Recent content by Hank Beckmeyer

Shit.

As of now, everything is ok here. Still lots of smoke in the air, but it seems the fire is mostly contained. We did have a scary 5 hours or so yesterday, when the fire grow at an estimated 130% in the afternoon. Suddenly, areas not so far from us were being evacuated. We packed some bags...

Incredibly enlightening.

What Steve said. Minus the 28 years.

Never really cared for Beaucastel...There's always something missing in the wines. No "spark". VT has it, yes. Rayas, certainly. But Beaucastel has always reminded me of the vinous equivalent of a starched white shirt.

"Facts"

fun = rouge tomate & their tasting menu. ate there last week and really enjoyed it. stellar wine list. weirdly fun = alder. the food is good starting point for conversations about the possibilities of food. and tasty, too.

"But I would prefer to warn winemakers now that it’s possible to go too far..." Wait...What?!?

Well, I've joined another mailing list...

I don't know. Maybe the broken stems add more of a green, sappy note. Whole clusters, foot trodden, come through fermentations intact, yet add a light, pleasant herbal note, and tend to dampen the rather exuberant fruit we get here.

I'm waiting for the clay mesh baskets to come out. Somebody will eventually come out with a "stems-in-a-bag" type product, maybe like matcha, that you can just add to your must. For that "authentic, old-world wine feel".

Interesting. My experience with adding back stems to destemmed fruit is not positive. Much more of a green, stemmy note than if you just use whole, non-destemmed fruit.

Within a year he'll be completely out. Either a cash buyout of his position, or forced out by the investors. They don't really need him anymore.

"this" far.

This is a GREAT tasting note, as far as tasting notes go.