Sister Creek Muscat Canelli Blind Tasting

January 16, 2013 by 2 Comments

We have always loved the Sister Creek Vineyards Muscat Canelli. The Italian style wine with its slight carbonation is the closest wine to Moscato d’Asti we have found in Texas. Sister Creek makes two versions of the Muscat Canelli, one which you can find at wine stores and a Reserve Muscat Canelli which can only be bought at the winery.

Some years do well for Sister Creek in getting Texas grapes and the labels proudly display the Texas word on the label (at least 75% Texas grapes) whereas other years out of state grapes are used providing a For Sale In Texas label (between 25% and 75% Texas grapes).

I personally could not tell the difference between the Reserve and non-Reserve wines but Gloria has been convinced for years the Reserve is better. It was time to do a blind tasting to determine if that was true. Looking at the Sister Creek website they describe the non-Reserve wine as “Elegantly sweet and balanced with fruity, floral, & honey aromas” and the Reserve wine as “Crisp citrus flavor and balanced with fruity and floral aromas.” The only difference I really see is honey in the non-Reserve wine.

Sister Creek Muscat Cannellis

It was time for the blind tasting and we had purchased three bottles of the Sister Creek Muscat Canelli. They were a 2009 Reserve, a 2010 Texas non-Reserve, and a 2011 non-Reserve. Our wine cooler had a little problem holding the bottles for some reason so please excuse the labels in the photo which got a little torn from removing. I need to get better at taking photos of wine bottles because they were all the same color, although in the photo the ones on the right look darker, but that is because there were dark items behind the bottles.

Using the old aluminum foil blind tasting method, I uncorked the bottles and then wrapped them. I didn’t bother removing the capsule foil since all bottles looked the same. After rearranging the bottles, I left the room and Gloria then picked an order to bring to us to taste. Since it was only the two of us doing the blind tasting, it was not really necessary to mark the bottles.

The order of the bottles tasted coincidentally were 2009, 2010, and 2011. During the tasting it was very, very difficult to determine any difference between the wines, either with the bouquet or the taste. That is a good thing when it comes to wanting to make sure different vintages of a wine taste the same for the consumers.

The first wine (2009) to me tasted a little more fruit forward so I thought it might be a newer wine. Gloria also detected the same thing. The rest of the wines were too close to tell apart initially. After the third time of sniffing and tasting, I thought the second wine (2010) was slightly different than the others so I guessed that was the Texas wine.

Remember the order of the wines were 2009, 2010, and 2011. My guesses were 2011, 2010, and 2009. Gloria guessed 2010, 2011, and 2009. At least I got the Texas wine correct.

Sister Creek Reserve Muscat Cannelli

We enjoyed the tasting and of course, someone had to drink the three bottles of wine in the days following which was not a problem at all. We did prove one thing doing the tasting though. Unless we picked a wrong vintage, the Sister Creek Reserve Muscat Canelli is not that much different from the non-Reserve, so feel free to buy that Muscat Canelli in the stores. But also if you’re near Sisterdale where Sister Creek Vineyards is located, definitely stop by and pick up a Reserve to do your own tasting!

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NICE Winery Malbec Vertical Wine Tasting

December 2, 2012 by 6 Comments

I have previously posted about the NICE Winery located in Houston and owned by Ryan Levy and Ian Eastveld. We enjoyed visiting the winery the first time so much that we joined their wine club. NICE Winery makes their Malbec in Mendoza, Argentina and has three vintages available: 2007, 2008, and 2009. The 2009 was their first Reserve wine and just won a silver medal in the 2013 Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo International Wine Competition.

We have done a couple vertical tastings before and were curious to see how a vertical of the NICE Winery Malbecs would be. If you do not know what a vertical is, different vintages of the same wine type from the same winery are tasted together. This can show differences between the various vintages. We bought the bottles of 2007, 2008, and 2009 and invited a small group of close friends to participate in the vertical tasting.

NICE Malbecs

NICE Malbecs: 2007, 2008, 2009 Reserve

To make it interesting for everybody involved and since we really like the NICE winemakers, we invited Ryan and Ian too. They told us they had a previous commitment but they provided their vertical tasting notes for the three wines to help us. We decided tasting three wines would not take very long so we decided to enhance the evening with a blind tasting of other Malbecs. Since we had done a blind tasting of Texas Orange Muscats earlier in the year, we had a little experience and started deciding on the wines to blind taste.

