October & November 2024 Delectable Reviews
With the holidays and work I’ve really fallen behind on my posts. I’m making a sprint to catch up before the summer really ramps up though it’s already 90°F plus in Houston now.
Cru Beaujolais, in my experience is reliably delicious and yet the various villages do have their distinct expressions of their terroir. The Wikipedia article does a great job deciphering the 10 villages.
Domestic US Chenin Blanc is criminally underrated as it can maintain acidity even in a hot climate such as typical California regions, though this delicious example is in a very cool location. With climate change, expect Chenin Blanc to continue to grow, though it will not make a full comeback from its volume peak in the early 1980s with lakes of low-quality Chenin. This producer shows what Chenin can achieve in the right location with a skilled winemaker.
For the under $20 price point Bordeaux offers some excellent values, especially with a few years of bottle age.
Postino is a growing almost-national chain of wine bar & bites restaurants. We've found that they are consistently delicious with a great wine list that changes a bit during the seasons to keep things interesting, offering lovely wine discoveries such as this bottle.
Italian Super Tuscan blends are probably one of my favorite food-friendly red wines and this is from the same producer as the famous Sassicaia wine.
Several of my friends and families simply aren't Pinot Noir fans and I'm not surprised as I've found the mass-market grocery store brands are very manipulated "oak-joke" wines. This, however is a great producer and I got a pretty good bottle price at one of my online discount wine clubs.
Most of the famous Bordeaux château offer a "Second Wine" at a much more reasonable price which represents a relatively good value, especially if you aren't intending to age them for decades or chasing trophy wines.
We have a local winery and club that was introduced to us at an event by a close friend. We joined the club for a few years but after a while I found their wines just weren't that exciting for the asking prices.
If you see Ridge wines in a retail store or online, don't think about it, just buy it. They will be fantastic. This was a spectacular Chardonnay we enjoyed on a date night for my birthday at TatemĂł. I'm glad my wife booked this excellent tiny tortilla-centered restaurant before it went on win a Michelin Star. Now reservations are predictably very difficult to get.
Bandol is one of the many overlooked French wine regions to the casual American drinker. I don't know if I want the secret to get out because not only is it some of the best rosé wines on the planet, but the red wines are beautifully complex and balanced.
A mark of a good Sonoma County producer is making a balanced, enjoyable Cab in a hellishly hot, fire-scarred year like 2020.
Surely this is not as brilliant as this famous producer's Barolo but it was also far more reasonably priced at a posh River Oaks district Italian restaurant price list.
In Houston-area wine lists, the word is getting out on Albariño, especially in our hot humid summers.
Usually bubbles in what's supposed to be a still wine is considered a wine fault but in this case it was still delicious. If you look closely at the bottle picture some small bubbles are visible at the top.
On occasion you just have to spring for Champagne. It's always interesting to try the smaller producers that often deliver superior QPR compared to the big houses.
I won this bottle at a raffle for a corporate-sponsored golf tournament event a couple of years ago. It seems the hot 2020 vintage resulted in a wine without enough acidity. I've read in wine magazines that 2020 Napa Valley reds, with sometimes smoke-tainted wine and the incredibly hot vintage is a bit of a dice-roll. Be wary of what may seem like a bargain.
