Should I decide to do a homemade Advent wine calendar next year I'm going to rethink a couple few things. One
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I absolutely "cheated" today while selecting a bottle from my box 'o wine Advent calendar. When I determined which wines to earmark as blind tasting challenges I knew anything with a screwcap would immediately be a dead giveaway. Not feeling up to another blind tasting humiliation today, I felt around for a screwcap and came up with a South African Pinotage. From reading other blogs it seems that Pinotage is something of a controversial grape. There are a lot of haters out there. We don't see a lot of Pinotage in Turkey (although more than I would expect). From what I've had though I do rather like it. A crossing
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It seems, based on a quick inspection of my Advent boxes o' wine, that I wrapped MOST of them to disguise the labels. Which really makes my Advent wine calendar a month-long blind tasting experiment. That's good though. I desperately need the practice. And it also lends an exciting sensation of fear and trepidation every time I reach into the box. Today's wine is missing the capsule. I must have thought that would give me too many clues as to its contents. That says to me either the wine is foreign and I wanted to remove any tell-tale DOP indications; or it's domestic but I put only one wine
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It's #CabFrancDay y'all! In 2015 Lori Budd of Dracaena Wines and Exploring the Wine Glass created #CabFrancDay to celebrate her favorite grape. While I've still not been able to get my hands on a bottle of Dracaena Wines Cab Franc (next time I'm State-side!) I'm still excited to be able to celebrate the day she created. And you can celebrate along with all of us Cab Franc lovers too! Follow along with the day's three hashtags: #CabFrancDay, #LoveCabFranc, and #CabFrancLove. Cabernet Franc Most probably know Cab Franc as a blending grape. In Bordeaux-style wines, Cab Franc often is blended with two of its offspring: Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot. However, the grape has
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This morning I pulled out from my Advent boxes o' wine another disguised bottle. Probably in punishment for how poorly I did at guessing yesterday's wine! But, part of super enforceable and binding agreement I made with myself included having to drink whichever wine I selected. No putting anything back to try my luck again. So let's see if my blind tasting skills improved at all since yesterday! Once again I had reasonable assurance that I'd pulled a Turkish wine based on the tax label on the capsule. I did include a number of wines from other countries in this calendar. However, the majority are Turkish so it's not
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Mixed in my boxes of Advent wine I put a few disguised bottles. Because I don't have a wine geek community here I don't get to practice blind tasting a lot. My cat, Sherlock has yet to learn wine service and it's mighty tricky to choose, open, and pour a bottle completely blindfolded. Since I chose these wines months ago I thought I might stand a chance of forgetting what a few of them are and disguised a couple labels. This morning I pulled out the first of these! I managed to open the bottle without getting a peek at the cork. So, off to a good start! The medium
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My homemade Advent wine calendar consists of two case-sized boxes. About two months ago I pull 26 wines from my collection and put them in these boxes. Every day I plan to pull out one wine in the morning (in case it's white and requires chilling!) and at some point during the day drink, write, and post about it! I visited Datça Bağcılık ve Şarapçılık
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Every year I'm envious of friends in the States who get wine Advent calendars. When I was a kid I found those little chocolate Advent calendars absolutely delightful. Occasionally I still send them to my siblings for the nostalgia. As an adult - and a wine lover! - a wine Advent calendar speaks to every part of me! But clearly we don't have those in Turkey. So I made my own! Well to be totally honest, two months ago I selected 26 bottles and moved them to a different part of my wine room. Some I covered in hopes that I might be able to make a blind tasting
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My brush with Jordanian wine comes thanks to my friend E who travels extensively for work. She bought me two bottles of Jordan River wine from Haddad Estates & Vineyards on her last trip to Amman. The first winery in Jordan, its wines were not released internationally, under the name Jordan River, until 2004. Some interesting facts about Hadded Estates & Vineyards/Jordan River: Founded in 1953 by Muthieb M. Haddad Located at 850 meters above sea level in the basalt soils of the Mountain Heights Plateau White grapes cultivated include: Chardonnay, Chenin Blanc, Pinot Grigio, Riesling, Roussanne, Sauvignon Blanc, and Viognier Black grapes include: Barbera, Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Pinot
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Now one of the most widely known grapes in Turkey, Kalecik Karası was nearly lost to history. This grape was nearly extinct until the 1970s when it was reborn. While studying for his Ph.D. in agriculture at Ankara University, Prof. Dr. Y. Sabit Ağaoğlu elected to form his thesis around clonal studies of dried Kalecik Karası vines. He finished his thesis and wound up with not only his doctorate but also a small vineyard. Rather than abandon it, and the grape he revived, he and wife decided to continue to work the vineyard and make wine. Sadly, his wife has since passed but the godfather of Kalecik Karası continues
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