The primary region in Argentina which makes Malbec is Mendoza in the north. Another region is Patagonia in the south. There were plenty of Mendoza Malbecs to choose from at the store but I decided on a popular brand which can be found most places: Alamos and their 2011 Malbec. I could only find one Patagonia Malbec which was the 2007 Del Fin Del Mundo Reserva Malbec.

I learned that Malbec originated in France and is now found primarily in the town of Cahors in South West France. I chose a 2010 Georges Vigouroux to represent the old world. Since I am a Texas wine lover, I had to include a Texas Malbec. When Gloria and I visited Perissos Vineyard and Winery, we got a bottle of their 2010 Malbec made from 75% estate Malbec and 25% estate Dolcetto. This wine is now sold out and we decided to share it with our close friends.

Ready to taste

We invited eight of our close friends and prepared for the evening. During the day we learned that Ryan and Ian of NICE Winery had been able to rearrange their schedules and would be able to attend. Everyone arrived and we sat down to start our vertical tasting of the NICE Malbecs. It was suggested to provide beef during our Argentinian evening so we had brisket and chimichurri sauce for eating along with the usual cheese and crackers.

NICE owners

Ian Eastveld and Ryan Levy

All was quiet while everybody tried the three years of Malbecs starting from oldest to newest. Discussion then started with people explaining which vintage they preferred and other comments on the three wines. Ryan and Ian provided answers to questions and also gave information on the different vintages. We all learned more about Malbec and how Ryan and Ian had made the wines in Argentina.

Blind wines

It was now time for the blind tasting and everybody was handed a tasting sheet for writing tasting notes and their rating of the wine. It was revealed there would be four Malbecs from different regions around the world and part of the tasting notes should be to include a guess as to where the particular Malbec was from. We have taken a couple blind tasting classes at NICE Winery, so it was going to be interesting to see Ryan and Ian in action doing a blind tasting of wines. They are both Certified Sommeliers and during the blind tasting, they were very quick in writing down their tasting notes.

After all four wines had been tasted, we went around the table and people gave their tasting notes, guessed where the wine was from, and then gave their rating for each wine. When we were done revealing the wines, the overall and almost unanimous choice was the 2011 Alamos Malbec from Mendoza. This was a little surprising since this is a very common brand and the cheapest in price of all four wines.

Alamos Malbec

The group had tasted seven Malbecs so we knew it was time for a change and brought out the NICE Winery 2010 Demi-Sec Sparkling Wine made from Muscat of Alexandria grapes again in Argentina. It was a refreshing change from the Malbecs.

The end of the evening was drawing near and we finished it with a White Port and Tawny Port along with cheesecake, cookies, and pastries which the various guests had brought. It was the perfect ending to a very entertaining and excellent evening.

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Cap*Rock Winery

July 8, 2012 by 5 Comments

http://www.caprockwinery.com

Cap*Rock Winery is located in Lubbock and is owned by Catherine Bodenstedt. Phillip Anderson is the General Manager and Michael Vorauer is the winemaker. Catherine Bodenstedt purchased the winery in August 2010 after multiple auctions. Instead of retelling the story of the auctions and other proceedings, please read the blog posts on VintageTexas starting at http://vintagetexas.com/blog/?p=2243.

Cap*Rock - entrance

We arrived at Cap*Rock Winery when they opened and as soon as we drove to the entrance, we immediately had to stop the car. It’s a good thing nobody was behind us. There was a gorgeous entrance in front of us with enter and exit roads, and further down the right road you could see the winery with its welcoming doors. I had to jump out of the car and start taking photos because I had a hunch. Sure enough, when Gloria and I were deciding on our 2012 TX Wine Lover Awards, we believed Cap*Rock Winery has the Best Entrance.

Cap*Rock - outside

Cap*Rock - statue

We proceeded to the winery and were still oohing and aahing as we took more photos, and we hadn’t even gone inside yet. There is a Native American statue over the doorway presenting his offerings. We finally made it inside and entered the tasting room with the tasting bar on the right and a seating area on the left including couches and a fireplace. As it turned out, another TX Wine Lover award went to Cap*Rock Winery for Best Tasting Room.

