Rhone Tasting with importer Dan Kravitz at WWWB

Tuesday, February 27, 2018 - 07:30 PM

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Okay we poppin champagne like we won a championship game
- Popping Bottles by Lil Wayne and Birdman 

You may think that we are celebrating something these next few weeks with three “Once in a Lifetime” tastings but that is just how we roll here at Wine Watch. 

What does hand-picked mean to you?  The most important part of what I do is taste wine as a wine merchant if you don't know what the grape juice tastes like that you sell what do you have?  Bad juice is hard to sell so we don't leave anything to chance, we taste every bottle before we bring it into the store.  If we demand that kind of expertise from ourselves then we hold our importers accountable to the same standards and Dan Kravitz is one of those meticulous type "A" personalities that we love as he has the same MO we do.  Nothing less than excellent wines will do!  Come out and see what perfecting the scientific process of selecting wine will do for quality with Dan showcasing some of his best wines this evening and Toni Lampasone will prepare a special meal to accompany these Most Excellent selections.  The fee for this tasting is $85 + tax for reservations call 954-523-9463 or email andy@winewatch.com.

Image result for importer Dan Kravitz

Rhone Wine Tasting with importer Dan Kravitz at WWWB
Tuesday, February 27, 2018
7:30 PM

 

Image result for Pink Pegau Rosé Vin de France 2016

Pink Pegau Rosé Vin de France 2016
Price: $20.00    Sale $17.60
Sourced from Laurence Féraud’s 100+ acre estate in Sorgues, just 4 miles south of Châteauneuf‐du‐Pape, Pink Pegau boasts an outsized popularity and ardent following in the marketplace. Crisp and aromatic (and a bit cheeky), this bone-dry rosé is loaded with character and offers immense enjoyment both on its own and at the table.
Pale pink/salmon in color, with peach, floral and red fruit aromas. Bone dry, with a crisp, mouth-watering acidity leading to a long, spicy, mineral finish.

Image result for Domaine Cabirau Côtes du Roussillon Roussillon 2016

Domaine Cabirau Côtes du Roussillon Roussillon 2016
Price: $15.50    Sale $13.64
(92 Points) Tasted out of barrel, the deep purple colored 2016 Cotes du Roussillon (50% Grenache, 27% Carignan and 23% Syrah) offers a medium to full-bodied, ripe, sexy and bombastic style as well as outstanding notes of black and blue fruits, candied violets and spice. Drink this Old Word fruit bomb on release and over the following 4-5 years. Robert Parker's Wine Advocate

Image result for Domaine Cabirau 'Serge & Nicolas' Maury 2016

Domaine Cabirau "Serge & Nicholas" Maury 2016
Price: $15.50    Sale $13.64
The softness of Grenache is balanced by the mineral
backbone extracted from the schistous soils. The Syrah
and Carignan add pronounced spicy and peppery
components. Intense yet subtle…

Image result for Domaine Cabirau 'First Things First' Maury 2015

Domaine Cabirau "First Things First" Maury 2015
Price: $35.00    Sale $30.80
After 27 years importing wine, HPS President Dan Kravitz took the plunge and purchased his own vineyard in Roussillon. Named Cabirau after the vineyard’s original designation, the domaine is in the town of Maury, on a hillside below the ancient Cathar fortress of Queribus. Domaine Cabirau’s first, special, prestige bottling was appropriately named “FIRST THINGS FIRST”.
Loaded with ripe, red and dark fruit character, complex spice notes, and plenty of Maury minerality. Well structured, with intense fruit and fine-grained tannins on the full-bodied palate. Very long on the finish.

Image result for Château Pegau 'Cuvée Lône' Côtes du Rhône 2015

Château Pegau 'Cuvée Lône' Côtes du Rhône 2015
Price: $19.25    Sale $16.94
The brief history of Chateau Pegau begins with the long history of Domaine Pegau. There have been Ferauds (of French and Italian origin) growing vines in Chateauneuf-du-Pape since 1670.
Paul was one of four children. Feeling that was too many he decided to have one child, and hit the jackpot with brilliant daughter Laurence. Paul spent the first half of his career cultivating his 17 acres of Chateauneuf-du-Pape. 90% of the production was sold in bulk to top Negociants; the remaining 10% was bottled as Cuvee Reservee, thus the origin of the name for the basic Chateauneuf.
In 1987 Laurence joined her father and created the Domaine du Pegau. Born to grow wine, she took courses in both viticulture and the beverage alcohol business. She sold wine in Paris, but wanted to come home. Excellent at both winegrowing and business, it took her but five years to build bottle sales from 10 to 100% of production! Since then, her purchases have expanded the vineyards in Chateauneuf to 42+ acres.
Laurence does not have a single arrogant or snobbish molecule in her body, but she is restless and ambitious. In 2012 a large property called Domaine de la Jouve came up for sale. Four miles from Pegau, it is on the banks of the Rhone in the town of Sorgues. It consists of 148 acres and a large rundown Chateau of 10,000 square feet. The ~101 acres of vineyards include 62 of Cotes du Rhone Villages and 12 of Cotes du Rhone, with the balance Vin de Table. Laurence bought it and rechristened it Chateau Pegau. For the first vintage, she and Paul learning their way, they declassified most of the Villages to Cotes du Rhone. The red Cotes du Rhone carries the name Chateau Pegau Cuvée Maclura. The Cotes du Rhone Villages (15% of the production) is Chateau Pegau Cuvée Setier. These are complemented by a white Cotes du Rhone, Chateau Pegau Cuvée Lône. The wines are emphatically not Chateauneuf-du-Pape, nor are they priced that way. However yields have been kept to the absurdly low limits permitted in Chateauneuf, and the wines have all of the density of that great Appellation.

