Slovak Wine

• November 2009

  Depends on what you mean by 'long life'. That's a term I personally use for those that improve over a 20-30 or even 50 year timeframe. Five to 15 years are more short-to midterm. Long term? I currently have Bordeauxs (red and sweet white) and Burgundies from the '50s and California... Read moreDepends on what you mean by 'long life'. That's a term I personally use for those that improve over a 20-30 or even 50 year timeframe. Five to 15 years are more short-to midterm. Long term? I currently have Bordeauxs (red and sweet white) and Burgundies from the '50s and California cabs and zins (and even the odd Chalone pinot) from the '70s that are in superb form. Also ports and Jura vin jaune from that era. I wasn't collecting Australians then and the Brunellos were all from Italy that I had from that period, and they, unfortunately, are all drunk up. I know Penfolds Grange and 389s last well from the '80s (the Grange was a bit cheaper then ;-) ), but don't know about others from that period because my knowledge of Oz was scanty back then. Certainly a whole range of California cabernets and zins (and even a few merlots), Burgundies, Champagnes, Rhones, Barolos, Super Tuscans and late-harvest German rieslings from the '80s are doing very well right now. First half of the '90s, some dry Bordeaux whites and Burgundy whites can be good, though though they are exceptional ones, but many more Californias, Washingtons and Oregons (pinots, cabs, zins, sparklings and the rare still chards), all sorts of French and Italian and Spanish bottlings (Rioja was all I knew then) are great now. Haven't had any success at all with New Zealand wines from that period, and still wasn't giving enough attention to Oz at that point. Didn't even have South America on my wine map then, and for various reasons wasn't picking up South African products at the time. The last 5-15 years and the number of great, maturely healthy (while in many cases still adolescent) wines just mushrooms. These are all from my personal experience, and I could list actual wines but it would be too lengthy a post. I do know if you look for the best wines from the type and region and periods I've mentioned, and know they've been stored well, you'll be very pleasantly surprised by what a mature wine can be. GregT, I'm going to part ways with you on your comments about fortified wines. Yes, you are absolutely spot-on about the relative value of ports these days, and even if there seem to be a lot of ports out there from the '70s and earlier, the fact is there actually isn't the selection you might want. Kinda like hunting for California reds from the early '90s in the marketplace now in terms of range of choice. So I say that if you're interested you should explore a range of ports now, learn what you like, and lay down what you can (and nothing wrong with also laying down those from the '70s and '80s you can buy now, because they'll continue to improve with age). 20 or more years from now you'll be happy that you did. Especially so for Madeiras since the selection for them is seemingly more limited to start with, and certain collectors have been talking the market up considerably over the past few years. I haven't hunted enough for aged sweet sherries, but the fact that you almost never see them in the marketplace means that you should buy new releases you know you like if you want to drink them in the future. I can't talk intelligently about Marsalas, Vin Santos, Banyuls, etc., because of lack of sufficient personal knowledge, but that's something I plan to remedy in the future. Though not fortified, late-harvest German and Alsatian and Austrian wines are just plain cheaper now than they will be in the future, so go for them now. Ditto Sauternes, if you like them. You'd know more about Tokaji, Greg, so I'll leave that analysis up to you.    (hide)

  Forum post in the topic Long cellar life wines. by dmcker

  
  

• November 2009

  Moscato, or muscat, is one of the oldest grapes known. It's found all over. Good examples are in France, Spain, Italy, and elsewhere. It's a very aromatic grape and because it smells so nice, people expect it to be sweet, but it isn't necessarily unless made that way. Moscato... Read moreMoscato, or muscat, is one of the oldest grapes known. It's found all over. Good examples are in France, Spain, Italy, and elsewhere. It's a very aromatic grape and because it smells so nice, people expect it to be sweet, but it isn't necessarily unless made that way. Moscato d'Asti, for example, often has some residual sugar. In Hungary it is used sometimes in sweet wine in Tokaj. In Spain and Portugal it is used to make a sweet wine they call moscatel, or even a sweet sherry. But all of those places also make a dry muscat that is lean, acidic, and tart, with the floral muscat nose. If you like the floral aromas, you might try viognier, malvesia, or torrontes. The problem with some of those wines is that while they smell wonderful, they don't deliver as much on the palate, so you need to choose carefully. WA is great and all of the recs above are pretty good. The Eroica is good every year. It's got a touch of residual sugar on it, so it's not completely dry, but then again, many German wines these day's aren't either. As far as the Long Shadows project goes, those wines are almost all good IMHO, except for the riesling, which always disappoints. There is much better in Germany and in WA. The most basic wines by Columbia Crest and its sister Chateau St Michelle are fair deals for their prices, so why pay extra for the collaboration project?    (hide)

