Art of the Table

Recently the G-pal and I attended some good friend’s 4 year old daughter’s birthday party. There were many young people, the requisite slip and slide in the backyard, a sand box, many parents, burnt hot dogs, melted ice cream. You get the picture? Expecting such, we brought a bottle of pink, the ‘06 Stephen Pannell Grenache, which is pure strawberry creme-sickle btw, and were ready to battle flies. We were pleasantly surprised in that the hosts were also thinking pink, and had both the ‘06 Domaine Faillenc Syrah and the ‘06 Gour de Chaule Gigondas. The Syrah was bright and yummy with lots of upfront fruit, almost to the point of slightly sweet, it went great with my spicy brat and watermelon wedge. The Gigondas was a different story. Bone dry, lots of complexity, notes of mineral, earth, crazy pink fruits, easily the best dry rose I’ve ever had. My partner became a ball hog with the Gigondas at this point, which was fine with me. Fyi, I think there are about two bottles left at the store.

So at this point Allison and I are talking away with various parents and generally having a jovial time and getting mildly stuffed. Our expectations had been met and suddenly, as the third designer lunchbox had just been torn from goofy wrapping paper, I noticed my glass empty, just as John arrived with a box of wine. “Who’s that strange red man?” Allison asked. “Things will get interesting,” I muttered. We heading back to the patio where John was pulling out three bottles of Loire Valley gems. A ‘96 Savennieres, a ‘95 Coteaux du Layon and a ‘90 Quartes du Chaume, all from Domaine Baumard, and all are, if you don’t know, incredibly ageableChenin Blanc. We were delighted at the opportunity to try these wines.

The Savennieres was first and the driest of the bunch. Deep gold with medium variation, it had aromas of dried apricot, peach, toasted nuts and honey. On the palate it was rich with additional notes of mineral and lime. Outstanding in every way, it quickly went as everyone caught wind of the tasting. Next up was the ‘95 Coteaux du Layon, which was more advanced visually, a more turgid gold, almost browning. The aromas really shot out of the glass and all I was getting initially was circus peanuts. Seriously. The more we swirled the more we got citrus rind, orange blossom, lots of honey. Truly complex aromas. I think I went almost five minutes before I even wanted to taste it. On the palate it’s certainly ripe and pushing sweet, but the thing I kept going back to was the ripping acidity. This wine was not going to go anywhere and I anticipate it lasting another ten years plus. Finally, the ‘90 Quarts du Chaume was poured and was discernibly lighter in color, a brilliant yellow gold with much less variation. Likewise, the aromatics were somewhat muted. We were stunned! This seventeen year old wine wasn’t even ready to drink. After vigorous swirling typical notes of botrytis, candied pear, orange liqueur and spice began to yield. Very sweet and again, ridiculously acidic, this is a wine to toss in the furthest corner of the cellar, as I anticipate it will last 25 more years. At the end of the night I snuck the last of the ‘95 into my glass to share with Allison, which we agreed was easily showing the best this night of all the wines. It was utterly sublime .

We have a 2003 Savennieres here at the store, and a 2003 Coteaux du Layon, please stop in and ask your friendly Art of the Table representative about Chenin Blanc.

This past week, Amy & Steve took a quick trip to California for both some R&R and some wine tasting. We happily report that California is just as beautiful as last time! Apparently there was an earthquake in San Francisco while we were there, but we were over in Modesto at the time and didn’t feel the effects. We did, however feel the effects of great food, wine, pool, sun & friends! We try to venture to California every other summer. We always go with the same three couples as they’re great travel companions. They have to bear with us as we get very in depth, full line tastings and the whole 9-yards tours of wineries. But then again, I don’t think it bothers them too much. They’re Dutch and I get them in free with extra wine!

Wine visits on this trip included a jaunt to Santa Rosa to taste at Hook & Ladder winery. We currently carry my favorite two wines from our tasting there - the Gewurtztraminer & Cabernet Sauvignon; and though I never thought I’d hear myself say this, their White Zinfandel wasn’t bad!

