Wine Subscription Review: Wineist Wine Carte, Part 2

"Small in size, big in wines" is the Wineist motto. They're I guess what you could call a wine club but they call themselves a "wine carte". Carte is actually a good choice of wordage because it can mean menu or map. You're getting a taste of the wines they sell and their wines are from all over the world!

This is how it works: you go to WINEIST.COM and see what plan works for you. You can get a monthly subscription, six month subscription or a yearly subscription. Let's just say you get a monthly subscription, which is $29 a month at the time of this review. Every month you'll receive six 50 ml sample bottles in a neat little box. There's also a pamphlet telling you what each bottle is, all the tech information you could possibly need, winery information, food pairings, etc, and space for your notes. If you like any of the wines then you can buy them in normal bottle size.

Just by seeing what they do, having this package in my hands, I can tell you this is a very cool product. But how are the wines in the package that I got?

I'm breaking it down into two reviews: In Part 1 I had a Riesling from Germany, a Pinotage Rosé from South Africa, and a Tempranillo blend from Spain. In Part 2 I've got a Chianti Rufina Cru Basciano, a Shiraz blend from South Africa, and another Tempranillo blend from Spain.

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Wine Subscription Review: Wineist Wine Carte, Part 1

"Small in size, big in wines" is the Wineist motto. They're I guess what you could call a wine club but they call themselves a "wine carte". Carte is actually a good choice of wordage because it can mean menu or map. You're getting a taste of the wines they sell and their wines are from all over the world!

This is how it works: you go to WINEIST.COM and see what plan works for you. You can get a monthly subscription, six month subscription or a yearly subscription. Let's just say you get a monthly subscription, which is $29 a month at the time of this review. Every month you'll receive six 50 ml sample bottles in a neat little box. There's also a pamphlet telling you what each bottle is, all the tech information you could possibly need, winery information, food pairings, etc, and space for your notes. If you like any of the wines then you can buy them in normal bottle size.

Just by seeing what they do, having this package in my hands, I can tell you this is a very cool product. But how are the wines in the package that I got?

I'm breaking it down into two reviews: In Part 1 I've got a Riesling from Germany, a Pinotage Rosé from South Africa, and a Tempranillo blend from Spain. In Part 2 I've got a Chianti Rufina, a Shiraz blend from South Africa, and another Tempranillo blend from Spain.

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Beer Review: Uinta Brewing Biere de Mars & Clown Shoes The Entertainer

This just isn't your random craft beer review, my friends. Both of these beers have something to do with our favorite adult beverage of them all... WINE! Biere de Mars is a French-Style Spring Ale aged in Chardonnay barrels and The Entertainer is a Red Ale aged in Cabernet barrels. Queen Chard and King Cab are in my house! They're playing the music too loud and I don't have to go out! That was a  terrible reference to a song that's popular with the young people.

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Glassware Variation: Wine vs. Beer

It seems this has led some people to believe that I think glassware isn't important to wine or that it's inferior to beer, when that's not at all what I'm saying. When you have the -->PROPER<-- a="" all="" awful.="" barleywine="" beer="" different.="" ever="" glass="" had="" in="" is="" it="" need="" p="" pilsner="" quite="" really="" s="" that="" while="" wine="" you="">
"Wine needs a tulip shaped, stemmed, reasonably sized glass with a small opening and no bulb on the rim.That's it. Ge the proper wine glass and that's all you need. And maybe one with a wider opening for Chardonnay. Beer calls for a friggin goddamn collection. Stout, pilsnerm stein, weizen, snifter... with beer, a variation of glass matters more than most realize. More than, dare I say, with wine." - Joey Casco, CSW/CSS

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Wine Review: Olsen Perri Central Coast 2014 L'Apache Pinot Noir

In my review of Olsen Perri Sta. Rita Hills (Hilliard Bruce Vineyard) 2014 Pinot Noir I went over Olsen Perri's origin story and how they do things. But here's a quote straight from the horses mouth, owner Mark Olsen: "Will Perri and I are both in our late 30s, each with young families. We share an addiction to Central Coast Pinot Noir and Chardonnay.  It started small and easy to manage, but grew into a way of life.  Drink wine, meet friends who make wine, buy fruit from these amazing folks, make wine, repeat.  In the process we get to share the experiences with our friends, family and customers. Life is good!"

So I know you're used to me going off on tangents or getting completely side-tracked sometimes but I really can't write long article-length reviews anymore. If you'd like to see why then you can read my announcement on it and why I'm putting off accepting more samples for awhile. But all you really need to know is that I'm gonna try and cut down on the amount of time spent writing wine reviews and still continue to keep, what @TheWiningHour on Twitter calls, #WineStalkerStyle. So you may see some experimenting on how I write reviews.

So enough about that. Let's review a wine.

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Wine Review: Olsen Perri Sta. Rita Hills (Hilliard Bruce Vineyard) 2014 Pinot Noir

I'm getting sick. I can feel it. Tomorrow I'm gonna feel like absolute garbage, but for today I can still taste and smell perfectly. So I better get this review done now.

I like to keep a consistent schedule on this website so I usually write reviews about a week before they're released just in case something comes up. This one is written two weeks ahead of time because, judging by how long my daughter was sick and how long my wife has been sick, this virus might take awhile. But when this review is released and the next one comes out just a few days later, there will be an entire illness in between that you wouldn't even know happened. I'm a planner. I also share too much.

