Here is Eric LeVine’s newsletter from CellarTracker on the subject.  And you have to commend him for being awfully forgiving in the circumstances.  Eric provides links in his newsletter to the blogs that originally identified the data scraping.

http://www.cellartracker.com/newsletter/1-31-2011.htm

I haven’t written about white wines on here at all… because I just don’t have them all that often.  But tonight called for a class of white.  My wife and I were making a creamy chicken pasta for dinner, and the reds I have just didn’t seem to make any sense.

For this particular wine, I’m not exactly sure how it got into my wine cabinet.  Possibly someone brought to one of our dinner parties to which many others had already brought and opened wine.

Good reason to host dinner parties: people feel obligated to leave the wine they brought, even if they don’t get to drink it.

I just did a quick lookup on the wine, and noticed that the 2008 has actually won quite a few awards, including a gold medal at the 2010 Pacific Rim International Wine Competition (click here for details).

But in any case, this wine was a great choice for dinner.  Now, my wife is seven months pregnant, so this one was all me.  It had aromas and tastes of sour apples and citrus.  A nice, crisp white.  A mouth-watering finish.  Overall, I really enjoyed it.  It reminded me of why I should drink more white wines.  And a great way to end a long weekend.

According to the Konzelmann Estate Winery website (click HERE), this wine is a Bordeaux style red aged 18 months in French oak barrels.

And it’s good!

Deep, pure red in colour, it has aromas of plum, blackberry, and oak.

Taste was smooth, not too dry, and more fruity than I expected.  Slight spice to it.

Overall, very good.  Not too heavy and well-rounded.  Great wine to relax!

This one was a deep and dark red and had aromas of plums, apples, and oak.  The taste was more of the same.  No pucker, but still quite dry.

Overall, good but not great.  Smooth, but not too exciting.  Alcohol was quite strong, perhaps I didn’t let it breath enough.

My disclaimer is also that I did not drink it with a heavy meal.  Possibly didn’t have my pallette prepared enough for a heavier cabernet-sauvignon type wine.

This wine was no disappointment either.  It was fantastic.  It was a treat that there were only two of us drinking red wine at the dinner, so we got a good thorough tasting of it as well.

The wine was a thick dark red, and had an ever-so-subtle purple hue.

I had plums and cherries and a slight floral aroma.  Medium tannins and a very smooth finish.  A sweet and smooth wine.

I loved it.  And it wasn’t too heavy to sip without a meal.  I had mine both during and after dinner over a game of cards.  Perfect.

I was given this bottle of wine as a gift in the summer.  In the past, I have really enjoyed Twisted Tree wines, so I was definitely excited for this one.  Especially given that it is so close to town (Osoyoos), it’s an easy trip up to the winery when I’m visiting.

And I definitely enjoyed this wine.

Very smooth, excellent texture.  Not too deep or dark, but a nice rich red colour.  Some plum and berry and a wood/leather on the tongue.

Very good wine.  I would definitely recommend another.  And my guess would be that now is the time to drink it.  No blue or bronze.  So just about perfect.

I would definitely pick up another.  Highly recommended.  And an easy wine to drink.

Needless to say, I cracked this bottle last night (click HERE for the winery website).  And I was definitely looking forward to it.  I decided it was time to dig something out of the cellar and go for it.

I bought this bottle a couple of years ago at the winery on one of our day trips through the Oliver-Osoyoos wineries.  Their winery is one of my wife’s favourite wineries (she loves their pinot gris and semillon chardonay) both for their excellent white wines and their tasting facilities.  It is always one of our first stops.

And their reserve reds are some of my favourites.  I always have high expectations with their reserve wines and this one was no exception.  Bold and powerful is what I was looking for.

The wine was deep maroon.  Thick, deep, and dark.  A little bit of browning, probably due to my inadequate storage methods.  Smells of plums, raspberry, oak, vanilla.  Taste had some spice, peppery.  And plums and berries.

Overall, an outstanding wine.  Nailed the bold and powerful.  I liked the spice especially.  Good oak flavour to it as well.  Fantastic!  Sad to say I only had one bottle left.  I’ll definitely pick up another one of these.

One of the things that always catches my eye is their distinct labels and bottle shape.  The picture here doesn’t show the shape of the bottle very well, but it’s definitely unique.  The diameter gets larger as you move up the bottle, and just above the label it cuts back in to form the neck.

According to their website (click HERE), a stoneboat is a sled used to remove heavy stones and was “originally used to clear our home vineyard of its abundant river rocks.”  They chose the name because “a stoneboat is representative of qualities that we value: hard work, tradition and perseverance.”

I find their wines to be very smooth but with lot’s of flavour.  They always have a distinct oak flavour that is unique to their wines.  A couple of years ago, the wine that really caught my attention was their pinotage.  And this past year as well.

This pinot noir didn’t disappoint either.  I highly recommend either of these wines if you ever have the chance to pick one up.

I’ve been a big fan of Cellartracker for over a year now.  Eric LeVine, the founder, provides an incredibly useful database tool for writing reviews, reading reviews, and keeping an inventory of your wine.  Their product beats any software alternative, at least as far as I’m concerned.  And it operates on a donation basis (while you can use it for free, donations are recommended).

If you haven’t already, head on over an check it out.

So, I have removed the ratings and reviews I had for all of the wines.  In the future, I’m going to try to indicate more along the lines of ’love it’, ‘like it’, and ‘not for me’ and talk a bit more about my experience with the wine.

I have a couple of reasons for this, but mainly I don’t want to discredit a good or great wine because I had a poor experience with it.  Another reason is that I have a different experience with a particular wine each time I drink it.  Especially being that I’m no professional, things like what I have for dinner play a significant role in how the wine tastes to me.

Leave a comment if you have any suggestions.