Category: inside naked wines

 A Super Sale and the Latest Happenings in Online Wine Clubs

 

cawineclub.com 

A Harvest Sale with 30% off all wines was an upbeat headliner coming from the California Wine Club. Based in California, this is one of the oldest and most reliable wine clubs around.

The website went through a redesign and upgrade earlier this year and is not only more attractive but also much easier to use.

As for the wines offered, what is most appealing is that the wineries are real, not custom labels, and the wines are not the typical fare or your pretend cult wine.

As I’ve mentioned before, when you see a $100 or so bottle of wine reduced by 50-60% in a flash sale or a daily offering, it was overpriced to begin with. Regardless of the hype, it is being dumped.

With the current wines offered by the California Wine Club, here are a few of the wines  that have great appeal at 30% and are seldom offered online. 

Heading my list are these:

2020 Handley Cellars Pinot Noir

2021 Testarossa Pinot Noir and also its Chardonnay

2020 Dragonette Syrah from Santa Ynez

2019 Keller Estate Syrah

2020 Wrath Pinot Noir

2020 Jeff Cohn Zinfandel

2022 Onesta Rose of Cinsault

The sale is on until September 30th Code: HARVEST

Other Breaking News!!

Vinesse

Vinesse, once a big and active wine club, is part of Vintage Wine Estates’ portfolio.  Last month, that company filed for bankruptcy and over the last few weeks some brands have been sold at auction. 

Vinesse was recently the target of a bid from the Full Glass company, a specialist in direct to consumer wines. 

Full Glass already owns three wine clubs: Winc, Bright Cellars, and Wine Insiders. So Vinesse seems destined to join this group. 

Vintage Wine Estates was a mix of wineries such as Clos Pegase, Kunde, Swanson, Girard  and brands without the winery like Qupe. It also has custom labels like Bar Dog which must be a woofer.

Since those wineries and brands have been auctioned off to multiple buyers,  Vinesse will likely not have access to them. 

Members may want to stock up on their favorite wines before they disappear.

nakedwines.com

Don’t know what to make of it, if anything, but a few wines from nakedwines.com are showing up in discount stores at drastically reduced prices.

As one example, wines from Rick Boyer, a well-known winemaker, were spotted at several stores. The 2021 Rick Boyer Syrah caught my attention at the $6.99 bottle price. 

Another winemaker in the nakedwine stable is Benjamin Darnault whose wines I’ve liked in the past.

His 2020 La Cote Doree has also been seen on several store shelves for $6.99.

Maybe these winemakers have dropped out of the program. 

Or maybe the particular wine has been discontinued.

Or whatever!!

Kick off 2024 by Getting Naked (Wines, that is)

Kick Off 2024 by Getting Naked (Wines, that is)

Yesterday NakedWines announced that during the entire month of January it has slashed the price of all its single bottles and cases by 50%. And you don’t have to sign up because no subscription is required,

The half-price deal applies sitewide though a six-bottle minimum purchase applies.

NakedWines offered about 500 wines from around the world with the majority from Caiifornia and the Northwest. One of the biggest online dealers, it experienced a few big bumps in the road recently with management changes and lower than expected sales growth.

Though I’m not a big fan of NakedWines with its annoying talk about subscribers as “angels,” I have bought wines and reviewed the website. It claims to have 300,000 subscribers.

Another issue I had was the arbitrary basic prices given since it can come up with any price it wants to. But at 50% off, things have changed.

I’m also quite familiar with some of the winemakers who put their names on the labels. You can read all about the way so-called “angels” support the winemakers, but there’s much better use of time here to talk about the wines on sale.

So I put together a case of wine that I as a veteran wine critic would recommend and would personally enjoy as a consumer. For the 12 wines selected which were said to have a market value of $409.88 my purchase price was $92.38. The $100 voucher offered me helped.And these vouchers are widely available.

