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Video Transcript: Taste A New Wine Every Month

Written By: ClassicWines.com Team on Thursday, July 3, 2008

Brian Freedman: Welcome to Classic Wines TV; I am your host Brian Freedman. Today, we'll be tasting a selection of wines from the California Wine Club.

Wine clubs are a great way to really expand your basic wine knowledge and to taste wines that you might not only be familiar with but might not actually have access to either.

Now with the California Wine Club, they offer several tiers of wine. Today, we'll be tasting both their premier and their international.

Now, wine number one here. This is the Winzer Krems 2007 Grüner Veltliner "Edition Chremisa" from Kremstal. Now Grüner Veltliner if you're not terribly familiar with is a wine that you will start to see more and more of. It offers a whole lot of flavor. It offers a really wonderful structure, great pairing possibilities with food and still offers great value.

This one -- on the nose it has a really pronounced mineral quality, almost flinty. There's a little bit of something citric on there. I am going in the lemon direction but it's not totally fruity lemon and there's also a peppery quality to the nose but very subtle.

Wonderfully structured, great backbone of acid and that pepperiness that was just being hinted out on the nose was really coming to the fore there. I’ll tell you what, if you have Wiener schnitzel in your future, go with this Grüner Veltliner. If you're having sushi, this is going to be a beautiful pairing, a lot of options with this wine.

Wine number two is the Buttonwood Farm Sauvignon Blanc 2006 in the Santa Ynez Valley, that's in Santa Barbara. Santa Barbara is one of those places in California that is just exploding right now. Some of my personal favorite wines are coming out of Santa Barbara and Santa Ynez in particular.

Now the nose on this Sauvignon Blanc is much more subtle, much more elegant than a lot of times you might be used to. Sometimes Sauvignon Blanc just gets totally weighed down with the tropical fruit, great fruit gooseberry. This one is all about finesse. There's a touch of gooseberry there, just the tiniest little hint of grapefruit. May be something a bit green but this one is really all about subtlety and elegance. See what this tastes like.

Again, fabulous acids of this wine, great structure. This one is really -- I almost want to describe it as compact and that it's not trying to be overblown or do more than it should. This is textbook example of why Santa Ynez Valley, such a great place. I have this sudden craving for grilled trout with this. I would love this with everything from -- oh, I don't know from littleneck clams or something like asparagus with this and that's a nightmare to pair with, fabulous, fabulous example.

Now, move onto the reds. Same producer as the Grüner Veltliner, we have the Winzer Krems 2005 "Edition Chremisa" Blauer Zweigelt. Mouthful I know, but I got to tell you, Zweigelt is absolutely one of my go to wines these days despite its unfamiliarity with most people.

For me, the nose here, there's something both Syrah like and Pinot Noir like here. I am getting that wild cherry character there. I am getting cassis but there's also this really great black peppercorn aroma. If you ever stuck your head into a bag or black peppercorns, it reminds me very much of that which is also something that we look for with Syrah.

This wine to me is a classic example of what red wine from unexpected regions can do. It has a very live, litheish structure but all this flavor -- it's totally not indicated by either the color or the texture. This wine is absolutely magnificent with any kind of game with any sort of your Filet Mignon like a peppercorn sauce or a demiglace, spot on.

Now, our last one is the Buttonwood Farm 2003 Merlot. This is also from the Santa Ynez Valley, which again is in Santa Barbara. Now California Merlot has really seen an upsurge in quality and as I smell this wine and to me it doesn't smell like the Classic California Merlot, it's the most Bordeaux like Merlot from California I've ever smelled. That's because there's 15% Cabernet Franc in there, classic blend from the right bank of the river in Bordeaux.

There's this great tobacco character, sort of like -- almost like a beautiful deep damp underbrush there. There's some leather going on there but still with that right California plum fruit that we look for in Merlot, absolutely a great wine. Truth of the matter is, when it comes to an outlet like the California Wine Club, it's a great chance like I said to expand what you normally drink and to taste things that you otherwise wouldn't even have access to in a lot of cases.

You can find other wine club videos on Classic Wines TV. Check out Classicwines.com. From all of us here; I am your host Brian Freedman. Keep experimenting with what you drink, you can't go wrong. Cheers.

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