wine o. wednesday #60

We had our second Brown Bag Wine Night and this time decided that everyone should bring a Pinot Noir so that we weren’t all over the place like last time.  This time we went to Kozy’s, check out yesterday’s post for details on their delicious food!

There were 8 of us at this gathering, so there were 8 wines:

1. The Four Graces 2009 Oregon Pinot Noir, brought by my sister, Beth.  I can’t remember if I’d had this one before with Beth or not.  This wine was a nice combination of spice and airiness.  It was good, but I think with a little more breathing time, I would have liked it even more.

2. Acrobat 2010 Oregon Pinot Noir was brought by me.  This wasn’t really a sweet wine and didn’t have a lot of spice.  It’s a dry Pinot Noir that definitely needed a lot more time to breath.  This was the only screw cap wine of the night.

3. Windsor Sonoma 2008 Russian River Valley Pinot Noir was brought by Justin.  He had never had this one before and it was a great wine.  It was fruity, had a darker color to it for  Pinot Noir and had hardly any spice.

4. Bearboat 2007 Russian River Valley Pinot Noir was brought by Chad. This was one of my favorites of the night.  It was heavy, spicy and bold.  The flavor was similar to that of a cherry cola.

5. Decoy by Duckhorn 2010 Sonoma County Pinot Noir was brought by Brent, my sister’s fiancé.  This was another one of my favorite wines of the night.  Of all the wines, it was the most like what I think of a Pinot Noir being. It had an almost syrup consistency texture to it; dark and fruity.

6. Chandon 2009 Pinot Meunier was brought by James.  He claims we did not specify Pinot Noir and simply said “Pinot;
not true!  He just doesn’t like Pinot Noir and had to be “rebellious” and not bring one. Once we found out what this wine was, it all made sense.  To me it stuck out like a sore thumb in the midst of all the other wines that night.

7. Nuits St. Georges  2007 Burgundy was brought by Terry.  Terry is a self-proclaimed Francophile and to be honest I’m glad.  I wouldn’t normally try French wines but thanks to Terry I get to!  When I first tried this wine it felt like the flavor was very compact and tightly packed but when I went back and tried it a second time about an hour later it really felt like it had opened up quite a bit, though I think to truly experience the flavor it needed to open up even more.

8. Retour 2006 Willamette Valley Pinot Noir was brought by Melanie.  This was the table favorite; I really enjoyed it but it wasn’t my favorite of the night.  This one was heavy but not peppery, instead had a nice smooth spice with what seemed like a hint of blackberry.

Kozy’s was nice enough to set out two glasses for each of us, but luckily Melanie brought some extra glasses.  To be honest, until this night I didn’t really buy into the whole idea that the glass really could effect the flavor of the wine, but it really did!

Also, if you’ve never done a blind tasting of wines, I highly recommend it.  It is a lot of fun!