Let's talk about wine.
What're you drinking? I'm currently drinking the Hahn GSM Blend from 2012. It's okay for a $14 red.
I just picked up a few bottles of this for a little get together this weekend. It's one of the better bottles I've ever had. I'm a big fan of Washington reds.
Got an 18 y/o french red for christmas from a family friend, holy shit Ive never tasted something so mellow and mature. Found some 8y/o red for less than 10€, but it was just....strong, thick, heavy.
Not really a wine person though, I dont follow the brands. I mix 2 parts budget (NOT the cheapest) prosecco with 1 part OJ. Perfect sipper, great buzz, no hangovers.
how about some josef chromy chardonnay 2014 bitches!
>>7364544
Anybody else enjoy yourself some gas station wine? A Speedway near me has this 2014 Chardonnay that's not bad.
>>7365116
I only buy expensive wine at the weekend. during the week a convenience store cheap bottle does the trick.
this is amazing for the price. I used to be snobbish about screw-top bottles but there are some good bargains you miss.
>>7365132
>being so poor as to purchase chinese knockoff wine
>>7365201
>france in charge of knowing about french wine
Got a bottle of this yesterday. It's got a faint amount of fizz and at the recommended temperature (55 F) it reminds me of a cross between a normal piedmont red and a dry lambrusco.
Lambrusco. Rex Goliath is mighty good, but it's hard to find more than that and Riunite, which is also great, but I'd like to try more varieties. I might have to actually go talk to the dude at liquor barn. I wonder if Trader Joes has a lambrusco? sigh.
>>7365335
You can get Roscato. It's a lambrusco disguised as a sweet red. Alot of stores have it because its served at olive garden.
>>7364544
>drinking right now
A bottle of Domaine des Hauts Chassis white Crozes Hermitage. I prefer reds generally but I definitely pick wines to go with food generally and I cooked sablefish last night. It's really nice.
Looking forward to opening the bottle of Serego Allighieri amarone I've got stored away.
What do you guys recommend for a 50-100$ red that'll be easy to find?
>>7366683
wat
Why would you need a red so expensive?
>>7366696
Maybe he wants it as a gift. The cash value of a gift has real symbolic significance as much as some people would like to think otherwise.
>>7366683
If you want it as a gift, many of the classic recognizable Napa cabernets (Montelena, Stags Leap, etc) fall in that price range. Anyone who likes wine should appreciate something like that, even if they pretend to only like old world because of reasons.
If you're going to drink it yourself, I agree with the other guy that you're wasting your money. Even if you live somewhere that has a shit wine selection like the midwest US, there are some (not many) perfectly reasonable wines available for under $40 as long as you're not buying your wine at the gas station or trader joe's. If you live somewhere that has a good selection you could get good wines for pretty close to $10 if you know what you're doing.
>>7366683
Don't spend the money. But if you want a nice gift like the other anon said, I'd go Caymus. It's easy to drink and recognizable. I used to work at a wine store and this was always one of the best sellers during the holidays
I've finally gotten into wine. Holy shit, I've been missing so much.
>tfw enjoy trying different wines now and seeing how different they taste from each other
Is costco a good source for wine? what brands to look for?
>>7366843
Different regions have developed their regional grapes to expert levels. I turned my nose up at Michigan wine when I moved from the southwest. But I tried it and it was grand. I did a bit of research and learned they perfected a well established grape to thrive in the Michigan temperate weather.
So be sure to try as many regions as you can.
>>7364544
Picked this up two days in a row. Very good for the price. Strange thing is, I have not slept in 30+ hours but I swear I don't feel any fatigue whatsoever which is bizarre because usually I'd pass out by now.
I know /ck/ isn't a blog, but god damn I am at the lowest point in my life that I've ever been at. I am most definitely a borderline alcoholic. Been digging into my savings and getting drunk like 4 times a week at least.
My friend got pulled over yesterday and got charged with DUI with refusal. He blew in the breathalyzer and did the field tests but refused blood sample because he hates needles. Any advice?
>>7366929
Get a lawyer.
>>7366683
Don't listen to all these poorfags and cheapfags.
If you want easy to find... probably a Silver Oak cab. But there are better out there in that price range but difficult to find.
Really, you need to stop by a wine shop (not a liquor store!) and find out what they recommend.
