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

• 10 Tariquet Classic Ugni Blanc-Colombard (Cotes de Gascogne): The French down this tropical goodness by the truckload; so should you. $9 B- >>find this wine>>
• 09 La Posta Estela Armando Vineyard Bonarda (Mendoza): Big fruits talking loud over soft-spoken spice, who can’t get word in edgewise $17 B- >>find this wine>>
• 11 Frisk Prickly Riesling (Victoria): A pinch of Muscat Gordo makes for more spritzy fun than ought to be legally allowed in 750ml. $11 B- >>find this wine>>
• 10 Ravines Dry Riesling (Finger Lakes): Lime & grapefruit playfully hitting their stride along the wet rocks, & they’re fun to watch. $17 B >>find this wine>>
• 09 Selbach Fish Label Riesling Dry (Mosel): Citrus steps backward from prev. vintages & stumbles on its own mineral German soils. $16 B- >>find this wine>>
• NV Lamberti Prosecco (Veneto): This fruity quaffer won’t start a firefight w/ your food, but won’t light a fire in your soul, either. $14 B- >>find this wine>>
• 08 Cobb Diane Cobb Coastlands Vineyard Pinot Noir (Sonoma Coast): Oscar-caliber love scene btw bright fruitiness & complex earthiness $78 A- >>find this wine>>
• 02 Laurent-Perrier Brut (Champagne): Van Gogh in a glass- textured & beautifully rendered; give it about 8 more years to really shine $69 A- >>find this wine>>
• NV La Vendemmia Prosecco (Prosecco): Do you like apples? How about I just give you more apple, how do you like them apples, huh?!? $10 C+ >>find this wine>>
• 08 Red Car Syrah (Sonoma County): Juicy berries & peppery, cured bacon apparently aren’t just for breakfast anymore, friends. $45 B+ >>find this wine>>
• 03 Brokenwood ILR Reserve Semillion (Hunter Valley): Makes a nutty, oily, refreshingly compelling case for aging Sem from down under. $20 B+ >>find this wine>>
• 10 Bonny Doon Vineyard Clos de Gilroy Grenache (Central Coast): Violets in her hair, red berries in her hand & leather in her pants. $18 B >>find this wine>>
• 07 Malk Cabernet Sauvignon (Napa Valley): Yeah, it’s basically a bulldog – but it’s a bulldog with friggin’ best-in-show papers! $72 A- >>find this wine>>

When you are parents to an active, creative, inquisitive, overtly-social, never-seems-to-stop-talking-like-EVER toddler, you don’t mess around when it comes to date night.

You’ve got something along the lines of three hours to enjoy dinner, drink wine and indulge in adult conversation. This is not, therefore, a time for risky experimentation. You do not go for totally unknown quantities – you go for ringers.

Which is precisely what I did this week when (a rather harried and child-care-worn) Mrs. Dudette and I hit our fave local Italian joint on date night (if you visit, I’ve got three words for you: Cannelonni di Carne!).

Anyway… I tough week of childcare for Mrs. Dudette inspired me to double-team her ass, vinously-speaking, pulling two such elegant and downright-gorgeous ringers from the “holy-crap-where-am-I-gonna-put-this-stuff”-sized sample pool – a vintage bubbly direct from the area that started it all, followed by one of the brightest stars of the shining Pinot Noir galaxy that is the Sonoma Coast.  Yes, both are flirting with the too-rich-for-my-blood price range, and at least one of them is flirting with where-the-f*ck-can-I-find-a-bottle-of-this-already availability due to its small production, BUT… both are stellar, expressive, beautiful wines, and are well-worth your wine geek time seeking them out. Now, since I’m flirting with stringing-too-many-words-together-with-hyphens territory, let’s get to the real meat on this plate…

