Tasting - Juggernaut Pinot Noir

 Part 2 of tasting with Adam on the final day of the first month of the 4th year of the 3rd decade of the 21st century, AD. Important to note this tasting was directly after Yellow Tail's Merlot

Wine: Juggernaut's Pinot Noir

Location: Russian River Valley, California

Year: 2020

Cost: $15.99 at Kroger

Color: darker than the merlot, with less red highlights. far purpler, almost brown/ruddy on the edges

Legs: looked thicker or the same as the merlot. suggests more viscosity, which should mean less alcohol, more sugar, right?

Smell: picked up a citrus zest flavor deep in my sinuses with a big whiff. Very faintly like when grapefruit peel is squeezed. No alcohol odor, didn't smell bitey or acidic like the merlot.

Taste: LOTS more tannin than the merlot, despite online reviews suggesting it was light in tannin. Certainly more substantial body. Not very sweet. Cherry flavors, and again feeling like there is grapefruit character, mayber from a general bitterness? Because I frequently say "bruised black/raspberries" for red wines, I specifically tried to find that, but couldn't detect it.

General Notes: I want to come back to this on a different day when my palate hasn't had wine on it yet. We were very surprised by alcohol percentage on this! With more viscosity, and less odor of alcohol, we expected 12.5-13%, but it is actually 14.5%!

Wine Folly lists Pinot Noir as having cherry, raspberry, clove, hibiscus, and mushroom characteristics. Definitely got the cherry, but I specifically found no raspberry flavor, and no mushroom. I regretfully don't know enough about cloves or hibiscus to recall the smells from memory.

I like the hardcore marketing on this bottle - cool bird of prey design, and this inscription on the back: 

"Juggernaut grapes are grown in challenging conditions, where true grit and determination yield spectacular results. Steadfast Pinot Noir vines endure, unwavering, amidst inhospitable conditions, battered by wind and fog, struggling to utilize every precious hour of warmth and sunlight over a long growing season. The reward is a balance of intensity and grace, with unrelenting flavors of red cherry, berry, and spicy, floral notes. Overcoming hardship builds character"

What compelled someone to write this on a wine label? 

Tasting - Merlot

 Cracked open a bottle of merlot with my buddy Adam tonight (along with a Pinot Noir, but that's the next review).

Wine: Yellow Tail Merlot

Location: South Eastern Australia

Year: 2021

Price: $7 ish

Color: dark red, purple almost. Rich, clear red color along the edges, like garnet?

Legs: relatively thin, assumed that meant lower sugar, higher alcohol 

Smell: "spice-ey" as in some spice character (mayber black pepper? maybe bell pepper?) but not like hot spicy. Tart cherries. After tasting, the alcohol smell was more pronounced. Wondering if that was something other than ethanol, as that is supposed to be odorless (was there methanol or something else in there in trace amounts?). 

Taste: lower tannins than expected from color & odor. Still tart cherry flavor (like a cheribundi sort of flavor). At one point I was thinking earthy/mineraly. Popped back to smell to find the mineraly character, ended up thinking about gravely soil, just made me think of cold and close to the ground.

General Notes: from the thin legs, clear alcohol odor, and feel of heat in my throat, assumed alcohol content was around 14%, but it was actually lower at 13.5%. We kept trying to figure out what the "spice" flavor was but were ultimately unsuccessful. Adam settled on "spice mix".

Wine Folly suggests we should have been tasting cherry, plum, chocolate, bay leaf, and vanilla. I got the cherry, and could maybe trick myself into tasting plums, but the chocolate, bay leaf, and vanilla were nowhere to be found. I have bay leaves, so we smelled those and agreed that was not in the wine.

Tasting - Sangue Di Giuda

 First tasting with fellows in the class - thank you to Jackson and Emily for sharing the wine!

Had to walk 5 minutes from my house through the arctic tundra to taste this thing, which may have affected my olfactory capabilities.

Terra's 2018 Sangue Di Giuda dell’Oltrepo Pavese, from Lombardy, Italy. Cost appx $13.00. 6% ABV

Blend wasn't listed on the bottle, but Sangue Di Giuda dell’Oltrepo Pavese is shown online as having roughly 45% Croatina, 45% Barbera, 5% Ughetta, and 5% Uva Rara.

Tasting profile & price listing: Terra Sangue di Giuda - Ed's Fine Wines (edsfinewines.com)

No specific page in Wine Folly for this, but it is mentioned on the Sparkling Red Wine page similar to Lambrusco and Brachetto d’Acqui. Both those wines get credited for tasting like blueberry/raspberry/strawberry/blackberry in differing amounts.

Smell: couldn't smell much, maybe it is just low in odor or my nose was affected by the cold walk? Does lower alcohol affect smell? Does sparkling increase smell?