Image result for Domaine du Pegau Cuvée Réservée Rouge Châteauneuf-du-Pape 2014

Domaine du Pegau Cuvée Réservée Rouge Châteauneuf-du-Pape 2014
Price: $60.75    Sale $53.46
(90 Points) As to the 2014 Chateauneuf du Pape Cuvee Reservee, which is already in bottle, it’s a medium-bodied, lively and fresh example of this cuvee that offers classic Pegau notes of cured meats, tapenade, spiced meats and blackcurrant fruits. Clean, complex, with bright acidity and solid concentration, it needs a decant if drinking anytime soon, but should keep for at least a decade. Robert Parker's Wine Advocate

Image result for Domaine du Pegau Cuvée Réservée Rouge Châteauneuf-du-Pape 2015

Domaine du Pegau Cuvée Réservée Rouge Châteauneuf-du-Pape 2015
Price: $98.00    Sale $86.24
(93-95 points) The 2015 Chateauneuf du Pape Cuvee Reservee (scheduled to be bottled November 2017) is a very fine, elegant example of Châteauneuf du Pape. Garrigue and violet notes spring forth on the nose, followed by layers of spice, hints of leather and black cherry fruit. It feels lithe and delicate for a full-bodied wine, with a long, silky finish. (JC) (10/2017) Robert Parker's Wine Advocate  

Image result for Jean Laurent Brut Blanc de Noirs Champagne Aube NV

Jean Laurent Brut Blanc de Noirs Champagne Aube NV
Price: $50.75    Sale $44.66
Gold. Light. Eternal. Ephemeral. These describe the wines of Jean Laurent. Jean's family has been growing wine in the village of Celles-sur-Ource for more than 1,000 years. The estate is situated in the Aube, an outlying Champagne district south of Marne that shares the same chalky soils as the heart of Champagne and Chablis.
  

Menu
Mushroom Provencal Herb Quiche with Tombe Cheese and Tomato Gelee
Trout, Crawfish and Sabodet Cassoulet
French Country Pate with Mustard Cornichon Relish and House Pickled Pearl Onion

 

The fee for this event is $85 + tax, for reservations call 954-523-9463 or e-mail andy@winewatch.com.

Hand Picked means a lot!
“Good wine is a necessity of life for me.” The quote is from Thomas Jefferson. Of course the statement isn’t literally true. Mr. Jefferson would not have perished from lack of wine, although his pleasure in life would have been greatly diminished. Wine was something of an obsession for him and his failure (due to phylloxera) to successfully grow fine wine in Virginia was one of the few disappointments in one of the happiest and most successful of lives.
Jefferson was an aristocrat to his fingertips. His leisurely trips to Europe included stops at and purchases of Châteaux Lafite, Haut-Brion and d’Yquem as well as Romanée Conti. While I would love to emulate his purchases and drinking habits, like 99.9% of us I can’t afford those beverages on an everyday basis.
The goal of Hand Picked Selections is to provide consumers with moderately priced wines of flavor and character. I am convinced that America will be a better and happier place as we begin to incorporate wine into our daily lives. Those wines will rarely be Lafite or Romanée-Conti. They won’t be Napa Valley Cabernets, Tête de Cuvée Champagnes, super-Tuscans or garage Saint-Emilions. They can be mass-produced wines from multinational drinks corporations – these are far better than nothing. One of the greatest advances in the history of wine has been the adaptation of modern technology. Most of the world’s vineyards can now produce consistently clean and pleasant wines. Good as these wines are, there is no reason why we shouldn’t choose to drink, at comparable prices, wines of individuality and character. These are wines from vineyards cultivated by independent growers, harvested, fermented, aged and bottled on their own property, wines that give you a sense of the place where they were grown. It is those wines that Hand Picked Selections chooses to sell.
There is a different quote from a Founding Father that for me best expresses what wine can bring to us:
“Wine makes daily living easier, less hurried, with fewer tensions and more tolerance.” — BEN FRANKLIN
What a perfect description. And what a great prescription for an improved quality of life in our beloved but increasingly harried and economically challenged America.
Dan Kravitz
President
Hand Picked Selections, Inc.

 

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