Back in the saddle with Napa Family Vineyards Cabernet 2010

Hey everyone!  With all the changes since September the Blog has been put on the back burner.  We welcomed our second child in early September and have been adjusting to having two little ones around the house.  My love of a good drink remains but those first few weeks were spent sleeping not catching up on a backlog of new wine and beer.

Bryant informing Will and I its time to get up. 

Due to the extra rugrat we are trying to eat in more often but still with style.  Carm is in the process of trying out some entertaining recipes that we can throw parties with, so if your in the Long Beach area we hope to have you over to the house soon.  To pair with the tasty experiment tonight we tried the Napa Family Vineyards (NFV) Cabernet Sauvignon.

NFV Cabernet Sauvignon 

The NFV is the Cab counterpart to the Meritage I featured several weeks back. This Cab is a medal winner in its own right winning awards at the Critics Challenge Intl. Wine Competition 2011 and Los Angeles International Wine Competition, 2011.  The NFV Cab is a young fruity Cabernet with a good nose and bright fruit flavors.  It is a full bodied classic Napa Cab so it is intense with the taste of dark berries.  Carm felt the alcohol content was a bit much but I thought it was tasty with that intensity.  The price point is about the same as its brand mate around $10~ which is a good value for a wine this good.

Meritage, its like a Bordeaux without the Frogs. Napa Family Vineyards Meritage 2009

Carm and I have been eating in a lot more lately, biding our time till our next child comes in a month or so and takes all of our time.  This is a good an excuse as any to drink through our wine supply, [with me taking the lions share of course.]  The dinner menu tonight included chicken lasagna, a loaf of oven baked crusty garlic bread and this tasty 2009 Meritage from Napa Family Vineyards ["NFV"].   www.napafamilyvineyards.com/

Technically only sparkling wines from Champagne can be labeled Champagne, similarly Bordeaux can only be labeled as such if it comes from Bordeaux France. The French take two month long holidays per year allowing their industries to grind to a halt, but protect to the death the integrity of the wine trademarks... [insert your favorite French joke here] A "Meritage" in a nutshell is a Bordeaux style blended wine that does not come from the Bordeaux region of France.  I enjoy a good Bordeaux and this Meritage is a very tasty California take on a Bordeaux.  Considering that buying a Meritage will save you $3-5 per bottle over their French counterparts it also makes for a great value.          

This NFV Meritage has a subtle bouquet.  The Meritage has a wonderful clear garnet hue in the glass.  On the taste you get the wonderful complex explosion of dark fruit on the tongue, followed by a smooth aftertaste.  Carm felt that the alcohol was too stiff for this wine;  I thought the alcohol profile was bold but not over the top.  All in all a very enjoyable weekday wine from our friends from northern California.    

Enjoying WineWrights Napa Merlot 2009, with Bob the Pig.

I remember watching the movie Sideways the great 2004 ode to binge wine drinking, with Carm a few years back.  Good movie but there were several things I didn't get and maybe the director cut out.  I did't get the  subplot of Miles' hatred of his parents or his mysterious hatred of  Merlot.  Maybe his parents beat Miles with Merlot bottles.   

I enjoy a good California Merlot, and the Winewrights Napa Merlot is a great example of an affordable high quality Merlot, its also $10 which is just icing on the cake.  I picked up a bottle of Winewrights Merlot along with some spare bottles of Chateau Coucy before a "whole pig" butchery class I attended, taught by Chef Paul from Primal Alchemy Catering.   It was 11 am on Saturday, I was drinking good wine, sampling cured meat, head cheese while separating the shoulder of a 200 lb organically raised pig; good times.  

Bob the Pig, after the hams were removed.
Chef Paul in the background.

My buddy Kurt from Probasketballtalk.com [a one stop shop for all of your NBA related news] joined me for this culinary adventure and by 11:30 we finished the bottles of French wine I brought. [between us Kurt and I have 4 soon to be 5 kiddos, so when we get out, we drink!] Chef brought out another round of figs wrapped in prosciutto so we cracked open the Merlot.  The primary flavors on the taste are dark berries, plum and chocolate. enveloped in a dense Merlot package. There is a hint of oak and gentle tannins on the finish.  I also love the label I dig the very Leonardo Da Vinci look to them, at a $10~ pricepoint this whole package wine is an absolute steal.   

Near the end of the class Chef prepared a pork loin as a demonstration.  That seared pork tasting alone with the Merlot accompanying it was worth the price of admission.