Friday, September 5, 2008
12.5% ABV indicated. Extraordinarily sulfurous, showing match heads and kerosene nose, with similar flavors. Unpleasant. ($5 on sale, BevMo)
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Brought back from China by my brother. Thanks, Dan. I’ll have to figure out a way to return the favor. The nose starts out strongly of lacquer and chocolate. Despite this, I taste it, and don’t immediately spit it out. It’s…sweet. And scary. After a few minutes a lot of the lacquer smell blows off, [...]
A little berry and a lot (16.4% ABV) of alcohol on the nose. Seemingly moderate RS (8.25%) and a very thin body. Slight baking spice and floral notes. Hot, slightly tannic, and not terribly pleasant. Ashy flavors. With a couple days of air, it becomes simpler, reminiscent of significantly alcoholic blueberry syrup. One of the [...]
Monday, September 17, 2007
Strongly waxy nose with alcoholic pineapple. Alcoholic, volatile, with an oaky finish. Awful. ($20ish – I brought it to dinner but I don’t know how it got in my fridge in the first place.)
Sunday, September 16, 2007
Alcoholic nose. Tastes like sweet chocolate booze. Yech. (About $30, but it was brought to a dinner, source unknown. A ripoff at half the price.) Insert obligatory comment about the Grapes of Roth.
Part of the box-wine-tasting-marathon. Sweet chocolate-covered cherry nose. While there’s clearly a structured, acidic, cherry-flavored wine in here somewhere, there’s an overwhelming flavor of bad mold, like a blue cheese that’s sat out in a plastic wrap for far too long. DNPIM. About $20/3L. Safeway.
Part of the box-wine-tasting-marathon. From bag-in-box package. Not as sweet as the Bandit Pinot Grigio, but over the neutral, dry white wine there’s a cheesy lactic note that’s nasty. About $18/3L? Safeway.
Part of the box-wine-tasting-marathon. From bag-in-box package. Stewed fruit nose. Sweet, sour, and rancid. Gross and grody. DNPIM. $18/3L. Safeway.
Nose not dissimilar to a pungent washed-rind cheese. The flavors mirror some of that cheese in a lingering way, and add caramel, marzipan, and a few slight spice (gewürz) notes. Insufficient acid. Very unpleasant.
This just won all sorts of awards at the California state fair. We had to try the BEST CHARD IN CALIFORNIA. Good concentration, varietal Chardonnay flavors (warm climate edition: pineapple and guava), surprisingly decent acid, and enough malo butter flavor to bother me. Can’t stand malolactic. That said, it’s surprisingly drinkable. I can see that [...]