WINO 101

Hello Friends and Wine Lovers!

Here we are again for another edition of the Periodic Periodical that is the Carpe Vinum Tasting Announcement Thing and Newsletter Thingy! This week we’re tasting the Pinot Family! “What do you mean by that?”, you may ask. “The answer is simple!” I may reply. “But first let me explain something mostly unrelated.” The answer may be simple, but long explanations are more fun, aren’t they? Allow me to explain.

I’ve been a longtime believer in spontaneity. This is not just because it’s fun. (”Hey! Call in sick to work! Let’s drive to Tijuana!”) It’s mostly because I’ve always felt that if you plan anything too far in advance, you’re inviting fate to intervene and ruin all of your plans. (”We’ve planned this driving trip to Tijuana for a year, but now extraterrestrials have landed and have blockaded I-5 from all traffic.”) I’ve usually found that planning two weeks in advance is just the appropriate amount of time for the clocks and levers in the cosmos to align things against your plans. Rain. Thunder. Earthquakes. Volcanic eruptions. Alien invasion. Apocalypse. You get the point. But really, what’s my point?

So I planned this tasting over 2 weeks out, back when it was sunny and 90 degrees outside. At the time, my spontaneous self was thinking, “Boy. . wouldn’t a Pinot Gris or a Pinot Blanc be good?” and sure enough, it would have been. So now, weeks later, fate has indeed intervened by bringing soggy, dismal, and cold weather, which leaves us thinking, “Boy. . .a Pinot Gris or a Pinot Blanc might not be the best right now.”

But, Ha! Ha! I KNEW that it was going to happen! And when I planned it, I had the backup plan of also including Pinot Noir! And therefore I could adjust the red to white ratio of the tasting to match the general mood of the week. And then we can all be happy again. Now that I’ve ranted about that, it’s back to the answer to “The Pinot Family”.

I guess you can’t really call it a “Family” as it’s not really set up like a family. It’s a bit more like Michael Keaton’s abomination of a movie “Multiplicity**”. It all begins with the noble Pinot Noir. Pinot Noir is a red grape variety. It makes very popular wines in the France’s Burgundy, our lovely backyards here in Oregon, New Zealand, and a handful of other places in the world.

Pinot Gris, a white wine, is what has been called a “clonal variety” of Pinot Noir. I’m not entirely sure what “clonal variety” means, but it sounds vaguely like “We were cloning it, and something went wrong. But we like it!” Even if that’s the case, it’s been making popular wines in the French Alsace, parts of Northern Italy, our lovely backyards here in Oregon, and a handful of other places in the world.

Pinot Blanc is a white wine grape that is a mutation of the Pinot Noir grape. This appeals to me greatly because I like the word “mutation” when it’s not being used in a purely Science Fiction-type sense. The Pinot Blanc is not planted as widespread as its clonal cousins, but can be found in the French Alsace and also, as a result of the grape clusters so closely resembling Chardonnay, it has survived in vineyards in the French Burgundy among the Chardonnay vines. Incognito, you could say.

So because the weather turned for the worse, I chose more Pinot Noir than the white wines, but of course have Pinot Gris and Pinot Blanc in there, because I promised. I’ll try again for more whites once it warms back up again. But I’ll only plan it out less than two weeks in advance, just in case!

So Friday, June 2nd, between 4:30 and 9:00 PM it’s:

The Pinot “Family”!!
Domaines Schlumberger 2004 Pinot Blanc Prince Abbes, Alsace, France
di Lenardo 2005 Pinot Grigio, Friuli, Italy
Louis Latour 2003 Domaine de Valmoissine, VdP Coteaux du Verdon, France
R. Stuart & Co. 2005 Big Fire Pinot Noir, Oregon
Andrew Rich 2004 Cuvee B Pinot Noir, Willamette Valley, Oregon

Coupla More Pinot Noir For Ya!!
Patricia Green 2004 Pinot Noir, Croft Vineyard, Willamette Valley, Oregon
Cristom 2003 Pinot Noir Mt. Jefferson Cuvee, Willamette Valley, Oregon

A stellar deal at $10 for the First 5, $6 for the Extra 2 Premium Pours
Hope to see you here!
Seize the Wine!

Next Friday tasting is The French Burgundy!

**Which I will not describe or explain, because just thinking about that movie in any kind of detail just makes me edgy and a bit irritated. You can check out a description here: http://www.allmovie.com/ Just don’t watch it! It’s awful.

M