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

• 07 Miss Vicky Wine (Fleurie): Lives up to Fleurie’s feminine, flowery nature w/ its sexy, candied red berries & a sprinkle of violets. $18 B >>find this wine>>
• 10 Graff Graacher Himmelreich Riesling Spatlese (Mosel): Citrus, apples & stone fruits FTW! For anything from cheese to spicy Indian. $17 B >>find this wine>>
• 07 Hess Collection Mount Veeder Cabernet Sauvignon (Napa Valley): Blackberry & chocolate are tasty but wrapped up tight (for now…) $48 B+ >>find this wine>>
• 10 Trapiche Varietals Malbec (Mendoza): Enjoyably simple, easy-drinking, raging bargain of a red plum, cherry-filled quaffer. Gulp. $7 B- >>find this wine>>
• 09 Trapiche Broquel Pinot Noir (Mendoza): There are vibrant & silky red berries in here. Somewhere, under all that toasty toasty-ness $15 C+ >>find this wine>>
• 08 Trapiche Oak Cask Malbec (Mendoza): Those oak casks might have had some Funk-tion as well as function. You’d better like em toasty $10 C+ >>find this wine>>
• 08 Trapiche Broquel Malbec (Mendoza): The dark fruit finish is very long. But also very smoky. Lots of oak, but deftly applied. $15 B >>find this wine>>
• 06 Chateau Chevalier Cabernet Sauvignon (Napa Valley): Chocolate & juicy stewed fruit, with sights set squarely on the steakhouse. $24 B >>find this wine>>
• 08 Cru Appellation Series Chardonnay (Santa Lucia Highlands): Lots of complexity for the price. Lots of butterscotch & booze, too. $27 B- >>find this wine>>
• 09 Flowers Camp Meeting Ridge Pinot Noir (Sonoma Coast): A strong case for a Fort Ross AVA. A ways to go, but this horse has legs! $55 A- >>find this wine>>
• 08 Littorai Thieriot Vineyard Pinot Noir (Sonoma Coast): A bit too much heat in here, but this is one GREAT-smelling, spicy kitchen. $70 A- >>find this wine>>
• 09 Littorai Sonoma Coast Pinot Noir (Sonoma Coast): Like cherries & raspberries balanced on top of squares of high-end chocolates. $38 B+ >>find this wine>>
• 10 Littorai Hirsh Vineyard Pinot Noir (Sonoma Coast): Totally comfortable in its own gorgeous, complex & pure coolish-climate skin. $65 A- >>find this wine>>
• 09 Patz And Hall Burnside Vineyard Pinot Noir (Sonoma Coast): Silky, sophisticated & certainly worth your time if you like them rich. $65 B+ >>find this wine>>
• 09 Small Vines MK Vineyard Pinot Noir (Sonoma Coast): For all the charm, we’ve ventured a bit too far into Cola Territory here… $70 B >>find this wine>>
• 09 Freeman Keefer Ranch Pinot Noir (Russian River Valley): Focus focus focus! is the mantra. You’ll wanna focus on the gr8 structure. $40 B+ >>find this wine>>
• 09 Cobb Emmaline Vineyard Pinot Noir (Sonoma Coast): She’s tart, wearing leather & carrying herbs; you just might fall in love w/ her $69 B+ >>find this wine>>
• 10 Grafen Neipperg Lemberger (Wurttemberg): If you want pepper aromas any purer, you’ll need to shop for a grinder at Williams-Sonoma. $21 B >>find this wine>>
• 10 Castell Silvaner Trocken (Franken): Might inspire you to sing Fishbone’s “Lemon Meringue” (or at least queue it up on the iPod). $17 B- >>find this wine>>

Burt Williams might speak softly and have a relatively unassuming appearance, but when it comes to age-worthy, elegant Pinot Noir he is one hundred percent deadly Jedi Knight.

That much was clear during the recent West Of West festival in Occidental, CA (I attended as a media guest), where Littorai’s Ted Lemon interviewed Williams to kick things off.  It was tough for me to pay attention, because a) there were Sonoma Coast Pinots sitting in front of me ranging from `96 to `01, and I was ready to geek out, and b) I found the entire event confusing, because I’m an anal Right Coast guy who requires exposition and purpose stated clearly up-front, and the WoW Fest proceedings launched without much detail on either.

Fortunately, possessing a formal plan is not a prerequisite for making great wine.  In fact, to hear Williams tell it, very little about Sonoma Coast Pinot Noir was planned in the early days when he first starting making Williams Selyem wine in his ‘spare’ time. “We got a call from an ATFA agent,” he mentioned, “who basically told us that we should get bonded before we got arrested; so, we got bonded.”

Williams also told us that “if the wine is balanced… if you pick the fruit before it’s really ripe… I know Sonoma Coast [Pinot Noir] can age!”  Proof is in the vinous pudding: the 1996 Williams Selyem Riverblock Pinot Noir (about $100 if you can find it, and an ‘A’ rated wine if I’ve ever had one) is delicate, earthy and svelte, with cherries, plums, spices and hints of game meat. The finish could accurately be described as gorgeous; it’s a wine that doesn’t smack you over the head, but seduces you.

And it’s in drinking wines like that 1996 Pinot – wines which seem to be made at a more-than-expected frequency in the West Sonoma Coast area – that you say to yourself (if you’re me, anyway): “F*ck Napa Valley Pinot – this is where it’s AT!”…

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