... of wine at a sitting, and even more rarely when I bring it to a restaurant.
I'm going off to Poland for a week starting tomorrow morning, and I didn't want to cook tonight, and I wanted a good, hearty meal.
So I went to K&J Bistro in Sebastopol, bringing along a bottle of Yoakim Bridge "Three Valleys Cuvee", a non-vintage Bordeauxish sort of blend from a winery that I've bragged about before. I had a great meal and I drank the whole bottle, which is almost unheard of for me!
K&J Bistro is a restaurant that probably couldn't exist anywhere else, and the same probably goes for David Cooper's blend. What a totally wonderful bottle of wine! I'm glad I tasted it before ordering my dinner, because its flavor made me totally change my planned order. I ended up with a smoked ham terrine for a starter and leg of duck confit which was cooked in an Asian style (lots of cumin and last-minute garlic) and served with baby bok choi and fresh thin flat cut noodles that were reminiscent of cappellini but may have been the “linguine” from Pasta Fresh over near Montgomery Village. There were more flavors that made me think of five-spice, but they were so well done that they were hard to figure out -- especially with all the wine.
Ok, the wine. Strong tannins, brambly blackberry Dry-Creek-Valley flavor on the entry and mid-palate, then a remarkable finish with (how can I say this?) lots of memories of other good wines. Talking to David Cooper, a few years ago when I bought it, he made a blend using mostly Dry Creek Valley Cabernet Sauvignon (but not entirely), and Russian River Valley Merlot, and Alexander Valley Cabernet Franc. (I may be wrong; I didn't write down what David was saying.) He also said that the wine was mostly 2006 vintage, but some of it was 2005 and some 2007. So there you are. It might not make a label that would sell in distribution, but they don't distribute, so who cares? It's really great wine!
John