WTN: Awesome Bordeaux, Dornfelder, Torrontes

2005 Chateau La Grollet Cotes de Bourg. This was kinda a wow wine for me. Still definitely mouth drying tannins, but not really shut down in any way. Flavors of pencil lead and tobacco complement the bright plum-cherry-anise Merlot fruit. Blazingly palate cleansing, delicious crisp acidity. Price???? $17

2009 Tomero Torrontes (Mendoza). Had lost a touch of the crispness over two days in refrigerator, but this wine is amazingly floral. May be the most floral wine I have ever tried! Almost saline minerality, with fantastic mouth feel. Perfect salad course wine.

2002 (Yes 2002) Sander "Terra Vita" Dornfelder
OK. Sometimes orphan bottles turn out to be a find! I've had this bottle in my wine cooler for years:
Nose of earth, cherry, red plum skin. Shoe leather? Palate follows through, but what really stood out was the luscious silkyness of the mouthfeel and texture. I doubt this wine was meant to be cellared for eight years after vintage date, but it was lovely with the grilled lamb and roasted potatos prepared by the Lucchios!

2005 Castello della Paneretta Chianti Classico Riserva. Maybe this was my fault for drinking this way, way too soon. I certainly did not get the elements in the importer's tasting notes:

http://www.northberkeleyimports.com/Cas ... -P448.aspx

Nope. No Sangiovese typicite at all. I just got generic red wine flavors. And OAK. Waves and waves and waves of OAK vanilla. We actually dumped this bottle. The onyl Chianti I have ever had that was this oaky was the Giorgio premium cuvee
a few years back. Disappointing.

2005 Castello della Paneretta Chianti Classico Riserva. Maybe this was my fault for drinking this way, way too soon. I certainly did not get the elements in the importer's tasting notes:

http://www.northberkeleyimports.com/Cas ... -P448.aspx

Well, if those Importer tasting notes are supposedly 'accurate' then drinking it too early should not have been a problem.

Well, if those Importer tasting notes are supposedly 'accurate' then drinking it too early should not have been a problem.

I had actually stopped at their shop on North Martin Luther King a couple of weeks ago to just look around, and the guy working the store enthused that it was his favorite Chianti in the store.

I know it is a mistake to expect wines to taste a certain way, and sometimes the outliers are delicious in their own unique way, but this was very generic oak bomb red wine.

the guy working the store enthused that it was his favorite Chianti in the store...this was very generic oak bomb red wine.

Stereotypes die hard, but that certainly seems to fit the common perception of NBI.

I am sure I tried some of these Paneretta wines back when I used to shop at NBI and attend their events (01/02). But I have zero memory of the actual wine.

I'll just limit my stops to the corner of Cedar and San Pablo in the future.

Although I'm not sure I totally buy Kermit's palate for Italian wines, either. (I had a so so Chianti. It tasted like Chianti, just not very exciting).