Tasting

My favourite position is Dogliani style

Real talk: installing six pieces of IKEA furniture on a Sunday with subsequent plans to write, study, and plug away at a work report is a stupidly ambitious goal, but I knew plans wouldn’t work out as soon as I woke up hungover to see the delivery truck arrive just outside the window. Who says yesterday’s steamed golden lava bun-stained shirt isn’t fashionable? Cue scenes with nails that won’t screw and Viognier to quell such frustrations, and then Googling how many calories are spent putting furniture together for eight hours. And then, do you ever have fucking fantastic conversations with an AIDS physician on a Saturday night and 5-more-minutes yourself way too many times? Jesus Christmas.

Piedmont week is the thicc daddy of the Northern Italian portion of the Italian Wine Scholar, so you might imagine such panic coinciding with work and moving.… read more

Tasting

12 other white Italian grapes for when you’re over Pinot Grigio

It’s clear that we’ve taken a departure from the experimental seminars of 2015’s Australia to the tacit themes of longevity and traditionalism of 2016’s theme of Italy for the Vancouver International Wine Festival. It’s expected that the colossal tasting room is skewed towards the stars of Tuscany, Piedmont, and Veneto, so this leaves the underdogs few and far between. There is not one Dolcetto (yeah I know: who cares) nor one pearl-clutching Franciacorta being poured during the whole festival, nor are there enough Montepulciano for me to make a terrible d’Ab(ruzzo) joke, so last year’s boner for Australian Touriga Nacional would have to be partially satiated by a seminar on all things white and distinctively not Pinot Grigio. I often find the whites of Italy frustratingly subtle – which probably says more about my taste above anything else – but this’ll be a nice opportunity to break things down past this pigeonhole.… read more

WSET Advanced

2010 Vietti Roero Arneis

Tasting Notes:

Eyes: clear, pale lemon, watery rim
Nose: clean, youthful, med- intensity, lemon, minerality, touch of stone fruit
Mouth: dry, med bodied, med+ acidity, med+ intensity, med+ alcohol, med+ length, lemon, peach, minerality
All in all: Good quality; drink now.

2010 Vietti Roero ArneisI’m currently really into reviewing my Italian wines and regions and I have no idea why I’m suddenly into this phase, since I haven’t had some kind of weird Italian wine epiphany following some godly sip of something. Anyways, I love to delve really far into a region (book-wise only unfortunately), and revisit my tasting notes. Most of the time, I think “WOAH, I had the opportunity to taste THAT?” and get angry that my knowledge was more limited back then (despite the fact that it was only last June), and sometimes I doubt what I had rated these wines, since after reading about them, I have a greater appreciation of what they’re supposed to be like.… read more