Lately, I’ve been enamored with this book. When I can take a break from focusing on keeping up at work, I will dive into a few chapters and savor the author’s journey through the beginnings of wine in the Mediterranean. It’s a fascinating journey.
Jason Murray at Arterra taught a class some years back (remember the world before the pandemic? yeah, back then) on ancient wine-making techniques and connected it to some of what he is doing with amphora, native yeast, and orange wines. He referenced the book Tasting the Past by Kevin Begos, which of course lead to an amazon purchase and then adding it to the stack of books I would eventually get to reading. Eventually finally got to now.
If you’ve followed my rambling writing for a bit, you know I don’t care a lot for wine that tastes like everything else out there and is something I can buy at the grocery store for $7.99. I tend to like going off the beaten path and finding something that is resoundingly different or crafted with care and precision rather than mass-produced for heavy consumption. Don’t get me wrong, I can consume heavily, but I prefer to consume something unique and reflective of time and place.
I go through periods of activity and lulls with this blog. I suppose that’s fairly normal – there are period of time that I go to a number of wineries and write about them, and then life gets in the way. July came and went with no new posts, because we got back from our Alaska cruise and I ended up bringing Covid home and was knocked out for a bit. I did a few winery visits but didn’t post until we got into August. Then I hit a flurry of posts about Mountain and Vine, Ankida Ridge and Walsh. Now we’re in another lull before we gear up for another flurry of visits and activity.
There is a group for LGBT+ folks in greater Charlottesville called Out and About and they’re set up a tasting at Montifalco Vineyards next weekend. So husband and I will head there for an afternoon. I’m pretty excited about this since they’ve been on the list for a while and some in the Virginia Wine Love facebook group rave about their wines and setting. It’s not far, so that’s a big plus.
In September we have a big Arterra 2021 Red Wines release. That will, of course, require a trip up and restocking of their red wines. I’ve finished much of the 2020 red collection, although I have held back the Norton and I am maintaining my verticals of Crooked Run, Tannat, and Petit Verdot so I have at least one of each of those to enjoy in some theoretical future tasting. The collection is big enough now that I don’t think I know enough people to come sample them all! Is this a bad problem to have?
Later in September, there is new winery nearby called Southwest Mountain Vineyards that will open. I scored an invitation to the soft opening and I’m really looking forward to that. The best is that I got some DM’s from the owner:
Now there is exactly the kind of challenge I am up for!
And once we get to the end of September, hubby and I head off to the beach for a bit to just try to breathe again. We’ve both been burning the candle at both ends at work and it’s hard to keep up with everything, so this will be a great week to just rest and get back into balance. After that we are into fall club allocation season and there will be pickups, and still so many new wineries to explore.
Drop a comment – what is on your wine calendar, and what are you looking forward to in the next few weeks?
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