Vinifico! The Original Vancouver Wine Blog

This is the second time I’ve picked this wine up from Kitsilano Wine Cellars in the last while… and I wanted to write it up because it’s quite the unique drop of juice.

Normally, when I think of (or drink) a Sauvignon Blanc, I think crisp, grassy and fruity with a mineral edge. This is a completely different SB. Instead of the usual grassy acidity, it’s got a load of honey-soaked wheat flavour followed by a medium-long and earthy finish that is full-bodied and a bit hot (it’s carrying 14.5% booze). Overall, it is really tasty and pretty well-balanced.

Do I like it? Hell yeah. It’s a tasty bottle of wine and is completely different from the usual Sauvignon Blanc – in a good way.

$26 at Kitsilano Wine Cellars.

Carmenère is an interesting grape. It started out as primarily a blending grape in France, but kinda’ fell out of favour… until the folks in Chile recently started putting it into a starring role. Folks down there like Errazuriz and these folks really do it justice.

And what’s this wine like? Well, it’s a jammy mix of ripe juicy plums and dark berries as well as some coffee and tobacco, which finishes with a slightly earthy edge – that pretty much sums up both the nose and the flavours.

What I’d really like to note is how this wine explodes in the mouth with its ripe fruit and coffee flavours Wow. It’s like sitting on a patio with a waft of cigar smoke while enjoying a mouthful of black cherry and blackberry juice followed by a sip of espresso. Yum.

Kirk at Kitsilano Wine Cellars pointed me toward this wine. Thanks Kirk!

Great stuff for the money.

$23 at Kitsilano Wine Cellars.

Even though I’ve been writing this site for over 2 years, I’ve never taken part in Wine Blogging Wednesday. So, when I read that Petite Sirah was the focus of WBW #40, I decided to finally bite the bullet… Thing is, I’ve always had a soft spot for Petite Sirah. It’s often used as a blending grape in many of my favourite Zinfandels and blends to add colour and depth and can occasionally be outstanding on its own. A couple of the best I’ve had were on visits to Napa at Ridge Vineyards in Sonoma and at Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars (when they were still making their delicious take on the grape). In other parts of the world, it’s also known as the Durif grape.

A while back, I reviewed the tasty Concannon Petite Sirah, but haven’t had a 100% version of the wine since… Well, WBW #40 made me change that… and I’m all for change when it comes to what I’m tasting.

I wandered into a downtown specialty LDB store today, briefly considered the 2004 Stag’s Leap Winery Petite Sirah (not to be confused with Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars), but was looking for something more in the $20 – 40 CDN range. I settled on the 2004 Carmen Reserve Petite Sirah, took it home opened it, gave it a few hours to breathe… and now I’m sipping.

It’s a 100% Petite Sirah from the Maipo Valley region of Chile. In the glass it’s an inky purple-red, with a nose that smells like it looks. For lack of a better word, it smells “purple” – there’s licorice, violets, dark berries, dark chocolate and a distinct vanilla edge from the new French oak barrels in which the wine was aged. A big ‘ol sip gives up juicy licorice-edged dark berries, that dark chocolate and a distinctly spicy and vanilla-edged finish. It’s carrying 14% booze, but does so nicely… there’s no “hot” edge to the wine.

I really like this wine. It doesn’t blow my mind, but it’s a bloody tasty drop for the moolah. My usual judgment is whether I’d buy a wine again… and yep, I would.

OK, so I might be posting a few hours early (on the West coast), but it’s already Wednesday in many places.

$29 at LDB stores here in BC.

When I was given this wine as a sample, I was pretty cynical… I can’t remember the last time I had a red wine at this price that I enjoyed at all. Well folks, this is pretty damn good for the money.

I’ll get right down to it. Yep, it’s red and is a blend of 60% Cabernet Sauvignon and 40% Shiraz… with a nose that gives up a bunch of dark cherry, chocolate and cassis. A juicy sip shows all that dark fruit, with a meaty and coffee-edged mint finish. It’s just tasty.

I had it tonight with a couple of lamb sausages from Oyama in the Granville Island Public Market. Toss in some Tarragon roasted potatoes and grilled red peppers and you’ve got a wine and food match that works it, folks.

This is a great value red wine.

$13.99 at LDB stores here in BC.

On my trip to the big city (downtown) this weekend, Sean and I made a quick stop at Kitsilano Wine Cellars and I picked this up on recommendation from Matt. We discussed the thoughts of pairing this one with nice steak, but after a particularly nasty meal at the local Moxie’s (don’t ask me what I was thinking) last night, I figured I was due for a nice glass once I got home.

