Food Do we have any oenophiles here?

No wonder my blood pressure and cholesterol are so good.

Health Benefits of Wine - Yahoo!

 

So...I ended up buying around 3 cases of wine on our trip. I'm not sure of the final count, to be honest, even after putting it away, as I wasn't keeping great track. I know I had approximately 20 bottles in my possession before leaving on vacation, and now I have 57. I also joined a wine club for Girardet Wines as I can't get some of their stuff locally and they make my favorite chardonnay. The fall shipment should be here in the next couple of days.

Is there an app for tracking my cellar? I've got two boxes worth of reds that could stand to be cellared ready to go into my basement.

 

This is what I use: Manage Your Cellar - Wine Cellar Software - Welcome

It's not an app, but you can obviously access the website from your phone/tablet. I looked through a lot of apps and other websites when I decided to start tracking my wine, and of the free ones, I found this one to be the best IMO. It takes a few minutes the first time through to enter what you have, but it's still very simple. Most wines I've found to already exist in their database. If they aren't in there, it is extremely easy to add them. Then it keeps track of everything for you, and has many awesome tools for you to use to look over what you have. Every time I purchase or finish a bottle I make it a point to log it. It takes 10-30 seconds. Sometimes I'll do it the next morning or whatever, but I always do it, and it keeps my list current.

The cool thing is that once you enter it all the first time, it's nearly painless to keep up with. And it'll help you remember exactly what you have, what you have had in the past, what your mix (varietal, region, age, etc.) is, how much is red vs. white, and values. I highly recommend it.

 

I'll have to take some time and get that set up before the wine disappears into the basement. We picked up a few bold reds that could stand some age, and a couple of tight tempranillos with promise once the tannins mellow in a few years.

 

If you are at 57 bottles, I bet you could set it all up in 45 minutes or an hour if you have them all together in one place. Before I started using the software, I would mark the back label with the month/year I purchased the bottle, and how much I paid. So when I set it up on the WineCellar website, I first took a notepad to my wine rack, wrote down every bottle's name, purchase time, and price, then sat down at my computer and entered them all. Obviously you could just drag your laptop or tablet to your wine and do it that way too. I can't remember exactly, but I think at that time I had somewhere near what you have now and it took me less than an hour.


The only thing I would do differently is add a location. The site gives you a space for it, but I didn't do it when I first went through, and I haven't felt like going back and adding them for over twice that many bottles now. I keep mine in three different places (wine rack in the basement, wine fridge in the kitchen, and the top shelf of the pantry), and sometimes I wish I knew which of the three locations a certain bottle was located at. #whitepeopleproblems


Here are some screenshots to show you part of what you get from the site:

This is a summary list of what is in the cellar, and the breakdown:


Here are a couple of shots of the listing of each individual wine. I sorted by varietal, but you can sort by any of the fields at the top:




There are also tables that show exactly what you spent each month on wine, how much you drank each month, fields for listing bottles you might've gifted/given away, and a section for comments you can add if you want to say who you drank it with, what meal you paired it with, etc. You can use as little or as much of that as you like, you don't have to enter all the info in each time, but it's there if you choose to.

 

Yikes.

Wine doesn't taste just like grape juice--it tastes like lots of different things, depending on what it is. I had a couple wines over the course of the trip that tasted like vanilla cherry cola. It was good. Other red wines might have aromas of tobacco, leather, cherry, blackberry, strawberry, stonefruit, etc. Whites tend to have a different lexicon: citrus, melon, vanilla, almond, even grass.

 

Uh oh. I predict excessive late night impulse purchased. Probably fueled by wine. It'll be a vicious vino cycle.

 

It's pretty good stuff. It's a red blend, mostly Zinfandel and Syrah IIRC. I actually opened some earlier this week. It has a big blackberry aroma and flavor, with pepper and vanilla. The "Kick Ass Red" is the top end of the Mike Ditka line. I bought some a few years ago at like $35-40/bottle or thereabouts. Now the '05 is selling for $50-55. Not sure if you can get newer vintages for less or not. He also makes a bunch of other wines with his name on them, they are typically priced about half of the Kick Ass Red. I've had a few and they are pretty decent as well. The KAR is a pretty big wine, so I'd recommend trying it with a grilled steak or something, maybe even lamb or venison.

