I’ll talk about our
Healdsburg tasting experiences in a not-too-distant future post, but I’m
starting with the non-Healdsburg wineries we visited.  We’ll start with Armida,
because it’s first alphabetically, and because our Winemaker B (Brandon
Lapides) is the winemaker at Armida. 
And he makes great wine there, and the view from the deck at Armida,
southeast across the Russian River Valley, is just fantastic, as you can see for
yourself below.  The first wine of
the day, in the barrel right now, tasting great, is the 2012 Armida Chardonnay,
Stuhlmuller Vineyards.  This is not
your stereotypical California Chardonnay, with oak and butter.  Nor is it really like a white Burgandy,
with more acids and minerality. 
This is a Chardonnay, grown in the Alexander Valley, and it tastes like
Chardonnay, grown in the Alexander Valley.  Which tastes different than Chardonnay from the Russian
River Valley.  (See Brandon’s 2010
Armida Chardonnay, Dutton Ranch.) 
At this point in time, the Stuhlmuller has more stone fruit flavors,
like a bit of peach in it.  The
second wine I tasted from the barrel was their Il Campo estate blend of
Zinfandel and Petite Sirah. 
Brandon is still working on the final blend, which will probably end up
somewhere in the range of 15-20% Petite Sirah.  Tasting really good right now, and should only get
better.  The last point about the
tasting experience at Armida is that the winemaker is there greeting all the
guests, introducing himself as the winemaker and making himself available to
answer questions about the wines. 
With many of the other places you go to on a weekend like this, the
winemaker isn’t there, and while others know about the wines, the winemaker can
tell you exactly what happened with each and every barrel.  A better tasting experience for
all. 

The Armida deck is a great place to enjoy the wines and the view.

Next on the list was Dutcher
Crossing.  When we first
visited, and I
wrote about our visit, I said that we’d be back.  Well, too many new wineries to visit, not enough time, and
it’s been nearly 4 years.  I’m
almost embarrassed about that. 
Beautiful winery, also with great views, and a nice arbor under which
are some nice picnic benches. (We ate our lunch there.)  They were serving a mushroom bisque to
go with their barrel wines, which were 2012 Pinot Noir and Zinfandel.  The Zinfandel was from Maple Vineyards
grapes, in the Dry Creek Valley, which is one of the top Zinfandel growers in
the area.  We also tasted the 2009
Dutcher Crossing Maple Vineyards Zinfandel, to see how we might expect the
barrel wine to evolve.  Very
nice.  Hopefully it won’t take us
another 4 years before we return. 

Last for this post is Limerick
Lane.  Limerick Lane was once
one of the standard bearers for Russian River Valley Zinfandel, with a well
deserved reputation for great Zins. 
And then there was the reputation, but it wasn’t so well deserved.  Not quite sure why.  And then there was new ownership (Jake
Bilbro), taking over right before the 2011 harvest.  And then there was the new winemaker, Jake’s brother Scott,
taking over the winemaking reins at the same time.  Scott was able to do the final blending on the 2010 wines,
but his influence is really noticed on the 2011s.  There was a marked difference tasting 2010 and 2011
Zinfandels and Syrahs side by side. 
The difference was more than just the vintage, because neither vintage
is “great”.  One of the truly great
things about California though, is that there is rarely a poor vintage, so the
winemaker should always have at least good to very good grapes to work with.  The 2011 shone bright in our tasting,
like the winemaker put some TLC (tender loving care) into the wines.  The 2010, well, I’m sure they’ll be
able to sell those bottles.  Looks
to me like Limerick Lane is well on its way to once again deserving their
reputation for great wines.  

Limerick Lane tasting room and estate vineyards.  

L’Chaim,

Larry

We started in December last year with big birthdays and other life
cycle events, and continued in January with my mother-in-law’s 75th
birthday.  We had a nice simple
lunch, with the group meeting in Auburn, somewhat equidistant between people
coming from Reno, Santa Cruz, and Santa Rosa.  And somewhat close to my mother-in-law in the Placerville
area.  Not too much to report from
the lunch, but we did have a great time, including our granddaughter having her
chocolate ice cream for her dessert.

On the way up to Placerville we decided to stop at Auriga Wine Cellars, in El Dorado County
in the Sierra Foothills.  We had
been there before, a few years ago, and had really liked their Sangiovese.  Great taste, great value.  Actually, we liked it so much that we
bought it for our younger son’s wedding
rehearsal dinner.  This time we
weren’t looking for wedding wine, just for some nice wine for everyday
drinking.  And we found some.  

