Every other month, the ten members of our Vintage Club meet to hold a blind tasting of six selected wines. Like a book club, at the previous meeting we decide on the particular wine varietal we want to taste and who will host the meeting. The host has two important jobs: research and select the wines, all must be under $20, and provide a delicious gourmet lunch following the tasting. On Tuesday, it was a blind tasting of six Shiraz wines, meticulously selected by our host Jim A (we have two Jim’s in the club). Here are the results of our wine tasting, the prices, and where the wines were purchased.
1. Schild 2007 Barossa – $15.49 at Costco
2. Layer Cake 2009 South Australia – $12.99 at K&L Wines
3. Pillar Box Reserve 2008 Padthaway – $10.02 for two at the BevMo Sale
4. Boarding Pass 2007 South Australia – $17.99 at BevMo
5. Penley Estate 2007 Hyland South Australia – $14.99 at K&L Wines
6. Robert Oakley 2007 Mudgee, New South Wales – $14.99 at K&L Wines
Pillar Box, Layer Cake, Schild
Our next tasting will be hosted by Joe and the wine selected is Tempranillo wines from Spain. Sorry, no California Tempranillo this time.
My error, Pillar Box is $10 a bottle on a two bottle buy at Bev Mo….
I agree on making the 2007 Schild Barossa a 90 vs the 92 that W. S. gave it (and I believe #7 out of their top 100)…I just bought and drank (again on the Costco shelves @ $7.99) a 2008 (?) Stump Jump shiraz which I enjoyed almost as much as the Schild shiraz. Thanks again for posting your Australian shiraz taste off.
I was astonished to learn the bottom three wines (and they deserved to be at the bottom) had 90 point ratings. One of them I would have sent back if served at a restaurant. It’s definitely a caveat about blindly following wine trade ratings.
Yes, I agree…luckily I frequent a great wine shop nearby in Bellevue, WA (Pete’s Wine Shop) that has
very fair pricing and a monthly sale sheet of about thirty wines. Last Sat (3-5) they had all thirty
wines available for free tasting and that is my usual method of deciding what to buy. My favorite was
the $11.99 Bergevin Lane Calico Red 2007 and the $16.99 Turnbull Merlot 2006.
That is a great wine shop you have. I have been a fan of Turnbull for years and the price for the Merlot is great. Thanks for your feedback.
Joe
Just back from Spencer-Daniels wine shop in SF. What started out as a discount shop has turned the corner and there are virtually no deals in the shop… Many of the wines on the floor are more expensive than at Safeway. Unless things change soon I am dropping them from my list of wine shops with deals.. Too Bad…
Have to agree with the comments above about ratings. While there wasn’t complete unanimity in the group’s ratings – some were very different – we were all surprised that the “high point” wines were at the bottom.