>>7366683
It would help to know what kind of red varietals you enjoy. At this price I might suggest getting a Syrah or a good Zinfandel over cabernet as you're going to get a higher quality wine for your dollar. Robert Craig is great. If you really want cab, look into Mark Herold wines, specifically Kamen Estate. Otherwise >>7366990 recommendation for Silver Oak is great, I prefer their Alexander Valley Cab over Napa. There are tons of others though, go to a wine shop and see what they keep in stock, they usually keep a lot of the same bottles.
>>7366875
That's where my dad gets it. It depends on what you like, he buys a fuck ton of Rombauer from there, but it's going to vary state by state what's available.
>>7366843
Welcome! What regions have you been preferring lately?
>>7366929
Wrong thread, ask in /adv/
>>7367138
I actually don't know, but I think I've really been enjoying California lately.
Also, I was in Barbacco in SF a week ago, and they paired some lasagna I ordered with a great red. I wish I could remember what the name was.
>>7367155
You can always try calling to find out, but I bet it was an Italian wine they paired with it.
Have you been trying any specific appellations? That started helping me define what I was enjoying in the wine and why in addition to helping you find new wines to enjoy from those regions. What have you been drinking?
Also, anyone here using delectable or vivino?
>>7367218
I used vivino until last fall when their latest update made it completely unusable (camera works normally when used in camera mode, but vivino takes over and it goes out of focus like crazy and can't into light balance)
They keep pushing updates that will supposedly fix it for real this time, but about three months of that and I just gave up and uninstalled it.
>>7367138
>Romabuer
Your dad is a MILF?
>>7367218
I'm pretty sure it was an Italian wine, but I'll just ask my friend about it.
I haven't actually, that's a great idea. Thanks, man. I've just been drinking a lot of pinot noirs, I don't know their names though.
>>7366929
get a lawyer, shit'll get gropped, a brethalyzer was plent of cooperation, and doing more is just the popo fishing for shit, but a public defender will screw your friend over with something like a three thousand dollar fine, two years probation, and community service
This is my new favorite, the cab is pretty good but the blend is the best.
I've been wanting to get in wine, but I don't know what do.
I just buy sawmill creek red/white wine for cooking, and I don't even know if that is acceptable.
Is any recommendations for a wine retard? At least some decent wine for cooking as I know jack shit?
>>7367310
If you want to learn more about wine focus more on small producers that respect regional styles and varietal character.
Cute animal international wines tend to blend the fuck out of their wines and use adjuncts and adulterants to turn everything into something that will appeal to your average neanderthal. Not that there is anything wrong with blending per se but if you want to know what pinot noir tastes like, for instance, you're not going to find out by buying rex goliath ''''pinot noir''''.
>>7367318
Huh, I guess I have to go further than visiting wine rack in a super market.
I'm guessing wine flavors will cause huge impact when making reduction sauces? Would I need to go as far as using local, unique wines?
>>7364544
Im drinking PBR
I also study viticulture at uc davis
>>7365393
I sell so much of this at the LC I work at. Only the trashy "Olive Garden is fancy eatin" crowd and black people buy this.
>>7365824
We need to hang out.
>>7367399
not if you intend to heat the wine at all. Buy something relatively cheap as you will cook out a lot of the flavor when you heat it anyways.
>>7368156
But not too cheap, I've ruined food by going for the bottom shelf stuff. Best to have a cheap wine you've tasted and trust and go to that one when you cook.
>>7368151
I'm not familiar with that particular lambrusco, and I haven't been to an olive garden in maybe 20 years, but it sounds like wine trends from the 70s and 80s are still playing out in flyover land. I imagine riesling is considered embarrassing, and chianti is crappy wine that comes in baskets? No doubt even the provocative new "anything but chardonnay" fad will come your way soon, maybe by the end of this decade.
Here in non-bizarro-land, lambrusco had a brief period of hipness in the 2000s around the time people were rediscovering rose, although most people have gotten over it by now. But it was mostly white hipsters under 35 who were getting excited over it.
Except it's a 2002.
>>7364544
Franzia Delicious Red master race
best wine, italy or french?
have u ever southafrican wine?it was a surprise
>>7369395
Most wine is good. I don't really like ones from South America though for whatever reason. They're not bad but not tremendously good either. I stick to a lot of stuff from California simply because it's cheaper but you typically have to pay a premium for French wines.
