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Bless my friends' hearts, though. They feel bad about drinking around me even though I'm OK with it.

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Obviously better friends than I would be...

Was suggested this wine two nights ago at Pappa's Bros so I got a bottle. Was pleasantly surprised!

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You chose wisely.

Had Rochioli Pinot at Max's Wine Dive. A great recommendation by the manager. I almost bought a few bottles for my cellar but decided to wait till all the mailing lists cycle through.

In answer to the "how wine do you drink?" question. Apparently sometimes the answer is "too much".

rochioli is good stuff. they make a great chard, too and their estate pinot is awesome (but not cheap)

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Was suggested this wine two nights ago at Pappa's Bros so I got a bottle. Was pleasantly surprised!

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I'm not a Pinot guy and Rochioli is great. My parents went there and brought a case back.

My wife and I have always enjoyed wine but just starting to get into nicer wines and finding our palette. I try keeping up with this thread but a lot of it goes over my head. Anyone have a place to steer me for a newby trying to learn?

Also, an uncle got us a couple bottles for our wedding present. A '06 Alexander valley silver oak and a '12 August Briggs meritage red wine. Any thoughts on these, aging recomendations?

Is the Meritage the "Wishes" label? If so, drink it now. Same for the Silver Oak.

Doesn't apear so.....

The Realm offer hit today. I loaded up on a few bottles of each of the cabs and one of the Absurd.

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Doesn't apear so.....

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The reason I ask is because I can't find anything about a Meritage wine in their website.

I got a Realm To Kalon and a bottle of the white (can't remember the name)

BPC, were you offered any Crane? I love that vineyard. The '06 Realm Crane was one of my favorite wines out of Napa in the last decade.

I got an offer today from realm for 2011 beckstoffer dr crane Cab. Is this worth $165
Trying to build a wine collection want to find some decent bottles to start with

BSD, yeah I was offered it but picked the To Kalon because I bought some 2012 Myriad Dr Crane Elsyian (sp) with their last release. Do you normally prefer the Dr Crane or To Kalon vineyard?

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I got an offer today from realm for 2011 beckstoffer dr crane Cab. Is this worth $165
Trying to build a wine collection want to find some decent bottles to start with

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That depends on your definition of "worth." That's over the release price of the '11 but under that of '12. It's not a bargain but it's not too rich. I looked at wine searcher pro and that is the price across about 5 stores. if it blows your wine budget, I'd look into getting some Myriad or Rivers Marie.

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BSD, yeah I was offered it but picked the To Kalon because I bought some 2012 Myriad Dr Crane Elsyian (sp) with their last release. Do you normally prefer the Dr Crane or To Kalon vineyard?

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Ah. Good call. I love them both. Most years I've been between one or the other but it's been pretty even. You won't go wrong with the To Kalon.

I'm really interested in this bottle of Absurd. I passed on the 2005 a few years back.

I was really impressed with the Siduri I drank tonight.

Yeah I thought about trying it as well, but at a certain point I had to stop since we'll be buying plenty of wine on our trip in a few months. I'm sure the trip will lead to buying another wine fridge which will mean needing to buy even more wine which will lead to...etc etc etc. it's an endless cycle but it sure is fun!

Thanks BSD. I've been reading the post recently and everyone has high praise for Realm. Think I may hold off

You know, at some point we (I) need to organize a get together for anyone on this thread who wants to. Price of admission a good bottle of wine. I'd love for a couple dozen of us to get together and quaff mass quantities together!

I don't care where. Hill Country, Austin, Houston, Metroplex. It matter not.

Maybe this summer some time. I'll be glad to to the leg work if there's interest...

You know I'd be up for that.

I'm game.

Long time drinker, first time collector. Just returned from Napa and tasted with Marston, Futo, Vice Versa, Anomaly, David Arthur and Surh Luchtel. Planning a return trip in late September. Any suggestions on small production, high quality cabs or bordeaux style blends is much appreciated!

