Boy, that sounds ominous, doesn’t it? Never fear, I am not hanging out with mobsters or any nationality… I am drinking wine from Don Sebastiani & Sons. This winery, an independent offshot of the Sebastiani Vineyards and Winery is terroir driven. The wine was poured by Greg Kitchen, the winemaker and Jack Meyer from their marketing department.

The wine poured was from their Crusher line of wines which are grower’s selections. We tasted the 2008 Petite Sirah from Clarksburg.

Don Sebastiani & Sons
P.O. Box 1248
Sonoma, CA 95476
(707) 933-1704

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Speaking of Desert Wind Vineyards, our next wine selection was from their winery. The Desert Wine 2008 Ruah was poured by Amber Fries. If you are confused by Ruah as I was, then I am pleased to tell you that Ruah means wind in Hebrew. This winery is different from the others that we have encountered at the conference in that it is a destination winery. In addition to the tours, tastings and special events that we have come to expect as part of winery, Desert Wind also has dining and accomodations. Each of the four rooms is distinctly decorated in a southwestern theme. The small restaurant, Mojave by Picazo is also southwestern in theme.

Desert Wind Winery
2258 Wine Country Rd.
Prosser, WA 99350
509.786.7277

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Somewhere a duck quacked and I was poured wine.

oops. That is a little out there, but I like the thought of wine being poured with the regularity of ducks quacking. Which brings us to Duck Pond Cellars. Greg Fries, partner and one of the winemakers poured for us their 2008 Red Blend which is a mix of Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and Syrah. The fruit is from the Desert Wind Vineyard which is also owned by the Fries Family.

Quack. Can I have some more, please?

Duck Pond Cellars
23145 Hwy 99W
PO Box 429
Dundee, Oregon 97115
1-800-437-3213

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Ok. Bachelor’s Buttons. Still it seemed the perfect name for a wine that was being “dated”. Denise Isenhower or Isenhower Cellars talks about the wine from her small winery. Oh, and the name? It comes from the flowers growing at their winery.. You probably guessed that because you are clever.

Isenhower Cellars
3471 Pranger Road
Walla Walla, WA 99362-7307
(509) 526-7896

Also, we here at VinoVerve would like to wish our fellow ‘Verver, Kevin Neuman a happy birthday. Feel free to stop by his Facebook page and wish him well!

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Speed dating a family? That sounds a bit kinky. Particularly by my Snow White standards… speed dating a vineyard? That sounds more like me. Though perhaps, I am becoming like Mae West when she said, “I used to be Snow White, but I drifted.”

Anywho…. next up on our speed dating agenda is the Ortman Family Vineyard’s O² Sangiovese. It is a second generation wine from the winery’s second generation wine maker. Enjoy!

Ortman Family Vineyards
1317 Park Street
Paso Robles, CA 93446
(805) 237-9009

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What can you tell about a wine in six minutes? More than you think. This is almost of test of skills for winery and wine blogger alike as we try to form opinions, ask questions, taste, communicate, blog and tweet. You saw my tweets and blogs in when the speed dating was happening.. Now you can see how I gathered my information.

Now we are tasting the Lot 1 Cabernet Sauvignon from Louis M. Martini (I forgot the M. in the video, mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa).

Btw, that guy you keep seeing in the background adjusting video is Michael Wangbickler of Caveman Wines… stop by and say hi to him!

Louis M. Martini
254 South St. Helena Highway
St. Helena, CA 94575

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Our next stop at the WBC’10 was to head to lunch at Whitman Cellars in Walla Walla. We listened to Gordy Vennari of Walla Walla Vintners and Stephen Lessard of Whitman Cellars.

Whitman Cellars
1015 West Pine Street
Walla Walla, WA 99362-1756
(509) 529-1142

Walla Walla Vintners
225 Vineyard Ln
Walla Walla, WA 99362-8404
(509) 525-4724

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Yes, I know.. This is not about the Wine Bloggers’ Conference, but rather something that happened to me yesterday. I opened the door to the store to take some recycling to the bin and there practically beneath my feet was this baby. I have never seen a baby bunny so close up and personal. Frankly, for a while I thought that this baby had made its way to my doorstep to croak. I couldn’t even see it breathing.

Eventually, it got used to me hovering near the door enough to move around a bit.

Here is my footage… just because it is cute.

And no. This baby was not offered a complementary tasting.

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I might be temporarily abstaining from wine on school nights (due to lent) but that doesn’t mean that I can’t continue to talk about the wines that I have already tasted.    This wine, like the Passion Has Red Lips, also falls into the Tip O’Neil Corollary territory and I was lucky enough to get to taste it when the rep came into the store.

The Chono wines are  associated with a wine I discussed a while ago… say, in the Fall of 2008, the Palin Syrah, which are both distributed by GeoWines.  I always like Chilean Carménère because it reminds me of my wine history. Carménère is the lost grape of Bordeaux where it was used to enhance the flavors of the other noble grapes of the region, Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Malbec, Petite Verdot and Merlot.  After Phylloxera destroyed most of the vineyards in the region, it was believed that Carménère was all but wiped out.  In 1994, an oenologist discovered that a variety of Merlot in Chile that tended to ripen faster was in fact the long, lost grape.  They were interplanted with Merlot which they resemble and accounted for a  large percentage of the grapes produced.  It turns out that Chilean winemaking owed more to France than Spain as one might have expected.

I have also learned that there were so many Carménère grapes produced that they were often used in the production of Pisco and Aguardiente.

The Carménère is produced in the Maipo River Valley of Chile which is in the heart of the most productive vineyards in the country and relatively close to Santiago. The grapes are picked in the second week of May are macerated in stainless steel and then partially aged in oak.  My first sip gave me a smokey taste of dark fruit. The second sip after a few minutes allowed the wine to open up and become smoother and fuller with more of an emphasis on black cherries and less on the smoke.  Clearly, a wine to let breathe a moment or two.

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I don’t think it is news to anyone that I love wine. Ok. Stop laughing already. I SAID it wouldn’t be news. And as much as I love local wine, I love trying wine from all over the world. Is this inconsistent with my locapour ways? Not at all… I refer to it as the Tip O’Neil Corollary, when speaking of politics, Speaker O’Neil once famously pointed out that “All politics are local”. And I believe that the same holds true with wine. It is local to somebody.

when I got a chance to try some wine from the “local” vineyards of the Clare Valley of Australia, I naturally jumped at the chance.

The wine is produced by Some Young Punks. Already, you know that I was enjoying this. Their name alone, indicates to me that while they love their wine, they don’t take themselves too seriously. The wine was the 2007 Passion Has Red Lips which was a Cabernet Sauvignon/Shiraz blend. I thought it was earthy, almost leathery. 1500 cases were produced. The artwork was taken from an old pulp fiction novel, Sin On Wheels.

I am hoping to find more of it soon.

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