Seghesio: A Bright and Fruity Wine at a Nice Price
The primary flavors of Zinfandel are jam, blackberry, black pepper, cherry and plum. You can even find boysenberry, cranberry and licorice in bottles as well. Sounds to me like a great party wine, and that season is just around the corner.
Seghesio is a great buy with a huge production that should not be missed. I have drunk many bottles of this wine. Seghesio has a tasting room in Healdsburg; and, if you ever get to that city, stop in and enjoy the tasting. If you can’t get to Healdsburg, you should you should be able to find this wine in several outlets. For the price, it is quite a delicious bottle.
Go with “Pride”
This past Sunday, we enjoyed a ride up the mountain to tour and taste at Pride Mountain Vineyards. This famous winery is located atop Spring Mountain and provides glorious views of Mount St. Helena and the Mayacamas Range. The expanse of vines provides picture perfect scenery for the photographer in you. Many times I have visited and never tire of the beauty of the setting.
While I am doing my best to explore the 500 wineries in Napa County and almost 450 in Sonoma County (yes, that is a lot), there is one winery I always seem to come back to — and that is Pride Mountain Vineyards. It is the winery I have the longest history with and always enjoy visiting. The people are gracious, the views are lovely and the wine – oh, yes, the wine is quite pleasurable to drink.
Good Wine Buy – a Northern California Cabernet for $30.00!
Here’s a low-priced Cabernet from Sonoma — it’s the 2010 Beringer Knights Valley Cabernet, and it’s priced at just $30. This AVA is only seven miles north of Calistoga; and, if you drive north from there, you might not realize that you’ve left Napa Valley. The tannic structure on this wine is such that, if you drink it now, it will be best with food or appetizers or decanted. The production is large enough that it should be available in many outlets, and it’s a value worth pursuing and a bottle worth aging. You could buy three bottles and drink one now, one a year from now, and one down the road. The 2009 vintage of this wine made Wine Spectators’ top 100 list. Will this one make it? I dare not say, but maybe.
Just a note about Wine Spectator’s top 100 list. There are specific criteria that the magazine uses to determine what is worthy of the list. Specifically, they consider, of course, wines that are well crafted; but they also consider wines that are well priced and have a certain level of production. Kudos to them, because it would be a shame to highlight only expensive, limited production wines.