Membership has its privileges…
I usually am not a fan of wine clubs. For one, you typically get wines that don’t sell well, so a club buys them up on the cheap, packages them up, applies their markup, and ships it to their club members. Every so often, you will come across a gem that’s truly worth the trouble and effort of purchasing a larger quantity. However, those opportunities are few and far between. Continue reading →
Sometimes, even a blind squirrel finds an acorn…
I like Las Vegas. A lot. In fact, I think I’ve been there about 6 times in the past two years. Honestly, I’ve lost count, as they tend to run together, between all of the good food, great shows, and fabulous rooms we’ve stayed in. (I’ll let Honey do the Vegas posts, as she has more fun with those). After attending a friend’s wedding at the Viva Las Vegas Wedding Chapel (which, if you’ve never been, you need to send some friends there to get married as it is a site to behold), We ended up at Nine Fine Irishmen at New York New York. Continue reading →
I will readily admit that I am not much of a chardonnay fan. I used to be a member of the ABC (Anything But Chardonnay) club. I couldn’t stand all that buttery, fat, heavy flavors and no fruit chardonnays. I think what happens is the winemaker tastes the wine before it goes in the barrel, and finds that it has some major flaws. The solution: dump it into a heavily charred barrel, and let the oak flavors cover up the flaws. Then you end up with a one-dimensional wine that’s almost too heavy to have with any food. Now, I find myself a member of the ABBC (Anything But Bad Chardonnay) club, and thankfully, winemakers are turning away from these heavy chards into leaner, fruitier chards that begin to show what this grape can actually do. Which brings us to the Columbia Crest Chardonnay Horse Heaven Hills H3 2007.
Periodically, (hopefully weekly) I’ll post about what were drinking wine-wise. There’s very little wine that we don’t like (the best of course being free). Our tastes tend to be polar opposites. I prefer more of the Old World styles (more dirt, refined structures, bottles with some age) while my wife is a New World girl (big fruit, smooth tannins, high acidity, younger wines). Fortunately, the middle ground is a fertile field of choices. We try, although not always successful, to stay around $10-$30 per bottle. That price point covers a wide array of wines, and you can usually find something that will fit every palate and occasion. However, I do occasionally splurge (as should everyone who likes wine). Continue reading →
Bear and I have been married for two years now… and undoubtedly he’ll come back to make some changes of his own to the things I have to say, but as for now…
We decided we needed to escape Austin and South by Southwest for a little time out in the Napa Valley. To me, my favorite part of traveling is actually making those plans to travel. We almost always end up scrapping all of our plans once we get there, but the longer you take to plan, the more time you get to spend “on vacation,” Continue reading →