Featured Wines - July 2015

The 2013 Chevalier Crozes-Hermitage Marius is truly one of the appellation’s stars and a collectable in its own right. And given the Chevaliers’ tiny production, the window of opportunity on availability for Marius is very limited. The product of an outstanding, highly concentrated vintage in the Rhône Valley, the 2013 Marius offers the savory scents and flavors of black fruits, crème de cassis, fennel and toasted oak. It also possesses the...

There is ordinary New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, good New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, and then New Zealand’s best Sauvignon Blanc: James Healy and Ivan Sutherland’s Dog Point Section 94. Dog Point’s 2012 Section 94 may be the most intense interpretation of the varietal we have ever tasted. In short, there is absolutely no wimp in this wine. No surprise then that Section 94 is Dog Point’s flagship offering. This outstanding Sauvignon Blanc offers...

Chapel Hill’s 2012 McLaren Vale Shiraz offers up a delightful array of savory aromas and flavors as well considerable complexity, which no doubt account for the many 90 point ratings it has received, including 91 points from Wine Advocate – a score we think a tad stingy. Deep ruby-purple in color, the 2012 McLaren Vale Shiraz opens with an enticing aroma of blueberry and blackberry preserves, anise, lavender and cracked black pepper.

Unlike its New World counterparts, the pleasure of Chardonnay in the form of Bourgogne Blanc lies neither in power nor in the preponderance of new oak. Instead, the 2013 Vignerons Réunis de Buxy Cuvée Réserve Bourgogne Chardonnay, like all good Bourgogne Blancs, offers a wine of blithe spirit. It is a wine imbued with ethereal charm, finesse, purity, and subtlety of flavor. It possesses all of Chardonnay’s unadulterated characteristics and...

You don’t have to play tennis or have ever longed for that coveted seat at Centre Court at Wimbledon to enjoy the 2011 Game Set Match Grenache Syrah Mourvedre. A bright ruby red color with savory aromatics the 2011 Game Set Match offers up delightful scents of summer raspberries and strawberries along with hints of dark chocolate. On the palate, the wine’s ripe red fruits fill the mouth and overlay smooth spicy flavors offset by gentle...

Angel Rodriguez continually fashions the quintessential Rueda Verdejo and one of Spain’s most compelling white wines. And to no one’s surprise the 2013 Martinsancho continues this iconic winemaker’s acumen with his beloved Verdejo. Farmed organically, the 2013 Martinsancho sports the wine’s usual sun splashed robe and offers plenty of alluring aromatics, too. An amplifying bouquet of apricot, citrus, spring flowers, minerals, and liquid stones...

The 2013 Black Pearl Mischief Maker Shiraz is simply the latest in a string of excellent Shiraz offerings to flow from Mary-Lou Nash’s Black Pearl Vineyards. With the estate’s small production and the immediate success of Mary-Lou’s Mischief Maker, procuring enough Mischief Maker Shiraz in recent vintages to satisfy our members has become a truly daunting task. But at first you don’t succeed . . . The 2013 Mischief Maker offers a saturated...