Lummi Island Wine Tasting March 1-2 ’13
The Way of the Dodo
Like many species before it and many to follow, the Dodo was eliminated from the roster of currently living things about 400 years ago. Until then it had thrived on Mauritius, where life was so easy that it had evolved away from its ancestors’ ability to fly. Accounts of what it actually looked like are contradictory, but let us assume that it was quite dashing for its time and place, and not, as this caricature suggests, reminiscent of an albatross hooked on Crack. However, like many species it was not equipped to defend itself against humans and their animals, which first arrived with the Dutch in 1598.
Similarly, we note this weekend the passing of the long-time tradition here at the Wine Gallery of the Five Dollar Wine Tasting. Like the Dodo, we have pushed the edges of our niche as best we could, but after eight years of holding the line while wine prices have crept, little by little, up and up, we are giving in to evolutionary pressure, and raising our tasting fee from $5 to $10.
However, unlike the Dodo, the $5 tasting is not extinct for all; it will continue to be available to our Wine Club Members. Just sign up next time you visit! (See below for more info.)
Wine Club News
Lest any of our stalwart supporters fall to the ground, grief-stricken by this devastating development, we urge you to Take Heart, for the $5 tasting is not, as rumored, extinct like the Dodo for everyone, oh, non, non, non, mesdames et monsieurs! The $5 tasting will be continuing for All of our Wine Club members! Back of the envelope calculations suggest that since it costs $35 to join the Wine Club for a year, anyone who plans on tasting wine with us at least seven times a year is better off joining the Wine Club than paying the higher fee. Put that together with the other benefits of membership and joining up is Pretty Appealing! Just click on the Wine Club! link above to sign up. At some point we will have a nifty way you can pay your annual membership online, but for now just sign up online and you can ante up on your next visit!
Speaking of Online Stores
Rumor has it that the Original Principle, or whatever was around that transcended the Big Bang, or the whole Multiverse of Big Bangs, made Our Entire Cosmos in “three days,” whatever that means. I can only interpret that as meaning that creating the Universe is Easy, but creating an Online Store is more difficult! After weeks of challenges, our Web Professional has advised us to Abandon All Hope of ever getting our online store functioning on the WordPress platform. The argument is convincing, given our experience over the last few months, and the rationale heads in the general direction of “don’t expect layers of complicated platforms that are continually being redesigned for blogging to stay still long enough to build a store on.” You heard it here first, folks!
So we are giving up on WordPress Ecommerce for our online wine shop, and now trying to get up and running with an old open-source package called Zencart. I explored it some years ago, but, in full disclosure I must admit that I gave it up because it seemed way too complicated! Which leads to the insight that, well, there are different kinds of complications and some may be easier to deal with than others…although of course you never really know. So, philosophically speaking, the search for an online store that meets our balance of expense, functionality, and ease of management is pretty much like everything else we do: the best we can with the resources available.
I must admit that regardless of whether we will ever be able to pull this thing together into a functioning online store, there is a definite appeal to using open-source products like ZenCart. It is aesthetically appealing in the same way as our backroom desktop computer which is running a Linux-based operating system called Ubuntu. That is, nowadays we have the choice of buying in to the slick corporate parade of New! Upgrade! Planned Obsolescence! represented by Apple and Microsoft, or opting into a more sustainable path….for the moment, however, we do NOT have an online store. But like the empty concrete silos you see in abandoned shopping centers, the artifacts of our recent attempts are still visible… WordPress version (abandoned) Zencart version (under construction) Your thoughts? Please comment.
First Wine Club Perk!
Okay, here it is, your first Wine Club Perk! A month or two ago a gentleman contacted me looking for a wine that Robert Parker (yeah, I know, most of our crowd says Robert Who???) gave a stupendously high rating of 94 points (read: A++) despite its modest price of $16. My research revealed that the wine was not available in Washington, but was very hot in the Northeast (closest to Europe). Figuring it would all be gone before it ever hit the West Coast, I advised the gentleman that I had ordered a bunch but might never see it, so he should order it from Wherever!
All you need to know is that I bought five cases of this amazing wine, and offer it to our members at a mere $15 a bottle, this weekend only! Can’t come in this weekend? Send us an email order. Or, maybe by the time you get this it will be listed in the online store (sometime Friday!). We have tasted it, and it is both Big and Delicious; we recommend decanting for several hours.
This Week’s Wines
San Martino Prosecco Italy $11
Pale straw yellow in colour, aromatic and elegant nose (unusual in prosecco), with notes of apple and banana; pleasantly full and harmonious on the palate.
Borsao Campo de Borja ’11 Spain 88pts $11
Inky purple, mostly garnacha. Aromas and flavors of blueberry, blackberry and bitter cherry are brightened by peppery spices. Concentrated and velvety in texture, with good finishing breadth and cling; outstanding value.
Montes Classic Malbec ’11 Chile 88pts $11
from nearly 100-year old vines in the Colchagua valley; ripe dark cherry and creme de cassis on the nose while the palate offers ripe, chewy, dark cherry and bilberry fruit encased in fine tannins and a pure vanilla-y finish that is satisfying.