>>7369395
>>7369438
Inexpensive wine from California and inexpensive wine from Argenitina/Chile/South Africa/Australia/New Zealand is all pretty much in the same boat and they follow the same bland principles.
Half the time they don't even taste like the name of the grape printed on the bottle. I dunno if it's like they're talking the shittiest quality grapes and the only way to make it drinkable is by the oenological equivalent of a South Korean plastic surgery mill, or if they could have actually made it taste like that grape but they realized nobody who buys the stuff knows what that grape really tastes like or if they did, they wouldn't want it in the first place except that so-and-so said that grape was all the rage these days.
Either way it's terrible and there's no reason to drink a bottle of Concha y Toro or Turning Leaf when there's tons of reasonably priced high quality and interesting wines from the less prestigious parts of France, Italy, or even Germany, Greece, Spain, Portugal, etc.
Unless you actually live in California in which case, I guess you're stuck with the exact same nine grapes, every day, forever. Because literally the only non-California wines you'll ever see are like Mouton Rothschild and Cristal and whatever else people who only know wines they saw in the Robb Report think of when they think of France (the only place besides Napa Valley that makes wine, according to the average Californian)
>>7370129
Caricature 2010
Am I a cheap bastard?
It's relatively cheap, but it seems to have some semblance of quality... Ignorance is bliss, I suppose- it's damn tasty with a decent finish~
Anyone have recommendations for ruby port under $40? I made the mistake of getting a cheap one last time, and I don't want to make the same mistake again. At the same time, I can't find (or remember) the first one I had that I liked so much.
No wine tonight, but for the weekend I have a Dry Comal Creek Red Port that is apparently "Rancio Texas style."
>>7366683
amarone. everything else is a waste of money.
Vallana Barbera. Not exactly great barbera and the first Vallana I've had that I wouldn't buy again.
All Vallana's nebbioli are creeping into $25-30 territory, they are no longer the no-brainer they were for years.
The world is going to shit.
>>7364544
I read this whole thread but still feel confused. I'm going out to Safeway this morning to buy some groceries for Valentine's dinner. I want to buy a decent bottle of wine for cheap, and suggestions?
Too poor for vintage Madeira, but whatever.
I am assuming that all these meme labels belong to american winefags.
I wouldn't buy any of them out of general principle. although, not being american I expect they would have normal labels in any civilised country.
tfw can buy several decent wines for 5 euros
t. Alberto Barbosa
>>7372548
>I've never heard of warres or blandys
>must be an american meme!
I somehow assumed that you guys did import some real wines to meet whatever domestic demand there is for wine that isn't horrid aussie wine. Guess not. Or, you don't associate with those kinds of tall poppies.
Rioja tonight
>>7367318
The wife and I are nailing an Ancien Toyon Farms Pinot Noir. 164 cases made. Freakin' awsome. Love the small producers.
purty good wine it was cheap at wally world so i picked it up went good with hotdogs
I recently discovered Roots Run Deep, and I like the Educated Guess cab sav.
However, Hypothesis is the longer aged, more esteemed version. Despite it being freshly opened and more than 2x the price of EG, to me it was much worse than Educated Guess, to the point of being a flat-out bad wine worse than Red Goliath in taste.
Why is this? Was it a bad bottle?
>>7370129
Napafag here. Bullshit. Everyone I know makes a conscious effort to avoid cellar palate. French, German, and Spanish can be great. Depends on what you're willing to pay. Here, we can buy wine, relatively inexpensive, yet is at least equal to the good French and Spanish wines.
>>7372417
Buy the most expensive Chianti you can find. Goes well with most any food.
>>7374078
Could be what you ate it with. Could be you just like a younger, fresher style wine. Could be it needs more time in the bottle. Could be it needed more time to air out.
Not familiar with those wines but some wines meant for aging won't be so appealing if you open them too soon. And if you do, let them breathe for a bit. In the worst case even overnight, although usually a couple of hours will do the trick.
>>7374114
One of the best wine thread posts ever. An important things to learn when beginning to explore wine is what questions to ask.
Are opened-for-days wine still good to drink? I mostly just cook with them.
>>7374089
correct as the methods are the same. Have you tried amarone and understood their method? Is there a comparable product from nappie valley?
>>7375772
He probably doesn't have access to Amarone there, or anything like it. The Napa region is preoccupied with Bordeaux style wine.