This was a nice pick-me-up for sure. There was nice tart blueberry on the first swirl, a bit of heat and some brown sugar – a good start. More blueberry and some savoury spice filled my mouth as I sat, my post meal mood rapidly improving. The finish had nice tight, chalky tannins and a little more heat. Tastes like another glass.

Plain and simple, I like this wine. I would say a GOOD steak would certainly be a fantastic accompaniment, however good old breaths of air paired nicely for me. I was certainly happier after a couple of glasses of this one.

~$23 at Kitsilano Wine Cellars.

Wow… I’m just getting over one of those annoying Autumn colds and can finally taste wine again (thank GOD!). I missed it.

OK, so I grabbed this at Kitsilano Wine Cellars last week and had been looking forward to quaffing it. What a tasty welcome back to wine. It tastes a lot like a decent Oregon Pinot, at a (somewhat) fraction of the price.

The colour is a medium red, with a juicy nose that pushes out vanilla, berry, cherries and cranberry fruit… with a bit of heat (it has 14% booze). The flavours are a great combination of vanilla, berry, cherry, pepper and herbal notes… bloody tasty stuff. It has layers and layers and a finish that lasts for a while.

I loved this wine, especially for the money – It’s a fantastic value.

$29.90 at Kitsilano Wine Cellars here in Vancouver.

I love Viognier of all styles as the range is quite broad and interesting. Recently I have had a couple of bottles of the 2006 La Frenz offering and liked it, but I was looking for something without the residual sweetness that characterizes La Frenz’s Viognier.

I chose this one based on some of the samples from Anakena I had tasted at previous festivals. This is really tasty, and would complement shellfish amazingly.

The first sniff showed tasty peach and apricot with some toasty oak overtones. A couple of healthy sips and my mouth was full of some nice citrus zest and some melon to boot. The finish was soft, dry and toasty, leading me to think, “mmmm… grilled scallops with lemon and cracked chilies“. Good stuff.

$19.99 at private wine shops here in Vancouver.

For the past few weeks, Tuesday night has turned into sushi night (from KOKO Japanese Restaurant on East Hastings here in Vancouver – if you’ve never been, you have to go; it’s been in the same family for 25 years and the quality is GREAT… thanks to my friend Erin for introducing me to it!). I pick up the food, bring it home and we have it with a bottle of wine. I’m liking this new ritual.

Anyhoo… what the sushi calls for is a wine that matches well with the fish, but it also runs into our personal desire(s) to have it grab us by our taste buds and make us buy it again. Although this wine was decent, it’s not one that we’ll be buying again anytime soon.

It has the regular SB pale, almost clear straw yellow colour. Its nose is actually the best part of the experience – it shows a tonne of citrus and tropical fruit as well as a bit of heat from the 14% booze.

It’s when the wine reaches your mouth that it disappoints… it just lacks that certain “oomph” at which the nose hinted. There is the mineral-laced fruit and a nice honey-tinged finish, but the wine lacked that middle structure – the zip and zing that the best Sauvignon Blancs have.

It is good, but there are a lot of other SB’s I’d rather be pairing with my meals. For the money, I’m still all over the 2006 Babich or the Brumont Gros Manseng-Sauvignon (I have to review the 2006 here soon).

$20 at Kitsilano Wine Cellars.

Sean’s been on a Pinot roll of late, so I thought I’d add to the mix with one that can only be described as surprising.

We first tasted this one during out WSET II course and all but two of the twenty-four in the room picked this one over a $60 Domain Drouhin Pinot in a blind tasting. This is one of those wines that temporarily makes you questions your palate for a second before jumping up and rushing to the store to buy all they have.

Plain and simple, this is a delicious glass of wine with absolutely astonishing value. The first swirl is full of ripe cherry and strawberry with a bit of green stalk. As soon as it hits your tongue, you get more cherry, some earth minerality and great light acidity and toasty pepper through the finish. In general this wine is nicely balanced straightforward and just darn tasty.

Get past the rather purple sparkly 80′s styling on the label and the fact that Chile isn’t a Pinot grower of renown and grab some of this. Summer beckons.

$13.56 at local liquor stores (imagine this would be $5-$6 in the US)

Chilean Zinfandel – now that’s a little different. However given the great wines coming from Chile of late, I thought: “let’s try it.”

The wine is a blend of 85% Zinfandel and 15% Shiraz. It’s deep and dark in colour with a tobacco leaf and briar nose. Nice start. From there the wine was interesting, yet not overwhelming. A body of plum, blueberry and a bit of date in the mouth which reflected the influence of both grapes. As the evening went on, the finish remained a little boozy with some raisin and soft oak, but brief.

Not bad on the whole. In general the fruit was pleasant, with the short finish being really the only slight drawback. This is another nice value.

$14.99 at Liberty Wine Merchants