{"id":1617,"date":"2020-08-31T17:00:14","date_gmt":"2020-08-31T17:00:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/?p=1617"},"modified":"2020-08-31T17:00:14","modified_gmt":"2020-08-31T17:00:14","slug":"discoveries","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/?p=1617","title":{"rendered":"Discoveries"},"content":{"rendered":"

We have been enjoying wine tasting for many years.\u00a0 We keep going back to Wine Country because of the beauty of the environment, enjoying our favorite wines, getting to know the terroir<\/em> and the people who make wine.\u00a0 At this point in our wine tasting \u201ccareer\u201d we get our greatest enjoyment from making discoveries.<\/p>\n

There are different sorts of discoveries and all are wonderful because they are, by definition, unexpected.\u00a0 One sort is finding that a winery that we\u2019re already familiar with has some delicious wines that we didn\u2019t know that they made.\u00a0 In recent months, one such was Etude Wines<\/a>\u2019 L\u2019Esprit, their new dessert wine, which we hadn\u2019t ever heard of, even though we are members of their wine club.\u00a0 For another example, we knew all about Robert Mondavi Winery\u2019<\/a>s top-ranked Cabernet Sauvignons.\u00a0 But we were unaware of the depth of their portfolio of Pinot Noirs.<\/p>\n

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The reverse can also happen, finding that a winery that we hadn\u2019t thought much of can produce some high-quality wines.\u00a0 Very often that\u2019s because those that focus on the mass market only allow their winemakers to make small amounts of finer wines, just to show off their chops.\u00a0 These wines are usually available only in the tasting rooms and then only in small quantities.\u00a0 The only way you\u2019ll ever get to taste them is on a wine tasting trip.\u00a0 When we find some of these wines, we leave the winery with a smile and the lingering taste of surprising wine on our lips.\u00a0 Without casting aspersions on any winery, we\u2019ve had that experience at Clos Du Val and William Hill Winery<\/a> in Napa Valley.<\/p>\n

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The tasting room at Testarossa Winery.\u00a0 Photo courtesy of the winery.<\/em><\/p>\n

We have also had the happy experience of finding great wine in a region where we visited with low expectations.\u00a0 Our best recent find in that regard was at Testarossa Winery<\/a> in, of all places, California\u2019s Silicon Valley.\u00a0 There among the software we found Pinot Noirs that completely wowed us.\u00a0 They are located at the northern end of the Santa Clara Valley where, we must sadly state, we found no other wines that came even close to what Testarossa can do.<\/p>\n

Then there are the discoveries of a whole different sort that occur when we travel internationally.\u00a0 Sure, we knew that places like Australia and South Africa<\/a> had vineyards.\u00a0 But very often the wines that are exported to the United States are of the mass production variety.\u00a0 That way there is enough volume to make it worthwhile for the States-side importers to bring them here.\u00a0 If you are lucky enough to discover their top-end wineries and wines before they become internationally known, you can do some fabulous tasting before the wines get terribly pricy.\u00a0 Perhaps our favorite example was buying bottles of Henschke Hill of Grace in Australia for $25; today they go for $800!<\/p>\n

The secret to making wine tasting discoveries is being open to them.\u00a0 Just because you may not have heard of a region, a winery or a wine doesn\u2019t eliminate the possibility of finding something you\u2019ll really enjoy.\u00a0 In fact, it\u2019s the possibilities<\/em> that make wine tasting such a life-long avocation.\u00a0 There\u2019s always something new \u2013 that\u2019s why they put vintage years on the labels \u2013 and there\u2019s always someone who\u2019s making great stuff that we haven\u2019t heard of.\u00a0 So let\u2019s go wine tasting and see what\u2019s over the next hill.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We have been enjoying wine tasting for many years.\u00a0 We keep going back to Wine Country because of the beauty of the environment, enjoying our favorite wines, getting to know the terroir and the people who make wine.\u00a0 At this point in our wine tasting \u201ccareer\u201d we get our greatest enjoyment from making discoveries. There … Continue reading Discoveries<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1617"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1617"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1617\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1620,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1617\/revisions\/1620"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1617"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1617"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1617"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}