February 8 2008
On the Quintessential Parker Wine
With all of the ongoing talk of “Parker’s palate” and the incumbent bit of posturing from those on the other side of the divide (every bit the equal of the political divide between the red, blue and disenfranchised, by the way), I have to say that I think I have found the “perfect” Parker wine.
If you want to buy a wine that encapsulates the vitriol on both sides of the aisle, I can think of no better example than the 2005 Marquis Phillips “Sarah’s Blend.” Speaking of vitriol, I’m linking to wine.com. Sorry about that. But, check out their hand-dandy dryness meter and note this baby is about a 25% up on the dryness meter.
I bought this at a wine shop on a random recent Saturday during a tasting. Under fluorescent lighting, without food, it seemed the least bombastic of the wines I tried that day and at around $16 it seemed like a relative bargain.
I opened the bottle this week and immediately thought that the oaky tannins were sweeeeeeet. Way sweet. Sweet as in too sweet. I did a search on the Internet and came back with Parker’s tasting note, as noted, from wine.com:
“One of my favorite Marquis Philips cuvees is the 2005 Sarah’s Blend, a concoction of 60% Shiraz, 22% Cabernet Sauvignon, 15% Merlot, and 3% Cabernet Franc fermented in wood and aged in both new and one-year-old French and American oak. Its deep ruby/purple hue is accompanied by aromas of flowers, spice box, blueberries, black currants, and smoky oak. Opulent, voluptuous, and full-bodied, with low acidity and sweet tannin, this is a blockbuster red that sells for a song. If you like fruit, flavor, and character, this is a big-time winner to drink over the next 3-4 years.”
91 points. -Wine Advocate
Now, mind you, I’m not going to get into this ideological debate because there is no right or wrong and I can drink down either party line, I will simply say that this wine, to me, typifies what is so polarizing about Parker’s palate: dense fruit, oaked to the bejeesus and virtually no acidity. It is a perfectly decent quaff, just depends on what you’re down for. It’s widely available. Give it a crack and let me know what you think.
Oh, and another note, I can already see the public tide shifting back towards sympathy for Britney. The same is true for Parker, if there’s too much backlash, every wine lover on the planet is going to start experiencing “Stockholm Syndrome.”
Wine Blog URL’s
I did a quick search on wine blog related URL’s. Both wineblogger.com and wineblog.com have been taken for some time, but, oddly, neither are in use. I sent emails to the owners of both asking if they were interested in selling the URL and neither replied. Cole Danehower who publishes the Oregon Wine Report owns wineblog.com. He bought the URL in 2002, so kudos to him for having some foresight. Too bad he doesn’t use the URL and an even greater tragedy that he doesn’t have the decency to extend professional courtesy and answer email.
Facebook + Wine
If you have not gotten on the Facebook wagon yet, I would highly encourage you to do so. There is a ton of wine-related activity. Rumor has it that a couple of winery specific groups on Facebook are getting shut down because Facebook doesn’t want to endorse alcohol or pornography. It seems a bit hypocritical to me to grandfather people in, but stop new groups from forming. Sign up for Facebook and search for wine and you’ll see the groups upon groups that exist already.
Valentine’s Day and Wine
Forget the wine for Valentine’s Day. If you want a fun, hand-crafted wine-related gift go to etsy.com and search for “wine.” All kinds of handcrafted wine-related items pop up. Your sweetie will appreciate the thought and it might pay more thoughtful dividends than the Victoria’s Secret gift.
Wine Retail Concepts
I keep reading about new retail concepts … and there are tons of them happening. The one thing I have not seen is where wine + technology merge; really merge in a retail venue. Hell, you cannot go into a Starbucks without see ½ of the people in there plastered into the glow of a laptop. Is a wine retail concept featuring some edutainment using the Microsoft computer table too far off? I think not, particularly because the Vinio is gaining some traction. Imagine the Oxford Companion to Wine come to life and Jancis Robinson introducing the Poilly-Fume you are drinking.
The Other Teams Playbook
I read many wine-related magazines, including many trade-oriented magazines. General wine enthusiasts who care not to see the wizard behind the curtain can bypass most of them. However, a new magazine geared towards Sommeliers may be the lone exception. The Sommelier Journal, found here, is a terrific new magazine with plenty of general interest articles to satisfy the general wine lover. If you like Wine Spectator or Wine News, you will like the Sommelier Journal. At $59 bucks, it is not inexpensive, but it fills a tremendous void in the marketplace between the hardcore trade mags. Like Restaurant Wine by Ronn Weigand and Wine Spectator. Plus, if you want to read the “other teams’ playbook” and get some insight into the role of being a Sommelier, in addition to some terrific general wine information, this is a great place to start.
Posted in, Free Run: Field Notes From a Wine Life. Permalink | Comments (2) |
Hi Jill,
Thanks for the comment. Good info. on the Phillips/MollyDooker.
I think those Mollydooker folks are printing money—I might buy some and further calibrate my palate.
Jeff
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Hi Jeff, lots of good stuff as usual!
Re: Sarah’s Blend, it was the kind of stuff I learned to like wine on, but now can’t deal with. It also was the model for what the Mollydooker folks call “Two Left Feet”, another Parker favorite. The Marquis’s (who left Marquis Philips a couple years back) stated goal is for the mouthfeel of their wines to feel like velvet. So no tannin or acid should be detectable, though they say that they’re there.
The wines are high alcohol, high fruit, and high tannin and high acid is what they say, but in perfect balance. This perfect balance is what makes everything but the fruit undetectable. I happen to like tasting that structure when I take a sip of wine, but many people don’t. And I remain unconvinced that it’s there, even if you can’t taste it.
As to the wine/technology retail thread…I saw something on Fine Living Network (yeah, yeah, I’ve been known to watch Yuppie Porn every once in a while) that featured a wine store that had some sort of computer touch screen mechanisms embedded into the bar area, so that people could select wines and get detailed info that way. Which is more or less what you’re talking about. Couldn’t tell you the name of the wine bar, just that something does exist. Also, there are the enomatics that just keep popping up everywhere; that must constitute wine meeting technology in some form or another. Those are just two examples I can think of. (Oh, and those people who just sell wine online, hehehehe!).
Cheers!
Jill