bularry said:

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checked around yesterday and seems United flies to Santa Barbara, usually via LAX or LAS, so that's doable.

likely that will be the goal if we can make it fit the budget in '19

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replying to myself!

Haven't done the Santa Barbara county wine trip in '19, but have booked flights for May 2020.

so, here we go!!

bumping wine thread!

recent acquisition for me... I'm a fan of this light style for our Texas weather and these are food friendly.

Stolpman vineyards in Santa Barbara county. a red, rose and orange all 2020. the red is a carbonic sangiovese, quite cool

I recently received two bottles of Frank Cornelissen Magma as a gift, a 2014 and a 2017. A Nerello Mascalese, old vines planted in 1910, and ungrafted. We drank the 2014 on a special night a couple of months ago. Definitely the finest wine I have ever had. All natural, the grapes are crushed by foot, fermented in amphorae made of lava sand. All organic, no filter, no sulphur added although there is some from the soil content. Frank does almost everything on the Magma himself, all the way down to hand painting the label in Japanese calligraphy. He only produces about 1,500 bottles a year. I'm saving the 2017 for an appropriately special occasion. I'm not sure I have many of those in my life.

bularry said:

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bumping wine thread!

recent acquisition for me... I'm a fan of this light style for our Texas weather and these are food friendly.

Stolpman vineyards in Santa Barbara county. a red, rose and orange all 2020. the red is a carbonic sangiovese, quite cool

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Stolpman is great. Delicious wine and also a dedication to taking care of their workers--each year they put out a blend called La Cuadrilla whose proceeds go back to the vineyard crew. It changes every year--sometimes it's syrah and sangiovese, sometimes it's grenache and mourvedre, but it's always very cost effective and crowd pleasing.

Gonna assume your May 2020 trip didn't quite work out, but if you're headed out this way this spring let me know. Stolpman is right across the street from Dragonette, which is my favorite SRH winery these days, but there are a few others to recommend.

I love Frank C and his wines... working through this Cru Munjebel!

And I love that I can get it at HEB!

CTCBear said:

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I love Frank C and his wines... working through this Cru Munjebel!

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That's also a Nerello Mascalese, and also a very nice wine. I love the Munjebel name too, a two-language fusion, named after Mt. Etna where the grapes are grown. Frank almost single-handedly changed the wine industry there from ho hum into one where there are some really high quality producers now.

You are correct, SB '20 got canceled but an abbreviated version for '21 is on the books.

I'm open to suggestions. I buy regularly from Liquid Farm, Domaine dlc and more recently Stolpman and Chanin.

forza orsi said:

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CTCBear said:

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I love Frank C and his wines... working through this Cru Munjebel!

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That's also a Nerello Mascalese, and also a very nice wine. I love the name too, a two-language fusion, named after Mt. Etna where the grapes are grown. Frank almost single-handedly changed the wine industry there from ho hum into one where there are some really high quality producers now.

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Yes, he is certainly a wine pioneer and one of the most
important vintners currently.

Headed to Napa Valley in April. I am a member of Groth and Davis Estates. I will probably drop Groth as I can find it at HEB now.

What are some of your favorites places to visit? I'd like to find a few spots that are high quality limited production.

GoBearsGo said:

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Headed to Napa Valley in April. I am a member of Groth and Davis Estates. I will probably drop Groth as I can find it at HEB now.

What are some of your favorites places to visit? I'd like to find a few spots that are high quality limited production.

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Bennett Lane up by Calistoga is a good place. Friendly and some really fine wines. Vincent Arroyo has always been a favorite. Extremely casual, very friendly, decent wines. We get to Napa a pretty good bit and we always make a stop there. Vince still comes out and chats some.

forza orsi said:

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GoBearsGo said:

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Headed to Napa Valley in April. I am a member of Groth and Davis Estates. I will probably drop Groth as I can find it at HEB now.

What are some of your favorites places to visit? I'd like to find a few spots that are high quality limited production.

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Bennett Lane up by Calistoga is a good place. Friendly and some really fine wines. Vincent Arroyo has always been a favorite. Extremely casual, very friendly, decent wines. We get to Napa a pretty good bit and we always make a stop there. Vince still comes out and chats some.

