Thorne Clarke's 2010 Shotfire Quartage from Barossa Valley

While I have had the bottle before (always buy in 3s), it didn't show very well. Nose was too much of tar with a mouthful cherries but too tannic to really enjoy. This one was barely drinkable.
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Col D'Orcia's 2007 Brunello Di Montalcino

I had high hopes for this because I have had previous vintages. But...
Light nose of cherries and dust.
A bit too tannic on the palate, uncomplicated but drinkable. Just not a $40 wine.
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Veuve Cliquot's Brut Champagne

My favorite bubbly with its classic effervescent and ever so slightly citrus nose. Buttery and rich but dry and über quaffable. Our "house" champagne when times are good and a splurge when they ain't. Only Krug and Dom can out shine here (yes I am excluding Cristal).
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2009 Iconoclast from SLD, Napa

Strong notes of vanilla and cherries on the nose. Big bursting plum with mouth covering flavors of smoke and chocolate.

The Four Seasons has this wine made for them. Gorgeous.

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Quintessa's 2009 Cabernet Sauvignon from Napa

This wine never disappoints.  Consistent year-to-year with scores in the mid-90's from just about every critic and for nearly every year.  A big nose of plum and earthy spice.  Flavors of cherry and plum, mixed with light tannins (taste of leather?) and a structured, but clean and pleasant finish.

I shared this wine with some customers at the Soho House in Hollywood.  The price was orbital ($235), but sometimes you have to splurge for the big experience.

You can find the wine at a much more "palatable price" on Wine.com for $139 a bottle.

If you do buy this bottle, lay it down.  I am saving one from a friend for a few more years...

$$$/+++

Provenance Vineyards' 2010 Uppercut Cabernet Sauvignon from Napa

I have to admit I was expecting a big, bold cab based on the name alone and knowing this was the "little brother" of the vineyard's namesake wine from Rutherford (which is a big, chewy cab), I was expecting it to deliver something with a strong nose and bold and spicy if not earthy palate.

What a disappointment.

Now I am not saying the wine is bad by any measure.  However, it was a very typical "Popular Napa Cab", with a ton of fruit forward, light on the tannins, quick finish, but in this case had little structure or anything of note to make it interesting.

Now at $10 a glass in Cafe Firenze or $21 a bottle from Wine Searcher, you really can't complain too much, but I think they should sit down with their marketing department and reconsider the name.  Perhaps "love tap" would be more appropriate--not even strong enough for a "bitch slap".

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Cielo's 2009 WildBerrys from the Woodstock Collection

Sitting down in the warm afternoon SoCal weather helps to abate the disappointment here. 

Normally a big fan of the Woodstock Collection, today I was disappointed.

A very pleasant nose of fresh, ripe, red fruit, but followed by a slight taste of sour cherries (using the venturi made it taste worse).  Ironically, it smells and tastes like a GSM, though it claims to be a Cabernet-based wine (100% Cabernet from Alexander Valley).

Drinkable, but not spectacular.

Wine-searcher has it for $19.99  Ironically from Wade's…

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Updated:  We tried the wine after storing half the bottle in a hand-vacuum pump.  Ironically, it got much better.  It took on structure and tasted more like a complex blend from Tuscany or Bordeaux.  Now the trick is to figure out how to "oxidize it, just right" consistently.