Cap*Rock - couches

We were greeted and unbeknownst to us, General Manager Phillip Anderson had been waiting for us. We met Phillip and he started us on a tasting with the help of some of the other tasting guides. There is a tasting fee for up to seven wines which includes an engraved tasting glass. And what a glass it is! We were shocked when Phillip took the glass and banged it on the edge of the counter and it didn’t break. He said it was titanium-based and virtually unbreakable. He did tell the others though the other day one did break when he did the demonstration. But the tasting fee is worth it just for the Schott Zwiesel wine glass, and it will be used often in our house to avoid any clumsiness (that would be me).

Cap*Rock - inside

The tastings are poured from the bottle while you stand at the tasting bar. Wine crackers are provided to cleanse your palate. The winery uses both corks and screw caps and Phillip said they will be switching soon to use screw caps for any wine which will be chilled.

Since the winery was purchased with existing inventory, they are using the inventory and when that is gone, changes will be made. For example, right now Cap*Rock Winery uses 75-80 percent Texas grapes. Phillip said to give them two years and they will be using 100 percent Texas grapes in their Texas wine. Right now other than Texas grapes, they use grapes from California. When the existing inventory is gone, they have made the decision if they cannot make a wine from Texas grapes, they are just not going to make it.

In addition, one of the upcoming changes will be the wine bottle labels. I had to ask what the design was on some of the bottles because it looked a little unusual to be on a wine bottle. Phillip explained it was a design of the Caprock Escarpment which is an outcropping of rock that stretches to the north and south for about 200 miles, and is part of the Llano Estacado (see Llano Estacado Winery for an explanation of that region). This was not the first time we had heard the geology formation of Caprock during our visit to the High Plains. Phillip did say they were going to be redesigning some of the wine bottle labels and showed us a possible redesign.

During our tasting we were lucky to be able to taste some wines which had just been bottled such as a Pinot Grigio made from Reddy Vineyards grapes and a 2010 Merlot. Cap*Rock had just received their results from the 2012 Lone Star International Wine Competition and we learned their Orange Muscat had received a Grand Star Award/Gold Medal/Double Gold Award. That was great to hear because earlier this year when we held a blind taste test in the Battle of the Texas wine Orange Muscats, Cap*Rock Winery’s Orange Muscat was the preferred Orange Muscat among the eight wines tasted. Hmm, perhaps we have a good panel of judges so look for more blind taste tests to come in the future.

Tours are available at the winery so after our excellent tasting, we were told to bring our glasses and Phillip gave us a tour of the winery. Besides Llano Estacado Winery’s tour, Cap*Rock Winery was the largest production facility we have seen in Texas and Phillip gave an extensive and very informative tour. Even though weddings are already popular at Cap*Rock Winery, they are building a special vineyard with arched walkway in front of the winery especially for events such as a wedding.

Cap*Rock - on top of tanks

We learned various things during the tour such as the winery can produce 80,000 cases of wine a year, but this year the total will be approximately 20,000 cases. During our tour we had the privilege of tasting the wine from various tanks and climbing on the catwalk above the large tanks to peer down into the tanks. When we got to the bottling line and another tour was being given, Phillip stepped in and gave both groups the rundown on the bottling process. We arrived back to the tasting room after the informative tour.

Cap*Rock - barrels and tanks

Events are very popular at the Cap*Rock Winery. The facilities include a barrel reception hall that can accommodate up to 250 people, a bridal suite, large tasting room, large lighted outdoor patio, full catering kitchen, 11 foot HD projection screen, professional sound system, and much more. Events such as dinners, live music, wine classes, and even comedy nights are held at the winery.

There is more than one wine club at Cap*Rock Winery with a focus on red wines, white wines, or a cross-section of wines. A nice gift shop is present with clothing and wine accessories.

Cap*Rock - Phillip Anderson

Phillip Anderson

It was nice of Phillip to take the time to spend with us and I could go on and on with all the information he gave us about the winery and its operations, but that would require multiple blog posts. Needless to say, we were very impressed with Cap*Rock Winery and can only look for good things to come from them and their Texas wine. When you visit Lubbock, Cap*Rock Winery is a must see.

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