Picked up Aug/Sept 2009 Wine Club Shipment Monday from Domaine Carneros

Well surprise, surprise, I missed the UPS guys last Friday by about 20 minutes. Damn! I never seem to be able to catch that guy. I guess if I were on un-employment I wouldn’t have that problem. But if I were on un-employment I probably wouldn’t have a wine club subscription. So once again I had to hold my wine for pickup at the UPS Depot. As usual with the mixed club I got a bottle of sparkling and a bottle of red, but this time they are both new releases.

The sparkling this shipment is a 2003 Late Disgorged Brut Vintage Cuvee, which has had an extra 3 years of aging before being released. And the red is a 2007 The Famous Gate Pinot Noir.

In other wine news, this past week when having dinner at a relative’s house I had a couple of glasses of some 1985 Mondavi Napa Valley Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon (Rating: 95, Wine Spectator, 11/01/1989). At first it was a little bit musty in smell, but after some airtime in the decanter it started to open up and stretch its legs. It wasn’t big and bold like some younger Cabs, more of a mature but fading smoothness from start to finish that only comes with some age (or a lot of age!). This wine is basically at the tale end of its ideal drinking age (1995-2005), so it was probably a good thing that we imbibed when we did. Because the end is near.

Bottoms up!