WBW #45 coming to you from the roof deck

Becky Josh and I, with some pinch hitter assistance from the upstairs neighbor Ari, came out swinging for Wine Blog Wednesday #45 - Old World Riesling Episode. The crew, minus Ari, started the night with some fajitas and Peroni to get a little something in the system...we sort of thought of it as a warm up stretch out. Then we headed to from Chez Wilson-Hale to Chez Hale-Hale to start out with the Rieslings. As any good lawyer might, Josh preemptively declared his bias against any and all white wine, and Riesling in particular, saying "for me, every white I drink, I get an essence of pledge". Maybe not the most favorable characterization, but honest. We had Ari in the group who apparently likes, buys and drinks Riesling on a fairly regular basis to balance Josh out.

We started with the Loosen Bros 2006 Riesling, which we all agreed had lots of green apple on the nose - Josh was sure to distinguish GREEN - his exact words being "not pink lady tart, granny smith tart". That said, it was in no way sour. On the contrary this juice seemed to present a just-right sweetness that was agreeable to all parties present. At one point Ari admitted to a pretty serious sweet tooth and authoritatively asked/admitted "is there any vanilla in this? I can’t really tell any taste different than another". I certainly didn't get any vanilla - but to re-emphasize, there are no wrong answers on greatjuice. Becky got a little bitof bubble gum, which I didn't necessarily agree with, but certainly would concur that this was the sweetest wine we tasted this evening. We all agreed that the Loosen Bro's had a very pleasant effervescence on the palette. I felt a fruitiness on the nose and palette, but also picked up a floral saccharin quality - maybe even magnolia..then again i could have just spent too much time in the southeast...if such a thing exists...but i digress. My final thoughts for this one are that it is very pleasant but that it may lack a little structure in my mouth - are white wines even supposed to have structure? Bottom line, B for this wine.

On to the next wine. On deck was the 2004 (French)Alsatian Trimbach, the most expensive of the three and unfortunately our least favorite. This one definitely has less effervescence. I tasted some tang but Josh and I quickly became embroiled in discussion on this subject, since he says that the Loosen Bros tasted like a sweet tart, where this Trimbach tastes like martinelli without the bubbles. Becky also tastes tartness, but Josh tries to use his lawyer skills to try to convince her that what she is tasting is more of an acrid dry cider taste. I actually ended up agreeing with Josh's assesment. Josh tastes a little rubber - an assertion backed up by Becky who characterizes it as "pencil eraser". I reminded Josh that he seems to taste rubber in everything. He also detected a thin blended scotch taste – almost a light smokiness. Ari notes that this wine seems to stand up to the gale force winds that were at this point blowing across the roof on which we were conducting this particular session of WBW. We agreed that this one deserved a C+...we were not particularly impressed.

On to the third and final vino - the 2006 Mosel Saar Ruwer, Terrassenmosel. Back to Germany. the overall consensus was an overwhelming nose of blueberry on this one - so much so Becky and Josh even went as far as to say this juice smelled like the plastic head of "Blueberry Muffin", a doll friend of her eminence "Strawberry Shortcake". Not being familiar with either young ladies, I an unable to judge the veracity of their characterizations, but i do agree that the nose presented blueberry. B- on this one. And by the way, the only place I could find a legitimate image of strawberry shortcake was on a website called gaygamer.net.....interesting.

All in all WBW was a success. Many thanks to the folks at Winecast for hosting. I think that although this was not a real Riesling crowd we were pleased by the range that was was presented in these wines. It was certainly interesting to observe the tone differences between the French and German Rieslings, with the french seeming to posess a more acidic minerality. I am not sure if this is a broad characteristic, but I am certainly now motivated to find out. Over and out from greatjuice. Until WBW #46.