Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you will know that it’s a bit of a challenge to attend wine tastings these days. OK, it’s impossible.
So if you can’t go to a wine tasting, why not bring the tasting to you? That’s what Black Hills Estate Winery in Oliver is doing. You pick the wine (there are three packs available: Red, White, Mixed), and they ship it to you and spend an hour on Zoom with you, tasting through the wines. You’ll get led by a knowledgable wine evangelist, and you can bring as many friends as you like (they do not necessarily have to have purchased the pack – the winery requires only 2 packs purchased per session).
A couple weeks ago, we participate in the red wine session, and last night we participated in the white wine session. You can see the various offerings at this link.
We have been club members for years, but this would be the first time we had tasted these specific wines, with the exception of the Nota Bene and the Syrah, which we tasted at last year’s Nota Bene release party. I didn’t review them that evening, but I recall thinking how good the Syrah was, and how big and intense the Nota Bene was. My opinions have not changed.
The other red wine in the pack is the 2018 Carmenere. I am not reviewing that at this time, because I just didn’t like it very much. This is a wine that I usually absolutely love, but this one falls flat, for now. I have this wine in my cellar and I will report on it the next time we open one. I have no doubt it will improve with time; in fact, the bottle that we opened during this tasting did get better when we went back to it the next day, so there is lots of optimism. If you have these, I would definitely let them age for a while.
On to the report!
As for last night’s whites, we opened (and started enjoying) the Alibi about 5 hours before the tasting, and the Viognier about 3 hours before the tasting. Both improved significantly by the time we got the virtual tasting started. The Chardonnay was opened a half hour before the tasting but not poured until it was time to drink it during the event.
The winery is making plans to open with limited spaces available, in early June. You will need to make an appointment (or get very lucky if you just drop in), particularly early in the re-opening process, so if you are going to be in the area, give them a call and book your spot.
As a bonus review, when pulling the 2018 Viognier out of our wine fridge, I noticed that we had a couple bottles of the 2017 in there, so today we cracked that one open to see the difference…..and it’s a completely different wine.
That’s it for today! Coming up, a bunch of random stuff we have been enjoying over the past few weeks/months.
Confessions of a Huge Wine-R 