 

She texted me again today. She's doing another revamp of their retail space and changing around some of the "by the glass" menu. Picked up 3 more cases for $100 each.

 

We're in the process of cleaning and organizing our garage right now, so I finally got around to unpacking some of the wine I'd boxed up for cellaring. I've been going through it and logging it in Manage Your Cellar as I go.

 

I seriously love it. So easy to use, doesn't take any time once you have the initial "enter everything you have" phase completed, and let's you track what you've had and do have.

 

There are a few Oregon wineries not in the database. I'd say I'm hitting 50% on whether or not the wine I have is actually in there.

 

Wine is like other things such as whiskey or cigars or cheese or coffee or tea. You only begin to understand what's going on with each tasting when you build your experience of it.

Anyone who hasn't had hard liquor before will likely think whiskey harsh and quite possibly "gross" or "not worth it." That's a knee-jerk reaction. With further experience, one will learn what's going on and will learn to appreciate it. This is what is meant by an acquired taste. Of course, tastes vary, and some people just can't stand whiskey (God forbid).

With wine, tastes vary as well. Some people like some characteristics while not being too fond of others. I myself could never really appreciate whites. I prefer bold reds. I like musky, complexity. There is something too crisp about whites that I haven't learned to appreciate. I'm not saying I won't or can't. It's just that I haven't taken the time. (This is my ultimate point. One needs to take the time with repeated experiences.) I haven't experienced good whites enough. I think most of the white wine I've had has been inferior. (Close to grape juice... )

The thing to remember is that whites vary a lot between whites, and reds vary a lot between reds. There are a number of factors operating in layers that give you certain outcomes. Wine appreciation is a complex and wonderful world.

That said, I don't drink nearly enough wine, unforch. I'm not really around people who appreciate good wine. In many ways, I'm a closet oenophile.

 

I'm usually at about 80/20, with most wines being in there. I seem to have the most problem with European stuff that comes in small releases. Sometimes if you try entering it a different way you will find it because the person who originally added it did so in a non-standard fashion. I find that about 30-50% of the time that I don't find something, it's there if I swap around how I search.

For instance, I have some 2008 Crossbarn Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley from Paul Hobbs Winery. The label looks like this:


I would search for this by typing in "Crossbarn Cabernet Sauvignon" or "Crossbarn Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley". But it might be entered as "Paul Hobbs Crossbarn Cabernet Sauvignon" or "Crossbarn by Paul Hobbs Cabernet Sauvignon". So if you run into things not being added, you can either add them yourself in the format/order you like them entered in, or search another way and see if it is in there. It all depends on how much trouble you want to go to.
--- merged: Mar 25, 2013 at 1:34 PM ---

Great explanation of acquired tastes and learning about new food/drink.

 

45 bottles of wine. Wow. If we counted sake and wine-like beers, I'd be up over 4 cases.

Baraka_Guru , there are lots of whites that aren't crisp at all. A Chardonnay that is well-oaked and/or has gone through malolactic fermentation is going to lose that crisp quality. Depending on the craft of the winemaker, it can take on rich vanilla notes, almond, and earthy tones from the oak and malo as well as a more supple mouthfeel. If malo is not done right or taken too far, it can be too buttery. Because of these techniques, Chardonnay has a whole range of flavors from fruit-forward (apple, citrus) to nutty (almonds, vanilla) with a mouthfeel that ranges from crisp to creamy--and a Chardonnay can fall anywhere along this range, depending on whether it was aged in stainless, neutral oak, American oak, French oak, a combination thereof, and whether or not it went through malo. Sometimes winemakers will blend a Chardonnay where half of it has gone through malo and half has not in order to control that buttery quality.

Can you tell I love Chardonnay? Sadly, I only have two bottles in my possession at the moment because I am pretty picky. There's a lot of bad Chardonnay out there, unfortunately.

 

If you ever feel like splurging on a special occasion Chardonnay, I recommend trying Mayacamas. I was able to meet the owner a while back when he came to my local wine bar for a tasting and meet-n-greet. Big beach bum/surfer looking dude who was very laid back and friendly. Their entire line of wines is awesome, and I wish I had the money to drink them all the time. I have a handful (Chard, Cab Sav, and Merlot) put away for special occasions, but their Chardonnay was incredible.