Posts Tagged ‘Fred Swan’

Scenes From A Wine Blogger Tasting

September 30, 2011

9.25.11 was the date, 1pm was the time, Lytton Springs was the place. Wine Bloggers Tasting, Edition III, 2011.

And before I proceed any further, a big Cheers! to Marcy Gordon, whose blog “Come For The Wine” wins the prize for swiftest post-tasting post. You can read it here.

Now, to return to the task at hand. In attendance (you can click each name to visit each writer’s site):

Alison Smith

Amy Cleary

Chiara Shannon

Dave Tong

Deb Kravitz

Fred Swan

Joe Manekin

Marcy Gordon

Martin Redmond

Richard Jennings

Thea Dwelle

And the theme? (There is always a theme!) Small-production, winery-only library wines from the Lytton Springs Estate Vineyards. I’ll let you visit our blogger’s sites to discover the list of offerings, but suffice it to say it was an exquisitely delicious array of wines!

As has been the case on numerous past occasions, my offerings proved not to be the only wines tasted; this time around, the very excellent Richard Jennings brought a surprise treat for everyone to taste …

Not familiar? Not many people are. The vineyard doesn’t actually exist any longer, and even when it did, it didn’t cast much of a shadow; it wasn’t even an acre’s worth of vines (it was located quite near downtown Sonoma), and this was in fact the last vintage that Ridge produced from this property. To see a review of this wine from back in 1992, you can click here, and as to a current review: it was fantastic! I’m not kidding you, this wine was truly, truly, truly, truly delicious; thanks RJ!

And here’s a bit of video from the tasting:

I wish to offer full and sincere gratitude to our guests. This tasting series has been a fantastic success, and so very much of that is due to the caliber of our bloggers; they’re a fascinating and deeply knowledgeable lot, and I encourage you to read them as often as you can.

I also wish to thank everyone at Lytton Springs for all the help and support. Sandy, Jason, Eliot, and Brandye, I simply couldn’t have done this without you, thank you so much! And thank you to Keren and Joany for so commandingly holding down the fort even as I was poaching your co-workers! And special thanks to John Olney (VP of Winemaking, Lytton Springs) and Muiris Griffin (Assistant Winemaker, Lytton Springs) for being so gracious with your time, and allowing our bloggers to share in, and experience firsthand, the excitement of harvest.

If you’re interested in being a guest at an upcoming tasting, please let us know either by commenting on this post, sending a tweet (#RidgeVineyards, @RidgeVineyards) or posting on our Facebook page (facebook.com/RidgeVineyards).

Cheers!

Wine Bloggers Tasting: The Acrostic Anagram Sessions!

December 29, 2010

Greetings all!

So, we’ve just very recently hosted the final Wine Bloggers Tasting of 2010 here at Monte Bello, and as always, it proved to be a delicious, and deliciously entertaining session. Many, many thanks to the bloggers who attended!

Wine Bloggers Tasting #4

With every one of these happenings, one of my tasks is to assemble the roster of wines that we’ll be tasting, and I always try and do this to a theme.

-For Session #1, we tasted exactly the same wines that Robert Parker had just reviewed, to see how the collective Blogger Palate matched up (I included a barrel sample of the ’08 Monte Bello, a five-vintage vertical of post-2000 Monte Bellos, plus the 1996 Monte Bello!) …

-For Session #2, we tasted all limited-production/winery-only Rhone varietal offerings …

-For Session #3 (held at Lytton Springs), we tasted a 10-vintage vertical of Lytton Springs …

So what to do for Session #4? Why, an Acrostic Anagram, of course!

Meaning, I poured an 11-wine flight with no discernible theme. I then explained to the bloggers that each wine’s label contributed one letter (just from the BIG letters, not every bit of fine print text!) to the puzzle. If they could guess the letters, and then get the letters in the right order, they’d find the secret phrase that gave us our theme! Because I poured the wines in the “proper” order for tasting, and not in the order of the letters, it was not only an acrostic, but an acrostic anagram!

Perhaps needless to say, when I explained my plan to a fellow Ridge staffer, I was called “a dork.”

Anyhow, care to play along? Here are the wines I selected, in the order poured:

Buchignani Ranch Carignane

East Bench

Lytton Estate Zinfandel/Primitivo

Geyserville

Nervo

Grenache

Independence School

Old School

Lytton West Syrah

Ridge Monte Bello

Geyserville Essence

Solved it yet? Ok, here’s a hint; as you’ll see below, I’ve bolded the relevant letter from each wine:

Buchignani Ranch Carignane

East Bench

Lytton Estate Zinfandel/Primitivo

Geyserville

Nervo

Grenache

Independence School

Old School

Lytton West Syrah

Ridge Monte Bello

Geyserville Essence

Got it now? No, not BELGNG IOWRE! You have to rearrange the letters! Got it now?

WINE BLOGGER

I am happy to report that Fred Swan, of the very great NorCalWine.com, was the first to successfully blurt out the correct answer. Congratulations Fred!

And lastly, a special thank you to Allan Bree, of the very great GangOfPour.com, for bringing the extraordinary trio of mystery wines we were all so fortunate to taste: 1993, 1994, and 1997 Ridge Vineyards Pagani Ranch Alicante Bouschet! How were they tasting? I think all involved agreed that “pretty” was by far and away the most appropriate descriptor, though I might add delicious, elegant, beautiful, extraordinary, enticing, and vibrant as well! Cheers Allan, that was such a treat!

Alicante Bouschet!

To close, a heartfelt thank you to Ridge Vineyards, all our participating wine bloggers, and everyone out there devotedly writing quality wine blogs; I feel very honored to be a part of both Ridge, and the wine blogger community, and 2010 was an extraordinary year for me in that regard, and for that, I thank you all! I am also very happy to report that we’ll be continuing this event is 2011, so cheers to the coming New Year!

Oh, one more thing, two other posts about this event have already gone up, you can find them here:

RJonWine

WineBookGirl

Enjoy!


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