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I'm all about a personal connection... those sound pretty cool for my preference.


to GoBearsGo, what do you like? you want the big fountain and the beautiful marble and art work and some very professionally trained salesperson doing your "tasting" and quoting to you the exact script they were taught and repeat 15 times per day....cause that is a lot of Napa. sometimes this is what hits the spot.

Or do you want something more personal like forza orsi mentioned?

bularry said:

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forza orsi said:

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GoBearsGo said:

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Headed to Napa Valley in April. I am a member of Groth and Davis Estates. I will probably drop Groth as I can find it at HEB now.

What are some of your favorites places to visit? I'd like to find a few spots that are high quality limited production.

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Bennett Lane up by Calistoga is a good place. Friendly and some really fine wines. Vincent Arroyo has always been a favorite. Extremely casual, very friendly, decent wines. We get to Napa a pretty good bit and we always make a stop there. Vince still comes out and chats some.

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I'm all about a personal connection... those sound pretty cool for my preference.


to GoBearsGo, what do you like? you want the big fountain and the beautiful marble and art work and some very professionally trained salesperson doing your "tasting" and quoting to you the exact script they were taught and repeat 15 times per day....cause that is a lot of Napa. sometimes this is what hits the spot.

Or do you want something more personal like forza orsi mentioned?

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We want more personal and smaller. We usually hit 3/4 tastings in a day. Our favorite place last visit was Staglin, we buy a bottle or two each year but it's pretty steep.

GoBearsGo said:

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Headed to Napa Valley in April. I am a member of Groth and Davis Estates. I will probably drop Groth as I can find it at HEB now.

What are some of your favorites places to visit? I'd like to find a few spots that are high quality limited production.

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Hourglass, just off the Silverado Trail outside Calistoga

Heading south from there, Mending Wall on the Silverado Trail btw Saint Helena and Calistoga

A little further south, Seavey on Conn Valley just east of Saint Helena

Most southerly and easterly (and way most spendy), Continuum outside of Rutherford. They only make two wines a year, and it's not cheap, but it's not quite Staglin prices.

ETA: I haven't been up there in a couple years and can't confirm that these places are all open post-fires and with Covid protocols. But you'd be reaching out to them for appointments anyway so easy to check. Have a great trip!

EnglishBear said:

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GoBearsGo said:

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Headed to Napa Valley in April. I am a member of Groth and Davis Estates. I will probably drop Groth as I can find it at HEB now.

What are some of your favorites places to visit? I'd like to find a few spots that are high quality limited production.

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Hourglass, just off the Silverado Trail outside Calistoga

Heading south from there, Mending Wall on the Silverado Trail btw Saint Helena and Calistoga

A little further south, Seavey on Conn Valley just east of Saint Helena

Most southerly and easterly (and way most spendy), Continuum outside of Rutherford. They only make two wines a year, and it's not cheap, but it's not quite Staglin prices.

ETA: I haven't been up there in a couple years and can't confirm that these places are all open post-fires and with Covid protocols. But you'd be reaching out to them for appointments anyway so easy to check. Have a great trip!

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I do love Continuum wines. I think they run about $240 ea from winery... which isn't bad for Napa premium wines but still an expensive investment. You can find these at wine shops, but I'd still consider it limited production.

Continuum is on Pritchard Hill. You could visit Chappellet on the same day and probably learn a lot about the history of that area.

Look up DeSantis... old school Napa family winery. Elyse is another in that mold although I think the family sold it a couple of years ago (not certain)

Thanks. Some of these I have down and some are places we will be sure and check out. Thanks.

Anyone else dig Chenin? I'm far from an expert but really love this grape. Bought this bad boy recently and plan to hold for a few years.

bularry said:

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Anyone else dig Chenin? I'm far from an expert but really love this grape. Bought this bad boy recently and plan to hold for a few years.

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Excellent! Just the act of pouring a glass of wine calms my mind.

