I picked up this red today at the grocery store for $10.49. The weather has been atrocious all day and Mrs. Barbarian didn’t want to venture out of the house. However I found myself short a few ingredients for the Sunday dinner I was planning in my head. Braving the elements I dashed into the store, avoiding the cold wet stuff falling from the sky. After I had grabbed the vegetables I sought, along with a few pounds of the flesh of lesser beasts, I wandered over to the wine section and spotted this Chilean. The store had hung a tag up under the bottle telling of a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Carmenère, and Cabernet Franc… three of my favorite grapes (after Petite Sirah of course!) It was surrounded by a host of Chilean Cabs, all sporting distinctly un-Chilean price tags in the mid-$20—to low-$30 range so my hopes were not high. I lifted the tag to check the price, expecting twenty-something dollars but instead saw $15.00. This store offers a discount if you buy four bottles (any bottles, mix&match), so I grabbed this along with 3 others (a bottle of aussie port, a Nuevo Mundo Cab/Malbec blend, and a California wine I’ll try later this week.) This discount knocked the cost down to $10.49 to be exact, so I’m a happy barbarian!

Dinner was a pasta dish with Italian sausage, along with some baked asparagus, sauteed broccoli/kale, and garlic bread. This wine worked very well with it all… very smooth, lots of flavor, a big sort of presence without being overpowering. Not much nose, but plenty of good stuff going on once it was in the mouth. The label has a watercolor picture of a bull, but this bottle has no bull in it whatsoever. Just a very good wine at a very reasonable price. I may go back a buy a case.

“Calcu”
2006 Red Wine “Super Chilean” from the Valle de Colchagua, Chile
60% Cabernet Sauvignon, 25% Carmenère, 15% Cabernet Franc

EXCELLENT value under $20.

A nice little birthday dinner for the Mrs. Barbarian of the household and once again we visited her favorite haunt. She loves to explore the menu, trying new things. Me? I order the same thing every time: New York Strip, medium-rare. The chef here has that steak down pat, so why tempt fate? I limit my explorations to the wine list. The owner of this little small-town bistro always has great stuff on the list and to be honest, like the chef’s steak the wine list has never let me down. On this trip I noted another wine from that Walla Walla place up in Washington, specifically Basel Cellars. We’d really enjoyed their Claret which was a cheap thrill indeed. This other selection was called “Merriment“. What better choice for a celebration? While it was well over 2X the price of the Claret we’d tried before, it still wasn’t outrageously priced as so many reds can be.

Merriment is a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, and Cabernet Franc. It is also awesome. Mrs. Barbarian loved it. I loved it. Wonderful stuff.

I’m not a “shopper”. When I have something to buy at a retail store I go in and out like an elite commando unit. Surgical strike. In. Grab the item. Go. Go. Go! It usually takes me longer to take a shower than it does to buy an item in a store.

I was at Target the other day, to pick up a two household items I was tasked to get by Mrs. Barbarian.. As I was making my way to the checkout at high speed a word in my peripheral vision caused me to stop, pause, and turn my head. What caught my eye was the word “Carmenère”. Visual pattern-matching has always been one of my minor superpowers since I was just a wee Barbarian. Remember those find the words in a square of seemingly random letters puzzles from childhood? Those things are trivial for me. The words themselves, as strong signal just seem to float above the background noise of letters for my brain. Since Petite Sirah and Carmenère seem to be my favorite varietals these days I seem to be able to “see” them even when I’m not looking for them. Even when I am beating a hasty exit from an otherwise uncomfortable situation/

I hardly step into Target more than once a year. I didn’t even know that they sold wine. But there is was, grabbing my attention. From six feet away using only 18 point type. My brain scares me sometimes.

So what is this Carmenère that stopped me in my tracks at Target? It is called “(Oops) 2007 Voluptuous Beauty”. It is a Cabernet Franc & Carmenère blend (84%/16%) from Chile’s Valle Central. The price tag said $9.34, so I figured I might as well buy it. I’ll drink anything…. once.

I brought the wine home and opened it to accompany a nice outdoor dinner of pasta and sauteed broccoli out on the deck. It was a hot evening, but breezy, so quite nice. The pasta was a four cheese ravioli in a pesto sauce. The wine surprised both Mrs. Barbarian and me. I was honestly prepared for the wine to be horrible. After all I bought it from Target! Instead we found it quite drinkable, though not a mind-blower. Just a very good, reasonably cheap red wine.

The Carmenère at only 16% of the blend was barely noticeable, though obviously there. It tasted like a rather earthy Cab Franc, just like I’d expect. Very dark in color. Certainly worth the sub-$10 price. I’ll have a look and see if I can find more examples of their product.

The label is a tad cutesy… OK it is way too cutesy… so cutesy I almost didn’t buy it. But it does tell the tale of the origins of Carmenère and how it was rediscovered in Chile after having thought to be lost. If you can overlook the cutesy marketing this is an OK wine.

http://www.oopswines.com

Horrible photograph of a very nice wine.

Sorry for the lack of posts lately… I came down with the flu a while ago and it utterly destroyed my senses of smell and taste for weeks. I’ve been recovering and along the way I’ve enjoyed a few good wines. This is a fine example, Basel Cellars 2006 Claret. Mrs. Barbarian, her sister, and I enjoyed this at our local favorite restaurant last weekend. “Claret” is a British term for “Bordeaux blend” and this indeed is a blend of mostly Bordeaux varietals, Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, and the a bit of the Rhone thrown in, in the form of Syrah. Basel Cellars is from that wonderful corner of Washington state that the natives call “Walla Walla”… funny name, great wines.

