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mostly wine stuff

mdf

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If it wasn't so foggy, and it wasn't after dark, you could see the Golden Gate Bridge behind my glass. This is a fantastic wine. Preston is one of the original Rhone Rangers. We visited them years ago. We don't usually do repeats, but maybe it is time to go back. Not this trip though, out of days...

This was at Green's Restaurant in Fort Mason, by the way. A superb vegetarian restuarant even if you eat meat (as I do). Had spinach ravioli with mushrooms.
 

mdf

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I'm curious, @mdf , did you guys hit any other wineries?
Of course. But first a couple wrong-headed beer pics. How's this for product placement. .Massachusetts brewery T-shirt with the Golden Gate Bridge in the background. 20170904_172032.jpg
Faction Brewing in Alameda.
The last beer is a blonde stout. That's just wrong.
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mdf

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I'm curious, @mdf , did you guys hit any other wineries?
After faction we went to Brooklyn West also in Alemeda. Mostly forgettable, but an excellent Tempranillo. Nice people and a snazzy tasting room too. Finished at Dashe... not my favorite.

Monday in SF, no wineries. Tuesday Sonoma ... Merriam (good, but went mostly because we met the owner at wine store promo visit and he is a skier), Ferrari-Carrano (way too impressed with themselves), and Fritz (how do wineries with expensive mediocre wine find a following?)

Wednesday Sonoma again, Landmark for the Chardonney tasting (the cheapest one, Overlook, is my favorite but my wife liked one of the higher end ones), Hartford family winery (good Zin, pretty grounds), and Paradise Ridge for "Wines and Sunsets" with a band, food truck, and a boring and flabby $44 zin. Great event though ... excellent view, excellent band. Lnadmark was beautiful too, by the way.

Thursday in Napa, Robert Craig in Napa City while my brother in law visited old friends who own a B&B -- good cab. Then Stag's Leap (not s'). It was as unthrilled as I expected, but we wanted to try one famous place. I could find much better ways to spend $245 on a bottle of wine. Lovely tasting room, though, with floor to ceiling windows overlooking the vines and the hill behind them. Then Hess Collection out in the middle of nowhere on Mt Veeder. Quite good, we bought 3 bottles.

No wineries today.

We are one bottle over our logistical planning. We have two of the styrofoam in a box 3-bottle carriers. Bought a Rockwall, a Brooklyn West, a couple Merrians, a Robert Craig, a Hertford, a Landmark, and had 3 Hess shipped.
 
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Tony S

Tony S

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If it wasn't so foggy, and it wasn't after dark, you could see the Golden Gate Bridge behind my glass. This is a fantastic wine. Preston is one of the original Rhone Rangers. We visited them years ago.

Yup.
 

Tony

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I picked grapes this morning as a volunteer for Satori, my first time doing it for a few years. We picked Zinfandel, really Primitivo as they have four Zin clones. The first 10 rows we picked were if anything too ripe (27 or higher Brix) and the last two rows we moved to were in the mid 20s so they mixed them together and decided to let the rest hang for a few more days to ripen further. It was not very hard work as it had rained a little this morning to knock down the dust and temps stayed cool. We worked from 7:10-9:40 when we took a break for a Bloody Mary, then we continued for almost another hour before stopping for sorting then lunch that featured a couple of their Zins and my wife and my favorite wine from there, Harmonic Convergence - I also like their Cab Franc. See http://satoricellars.com/our_wines_p2/#ps for more details on some of their wines.
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mdf

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Big thanks to you Pugski wine drinkers for the Gruner Veltliner tip!
I'll admit I had forgotten all about it, and you got me curious. So I went looking, and sure enough I had one in the basement!

All the good points of Sauvignon Blanc with none of the grapefruit!

A (nearly) last gasp of summer grilling, Cilantro lime shrimp with zucchini and corn.
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It's a 2008, but it is still very crisp, no signs of age.
 

mdf

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I understand your skepticism, and in fact I put a back-up bottle of chardonnay in the fridge. Now that I think about it, the too-old wines I can remember were all reds that were meant to age but just aged too far.
Maybe acidic whites with no cork to fail really are that stable.
 
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Tony S

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You gotta love it when a $13.99 negociant wine is actually an estate beauty. Hats off to Kermit Lynch AGAIN.

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LKLA

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Any thoughts on how the terrible fires around Napa/Sonoma might impact wine prices, if at all?
 

cantunamunch

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Came across an interesting beastie at the weekend : petit masseng finished dry which of course pushed it to 15%+ This puppy is going make some choice martinis
 

John Webb

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Wind went from 0 to 60mph gusts Mon night Oct 9 in 3 hours from 8 to 11 pm at my house in CA foothills. Never seen anything like it. Started multiple fires
within 10 miles of my house. 2 large ones are still going. 2 more large ones toward Oroville. Sparks were flying up to a mile past fire lines.

Sonoma and Napa wine country got it even worse. Multiple fires up to 20,000 acres to 50000 acres are still going full bore.with almost no containment. At least
3 smaller wineries burned down. Stags Leap has some damage as does Frey.

North Santa Rosa had a complete disaster. Fire burned straight south west thru town wiping out row after row of houses in town Fire burned a Hilton hotel
then jumped the 101 freeway burning a Kmart, restaurants and more neighborhoods. Maybe 1500 buildings total. This fire has 0% containment.
Ca fire list here: https://yubanet.com/Fires/ No school in most of Marin, Napa & Sonoma counties. Raining ash in San Francisco.

Winds were out of NW then SW and calmer till today. Now NW and windy causing more havoc. Can't say the
overextended firefighters didn't try with no notice. They even threw multiple DC-10's and a B-747 fire tanker
on the fires. We're Fine !
 
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Jilly

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I belong to a wine club in Canada. We import wine from Stag's Leap. There is a notice on the Club's FB page it was destroyed.

It's not just the lost of homes in the area, but the lost of livelihood. These wineries were a source of jobs too. Yes they can rebuild, but the vines will take a lot longer. Now there will be a flood of South American products.
 

mdf

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Was it "Stag's Leap" or "Stags' Leap"? They are two different wineries. (I think it was s')

Paradise Ridge, which was a fantastic view and fantastic concert & wine venue, was completely destroyed.
I loved that place, in spite of the "just ok" (by Sonoma standards) wine.
 

LKLA

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Was it "Stag's Leap" or "Stags' Leap"? They are two different wineries. (I think it was s')

Paradise Ridge, which was a fantastic view and fantastic concert & wine venue, was completely destroyed.
I loved that place, in spite of the "just ok" (by Sonoma standards) wine.


It was Stags' Leap Winery -

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Often confused with Stag's Leap Wine Cellars of Cask 23, Fay, SLV and Artemis wines.

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Mendieta

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Frey and Frei are also two different wineries.

Frey burned down.
Frei ,the organic one we like, is still untouched.

It's simply heart breaking. I'll worry about wine prices once the dust settles. Right now it's just a tragedy, and it keeps going. We really need the wind to stop for a few days. Sigh.
 

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