough sun and warmth to fully develop, slowly and gradually ripening to gain the trademark subtle yet profound complexities. The last two vintages in Oregon’s Willamette Valley are shining examples of this conflict, as the last two vintages have been dramatically different from each other. 2007 was a very trying vintage, very cool and overcast through most of the year and rainy in late September just before harvest. Most wines were not flawed by rot or damage, but tended to be lighter bodied and a bit more tart than usual due to higher acidity. Good smaller wineries that know what they are doing were not effected much, and those that tend to make wines in a lighter, more Burgundian influenced manner like store favorite Patricia Green made wines just as good as ever. But there was a lot of very blah wine to be had. 2008, on the other hand, looks to be a benchmark vintage for the region, near perfect weather throughout the vintage, and with more wineries than ever ready to take advantage of the bounty. Like 2007 was for California and Southern France, if you didn’t make good wine this year, it may be time for you to find another profession, because the wine gods won’t be serving up many softball pitches like this. Now is the time we see the first waves of wine from this vintage, the everyday drinkers that spend very little time in wood and are meant for immediate consumption. And consume it you shall! Beautiful deep cherry color, and immediate aromas of smoky black cherry and subtle Asian spice that get more subtle and sweet as it opens. The mouth is very silky and filling, light but not watery at all, with a surprising amount of depth and fine tannin on the finish to prevent any comparisons to much of the cheap cherry cola that passes for inexpensive Pinot Noir these days. A testament to the quality of the vintage, and a great sign for what is to come.
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February 11, 2010
2006 FATTORIA SCOPONE 'IL GREGORIANO' SANT' ANTIMO DOC
$18.99, $16,14/case
In the midst of the recent string of exceptional vintages in Tuscany, scandal has plagued the reputations of quite a few producers in Montalcino, and tarnished the image of the region as a whole. Several prominent producers were accused of making Brunello di Montalcino- the region’s flagship wine which is required to be 100% Sangiovese- using outside varietals like Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, or Syrah. Many believed the accused were strengthening and intensifying their wines to gain more recognition with the very influential American wine press, which has developed a reputation for being easily swayed by such wines. The crime is in the subversion, the corruption of what is supposed to be a very pure and singular wine under the name Brunello di Montalcino. The crime is NOT, however, in blending these grapes, because they are allowed to be grown here and blended into wine under the Sant’ Antimo denomination, or DOC. Created fairly recently in 1996, this DOC essentially overlaps the lines of Brunello, and was established to give wineries some leeway to experiment with other varietals. Usually Sangiovese is blended under this name with the more famous and recognizable grapes like those used to potentially spike Brunello mentioned earlier. This small producer goes a different route and blends in a little Petit Verdot, creating an unexpectedly deep and savory wine. Bordeaux-ish crimson colored, the nose is mostly dark dried fruit, anise, tree bark and tobacco, stemming mostly from the Petit Verdot. The grape’s intensity still shows through in the mouth as well, though the Sangiovese starts coming through more here with signs of tart red fruits, silky texture, and Italian spice, at least until the Petit Verdot kicks in some pretty chewy tannins on the finish. This is an impressively bold and structured wine for the price, capable of some mid-length cellaring of 4+ years, as well as a great red meat or wild game pairing now.

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February 04, 2010
2006 NEWTON VINEYARDS NAPA VALLEY CLARET
$19.99, $16.99/case
As we prepare ourselves for the next super-sized snowstorm (or, as it has been billed here, “Snowzilla II: Electric Boogaloo”), we figured the majority of you would be looking for wine to help keep you warm during the next 3-5+ days of home confinement. When Napa Valley wineries aren’t being completely full of themselves and pricing their wines into the stratosphere, they really and truly can make great quality wines for the money, delivering a silky, seductive and complex drinking experience for a very reasonable price. Newton Vineyards was one of the first producers to venture up into the rugged peaks of the Spring Mountain District above St. Helena, and though their name has been made from their higher end Unfiltered series of Chardonnay, Merlot, and Cabernet, their value line Red Label series has really driven the brand’s recognition for most consumers. The Claret is very close to being a Meritage, which uses only the traditional Bordeaux grapes, as was the case a few weeks back in the Insider’s Pick with the Dry Creek Meritage. Newton chooses to add a small bit of Syrah to the blend most every year, so the Meritage term is off limits. The breakdown each year varies some, but Merlot usually is the dominant grape. Don’t let any of your Merlot biases prevent you from trying this, however, because this is far from tame. Deep, deep ruby color prepares you for a fairly strong aroma blast of black cherry and blackcurrant, a hint of perfume from the Cabernet Franc, and a surprisingly firm note of iron and anise from a small portion of Petit Verdot. In the mouth the texture is moderate in weight and incredibly silky, almost supple except for a bit of fine chocolatey tannins on the finish. This wine is open and smooth enough that it can be enjoyed fairly quickly after opening, but definitely builds in complexity as it opens, so when you’re stuck at home with nothing exciting to do you can enjoy playing with and watch it evolve over several hours.