  Forum post in the topic Moscato wines by GregT

  
  
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  November 2009

  Znacka Pavelka Frankovka Modra 2007

  Snoothrank:

  No written review

  Wine review by stinkyraygumbo

  
  

• October 2009

  Not really. I built the room pretty quickly but spent more time thinking about shelving and figuring the space needed for bins, for shelves, for racks, etc., vs what I could store on them. I got all kinds of measurements for bottles and put up bins on one side. Loaded them up and... Read moreNot really. I built the room pretty quickly but spent more time thinking about shelving and figuring the space needed for bins, for shelves, for racks, etc., vs what I could store on them. I got all kinds of measurements for bottles and put up bins on one side. Loaded them up and within a couple of days started to hate them. So for the other side of the room I decided to build shelves. I had plenty of wood around so it didn't seem like a big problem. Then found that some Beaujolais, some Turley zins, and some Pax syrah and some Hungarian wines are just too fat to fit in any "standard" spacing regime. So I used 5/8 plywood, ripped it into 10 foot shelves about 9 inches wide, and cut little spacers of about 3 3/4 inch, and put them in. The idea was that I'd lay out four or five bottles, put a spacer, etc. Didn't work out as well as I'd hoped. The bottles are just too variable in size Then I loaded those up and damned if once again there wasn't a problem. The weirder shapes, like Tokaji-aszu or some of the extra long bottles from Tokaj or Italy roll around too. And Port and Madeira. So you really don't win no matter what you do. And somewhere during this process I got a DVT and got stuck in the hospital for a week. But I looked at people's blogs and talked to people who build these things and they're just too complicated and dumb IMO. The best insulation is extruded polystyrene. It has an R value of 10 per inch. Fiberglass isn't nearly as good. So if you buy a 2 inch piece you have an R value of 20 and if you double that you get 40 which is pretty decent. You get them already sized to 24 inches, so just use steel studs. Lay in the insulation, pop in the next stud, and so on and you've built the cellar room in a day. They aren't load bearing walls so 24 inches is just fine with minimal work. Your ceiling should be insulated better because in a basement you are under a heated room, so I doubled the insulation but essentially did the same thing there. And because I was nervous about possible water in the basement, I used cement board along the floor inside and out, rather than something like drywall. Doesn't look so nice but it's covered with bottles anyway. And here's a trick because it's full of holes -- get a good mildew resistant paint, mix it with drywall mud, and paint your cement board with that. It's easier than doing a skim coat and you smooth out all the roughness. But I was only looking for something functional, not something to show off carpentry skills. I did that in the rest of the house. A wine cellar is just a refrigerator and I don't have some fetish where I like to go and look at my "collection" which is just haphazard wines that I like to drink. You can build it in a weekend. The hard part is building and hanging the door and the racking. Had I been a little smarter, i would have made it a tad bigger. My thinking was that I could get drywall in 10 foot lengths and cement board in five foot lengths, so I made it ten by five so I didn't have to cut anything. That plan didn't work out either. And when building a door, if you hinge the outside, the arc the door makes needs to be considered. For a regular door it isn't such a big deal. But if your door is six inches thick, like mine is, your're basically swinging a box. You need more clearance because the inside of the door scribes an arc with a different radius than the outside of the door. So you have to make your opening much wider than the door and then you're stuck trying to seal that. The solution is to angle the closing part of the door, but I hadn't figured that out when I built it.    (hide)

  Forum post in the topic Turning a closet into a wine... by GregT

  
  

• October 2009

  France - try Muscadet from the Loire valley or dry Bordeaux. Spain - try verdejo from Rueda or Xarel-lo from Penedes Italy - try verdiccio from the Marche region or pinot bianco from Alto Adige. You can try pinot grigio but there is so much insipid stuff produced that it's a... Read moreFrance - try Muscadet from the Loire valley or dry Bordeaux. Spain - try verdejo from Rueda or Xarel-lo from Penedes Italy - try verdiccio from the Marche region or pinot bianco from Alto Adige. You can try pinot grigio but there is so much insipid stuff produced that it's a crapshoot. Hungary - try a dry furmint from Tokaj Australia - try a semillon or even more interesting, a riesling. They tend to be much drier than the Germans these days. There are many more but those should get you started.    (hide)

  Forum post in the topic Very dry white wines by GregT

  
  

• October 2009

  mate my sense of humour is a bit better than that ;) probably shouldnt have gone straight in there with the questionnaire, bit too much to take in anyway, it is a real assignment, and i am genuinely interested in what the poles think about wine. apparently poland is exempt from... Read moremate my sense of humour is a bit better than that ;) probably shouldnt have gone straight in there with the questionnaire, bit too much to take in anyway, it is a real assignment, and i am genuinely interested in what the poles think about wine. apparently poland is exempt from certain EU tax laws for the next few years to help them set up their wine market. however, i dont have a clue about what wines they drink, where they drink it, substitutes for wine, and whether polish food compliments wine etc etc didnt know they bought stuff from hungary though. is it just tokaji or do they go for the reds as well?    (hide)