Now to the chosen 12:

Scott Steingraber Building Bridges Rogue Valley Viognier 2021 $12.49

Scott Steingraber Building Bridges Rogue Valley Tempranillo 2022 $19.49

Matt Parish “The 24” Contra Costa Zinfandel 2021 $15.99

Dave Harvey Walla Walla Valley Cabernet Franc 2021 $13.99

Michaud Columbia Valley Sauvignon Blanc 2021 $10.49

Mick Schroeter Russian River Chardonnay 2022 $14.99

F. Stephen Millier Black Label Calaveras Zinfandel 2021 $11.99

DRG Daryl Groom Reserve Sonoma Coast Pinot Noir 2021 $24.99

Scott Kelley Oregon Tempranillo 2021 $17.49

Sharon Weeks Cattoo Paso Robles Cabernet Sauvignon 2020 $14.99

Scott Kelley Willamette Valley Pinot Noir 2022 $16.99

DRG Daryl Groom Alexander Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 2021 $18.49

Again, at 50% off,  my price for these 12 wines is $92.38.

So, as you can see I prefer its red wines much more than whites and roses. 

And I avoid the imports because whether from South America, Europe, or other countries, they are bottled in the USA. 

A Cabernet Sauvignon from Chile or Malbec from Argentina imported and bottled in Lodi or in Napa’s American Canyon? That means they arrived by trucks and boats in large containers and have been pumped and fiddled with. Some I tasted were ok at best, but others were not.

As for other advice, it is better to act quickly because over its history when it runs out of some wines nakedwines then suggests replacements. That can go bad.

Secret Stuff in A Perfect, 100 point Wine

Revealing the Hidden Pleasures Experts Find in 100 Point Wines

My friends at winetoday.com list 32 different wines that earned 100 points, a perfect score from wine experts.

Needing to take a break from various fact checking articles and today’s tweet storms, I decided to study the reviews and try to pinpoint what is in a wine that makes critics declare they have found perfection, Nirvana in a glass.

This seemed like a useful study to share since most normal wine loving people wouldn’t cough up the big bucks needed to buy most of those listed. The prices of these 32 perfect wines ranged from $115 to $1,249.99 a bottle. The cheapest was from Chile. The most expensive was actually on sale.

Most are red wines, so they like most good reds were loaded with blackberry, cherry, and plum fruit, with lots of violets and rose aromas, and had notes of various spices up the wazoo.

And off course the 100 pointers were ultra-ripe, plush, seamless, hedonistic, and smoother than a baby’s bottom. Some jump out of the glass which is a bit frightening. Another was built “like a brick house” which is good, I think.

But what else makes the 100 pointers different from the other red wines are three key ingredients:

  1. Dirt and Dust

 

Yes, dusty and dried things are frequently cited, so hold your breath.

The following are part of expert descriptions capturing the joys and pleasure to be found in 100 point wines:

 

…”hints of iron ore and dusty earth.”

…”raspberries and wet rocks.”

…“wet pebbles”

…”scorched earth”

…”dusty earth”

…”singed iron and chalky minerality”

  1. Smoke

No, this component was unrelated to recent wine country fires. But maybe critics should have had those masks handy because many perfect wines have these notes:

..”a.hint of barbecue smoke”

…”cedar and charcoal”

..”.a well-roasted frame of alder and juniper”

…”with wafts of dried roses, unsmoked cigars and tilled soil”

…”smoldering tobacco, charcoal and licorice”

 

  1. Truly strange stuff

“notes of creosote”

“beef drippings and cloves plus a hint of underbrush”

“Fenugreek”

There you have it!

If you weren’t so frugal, you could be savoring a 100 point wine and enjoying every nuance of its dusty, dried, scorched earth aromas with enticing smoky barbecue and charcoal flavors culminating in creosote and beef drippings.

Then again, think of all the money you are saving.

True confession: I had to google “fenugreek,” and so will you, if curious.

Cheers,