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I read online that Fantesca isn't open for tours/tastings, is that not correct? What I saw was a Spring Mountain winery map ad labeled wineries as "tastings available" and "tastings not available". Fantesca is listed as tastings not available. Atchley and Crowley also were listed as not offering tastings.

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Fantesca did a private tasting last Tuesday. In fact it was a double tasting that preluded La Sirena.

Welcome, Stagecoach. My favorites out of Napa include the following:

Rivers Marie (made by Thomas Rivers Brown, it's his personal label. It's both cabs and pinot)
Schrader (also made by TRB, world class Napa wine)
Hobel (yet another TRB wine)
Myriad (and Quivet, Becklyn, Carter...all made by Mike Smith)
Pott ( carefully sources grapes from different areas for vineyard designated wines)
Roy Piper Wines (just one wine: a cab. And it's damn good. I'm having dinner with him Friday to taste the '12)
Realm (while the others above are mostly cabs, realm offers some more bdx styles wines in addition to the single vineyard cabs that are insanely good)
Scarecrow
Ridge (Monte Bello cab for aging)
Detert (cabs Sauv and cab franc from what is essentially to Kalon vineyard)
MacDonald (same as above but very limited...sign up on the list now)
Drinkward Peschon

I'll think of more soon, I'm sure, but this will get you started.

Here are a few more
Corra
Dalla Valle
Outpost (TRB wine again)
Maybach (TRB wine, can't believe I forgot this in the first post...one of the best Napa wines I've ever had was the 2007)
Stone the Crows

I'd also get in contact with 750 Wines, a retail shop in St Helena. I can introduce you if you like. It's a great speakeasy type retail shop that is appointment only. They specialize in higher end wines.

what is the best software/app to manage a growing cellar (say up to 1500 bottles or so)?

Cellartracker.com is what I've used with great success.

Disclaimer... I'm no where near the level of knowledge of most posters here.

That said, I highly highly recommend Bell as a small volume cab winery. We did a private wine tasting with cheese pairing there and it was fantastic.

Thanks!

And please, no need for disclaimers. We're all in this together!

So my wife and I are in Napa for the weekend and made a stop by the Macdonald property. For those that don't know the story, this property is in the To Kalon vineyard and is owned by the Macdonald family. They have sold their grapes to Mondavi for years for use in the To Kalon bottle and some for the Reserve labels (the two wines of Mondavi that are still good!). The two brothers started using their own grapes for their own label in 2004 and finally felt strong enough about their skills to go public with the wine with the 2010 vintage. The less than 100 case allotment sold out in 25 minutes. We walked the property and heard the brothers tell their story about the history and winemaking of the MacDonald family. We finished it off with a glass of the 2012 bottle which will be released this fall. It had been open for 5 hours. Wow. What a big wine, typical of the vineyard. Built for aging but it's going to be good! Here are a few pics of the vineyard.





Here's the cottage on the property. The area in the foreground will be a new block of vines that the brothers will plant (every generation of the family has planted vines so they are continuing the tradition)



And here are some Opus One vines next door. Notice the ground cover is much less than the Macdonald vineyards. Macdonald doesn't use fertilizers and rely on natural nutrients from mustard and pea plants to provide the grapes with what they need. Mondavi has different farming methods. Also notice the spacing is much tighter at Mondavi and the grapes are lower to the ground. In the heat of Napa, that isn't necessarily a good thing.



After this we stopped into 750 Wines to say hi to our favorite retailers and ended up tasting a few Pritchard Hill wines that were absolutely rocking. I gotta say it was a good day.

For dinner at Bistro Jeanty we tasted the 2012 Roy Piper cab. My wife actually did a punch down on this a few years ago at the winery. This is a solid wine. Good fruit, good balance, and heavy. It's a very good representation of Napa cabs.

I brought a 2005 Cellar Cal Pla Mas d'en Compte that I got in Priorat a few years ago. I was very excited to try it and after telling the stories that accompanied the purchase on that trip, we opened the wine and I took a sip, ready to relive the memories. Damn thing was corked.