Fine Wines

Many years ago (shortly after turning 21) I decided I wanted to see what wine was all about. My first wine I bought at the local Kroger, a carafe of some vapid red chosen for its price. Needless to say, I was not impressed.

Fast forward three or four years when a CNN article on wine varietals convinced me to give wine another shot; this time I sought out a dessert Muscat on the article's hint that Muscat is one of the few wine grapes to produce "grapey" wines. A few weeks later I bought a really nice Reisling (which is still my favorite varietal) for Thanksgiving dinner and have never looked back since.

Yes, I began with sweet white wines and found reds to be an acquired taste, but since then I have come to like nearly all wines (of quality, that is--life is too short to drink cheap wine). My favorites are Reisling, Shiraz, Cab Sauv, and Sauvignon Blanc.

Favorite Wines

Henschke "Hill of Grace" Shiraz (100 points)
My, my, how can one describe this marvelous wine? Magnificent, rich color like mulberry ink rolls from bottle to glass. Rich aromas of cedar, plums, spice, chocolate, and lavender conjure visions of age-worn attic chests filled with sachets of potpourri and a complexity rarely but luxuriously glimpsed by the nose. Startlingly bold yet mature fruit at the first sip: plums, the darkest sloe, and a hint of inky black berries with rolls of velvet on the finish, and tannins keeping teeth unbared that promise at years of maturity to come. Expect to pay over $250 for this wine, but the Hill of Grace is worth every single penny.

1998 Christoffel Urziger Wurzgarten Reisling Spatlese (94 points)
My first experience with great wine and one to be hoarded in one's cellar for years to come. A complex blend of fruits with hints of sweet peaches balanced by acidic pears and apple overtones flavor a wine difficult to believe is a spatlese and not something more. Light yet seemingly syrupy, this wine coats the mouth in ecstatic flavor finished by the perfect complement of tart acidity and carved granite crispness that will guarantee a wine that though wonderful now promises rich complexity through decades to follow. Becoming more difficult to find, but a bargain at around $30 a bottle.

Chambers Rutherglen Special Tokay (99 points)
Sinful. One word might describe this incredible wine, as might many hundreds, yet nothing can capture the complex and luxurious essence of this dessert wine. Ample years granted by her blend of material dating to the Great War make this Australian Tokay an enigmatic liquor of coffee, chocolate, raisins, toffee, and candied oranges. Decadent and sweet, one sip of this thick, well-legged girl is not enough to even begin to discern her true nature. Truly the nectar of the gods, her maturity will keep for many a year more and draw the palate of her every lover into addicting embrace that will nearly drown the senses and which lingers on the tongue like a parting kiss. Difficult to locate, perhaps, but worth the $75 or so per half-bottle that she commands and drawing the first bars of siren-song for her elder sister, the Rare Tokay of over a century in age.

2000 William Randall Shiraz (90 points)
Intense fruit of black currants tease the mouth without overpowering in this wonderful Shiraz from Australia's Barossa Valley. Smooth tannins enfold the tongue and offer a promise of maturity in a wine easily drinkable whilst still a toddler; overtones of vanilla and coffee add to a body seemingly too complex for its cost (a steal at around $30 a bottle). While Penfolds' Grange and Henschke's Hill of Grace might be the standard bearers for excellent Australian wines, this Shiraz is a worthy little brother to both.