When we arrived there the
owner/winemaker, Richard Sturgis, was behind the bar and, not surprisingly for
a Friday afternoon, the tasting room wasn’t crowded.  We tasted through almost their whole selection:  sparkling french columbard, sauvignon
blanc, sangiovese, super tuscan, barbera, zinfandel and syrah.  We didn’t taste the dessert port-style
wine.  This is a pretty typical
range of varietals for a Sierra Foothills winery, because these are the grapes
that grow well in the Foothills.

We’re not huge fans of sparkling wines, but we really liked this
one, and with a few more – events grandchildren being born, weddings, big
birthdays – coming up this year we thought a few bottles might be good in the
cellar.  On to the others now.  Most of the reds were from 2010.  We weren’t as excited about the
Sangiovese this time, but we really loved the Super Tuscan, which is a blend of
Sangiovese, Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and Zinfandel (only a “dash”).  The other one was the Barbera.  And while we enjoyed the wines, the
best part was talking with Richard about his wines, grape growing in the
Foothills, other winemakers, and more.  

L’Chaim,

Larry Lapides

PS.  We now have opened one of those Auriga Sparkling French Columbards, for the birth of our second grandchild, another granddaughter.  It was delicious, especially the first sip for the new mom!  

In my real world job – not this fun world of writing about
wine-related experiences – I go to England at least once a year.  The company that I work for has its
headquarters just outside of Oxford, in what used to be the milking shed of a
farm.  Actually, the farm is still
there, next to the office, and it’s pretty typical to hear roosters and other
livestock throughout the workday. 
It’s a bit isolated though, so for lunch we usually get a sandwich from
the catering truck that comes around. 
And my favorite sandwich from the truck is curry chicken salad. 

(As a side note, I have a bit of a soft spot in my heart for the little catering trucks.  When I was young, Cousin Louie drove one, and occasionally we would get to help him count coins from his day’s business.  Not much, but then it doesn’t take much to make a 6 year old kid happy.)  

Last week I decided to try to replicate that sandwich for
dinner.  I just used canned chicken
breast meat, plus mayonnaise, spicy mustard, curry powder, chopped peanuts,
celery, green onions, cilantro (probably not in the English version, but I love
the flavor) and raisins.  Turned
out pretty darn good.  Lori made a
berry salad with strawberries, blueberries and raspberries to go with it.  And we opened a nice bottle of wine (2
paragraphs into this, and I finally get to the wine!), a 2008 West
Wines Dry Creek Valley Viognier.

We visited West Wines last March, where we met Katarina
Bonde and
Bengt Akerlind, the owners of West Wines.  Katarina and Bengt are originally from Sweden, which goes a
long way to explaining why in 2010 the West Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve 2005 was
the first American wine ever served at the Nobel Prize Banquet.  We really enjoyed the atmosphere at the
winery and tasting room, and enjoyed the wines.  They only make Chardonnay, Viognier, Cabernet Sauvignon and
a Cab blend, so they’re pretty focused. 
We walked away having purchased Chardonnay, Viognier and Cabernet
bottles. 

The curry chicken salad and Viognier was a really nice
pairing, as it turned out.  The
West Wines Viognier was all we remembered it to be:  nice floral nose, bright flavors on entry, medium body and
just a bit of acid on the finish. 
Worked really well with the curry-based flavors. 

So now we’re eyeing the Chardonnay and Cab in the cellar,
and thinking about when to open those!

L’Chaim,

Larry Lapides

One of my New Year’s
resolutions, number two on my list – No, I’m not going to tell you what number
one is, so don’t even ask — was to get back to writing about wines:  about visiting wineries, wine travel
and tasting experiences, and wine and food pairings.  So I’m getting after it on day one of 2013. 

Lori and I took off most of
2012 from ViciVino.com.  It wasn’t
intentional, it just happened that way. 
Blame work, granddaughter Elli, dealing with family crises, etc.  But things seem to be evening out,
starting with this holiday season. 
So I’ll catch you up on our celebrations, especially the wine and food
part of it. 