>>7364544
Carnivor cabernet. California, 2013 I guess. Is p. good
>>7364544
Blackberry arbor mist because Im a cheap fuck
>>7365016
How is it compared to Chateau Ste Michelle or Canoe ridge?
>>7365016
>Walla walla valley
Is this a fucking valley where you have to say voila twice when you serve a dish?
Rainwater Madeira, because I'm an alcoholic who has no time for unfortified wines.
>>7376429
I'm not familiar with Canoe Ridge but its a much better bottle of cab than Ste. Michelle. The 2010 is really amazing. Sadly it's also really expensive so it isn't within my means to drink it often. I decided to put a bottle away for a while when I bought them this time.
>>7373996
I love Spanish wine. If you like Rioja you should try to pick up one of these. It sounds crazy but it has this really strange almost sheep's cheese nose on it but then the palate is all fennel and mustardy. If you like funky wines at all I highly recommend it.
Drinking this right now. Can't tell if I like it or not though.
>>7376836
I used to love rioja but I kind of fell out of love with it as I expanded more and more beyond the confines of the CVNE, Heredia, Murrieta, Muga, Lacusta, old school crowd. Last straw was last week when I got a bottle of some shit where when I googled it to find more information literally all it had was a website with old people in a vineyard and a red X through it, and young kids dancing in a club saying "this is the new rioja" or some shit like that.
I got the Lacuesta (actually only ended up opening it about a half hour ago) to return to the roots. It's beautiful. I just want to drink it forever.
But, if I see that Gonzalo Pastor I'll give it a shot. My local store doesn't have it, and they have a huge selection of rioja.
>>7364544
Had a gigondas last night that was delicious, nice medium body leaning toward the lighter side and fantastic nose that keeps you coming back over and over again, can't remember for the life of me what it was called
Also tried a riesling torrontesblend which was fantastic, never expected the two to work so well with each other
Strawberry wine, much better than grape wine.
>>7376862
I really only got into Spanish wine in the last couple of years so I'm still exploring. I've got this one on the rack. It's good, kinda pricey but honestly I prefer the Pastor over it.
>>7378372
Yeah LdH isn't cheap especially if you are comparing grade levels to other brands (like say their crianza that goes for more than the reserva for other brands, the reserva that costs the normal gran reserva price, etc).
The reds are very good but to me their most exciting wines are the gran reserva blancos, and even more, the gran reserva rosado (when you can find it, which is almost never). There is nothing else out there like the gran reserva rosado, it's a really cool wine.
>>7378399
I'm not at all familiar with that. Now I must have one. Not gonna lie, it's more than I wanted to spend today on another bottle of wine but I'm a sucker for a new experience. Thanks for the heads up.
Question, is 100 dollars for wine to complement a tasting menu right? The tasting menu itself is about 150-200 dollars. I looked up the wine for the tasting menu and it's about 4 wine pairing for 5 courses. I've never done a tasting menu before.
>>7376359
We have access to Amorone. There are a few wineries here that use raisinated grapes, but the end product is much different from Amorone. We are some nice Rhone blends, Loire style Cab Francs, Reislings, and Burgundian style Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, some nice Sangioveses and Super Tuscans. Small area, but large variety of soil types and temperatures allow us to grow most anything.
>>7380348
Have some nice . . . . Sorry for the typo.
I have found that I like wine that has more flavors on the savory end of the spectrum rather than super fruity, my favorite wine that I have had was a Loire Valley Cabernet Franc, to me it tasted like it had some brett yeast in it, which I liked a lot because I like belgian guezes and wild ales.
What are some other regions/varietals I should look into? I haven't found anything that was as funky/savory.
I have had some very earthy tasting wine, it had a very "soil" like scent, it was a 2009 chiroubles, and I even liked that.
I want to branch out from France though. I am going to Spain this summer and I want to get to know the wine before hand, but the Spanish wine I have had (Monastrell, Tempranillo/Rioja, and Grenacha) were all good but pretty boring and fruit/oak forward.
>>7378639
Sounds about right for a higher end place pairing the courses with more expensive wines.
>>7380519
If funk and restraint are your thing, the loire is your holy land. They love their spontaneous fermentation and they love their mineral-driven wines.
You can find some "interesting" spanish wines, try these guys for instance >>7378617 >>7378372 but they will not have the funk you might find from a particularly stinky loire wine. But they have some characteristics (oxidation in the whites and roses) which make them stand out from the boring fruit/oak bomb style you get from budget/mass market spanish wines.
