Rued Vineyards, located in the Dry Creek Valley in Sonoma County, California, is a small production family winery. The Rued family’s grape growing history extends back six generations to a great grandfather who immigrated to the United States from Switzerland to work the vineyards in the Napa Valley. Subsequent generations have tended vineyards as well […]

If Miles had tasted either of these Washington Merlots, he never would have made his ridiculous comment about the varietal in the movie, Sideways. Washington State, in general, makes outstanding Merlot. Washington Merlot is known for its sweet cherry flavors and complex aromas and is generally higher in acidity than California Merlot. Recently, we had […]

Note: The “Wine Word of the Week” series will be moving to Saturdays as this new “A Wine for Tonight” series will be running on Thursdays starting today. Would you like a quick suggestion for a good wine to drink tonight (or this weekend) that won’t break your budget and is widely available? Many of […]

Last week, Dad (John) and I attended the Cabernet Classic sponsored by Seattle Uncorked at the Shilshole Bay Beach Club here in Seattle. It was a fundraiser for CoCA, the Center on Contemporary Art, and featured Cabernets and Cabernet-based blends. We tasted 46 wines from 23 different Washington State wineries. It was a great opportunity […]

Recently, we had what turned out to be an Italian reds showdown in one of our double blind private tasting dinners pitting the 2005 Pasetti Montepulciano d’Abruzzo against the 2003 Villa Artimino Riserva Villa Medicea. For a more complete description of how we set up these private tastings, please refer to How We Taste. Before […]

Last Friday was a cold, dark, and rainy fall evening here in Seattle, not exactly perfect weather for crisp, refreshing white wines. Nevertheless, we wanted to feature Washington Pinot Gris in one of our monthly wine tasting dinners and simply ran out of summer months to do it. So we just turned up the heat […]

Recently, we had the opportunity to taste some of the current releases from three outstanding Washington wineries, Fielding Hills Winery in Wenatchee, Nefarious Cellars in Lake Chelan, and Saviah Cellars in Walla Walla. While all nine of the wines are very good, we were especially impressed by the 2007 Fielding Hills Cabernet Sauvignon and the […]

Our host for the October edition of Wine Blogging Wednesday, the blogosphere’s monthly virtual wine tasting event, is Dale Cruse of Drinks Are On Me. He selected A Grape By Any Other Name as this month’s theme and issued a semantic challenge to “taste wines labeled with their lesser-known varietal synonyms.” He also offered, “Extra […]

Recently, we had what turned out to be an Australian Shiraz blends showdown in one of our double blind private tasting dinners pitting the 2006 Penfolds Koonunga Hill Shiraz Cabernet against the 2006 Mollydooker Two Left Feet. The Mollydooker is a very good wine but the Penfolds Koonunga Hill is excellent. At $8 and with […]

Our monthly wine tasting dinners are really the foundation upon which Wine Peeps was built. We have been getting together each month with friends to taste and evaluate wines throughout a four-course meal for years. Last Friday’s dinner featuring Washington Malbec was our 75th wine tasting dinner. To mark this milestone of sorts, we decided […]