Thanksgiving:  Actually, the day after Thanksgiving is
what I really want to talk about. 
We celebrated the holiday in Las Vegas, as the grandmother of our
younger son’s wife lives there, and the grandmother is our daughter-in-law’s
only family.  So, road trip to Las
Vegas, with a stop near Placerville to pick up my in-laws so that we could spend
the 10-hour drive to Las Vegas with them. 
If you’re waiting for all the jokes and rude comments about that road
trip, don’t look here.  It went
well from my perspective, mainly because I spent it either driving or
sleeping.  Not that it’s high on my
list of things to do again.  Back
to dinner.  Thanksgiving itself,
out at a restaurant in the Venetian Hotel, was very nice from a family
celebration perspective, but nothing special on the food/wine side.  The next night we went to Prime
Steakhouse in the Bellagio. 
Great meal, with a very nice bottle of wine.  Everyone ordered their own food, so I’ll only go over my
selections.  My main course was the
Duck l’Orange.  And the wine that
we had with our main course was the 2009 Hirsch
Vineyards “San Andreas Fault” Pinot Noir (Sonoma Coast).  Great combination, with the duck cooked
perfectly, great sauce, and the wine with enough fruit and acid to balance the
duck in the mouth.  Wonderful, and
thanks again to “Grandma Dee” for that dinner. 

Hanukkah:  Dinner with both of our boys and their
wives (both expecting in 2013, by the way), and the granddaughter.  After stuffing ourselves with potato
latkes during the day, we were ready for some protein that evening.  Dinner that evening was beef short
ribs, served with a 2002 Soquel
Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon (Partners’ Reserve, Santa Cruz Mountains) and
a 2003 Soquel Vineyards Trinity. 
The Trinity is only labeled as “California”, and I don’t know sources of
the grapes or even the varietals that went into this blend.  We decanted both wines, and therein
made two mistakes.  The first was
drinking the wines right after decanting, and not giving them time to
breathe.  The second was which
decanters we used.  For the Cab, we
used a nice, basic decanter that provides a good amount of surface area to help
get oxygen into the wine, more than just the oxygen that gets in when you pour
into the decanter.  For the
Trinity, we used a beautiful Waterford decanter.  Looks great, but it narrows down at the top so that the
surface area of the wine in the decanter is not much more than the surface area
of a cork; i.e., not much additional oxygen gets to that wine.  The Cab was excellent that
evening.  A really nice example of
a well balanced wine, and went great with the short ribs.  The Trinity had a nice nose, but
otherwise fell flat.  So everyone
drank the Cab, and everyone was happy. 
Except for me, because I had higher expectations for the Trinity, having
tasted it throughout the years.  So
I tried it again the next day, and Doh! it hit me, the decanting mistakes I’d
made.  Because the Trinity was not
just excellent, but outstanding. 
(On the same level with some of the wines in the Birthday celebration
below.)  I’ve got one more bottle
left, and I’m now going to save it for a special occasion.  I’m not sure what occasion, or when,
but it’s got at least another 5 years in the bottle, and I’m sure something
will happen that deserves that wine. 

Dad’s 85^th
Birthday:  In the past, for one of
the every-five-year birthdays for Mom or Dad, we’ve had a nice meal.  Sometimes we’ve gone out, sometimes
we’ve catered in.  I previously
wrote about Dad’s 80^th
birthday.  For this celebration
we decided to do the cooking ourselves. 
Mom took the hors d’oeuvres, my brother and sister-in-law took the
appetizer course (asparagus and prosciutto wrapped in filo dough, and a baked
brie and jam/chutney dish), we took the main course and my sister took dessert
(apple pie).  The “we” for the main
course included my wife and I, and both boys and wives.  The main course was tri tip, twice
baked potatoes and roasted asparagus with lemon and garlic.  The wines were 1992 and 1995 Opus One (Napa Valley Cabernet
Sauvignon based blends), and a 1993 V Sattui
Napa Valley Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon. 
The Opus One wines were excellent, with a split at the table as to which
was preferred.  And the V Sattui
held its own with the others; another great tasting experience.  It was a bit chaotic with everyone in
and out of the kitchen, but truly a memorable experience for the fun we all had
celebrating a big birthday. 

Leftovers:  In addition to the intimate home
celebration of Dad’s birthday, we also had a large party at a restaurant.  And Lori and I took home a container of
ziti pasta with chicken and mushrooms in a cream-based sauce.  The next night we opened a bottle of
2004 Peachy
Canyon Zinfandel (Paso Robles, Old Schoolhouse Vineyard).  This wine has aged quite well, and is
now a very nicely balanced wine, great with meals like this.  The Zin was not too heavy for the meal,
as the mushrooms in particular gave the pasta a nice earthy, meaty tone that
the wine complemented well.  Also,
the nice acidity in the wine cut through the cream sauce, cleaning out the
mouth after each bite.  Yes,
Zinfandels can age really well if they’re made to do that, and this wine
definitely has at least a few more years. 
Good thing, since we have another couple of bottles. 

That’s all for now.  No wine for New Year’s Eve, just
margaritas.  Here’s wishing you and
yours a happy, healthy and prosperous 2013!

L’chaim,

Larry