Portugal has a few foot-stomped, spontaneously fermenting non-fortified wines you could find if you're lucky. They can be quite "interesting" and very affordable.
From Italy you can look for the wines of Frank Cornelissen which can be really crazy and weird.
From Lebanon, look to Chateau Musar.
From Georgia look to the wines of Pheasant's Tears winery.
Can't really help you with new world, perhaps such things exist but for the most part it's fruity oak bomb mega purple hell as far as I can tell.
>>7380646
I have heard of Chateau Musar ad Pheasant's Tears, but unfortunately I have never seen their wines. I have been reading about Frank Cornelissen and his wines, it pretty interesting, I will have to look out for them now.
It is not just funk I like but as you said, a mineral driven character, or some controlled oxidation in wines are things I have enjoyed as well.
Is this the /alc/ general?
Hey, what does it mean for your body when you lose your appetite and basically prefer to just binge on alcohol instead of eating?
What's that actually called in terms of your progress into alcoholism?
>>7382007
No, please go somewhere else and don't even respond to me or in this thread ever again.
This is a thread about wine, and discussing it, and enjoying it. It is not your personal blog. If you would like to blog and wallow in self pity, start and /alc/ thread. Did you see the phrase /alc/ in the OP? Did you read the thread at all?
Those were rhetorical questions, the answer is no, which is also the answer to your question.
>>7366884
> tfw trying so hard to get myself out of the constant cycle of drinking too much
>>7373206
I don't trust any wine that puts a huge garish picture on the label.
been loving this wine recently. Bit pricey so I don't get it often. Well worth it though.
>>7385285
I used to have rules like this when I first started drinking wine
It gave me a sense of assurance faced with an otherwise overwhelming set of choices
Last night I had some Ribera. It was yummy!
Was looking for Domaine Serene, but was recommended a bottle of Carlton Hill 2010. Really nice but not feeling the comparison.
>>7386395
I've only had a couple of ohio wines but they were all overpriced and terrible. Like $30 for a mediocre wine that consists of 75% juice from grapes trucked in from somewhere in california. And oh sure they have a 100% estate wine and it's $60, lolwut?
But I hate it when I'm in a new store and I ask for something they don't have, or something like it, and the wine guy clearly has no idea what style I'm after and they just go with a default suggestion which is invariably the opposite of what I wanted.
It's like talking to a new barber. Sometimes they pick up on what you're saying, sometimes they don't. You can usually tell and then it's a matter of turning 360 degrees or just biting the bullet and accepting a surprise.
Frenchfag here.
If you are wine lover who love discovering special wine, i would recommand white wine from the Castle 'Bethanie'.
Its taste has a special flavour of walnuts (no joke!!) that you cant find in any other white wine. I speak with experience
Its flavour is due to a special grap variety called 'Savagnin' that you only can make grow in some area of my country. some people tried to make it grow in many areas buut it didnt work except in 'Jura' a massif mountain betwenn France and Switzerland
Some people tried to make it grow in other country but it didnt give its best because the ground and the climate weren t at their top.
Seriously, its taste is very special and its like nuts just try it its not very expensive but if you are wine lover and curious... you will be happy
>>7386515
Actually the 'bethanie' is made with 60 percent of chardonnay and 40 percent of Savagnin.
Its not that expensive and i will be a tasty trip. enjoy it wine lover
>>7386515
Murriclap here, we have some Jura wines, they're not completely unknown but mostly just hipsters and wine lovers know about it. I dunno what they cost in France but they're rarely under $30 here. I like them but I can't afford to drink like that often.
Did a blind wine tasting a couple weeks ago. Was pleasantly surprised by a cabernet and a pinot noir from Crane Lake. Dirt cheap, and it beat out bottles that were $18+.
>>7386652
I have never even see a wine from Jura before. I have been looking out for them too. I guess if I went to the city or a really well off area I may be able to find them, but it is not like I live in a poor area, I have a pretty big selection of nice liquor stores near me, but none of them have any.
>>7386721
Wine is not like liquor, the selection really varies wildly depending on geography. In the midwest you can expect Constellation Brands and Diageo products exclusively. On the west coast you can sometimes find small local producers at the right kind of shop, but forget about anything from Europe unless it's Constellation or Diageo. It's really only in the northeast that you get a diverse selection of old world wines.
Ever notice how the Germans make the best white wine?
