Barbera Wine Tasting
Second Thursday, September 10, 2009 - 4:00 PM to 8:00 PM
Barbera is, first of all, a grape variety. Barbera wine is ruby
red, and its typical perfumes are the same of rose, and black
cherry. Taste is powerful, fresh and low in tannins, and it is very
well matching with food, specially traditional recipes, meat and
barbecue.
Barbera is the yum-yum grape. It makes approachable, affordable red wines that can introduce new wine lovers to the fabulous world of reds.
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First, thanks to you all for helping raise about $175.00 for the Golden Art Gallery. And, from all the comments we got, we all had fun as well.
Special thanks to Doug Siegel for his vocal and guitar work as well as Franco Marchesi and Anya Cristina for being part of our evening. Even the weather cooperated.
Now to the Barbera tasting. Four wine producers were part of the event: Marshal's Winery, Marchesi Vineyards, Maryhill Winery, and Waving Tree Vineyards & Winery. We thank them as well as IGA in Goldendale for their support.
We learned several things after two "Great Tastings." One is that people really do enjoy blind tasting events. We will have more. We also learned that people tend not to enjoy a number based rating system very much.
So, thanks to those who filled out the rating sheets, but we won't publish a score this time. It's a bit daunting translating " I loved this wine!" into a number between 0 and 20. The consensus is however that the four wines essentially fell into two groups. Group one I'll call, "Well received, with lots of kind words." Group 2 I'll call "Not so much! Group one was Waving Tree and Marchesi. Group two was Marshal's and Maryhill. For everyone's information, I obtain the samples for the tasting from shelf stock from the local IGA. If not possible, I obtain it from other retail sources without telling anyone why. I am buying in the same context as "Joe Public".
Now, it's possible that a particular sample may have been on the shelf longer than optimal. Maybe the wine spent too much time in a hot truck, or for whatever reason, you may not always receive the best the winery has to offer.
But, as the wine buying public, we know we are at the bottom of the food chain and we depend on a distribution and retail network subject to human failings.
Of course the above rant has a reason behind it. Last night one of the wines, both bottles to be exact, exhibited characteristics not normally encountered in a quality product. I, like you, will take this to the attention of those who will listen. I'll keep you informed.
So the lesson might be that, wine, like all living things, can have a bad day.
Thanks again for your support. I'm looking forward to the next "Great Tasting!"
Ciao!
Leroy Schoot