Friday night, I had a friend of mine from my home winemaking days over for our weekly neighborhood get-together and thought I'd open up a bottle of something that is nominally a home winemaker wine. We had Howie Hart's Riesling (I believe the 2014, but unfortunately did not write it down). It was a delicious bony dry take, with good varietal character (including a nice bit of that petrol thing) and a crisp, chalky finish. Really nice stuff and it was fun to hear another friend say that he'd never been much of a fan of riesling until tasting that wine. It drank well Friday night, but I wonder if I should have left it for a while to develop further.
Last night, I opened a bottle of Howie's 2014 Chardonnay for another friend who came over for supper last night. This is just a great bottle of wine, with lovely tropical chard fruit on the nose and in the palate with crisp acidity and nothing to mask its purity. I suppose it's possible that I opened this one too soon but it was so good last night that I don't mind that thought at all.