Wine reviews

Well, no shite. It's a young Bordeaux. They're meant to lay on their side for years.

Buy a "little brother' wine of the same or a similar vineyard if you want something new that is not only less expensive but made to drink when it's released.

Not a really great wine . . . and young.

I miss the old days of the young Robert Parker. Decanter ain’t him.

My best advice, besides the wine shop tip, is to find importers you like. Rosenthal, Kermit Lynch, Mary Taylor selections, etc… and try and shop based on the importer rather than the label. Well the importer is on the back label but you get the idea.

I can usually be guided to a bottle I’ll enjoy by asking the somm or shop steward for wines by the importer.

Take Mary Taylor for instance. She is a relative newcomer but bottles basically as a negociant unique wines from Italy and France. They are all under $20 or so and way out punch their weight class. Her Bordeaux is maybe $16 and has that Bordeaux quality you are looking for.

Casa Madero 3V. Mexican wine. Oldest winemaker in the new world. Best everyday bottle around.

I’ve found some great wine by buying the house red wine at many small restaurants. If I like it, I ask what it is. Many restaurants will find a good, affordable wine to serve at a good price point. They are almost always served by the glass.

What quality are you referring to? Buying it and waiting years to drink it?

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Try to find a small wine shop with a knowledgeable staff.

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Yes this is a good suggestion. Get to know them, and they can get to know your tastes.

Know which bottles are "drink now", in the 20-50 dollar range, and which ones may need a year or 10.

Those wine scores are all over the place, and some of the guys/sites that do them are notoriously fast and loose with the ratings.

The bottle you got was too early to drink most likely.


Also, Apps like Vivino, Delectable, Cellar Tracker are useful. Vivino is for the masses so a lot of popular wines and napa cabs get super overrated, but its still useful in aggregate. Delectable and CT have a far tougher crowd that will rate wines a lot harsher, but far less users.


Last, if a bordeaux tastes like a jug wine to you, even a young bordeaux...I don't know what to tell you.


The Reddit Wine board is also a good resource.

Sorry for all of the posts, I like this topic.


90% of the time I am shopping at a local wine shop.

But I do like to use the Total Wine app. I filter by what I am looking for, and then put in price parameters, and then sort by Expert Rating.


This just gives me a good idea of what is available at certain price points. I then will look at Vivino or one of the other apps and see what people are saying about a particular wine that fits the parameters. (For instance, sometimes you will see a "97 rated wine" and its only like 50 bucks or something. Then look to see what actual people think of it)

Yeah I a just not super into Bordeaux because of the time/cost factor.

I also don’t buy cheap Burgundy (stateside you can find decent values in France on smaller named vineyards)

yeah that’s my go too.

gotta go north to get that elegance. I didn’t realize how much further south almost the entire country was than europe until I got into wines and started comparing climates lol.

i just didn’t think about it