Pinot Noir Archives -

Arista Winery Perli Vineyard Pinot Noir 2019 Review – A Gem

It should be no surprise that Arista was one of our favorite wineries in Sonoma from our last visit, and since then we have been building a cellar of their stellar Pinot Noirs as club members.

One of our favorite vineyard plots, Perli Vineyards, was one of our favorites and we have a modest collection that is sleeping for some age.

We decided to pull a bottle of this gem from our cellar from the 2019 vintage to check how it was doing at approximately four years old, and this one, naturally, still had a lot of youth in it while just starting to show signs of age!

La Crema is one of those brands we see seemingly everywhere. From wine shop to wine shop, bar menu to bar menu, La Crema is one of those brands it is hard to get away from in the USA.

So, naturally, it sparked our interest, and we wanted to find out if their California Pinot Noir was worth our attention.

For its price, well, this certainly was an interesting one!

Whenever we drink Champagne, we often go for the more common blanc de blanc or blanc de noir bottles over rose and other styles. But when we found Moet & Chandon Rose Imperial NV at a duty free store at an approachable price point, we knew we had to give it a try.

If you are looking for a sparkling wine with some intense red fruits and, admittedly, more mellow lees character, this one may need to be on your radar!

Whenever we travel, especially to regions that are not known for wine production, we often pick up a bottle or two of sparkling wine at duty free to enjoy somewhere beautiful.

Whenever our duty free shopping happens in Europe, odds are good we are picking up a bottle of Veuve Clicquot Champagne to enjoy if only because it is at a vastly lower price point than we are able to find at home.

For a bottle that you are paying for the name recognition as much as you are what is inside, a lower price point is always welcomed!

We're never ones to say no to an easy drinking Gamay, and when we can find this grape in a blend we almost always have to give it a try.

Domaine Curtet's Autrement Rouge gave us just that with a mix of Gamay, Pinot Noir, and Mondeuse Noir giving all of the hallmarks of a classic Beaujolais but originating from Savoie!

One of the perks of having a wine cellar is that sometimes we do not really know what we have in stock. We keep an inventory of our bottles, of course, but sometimes a few slip through the cracks and we forget about them for years.

Our Lamoreaux Landing Pinot Noir 2014 was one such bottle. We pulled it out not only to find that we had one at all, but also that it was pushing almost nine years old.

As we didn't expect this bottle to age too much longer, we decided to open it up and see how it was faring, and we were pleasantly surprised by what we found!

Whenever it comes to fine Champagne, you generally have many categories of bottles to choose from. These can include non-vintage, vintage, and more exclusive blends that feature the best of the best the producer has to offer.

Prestige-branded Champagne often is the top of the top for any given producer, and we knew we were in for a treat when we opened Champagne Dumenil's Cuvee Prestige Vieilles Vignes Brut.

But it wasn't until we sampled this astoundingly delicious bottle that we truly understood how special it was. This one is quite the gem!

When I decided to sign up for WSET Diploma, I knew I'd have to go sparkling heavy when in the D4 module.

As I have the least experience with all things bubbles, this meant finding new styles of wines to try outright (although not necessarily new grapes per our quest).

So early on in this module, I decided to go for Jean-Baptiste Adam Brute Rose- a Cremant d'Alsace made in the traditional method with a little bit of skin contact from my favorite region in France!

It was every bit what I hoped for.

When we visited several Sonoma wineries on a California trip a few years ago, we made sure to stop at Iron Horse Vineyards to try their acclaimed sparkling wines. We fell in love with them and brought many bottles home with us to enjoy later on.

Most of those bottles did not last very long, but we held onto a few to give a few more years of age to for good measure. One such bottle was Iron Horse Brut LD 2010, and we decided to open it up in mid-2022 to celebrate our 10-year wedding anniversary.

It was better than we expected.

We often find that non-vintage Champagne can have flavor profiles all over the place. Some are high acid with simple citrus fruit flavors. Others have strong lees components. Others still may have some indication of age because, well, we simply have no way of knowing how old that bottle was to begin with.

Champagne Taittinger's Brut NV definitely fell towards the end of being one of the more complex non-vintage Champagnes we've had to date, and now we simply want more!

Arista Winery Perli Vineyard Pinot Noir 2019 Review – A Gem

La Crema Sonoma Coast 2021 Review – A Solid Entry Wine

Moet & Chandon Rose Imperial NV Review – Subtle and Bubbly

Veuve Clicquot Champagne Review – Delicious at a Price

Domaine Curtet Autrement Rouge 2018 Review – Gamay Blend

Lamoreaux Landing Pinot Noir 2014 Review – Showing Some Age

Champagne Dumenil Cuvee Prestige Vieilles Vignes Review

Jean-Baptiste Adam Brute Rose NV – Traditional Method Rose

Iron Horse Brut LD 2010 Review – Delicious Aged Sparkling Wine

Taittinger Champagne Brut NV Review – Impressive Flavor Profile