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January 28, 2010
2005 QUINTA DE LA ROSA VINHO TINTO DOURO
$17.99.,$15.29/case
Portugal has a strong wine industry beyond the realms of fortified Port wines and light bodied Vinho Verde, mostly for fleshy, full bodied reds. Their style tends to be similar in many ways to Spain, but have not experienced the success and media blitzkrieg of their peninsular neighbors. Volume certainly has something to do with it to be sure (Spain has more acreage under vine than any other country in the world), as well as the connection with Bordeaux and Rioja in the late 1800s that helped establish their reputation for quality. Otherwise Portuguese red wines have been a somewhat forgotten product; it’s as if people they start their meal with a Vinho Verde, finish with a Port, and have nothing in between. The last decade has seen an increasing awareness and improvement in Portuguese reds, at least in terms of what we’ve been able to get our hands on here in the states, with the best wines coming from the same grapes used to make Ports. Tempranillo (called Tinta Roriz here) usually isn’t a major player in Port, but in red wines it is as instrumental as the Spanish wines from upriver in Ribera del Duero. The other prized Port grapes (Touriga National, Touriga Franca, and Tinta Barroca) play lesser roles in these wines, but you can still definitely catch their presence in unfortified wines like this, bringing a rich plummy fruit aroma and impressively deep purple color. A bit of time has been kind to this wine, providing some elegant smoky aromas behind the purple fruits, and though there are still some fairly strong chewy tannins here, they delay themselves until later on the finish, allowing much of the wine’s time on the palate to be silky and loaded with flavor. Fans of Spanish wines from the Duero and Toro regions would be well advised to experiment with wines like this as the Port grapes bring some unique dark fruit characters to enhance the Tempranillo, and they tend to be less aggressive and alcoholic as well.

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January 21, 2010
2007 FRIEDRICH BECKER PIOT NOIR PFALZ
$17.99,$15.39/case
As many of you frequent readers will know, Pinot Noir has a well earned reputation of being extremely difficult to grow in many (some would venture MOST) pars of the world. Easily rots in humid regions or when it rains at the wrong time, the grape’s flesh burns easily in heavy sun. Too hot and the juice is overly sweet and insipid, too cool and the juice is hard and tart with barely any color at all. Some places, like Sancerre, plant Pinot Noir with an almost implied expectation that it will provide juice for Rose wines (delicious ones, to be sure), and there is much rejoicing when a vintage yields more than a few successful Pinots. So why do so many wineries all over the world still plant this grape, which seems in many ways to be at best a fool’s wager? Because, when all the factors align and Pinot Noir is at its best, oooh baby. Few if any red grapes can match it’s deft combination of subtlety and complexity, layers upon layers of aromatics and red fruits that can vary from site to site more so than any other grape. It’s the reason vintners in Burgundy, Pinot Noir’s epicenter, will cling to individual rows within the more famous parcels for the opportunity to make a few mere barrels worth of highly prized wine. Germany has never been much of a Pinot Noir (also called Spatburgunder on some labels) destination, generally considered too cold to ripen the grape very consistently, with the possible exception of the Baden region, found across the Rhine from Alsace in France. Recent warm vintages across Germany has provided better opportunities for Pinot growers to achieve their fullest potential, and the best of them have actually been quite impressive. Freidrich Becker has earned a reputation as one of the finest Pinot Noir producers during this time, with his top end wine (at $150, it’s priced like a Burgundy) considered by International Wine Cellar reviewer Joel Payne as “one of the best (Pinot Noirs) I have ever tasted from Germany.” This entry level is not quite at that level, but the expertise certainly is evident. Classic Pinot Noir opaque and dusty ruby color, the aromas are full of smoky red cherries and hints of dried herbs and cinnamon. The biggest surprise here is in the first sip, surprisingly juicy and silky with no astringency or harsh edges, with plenty of racy black and red fruits running through to the finish, drawing comparison with some of Oregon’s more European styled producers, or even some of the Pinots from Italy’s Alto Adige region we have featured. I wouldn’t necessarily say this wine is the sign that Pinot Noir is going to be like this now and forever from Germany, because cooler vintages will kick that trend to the curb in an instant. I would definitely say that this is a sign that the Germans have picked up their game regarding Pinot Noir, and Pinot fans should definitely put wines like this on their immediate drinking list.
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