Archive for January, 2010

Monte Bello Flies The Freak Flag! Plus, Cab Santa Cruz At 16 Years!

January 18, 2010

GREAT post on the 1993 Santa Cruz Mountains Cabernet to be found over at Wine Think, a wine blog very much worth checking in on; for this review, and more. Of particular note is a wonderful feature on the site, a Wine and Food Pairing Search. As but two examples of the charming efficacy of this particular engine:

1) I was speaking with two great friends yesterday, a husband and wife, about many things culinary, and they shared some tales about their recent experiments with Raclette, a rather imposing cheese (and a rather imposing dish featuring said cheese!); and accordingly, I’ve had Raclette on the brain ever since.

So, on a whim, I took the Wine and Food Pairing Search to task, and was able to locate Raclette on the Pairing Search’s pull-down filters; almost instantaneously, I was offered two astonishingly unique suggestions:

Passetoutgrains: a blend of Gamay and Pinot Noir from Burgundy

Dôle: Switzerlands answer to Passetoutgrains, a juicy blend of Pinot Noir and Gamay

Excellent!

2) My missus and I have been discussing asparagus quite often of late, as our 13-month-old baby girl has recently emerged to claim her throne in the kingdom of asparagus appreciation, and as is inevitably the case in our home, any discussion of any food item is usually accompanied by discussions of wine, so again on a whim, I tossed asparagus into the Wine and Food Pairing Search, and was delighted to receive Muscat and Gruner Veltliner as suggestions. Wonderful!

So, all that said, I encourage you to read the very positive review of the 1993 Santa Cruz Mountains, as well as some interesting, if not altogether factually spot-on, thoughts on Monte Bello, and to take advantage of the resource that is the Wine and Food Pairing Search.

Cheers!

Contemporary Tasting Notes On Multiple Monte Bellos!

January 11, 2010

If you’re interested in perusing an interesting and contemporary set of tasting notes on Monte Bello vintages from 1992, 1994, and 1996, you can take a virtual stroll over to the Spirit of ’76 website and have a read; the notes are posted here: 

Monte Bello Vintage Pack 

And for a very nice summary, in tasting note form, of an event hosted by Paul Draper at Mirabelle restaurant in Austin, in which the 90, 91, 92, and 03 vintages of Monte Bello were tasted (along with several other Ridge offerings), check out: 

The Good Taste Report 

And definitely take a trip over to Vine Arts for a look at their Top Wines of the Year, which happens to include some lovely comments about the 2005, the 1996, and the 1987 vintages. Here is the post: 

2009 Year In Review 

And here’s another year-end summary of wines in 2009, featuring the 2005 Monte Bello, written by Geoff Last for the Calgary Herald: 

Top Ten Wines of 2009 

And lastly, head over to our friends at Slaked for notes on the 1984! 

SLAKED!  

Cheers!

TasteLive! Video, Tasting Notes, & More!

January 10, 2010

Were you in attendance for last night’s TasteLive! event, either virtually or physically? If not, you can see a bit of video shot by an attendee at Lytton Springs (one Erik Hwang) right here! Thanks Erik!

And for some great tasting notes from the event, check out RJ’s Wine Blog!

Ridge Vineyards and TasteLive!

January 9, 2010

Some very exciting developments afoot in the Ridge tasting rooms! To ring in the New Year (and the new decade!) we are seriously upping the ante with our first After-Hours Member Event of The Tens; not only will legendary cheese-makers Cowgirl Creamery be in attendance at Monte Bello, but both tasting rooms will become TasteLive! epicenters for the night!

Not familiar with how the TasteLive! phenomenon plays out? Essentially, it’s a virtual way to taste wines and share perspectives with an on-line community of like-minded oenophiles. Here’s the specs from our Events page:

January After Hours and TasteLive! event
January 9th 5-7pm PST
Monte Bello Tasting Room (Cupertino) Lytton Springs Tasting Room (Healdsburg)

Join us for our first After Hours of 2010 with an opportunity to pick up the latest ATP offering: the 2006 Zinfandel Caboose from the Nervo Vineyard. We will also taste the 2007 Chardonnay Santa Cruz Mountains Estate, the 2007 Carignane Buchignani Ranch and the 2007 Lytton Springs.

At the Monte Bello tasting room we welcome Cowgirl Creamery with several enticing offerings. Cowgirl Creamery began in 1997 with the goal to create farmstead quality cheese on a small scale production, much like fine quality wine. Ridge stands firm on having a respect for the land our grapes are grown on. We support local artisans whose products have a sense of place and share our ecological values.

At both tasting rooms we will introduce a new way to taste wines together and launch our TasteLive page. While we taste through the wines live in the tasting rooms you are encouraged to tweet while you taste with other Ridge fans in the Virtual Ridge Tasting Room online. Can’t make it to the event in person? Taste along with us at www.tastelive.com/ridgevineyards. Once you create your free account with TasteLive you can post your tasting notes and questions directly onto our page and see what others have to say!

Following the conversation is easy– You can either log onto http://www.tastelive.com/ridgevineyards (do this before the event starts) and follow and tweet from there, or just mark / tag your tweets with the hashtag #ridgewines . Then follow the tag on your twitter application of choice.

To purchase the wines and taste along at home, please choose from the following TasteLive! kit: TasteLive! Kit MEMBER – $133 or TasteLive! Kit NON-MEMBER – $103

See you at Monte Bello, see you at Lytton Springs, and see you on TasteLive!

The Fog!

January 4, 2010

In 1980, The Fog looked like this:

And on the second day of the new decade that is and will be The Tens, way up on Monte Bello, at around 10am, The Fog looked like this:

And by about 3pm in the afternoon, The Fog looked like this:

And at night, getting ready to leave, staring at through our old barn window, it looked like this:

And while locking up the gate, gazing back through the fence, past the ol’ welcome sign, it looked like this:

And driving home down the mountain, it looked like this:

The Fog. Monte Bello. The Tens.


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