I'm kind of bummed. I like Occhipinti SP68 white, a blend of zibibbo (the world's oldest varietal) and alabanello and have been buying it at a good price from a liquor store in New Jersey. It's a unique Sicilian white. CNN has been doing a series with Stanley Tucci on Italy (mostly food & wine oriented) for the past few weeks and tonight they did Sicily. They featured Arianna Occhipinti as the innovative winemaker she is, and she was the only one featured, and they also featured that specific wine. We're having some friends over for a Sicilan food night in about 3 weeks (we're vaccinated and so are all the guests) so I wanted to be sure we had plenty, so I tried to order some during the show, hoping to beat the rush, and it was sold out at all of the normal places. I found some and had to pay more than normal for it. I'm hoping that Arianna's good fortune appearing on the show isn't my bad fortune, making me pay a bunch more for one of my secret favorites.

I also dig the Ochipinti white.

My recent and rare Napa splurge

We're probably going out to Napa in May. Will have to check out Continuum. Follow up on the Occhipinti - the place that had it at the higher price followed up with "oops - turns out we don't have any Occhipinti." Looks like the show was good for her, now seemingly sold out everywhere. Trying to stay Sicilian for the dinner, went with Tasca d'Almerita Mozia Grillo from the Whitaker estate. The Mozia is a decent subsitute.

Some friends of ours just got back and said it was wonderful. No waits, no traffic, could get into any restaurant they wanted for the most part, etc. they would recommend anyone grabbing a plane ticket and getting out there ASAP while it's still sleepy.

Getting ready for our trip next week. We hired a driver to drive our car for three days. One day is hiking recharge day. We also were able to get a reservation at French Laundry for our friends 50th. Very excited for that. It's a bucket list item for sure.

GoBearsGo said:

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Getting ready for our trip next week. We hired a driver to drive our car for three days. One day is hiking recharge day. We also were able to get a reservation at French Laundry for our friends 50th. Very excited for that. It's a bucket list item for sure.

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awesome get with FL reservation! Definitely on my bucket list.


How did you do the driver? Your car or a rental?

bularry said:

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I also dig the Ochipinti white.

My recent and rare Napa splurge

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Just got my trip back to Sicily for June booked. I've never been to Occhipinti and Cornelissen wineries, but would really like to get over there. This may not been the time, but definitely going to check it out. Arianna Occhipinti and Frank Cornelissen are both characters and it would be fun to meet them and see how they do theirs. A little different there with the lava soil. At one point Frank was aging wine in amphorae buried in the lava.

So jealous of your Sicily trip. I lived there one summer while studying abroad and couldn't have loved it more. Can't wait to here about it.

If you are looking for a new spot to enjoy, I lived down on the island of Ortigia in Siracusa. A beautiful little town.

CTCBear said:

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So jealous of your Sicily trip. I lived there one summer while studying abroad and couldn't have loved it more. Can't wait to here about it.

If you are looking for a new spot to enjoy, I lived down on the island of Ortigia in Siracusa. A beautiful little town.

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Siracusa is fabulous. Unfortunately it's on the opposite end of the island from us, so I only rarely get down there. It's a great part of the island though. Siracusa, Ragusa, Noto, Modica - all gorgeous places so close together.

bularry said:

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GoBearsGo said:

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Getting ready for our trip next week. We hired a driver to drive our car for three days. One day is hiking recharge day. We also were able to get a reservation at French Laundry for our friends 50th. Very excited for that. It's a bucket list item for sure.

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awesome get with FL reservation! Definitely on my bucket list.


How did you do the driver? Your car or a rental?

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Our rental car. I asked one of the wine clubs we are in who they recommend. I think it's about $40/hour which is way cheaper than my attorney for a DUI.

Masseto. Aromas evoking cocoa, violet, toast, and baked plum slowly take shape in the glass.

You people go support this Baylor owned winery. Napa fruit but they sell it from Dallas. Check 'Em out online. Can't remember the shop in Dallas that carries their wines

Punches above price.

bularry said:

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Can't remember the shop in Dallas that carries their wines

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LOL

bularry said:

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You people go support this Baylor owned winery. Napa fruit but they sell it from Dallas. Check 'Em out online. Can't remember the shop in Dallas that carries their wines

Punches above price.

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Times Ten carries it.
https://timestencellars.com/

that's correct, Times Ten!

WILLIS said:

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bularry said:

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Can't remember the shop in Dallas that carries their wines

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LOL

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I order directly from them and don't live in Dallas, so not really on my radar.

Wine improves with age. The older I get, the better I like it.