So, like, what is this stuff, anyway?
I taste a bunch-o-wine (technical term for more than most people). So each week, I share some of my wine reviews (mostly from samples) and tasting notes with you via twitter (limited to 140 characters). They are meant to be quirky, fun, and easily-digestible reviews of currently available wines. Below is a wrap-up of those twitter wine reviews from the past week (click here for the skinny on how to read them), along with links to help you find these wines, so that you can try them for yourself. Cheers!

• 08 Rudolf Furst R Centgrafenberg Spatburgunder Grosses Gewachs (Franken): Pinot centered Zen-like, to carry itself many years hence. $110 A- >>find this wine<<
• NV Berlucchi Cuvee 61 Rose (Franciacorta): Sweet & savory biscuits flecked with strawberries & cherries. And Yeah, we said flecked. $22 B+ >>find this wine<<
• 05 Smith-Madrone Cabernet Sauvignon (Spring Mountain District): The kind of austerity measure that we should all be getting behind. $40 B+ >>find this wine<<
• 10 Trapiche Iscay Syrah Viognier (Mendoza): For those who dig that everything is bigger in Texas, because everything is *bigger* here $50 B+ >>find this wine<<
• 08 Trapiche Iscay Malbec Cabernet Franc (Mendoza): Rocks, silky richness, taught structure, all screaming Focus, Focus, Focus! $50 A- >>find this wine<<
• 12 Trapiche Pure Malbec (Uco valley): No wood, just spicy berry that gives a respectful nod to France before partying Argentine style. $18 B >>find this wine<<
• 11 Trapiche Oak Case Pinot Noir (Mendoza): Comes on bright, smooth, strong, and smoking, and leaves just when things get interesting. $10 B- >>find this wine<<
• 10 Zuccardi Zeta (Uco Valley): Begrudgingly shows off grit, softness, herbs & dark fruit; for now, hanging the Do Not Disturb sign. $45 B+ >>find this wine<<
• 11 Zuccardi Emma Bonarda (Mendoza): Elegant Bonarda? Really? Well, this is pretty much a primer on how it ought to be done, people. $35 B+ >>find this wine<<
• 11 Zuccardi Serie A Bonarda (Santa Rosa): Hanging on to the meaty, red-plummy juiciness, and letting go of the astringent structure. $15 B >>find this wine<<
• 11 Zuccardi Serie A Torrontes (Salta): Long on green fields of white flowers, and on displays of soulful, energetic character. $15 B >>find this wine<<
• 09 Familia Zuccardi Aluvional La Consulta Malbec (Mendoza): Like a gaucho who once apprenticed with The World's Most Interesting Man. $80 A- >>find this wine<<
• 12 Claypool Cellars CC Pachyderm Pinot Noir Rose (Russian River Valley): Cherry, peach, roses &… dang, somebody's getting serious! $NA B+ >>find this wine<<
• 10 Tenuta San Guido Le Difese (Toscana): It's gonna be bright, bright – and spicy – sunshiney, pasta-with-red-meat-sauce meal… $35 B+ >>find this wine<<
• 09 Chateau Mont-Redon Blanc (Chateauneuf-du-Pape): Just when it hit me somebody turned round & shouted Play that funky music whiteboy $35 B+ >>find this wine<<

Merced del Estero, in the über-sunny San Juan region of Argentina, has been tending vineyards under the care of the familia Rodriguez  for three generations, since 1897.

But it took me just one iteration of the annual

Argentina Wine Awards to help screw them up a little bit.

MdE was one of the producer visit stops for a group of about half of AWA judges that followed the awards judging, seminar and winners’ gala in February. It was also one of the most unassuming – twelve hectares of estate vineyards, west of the Tulum Valley, close enough to the Andes to be impacted by the hot sonda winds, and sitting about 700 meters above sea level (which sounds impressive, but that’s about average for a lot of fine wine grapegrowing in the high elevation dessert of Argentina).

The first thing that you notice about the Rodriguez family vineyards – if you’re a geek like me, I mean – is that many of the vines are trained in pergolas, reaching fairly high off the ground. The second thing you’ll notice is that the Bonarda (planned to be introduced to the MdE lineup this year) on the sunnier, exposed areas of the pergola are practically… raisins.

Which you’d resemble, too, if you were openly exposed to that punishing sun for as long as they are…

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Welcome to the Weekly Wine Quiz!

This week, we are finishing up the series of questions focusing on Argentine wine (I’ve recently returned from a two week jaunt down there to judge in the 2013 Argentina Wine Awards), all of which originally appeared in the newsletter The Juice. And we’re ending our S. American run with a tricky one… which red wine grape rules Argentina?

What is Argentina’s most-planted red wine grape?

A.  Malbec

B.  Bonarda

C.  Cabernet Sauvignon

D.  Merlot

E.  Tempranillo

Cheers – and good luck!

Last month, I was away in Mendoza playing Team America as an International judge in the 2013 Argentina Wine Awards. The AWAs were followed by a seminar that centered on the topic of how to reach “next generation” (Millennial) wine consumers. Today, I’m going to focus on the Trophy results of the AWAs – but believe me, a lot more is coming on the seminar and the topic of Millennial wine drinkers (including thoughts on the wines that my co-judges believed appealed to those next gen drinkers) later.

I’ve two main takeaways from the 2013 AWAs, which are organized by Wines of Argentina (who footed the bill for my participation) and Hunt & Cody (a UK-based team consisting of MW Jane Hunt and Tina Cody):

1) I was self-conscious just to be in the same room as the rest of the judges, all of whom I felt outranked me in terms of tasting prowess, winemaking knowledge and industry accomplishments (I feel privileged to have made fast friends with many of them), and

2) If you try to taste thirteen Gold Medal winning Malbecs in only a few minutes and rank them in order of preference so that a Trophy winner can be determined, you will destroy your palate’s ability to taste anything (including coffee, tea, air, water and, I suspect, crude oil) for several minutes afterward.

The entire process of judging was incredibly fun (despite being shut up in a large conference room in the Diplomatic hotel while the sun was raging all Summer-style outside our windows), and enjoyed seeing the different tolerances we all had as tasters. For example, the UK judges putting up with more Brett (having ben schooled on Old World / Western European wines), the Chinese judge having a higher tolerance for oxidation (because so much international wine reaches her only after it’s been impacted by oxygen), the Argentine winemaking judges almost universally accepting high levels of VA (sought after to smooth out the mouthfeel of those tersely tannic Malbecs).

As for yours truly, receiving boatloads of California samples has taken its toll: I clearly had higher tolerances for oak influences and riper fruits. Sigh…

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