Taste: Sweet, not tannic. Only about the front 10% of my tongue felt the tannin character. Slightly carbonated, felt like much smaller bubbles than most beer or sodas, and even smaller than other sparkling wines I have had. Consistent with an the online reviews, I could identify blueberry/jam hints, maybe currants too.

Look: dark red, small columns of carbonation visible after pouring.

After main tasting, had a small piece of Ghiradelli 86% chocolate with it. Chocolate had little flavor to me, but felt very buttery and smooth. The already low sour character of the wine was further decreased by the chocolate.

Tasting - Anthony Road Cabernet Franc

 On the evening of January 23rd, 2023, a man attempted to cook dinner and drink wine. This is his story.

Little date night action with me and the missus - pan roasted lamb chops in ghee, fresh garlic, thyme, rosemary, celery, baby bella mushrooms and carrots. Served with oven roasted yellow potatoes and broccoli, tossed in olive oil, salt, pepper, garlic powder, paprika, rosemary and thyme.

First time cooking lamb, wasn't aware of the ability of the fat to render out so completely. Should have allowed it to cook on the fat side for longer, but we were impatient. Also, undersalted the potatoes and the lamb veggies, but some post-cooking salt and all that garlic made up for it.

About the wine: Anthony Road Winery's 2020 Cabernet Franc. Grapes grown in the Finger Lakes of NY in America, on the West side of the Seneca Lake (vineyard slopes facing east). We had tried this in a wine tasting back in December at the winery, and it was her favorite, so I brought a bottle back to Blacksburg. Wish we had taken notes at the tasting, but all that is lost to the ether now. 10/10 experience though, recommend the past/present/future white wine flight.

Online it is listed at ~$27 for a bottle, but I believe we paid a lower price at the in-person shop. Don't have a receipt but I remember it being closer to $21.

Couldn't find much online about tasting notes, but was rushed trying to get dinner put together.

The Comprehensive Guide to Cabernet Franc | Wine Folly We consulted this site while waiting for things to cook, and sipping on our first glasses of the wine. Concerned about how to avoid placebo when reading about what you are supposed to be tasting versus actually tasting those things.

My disagreements with Wine Folly: no strawberry, no bell pepper (she tasted some but this is my review), no "crushed gravel". I know what crushed gravel smells like intimately - my driveway at home is gravel and I know what it smells like in any weather or time of year. I did agree with the raspberry, and a little bit with the chile/spiciness, but only faintly.

Color: DARK red. Almost purple in thin layers when held up to the light.

Smell: before dinner, smelled of red fruits (raspberry, blackberry, dark plums). after dinner: maple syrup very clearly on the nose! Reading the winery's page, this wine was oaked, so maybe it is the oak characteristic I picked up as "maple". I don't know what oak wood smells like. Wondering if the change in smell for me was affected more by the food or by the wine sitting out?

Taste: more dark red fruits, cherries, bruised flavor!! Like if you've had a smushed raspberry or blackberry at the bottom of a carton, it tastes different than a pristine, unblemished berry.

Mouthfeel: less tannin than I would expect from something this dark colored. Didn't coat my whole tongue in that texture, mostly the front 1/3 of my mouth. More enjoyable to take a big swig when it had sat a little while.

Note of changes over time: wine was probably not changing in temperature, but certainly getting more oxygen. I don't have a decanter bc I am a poor college kid and it looks pretentious, but it was cool to have the wine get more airflow and change flavor. Definitely felt sweeter all over my tongue when it had sat out longer. Didn't finish the bottle so might compare tomorrow or something too.

My First Post: Background

 Hi! My name is Graydon "Cooper" Whiteleather, and this is the start of my blog for Professor Boyer's Geography of Wine course at Virginia Tech.

I grew up in Upstate New York, in the Finger Lakes Region, which is known for its beautiful lakes, heavy snowfall, and hundreds of vineyards. For scale of how integrated wine is with my home area, my cross country coach's family runs a vineyard, and at least two other kids on the team had parents who worked at or owned vineyards in the area.

My senior year of high school, our chemistry teacher offered a year long class that was two quarters of organic chemistry, and two quarters of viti/viniculture - we didn't taste wines in class because we were all 17/18 years old, but learned about the culture and science behind growing grapes, making wine, and tasting that wine.

Not wine, but I have additional experience with alcohol production, as I took Dr. Sean O'Keefe's Brewing Science and Technology class here at VT back in Fall 2019, and I worked for Molson Coors Beverage Company's Shenandoah Brewery this past summer, as a Brewing Operations intern.

My tasting experience is limited - I've drank mostly wine from upstate NY; some rieslings and dry reds.

To be honest, my sense of smell is probably less sensitive than the average person's but I believe I have pretty good hang of putting mouthfeel and taste into words.

I'm hoping to improve my sense of smell, if possible, and be more able to predict what a wine will taste like just from its name and knowing where it is from.

Excited for this class, first wine blog coming soon!