Olsen Perri's winery is in San Diego and their grapes are from various places in the Central Coast, but they're totally old-school. Founders Will Perri and Mark Olsen took a trip to Burgundy where they saw how Burgundian wine was made before modern technology, and they decided to do just that in California. They use a manual Italian basket press, gravity pumps, and ferment with natural yeasts. This California Pinot is made OG style.

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Patrick puts it somewhere else.

Why don't we take all the Malbec in Chile... and put it in Argentina where it's good.

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Wine Review: Vindie California 2014 Red Blend

Vindie is a wine label created by Jeff Bundschu of the Gundlach Bundshu Winery and Rand Rognlien of Music Nomad, with winemaker Alison Crowe. The whole concept of the wine is for it to be paired wiiiith.... music. Yup! Music! That actually makes sense to me. I write all of my reviews to vastly different forms of music and, even though I don't think it influences whether I like the wine or not, it definitely influences the tone of the review. So I really like the idea of providing music for people to listen to that pairs well with their wine.

You can read more about this concept in my review of their Sonoma County 2014 Chardonnay, but here's a quick rundown:

There's a code that you scratch off on the back label, which you redeem on VINDIEWINE.COM to gain access to a playlist of eight songs by independent artists chosen for your bottle of wine. I made sure that it works on mobile, which I felt was pretty damn important. After redeeming your code it may tell you that there was an error with your code... but if you look to the left on your computer or scroll down on your mobile device, you'll see that your playlist was pulled up. Click on it, pour some wine, and enjoy.

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Wine Review: Vindie Sonoma Coast 2014 Chardonnay

I had the pleasure of meeting Jeff Bundschu of the Gundlach Bundshu Winery during an east coast trip he made probably about ten years ago. I was just some kid that worked in a liquor store here on Cape Cod so the dude wouldn't remember me. What I remember is 1) his wines are fucking delicious 2) he's a total California dude with the "woooah" surfer accent, hemp-rope necklace and long, blonde hair. Gundlach is still one of my favorite wineries out of Cali.

Jeff got together with Music Nomad's Rand Rognlien to create Vindie Wines and they hired Alison Crowe as their winemaker. But there's something truly unique about this wine of the likes I have never seen: they did a shit ton of research in wine tasting and music, and then talent scouting to pair their wines with emerging artists. This is wine that is meant to be paired with music.

On a regular basis you see me talk about what music I'm listening to while I review a wine. And I have a wide taste in music so you've seen me talk about everything from blues to ska to hair bands to heavy metal, and I've expressed my dislike of country music at least once. So who would be a better reviewer than me for a wine that pairs its own damn self with music? Alright, probably a whole bunch of other reviewers would be better but too bad. I'm the one reviewing it today. Deal with it.

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Old men laughing

Sulfites DON'T cause headaches and sadly this meme is more true than you think. The "CONTAINS SULFITES" warning on wine bottles in the USA was started by a senator in the 1970's that wanted to bring back prohibition and used every scare tactic that he could. Check out my little rant on sulfites to learn the truth: "Sulfites in wine: the truth you may not like"

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VIDEO: Bud Light vs Coors Light vs Miller Lite

The big three American light beers face each other because I've got nothing better to do with my time! Who will win? Why do I torture myself? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hrFJ_jkF-8c


Result: Bud Light tastes like rice with a little sweetness. I could deal with it if it's the only option. Coors Light tastes like water with a drop of Pilsner. I won't drink it if it's the only option. What about Miller Lite? Well, you're gonna have to watch the video!

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Kickstarter campaign for Long Island Vine Care

I was recently contacted by fan of the blog Steven Scarnardo of Long Island Vine Care (http://www.longislandvinecare.com) about a kickstarter campaign for his business. I took a look and thought what he was doing was really cool and it deserved to be funded.

In order to combat the ever growing malls and parking lots on Long Island, Steve is using his love of wine and knowledge of viticulture to grow vineyards for people in their own backyards and keep the suburbs connected to the natural world around us.

I think that's something all of us winelovers can appreciate. Check out the kickstarter and think about pledging! There's some cool incentives for you, too.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1076517627/backyard-vineyards/posts/1509410

The campaign ends Saturday, March 19th, 2016.

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Wine Review: Montes Cherub Rosé of Syrah 2015 and Montes Twins Red Wine 2013

On February 10th I participated in a Twitter #WineChat for Montes Wines. I love those things. You get to sit down at your computer and enjoy the same wine with people all over the world for an hour. Pretty cool. So the following day I looked at my leftovers and I thought "well, might as well write up some reviews!" Keep in mind that this was written the day after the #WineChat and not recently. Reviewing a wine a month after it's been opened would not be a wise decision.

What I've got is the 2015 vintage of Montes Cherub Rosé of Syrah and the 2013 vintage of Montes Twins Red Wine. I'm going to make this rather quick. Think of it as a bonus review.

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March Wine Pick: Chateau de Cazenove 2009 Bordeaux Supérieur

This WINE PICK of the month was written for the Luke's of Cape Cod website.

Once upon a time there was Domaine de la Maqueline, which operated from the late 19th century until 1956. The seven hectares of land remained untouched until it was bought by Wihelmina van Essen de Cazenove in 1989. She replanted the vineyards and renamed it Chateau de Cazenove.

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