From Podcast Alley:
I really enjoy this blog on the drive home. Then, when I get home, I’m already thinking about characteristics of wine and what I want to drink. Alas, then I should drink whatever was left over from a previous tasting. Thanks!

I can’t think of a greater complement. This is the fuel that keeps me going…

Cheers!

I’m back home after a long weekend in Ontario, California attending the Podcast Expo. I met a ton of podcasters and had a great time, some of which I will talk about here once I get some rest… resuming normal blogging and podcasting tomorrow.

Hot on the heels of Fatemeh’s write-up of WBW 15, Derrick across town at An Obsession with Food has posted the theme to December’s wine blogging event: Judge a Bottle By Its Cover. Instead of consulting the critics or our wine merchants for the best bottle we can find that fits the theme, Derrick is encouraging us to pick up any wine with a label that attracts us. I’m going to limit myself to wines and producers I have never tasted before to make this a bit more interesting. So join us on December 7th and see if great wine lives behind those beautiful labels.

Fatemeh over at Gastronomie has started to post the results of Wine Blogging Wednesday 15. A very interesting bunch of wines from producers you don’t run into everyday. It will not be very long until the host of WBW 16 posts the theme for December… stay tuned.

Cline Cellars, “Ancient Vines”, Mourvedre, Contra Costa County 2003 ($12) - Garnet in color with plum, black pepper and vanilla aromas; jammy blueberry and plum fruit flavors with spice and silky tannins finishing with a rich, thick mouthfeel. A very good example of this Rhone varietal and a great value. Score: 8.5/10

Karly Winery, “Buck’s Ten Point”, Zinfandel, Amador County 1999 ($18/now sold out) - From the personal stock of listener Darrel. Made by an artisan producer in one of my favorite parts of my native state, the Amador County. Medium ruby in color with raspberry and strawberry aromas; jammy boysenberry fruit and soft tannins make for some easy drinking Zin. A wine with plenty of fruit left now, but makes me want to try the 2003 vintage for comparison. Finished with a plastic cork that has protected this wine well. Score: 8/10

Thanks for sharing, Darrel!

One of the great side benefits of this podcast and blog is that from time to time listeners share some of their wines with me. This wine was sent to me this summer by Ethan from The Vision Thing blog and I forgot to post my notes here. So here they are:

Chateau aux Arc, “Altage” Reserve, Altus, Arkansas 2002 - A mysterious blend of white varieties with only Chardonnay disclosed on the back label. Further investigation found that Kerner, Muller-Thurgau, Scheurebe, Oraniensteiner, Vignoles, and Vidal are also grown at the winery and presumably in the blend. Light straw in color, aromas of pear, honey, minerals; nutty pear, green apple and mineral flavors with the an off-dry finish that is slightly bitter and acidic. An interesting wine from a state you don’t expect fine wine to be made in. Score: 7.5/10

Thanks, again, Ethan for the vino and I am looking forward to checking out other wines from Arkansas in the future.

It’s been a busy fall for me and I have fallen behind in my blogging, but a couple of weeks ago I was informed that Winecast was selected as one of the Top 10 Sources for wine reviews by the folks over at TopTenSources.com. I am honored to be in the same feed as Alder from Vinography, Andrew from Spittoon, Beau from Basic Juice and Stephen from Professor Bainbridge, all blogs I read daily and inspire me to make my work here better. It’s also good to see others I equally find essential reading and listening in other categories, such as Tom’s FERMENTATION and Grape Radio in Wine News and Commentary and Carrie’s Ultimate California Wine Blog and Lenn’s LENNDEVOURS in the Regional Wine category. A number of other great blogs are also listed, some of which I will be adding to my aggregator.

Thanks again to the people behind TopTenSources.com for the recognition.

Even though my pod buddy Chuck objects with the name, I’ve released my first video podcast on its own feed and at the bottom of this post. After Googling a bit, I’ve decided to call my videos, “vcast’s”, which I hope Chuck thinks is OK.

If not for the great post-production from my son Steven, I might not have released this video. While it is cool to watch yourself on an iPod, I don’t think the virtual tasting works on video, or even on the audio podcast, so this is my swan song for the format. Future videos will have their own structure, not connected with the audio podcast. Hope you like this, anyway.

The theme for this month’s edition of Wine Blogging Wednesday is provided by food blogger Fatemeh of Gastronomie who challenged us to pick up a wine that was made in a batch of less than 250 cases. As fate would have it, the day this theme was announced I received a sample from a small winery for an upcoming show on Sangiovese. The wine was made in a garage in a batch of just 84 cases, so I took this as a sign that this wine was meant to be featured this month. The fact that it came from a winery that donates their profits to charity sealed the deal. So, for the first time since I started participating in this event, I will feature just one wine: Humanitas, L’Huile du Garagiste; a non-vintage red blend of Sangiovese and Cabernet Sauvignon made from Napa Valley fruit. A sort of Super Tuscan, California-style.

The bottle is quite distinctive with the first U.S. commercial application of the Australian Zork closure that appears to be almost like a wax seal on the top. After peeling back the plastic, it took a bit of work to get the closure off the bottle, but it was much better than a recent experience I had with a synthetic cork in a Chilean Carmenere. So here are my tasting notes for this unique wine:

Humanitas, L’Huile du Garagiste, Napa Valley NV ($30/received as a sample) - Deep ruby in color with complex aromas of raspberry, white pepper and earth; bright raspberry and black pepper flavors combine with noticeable, but supple, tannins and a long finish. A nice balance between the fruit and tannin makes this a delicious wine now and one I will age for another few years to see what develops. Score: 9/10

I found this to be a very individualistic wine and wanted to get a bit more background on the winery and the winemaker, so I interviewed Judd Wallenbrock the winemaker, proprietor and head bottle washer of Humanitas. If you listen to the podcast, you will hear our conversation about this wine and his cause. I have placed an order for more of this wine and encourage you to check it out yourself. It is not often that we can combine our passion for wine and charity at the same time.

Thanks again to Fatemeh of the Gastronomie blog for a great theme and for Judd to spend a part of his day with me today. I’m looking forward to the last WBW of 2005 next month.

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Copyright 2005 Tim Elliott. Licensed to the public under http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

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