  Forum post in the topic Polish Wine Drinkers? by purplehaze1988

  
  

• Sep 22

  I suggest this page for those who are interested in Slovak wines: http://www.nsvsr.sk/index.php?nsv=3&cat=8, unfortunately the page is completely in slovak. I hope a translation is in course. Even so, there are names and links to the most prominent wine producers of Slovakia. Read moreI suggest this page for those who are interested in Slovak wines: http://www.nsvsr.sk/index.php?nsv=3&cat=8, unfortunately the page is completely in slovak. I hope a translation is in course. Even so, there are names and links to the most prominent wine producers of Slovakia.    (hide)

  Comment by karlkoff

  
  

• August 2009

  Get ready for a fun evening tasting 5 wonderfully aromatic Muscats 06 Trimbach, Muscat Reserve, Ribeauville, Alsace, FR 08 Robert Hall, Margaret's Vineyard, Orange Muscat, Paso Robles, CA 07 Domaine Gardies, Las Cabes, Vin de pays des Cotes Catalanes, FR 06 Grof Degenfeld, Muscat... Read more Get ready for a fun evening tasting 5 wonderfully aromatic Muscats 06 Trimbach, Muscat Reserve, Ribeauville, Alsace, FR 08 Robert Hall, Margaret's Vineyard, Orange Muscat, Paso Robles, CA 07 Domaine Gardies, Las Cabes, Vin de pays des Cotes Catalanes, FR 06 Grof Degenfeld, Muscat Lunel, Tokaji, Hungary 08 Santa Barbara Winery, Orange Muscat, Santa Barbara County, CA Paired with delicious foods Great deal at 25.00 Passport to Wine Wed September 2 7pm Pierre Lafond Wine Bistro 516 State Street SB http://www.pierrelafond.com    (hide)

  Forum post in the topic Muscat lovers in Santa Barbara by countessa618

  
  

• July 2009

  Thanks for the good comments, GregT. RE: The German flavor, I think we meant ... The new Central Europe (Slovakia, Czech Republic, Hungary, etc) is actually an amazing story, in terms of modernization and success. RE: 6. Marketing rules the world, and we all get caught up in it at... Read moreThanks for the good comments, GregT. RE: The German flavor, I think we meant ... The new Central Europe (Slovakia, Czech Republic, Hungary, etc) is actually an amazing story, in terms of modernization and success. RE: 6. Marketing rules the world, and we all get caught up in it at times. It does make a good drinking story, lol. All in all, thanks a ton for your comments! We're merely three months into this experiment, and in the future we're going to be doing some heavier pre-show research. In general, it's tough to pull out the roses in the sea of thorns that is the PA Wine and Spirits store, but we're trying to find some gems, in between our more enjoyable reviews of East Coast Wines.    (hide)

  Forum post in the topic New East Coast Wine Geeks... by WineGeekChris

  
  

• July 2009

  Interesting question because I decided to learn a little more about it this summer. I've had a number from South Africa and for the most part they weren't inspiring. Had a few from Washington state and CA. THere aren't that many producers of the grape. I think that partly it's... Read moreInteresting question because I decided to learn a little more about it this summer. I've had a number from South Africa and for the most part they weren't inspiring. Had a few from Washington state and CA. THere aren't that many producers of the grape. I think that partly it's because it doesn't have an overt personality. Much like chardonnay actually, but chardonnay was lucky in that it got the KJ oak treatment and with that came to establish itself as the white wine for the US. Plus it's got a beautiful name. Chenin can be a little austere, doesn't have the grass and apple of sauvignon blanc, nor the buttery toasty qualities of archtypical American chardonnay. I think it's best from the Loire and the botrytized wines from the Loire are some of the best I've had. They can almost rival Tokaji-aszu and in some respects, chenin blanc reminds me a little bit of furmint. But I think more people should work with chenin blanc. THere is a pretty good one produced in Long Island by Paumonok vineyards - I think it's the only one there but it's better than most of what gets made there. I've had some from Idaho and British Columbia. No reason it can't make a great wine.    (hide)

  Forum post in the topic Chenin Blanc? How familiar... by GregT

  
  
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  June 2009

  Villa Vino Raca Rizling Rynsky 2007

  Snoothrank:

  No written review

  Wine review by shot2pieces

  
  

• Jun 11

  I suggest Frankovka and Tokaj for all visitors :)

  Comment by peterza

  
  

• Apr 24

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• Apr 21

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