This bottle retails for right around $20 bucks. You really can’t go wrong at that price. Excellent value, and good enough to be a bit better than an everyday wine.

This that Cab Franc I mentioned in my last post. It is from Owen Roe, and named “Rosa Mystica” The bottle features a moody photograph of a ruined Irish abbey and tells tales of the misdeeds of the evil Oliver Cromwell on the Emerald Isle. Our bottle was numbered: 4753 of 7596 produced. The winery is located in Oregon, but the grapes are sourced from it’s northern neighbor, Washington state. I’ll tag it as the both.

We enjoyed this wine with a fine meal at Mrs. Barbarian’s favorite restaurant. She did the two-starters thing for dinner, whereas I went completely overboard with Chef Martin’s special of the night, a pair of venison chops in a red wine reduction sauce that was so amazing that I spooned it all up and was about to start licking my plate when Mrs. Barbarian deftly snatched the plate away to avoid death by embarrassment. What did she expect, marrying a Barbarian? Sigh.

The Owen Roe Cab Franc lived up to it’s name, being both red, and mysterious. Big as one would expect from a cab franc, but with subtlety and depth. Give it a try, I bet you’ll like it.

You’d do well to find Chef Martin and fresh-cut tender Bambi though. yum! (Now that I mention it some rabbit would be good with this too. mmmmmm…)

This wine sells for mid-range $35-$45 bucks, so again, it is a bit above my usual range. Seems par for the course for domestic products though, which is a shame. Well, I’ll always have Chile. I’ve decided to add a new category in this range’s honor: “Expensive, but not outrageous.”

Mrs. Barbarian & I went out for dinner last night. It was Christmas Eve and we’d done nothing to prepare, so when the better half declared “let’s go out” I was already dialling our favorite small town bistro for a reservation. Our little foothills burg had been blanketed with an unusual snowfall. Not that we don’t get snow, it is just we rarely see more than a dusting. For the past nine days we’ve been getting dumped upon. Our home is buried under over 3 feet, and down in town things are Alaskan in appearance. Our favorite bistro was indeed open on this semi-holiday, and we secured a table for two.

Upon arrival we found a festive atmosphere and a likeness of the owner/chef, Chef Martin in snow out front:

We were seated in a comfy spot at the back, beyond a large party of revelers, but adjacent to the wine racks and small bar. We both ordered one of their “signature martinis”… neither of which are really martinis in the traditional sense. Mrs. Barbarian’s was more like a margarita, with a salted rim, and tequila as the main liquor. Mine was called a “Toasted L’Orange” and is a bourbon-based concoction. Both were awesome. Chef Martin had a special for the occasion, a slab of prime rib that looked too good to pass up, so I ordered that along with an onion soup. Mrs. Barbarian ordered a pair of appetizers as her main course, some potato latkes with smoked salmon, and an amazing glazed prawns thing which she prevented me from tasting in a fit of selfishness. Her soup was a squash/curry contrivance that was spec-effing-tacular. Midway through our soups I ordered some wine. Martin’s business partner Steve always has a great wine list and introduces me to all sorts of good stuff. Last time we visited we enjoyed a wonderful Cabernet Franc (review coming soon) so I was paying close attention to that varietal. I didn’t see anything that caught my eye until I ran down the list of blends and here was something at a reasonable price point that just had a promising ring to it: Fall Line Winery Horse Heaven Hills Red Wine 2005, 39% Merlot, 33% Cabernet Franc, and 28% Cabernet Sauvignon.

It proved a wonderful accompaniment to our meal. Smooth and flavorful. Very drinkable. Very deep and satisfying.

The wine retails for around $30, so it is just a bit outside my usual range but I always throw my cheap side under the bus when I go out to eat. Mind you, it still calls out to me when I order so I never do anything stupid like order anything in triple digits! This wine falls into that grey area between “cheap” and “expensive” so I’ll classify it as both. However, I will be pursuing this one on my own and perhaps more of the output from this small winery in Washington state. From what I read on their website they make very limited quantities, so if you want to get yours before I hoard it all for the apocalypse, get off the couch and buy some!

The Vinagoth can’t take a photo obviously. Of course if you knew the circumstances leading up to this photo you might be more forgiving. It was at the Office Xmas Party last Friday night. I ended up at a table with the CEO, who said “You’re the expert, pick the wine!” That’s like handing a chainsaw to a psychopath! How could I resist?

So, perusing the long list I picked a Cab Franc that looked promising… a total wild ass guess to be honest. The Sommelier thought I was some sort of genius, saying something like “That is my favorite!” She brought the first bottle, which she expertly poured for the FIVE of us at that end of the table sharing that bottle. I thought she was a genius for getting the pour exactly right in each glass while and ending up with nothing left and all even. Damn this wine was good. The place where we had our party charged $60 a bottle, and I didn’t pay for it… well, I did pay for one bottle later, but it’ll be covered on my next expense report! I think between the five of us we polished off five bottles. It WAS a five course meal though.

Everyone at my table thought I was a genius, and everyone loved the wine. So what is it? Have a look at the photo above, can’t you read?

It is a O*S Winery 2006 Cabernet Franc. I can’t take a photo, but I can make an blur-free HTML link:

Here you go.

I have no idea what it goes for retail, but I may seek it out and buy some. How can you resist? It makes you into a genius!