The other two visits that day included Ace Cider Company and B.R. Cohn winery.

We rented a house in Sonoma and ate out at two neat restaurants; Deuce & The General’s Daughter. Both were great, though if you go to The General’s Daughter, be prepared for a price fixe meal. We weren’t. Don’t get me wrong. It was good food, it just wasn’t what we were expecting.

The other day of our tastings took us to Napa. We made a quick stop at the Oakville Grocery so Amy could get some more ideas of products to carry. Watch for the Bread Dip Co. to arrive soon! Our two wineries today included Cosentino & Grgich Hills. At Grgich, we got the special tour from Dave Bos, one of the vineyard managers (originally from Holland, MI). They are using biodynamics in their fields to create better grapes - therefore making better wines. We got the whole schpiel and our own tasting with Dave. My favorite? The Fume Blanc. It’s got a ton of flavor and it’s round and full in the mouth.

At Cosentino we tasted through a ton of different stuff. On the top of my list were - the expensive ones! Seriously though, collectively we liked “The Franc”, Legends Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, the Merlot and the Napa Cab. The Cabernet was not ‘typical’ we decided. It was lighter and dirtier than most. The Merlot had a great nose, was plush and at a great price. The real fave for me was the Legends Meritage. A blend of 41% Cab, 37% Merlot & 22% Cab Franc, it was plush but not sugary, besides that all I could think about was the green pepper. Yes, up there at $80 of course I like it!

This is (as always) an exciting time of year for the wine department here at Art of the Table. As Spring approaches we get excited for fresh air and move our palates towards white and rosé wines. We will be getting all our spring direct import deliveries soon! First arrival: 2006 rosés, 2005 red Rhone & 2006 white Rhone selections in late April/early May & our 2006 German Rieslings late May/early June!

We are tasting new wines all the time looking for the best values and best varietals from the very best producers from all over the world for you. More than ever are so many amazing wines available to us—and that’s exciting! Here’s a brief on some standouts:

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2006 at Art of the Table was another amazing year. This year we had more new and interesting wines in the store than ever and more new and interesting customers along the way as well – and we love that!

I thought it would be fun to list off the highlights for the year and that turned into the saga shown below. We’ve not done one before and as it’s been so crazy around here I’m actually looking forward to doing something fun. (It must have been fun, because Mike slipped in a 26 th wine on Amy’s nagging request!)

What’s the criteria for Top Twenty Five status? Well, the intrepid wine staff here at Art of the Table has spent hours in round table discussion and we’ve used every possible rational to determine just which wines should be honored including “best selling,” “cutest label,” “quality verses price,” “Mike said it was good,” “it really went well with that ______ display,” “Suzanne said it was good,” “the label looks like a spaceship,” and many more as you can imagine.

Top 25 drumroll please…

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Ken Wright started in Oregon Pinot Noir in 1986 as the winemaker for Panther Creek. In 1993 he established Ken Wright Cellars and began a path of bottling only single vineyard Pinot Noirs.

From 1993 to 1996 he served as winemaker at Domaine Serene while he built and established his own winery.

Ken’s Pinots always emphasize elegance over power; and he achieves this by having very close relationships with his vineyard owners and their workers, and thus yields are very low and concentrated. Ken’s philosophy is that winemaking revolves around working with nature to fully allow the vines to express their quality of fruit and place.

He mentions, “human beings are not responsible for the wine we enjoy, the qualities the grapes posses are inherent, we don’t inject them.” He views his role as to “simply try to have the purest expression the fruit is capable of, brought all the way to the bottle and evident in the glass of wine.” Because of this philosophy, it’s no wonder that Ken feels “pinot noir has a far greater ability than any other variety to express the qualities of place, and that’s magical!” Needless to say we’re excited to have been able to grab a few bottles of the 2005 Ken Wright’s Pinot Noirs. These will be fantastic gifts for the collector for the holidays, as they age well for 8 to 15 years.

Following, a breakdown of the different single vineyards:

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