Crios de Susana Balbo Malbec ’11 Argentina 89pts $14
Good full medium ruby. Crushed blackberry, licorice and violet on the lively nose. Quite ripe and sweet in the mouth, showing impressive volume and breadth for the price range. Finishes with serious ripe tannins and noteworthy persistence.
Bodegas Triton Tempranillo Entre Suelos ’10 Spain 90pts $12
Inky purple. Sexy, oak-spiced aromas of black raspberry and cherry, with pipe tobacco and floral nuances building with air. Fleshy, supple and sweet, offering bright red and dark berry flavors and a smoky, spicy quality. Fine-grained tannins help shape the a long, smoky finish.
Lummi Island Wine Tasting February 23 ’13
Library Fund Update
Thanks to all of you who responded to our request to contribute (again!) to support the Island Library remodel and upgrade. Special thanks are extended to those friends who gave from as far away as California and Colorado–wow, your gifts are deeply appreciated!
We hope you will continue to support the project over the next few months, as there are certain to be other opportunities to help out. One idea being explored is an option to purchase engraved bricks (let’s see, one for me, one for him, one for her, some for them…!) for a possible new donor wall in the new reading garden behind the fiction room. You know the spot, right? I expect we have all noticed its potential as a Cozy Little Outdoor Room, so hey, maybe it will have a brick wall with your name on it!
I expect there will be some folks, who have already given generously, who might like an acknowledging brick or two for earlier donations. Oh, would that that were practical…but hello, it’s a fundraiser, so, no, it’s not! Fortunately, bricks will be quite inexpensive (around $50 each), so we’ll all just have to dig a little deeper for a little dab of brick-and-mortar immortality…! Stay tuned!
Wine Club Update
After months of suggestions, planning sessions, false starts, confusion, software glitches, opinions, and endless discussions (whew!), our Wine Club is now a Reality! Sure, it’s just barely off the ground, tapocketing on just a cylinder or two, and struggling for altitude, but it is officially launched! HURRAY! At present we have six (count’em!) official members! To find out more just click on the WINE CLUB! link at the top of this blog page (or here if you are reading this as an email.) The centerpiece of the club is the “punch card,” which, as it turns out, isn’t really a “punch card” at all. Rather, it’s more of a “OMD, how much have I spent this time” card, and we will keep the cards on file here at the wine shop, so you don’t have to worry about losing or forgetting them. There is a series of three cards (white, rose, and red), as described at the above link. When you buy wine, we mark the back of the card with the amount of the purchase. As each card is filled, you get a prize and the benefits of the next card. Check it out, and let us know what you think. And better yet, sign up and be part of it!
Shamelessly speaking, one of the reasons for structuring our club this way is to make it worth your while to spend a larger proportion of your wine budget with us. I mean, let’s face it, we all know you cheat on us! (Haggen’s, Trader Joe’s, Costco…tsk, tsk…have you no shame at all?) Sure, when you’re with us you act as we’re the Only Ones, as if you bought all your wine here, but (as we know only too well) we were NOT born anywhere close to yesterday. Oh non, non, non monsieur, we are now officially engaged in the knock-down, drag-out battle for your hard-earned wine dollars! Is there a wine you buy elsewhere that we don’t carry? Let us know, and we will get it to you for less! Something you buy elsewhere by the case? Special order it from us! We will do our best to meet anyone’s prices, AND save you a trip to town. We are, like, SO here for you! THAT’S what our club is about!
Another primary benefit of our wine club, of course, is our connection to Ryan’s new import business, which will bring to our doorstep some of the French wines that many of you tasted on your tour with him last spring, or will be enjoying on the tour this spring. We will have Washington exclusives on these wines, and will be able to offer them to our members at “futures” prices at preview tastings just for our members! (No, honestly, I am not making this up!)
Online Store Update
Okay, okay, I admit it. The truth is that nobody actually said it was going to be easy. After fifteen years or so of working on various websites, I just assumed it would be easy. Well, I was wrong about that! Big Time! Somehow, in the last few years the Web has “evolved” (not so sure about that) on a path of exponentially increasing complexity. The way my old economist’s mind views this is that we are way, way, way past “diminishing returns,” with this web thing, but there it is, the endless battalions of geeks just keep adding more and more complexity. For some many years when I needed some new software to deal with some growing set of issues or problems, the Universe was still small enough that I could find a handful, try them out, evaluate, and possibly choose one.
Nowadays there are no simple web pages. WordPress, the software system in which I am writing this blog at this very moment, consists of hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of files. Some files have information. Some files define the kinds of information that can be included. Some files tell the server how to configure the information it sends to the user. Some files tell the user’s computer how to present the information. Hello, once it was just a document with a few instructions about how to present some information visually, and yes, a part of me does long for those simpler times.
I’m just saying that the online store is proving challenging, even now that I have engaged a Professional to make it all work. It is curiously reassuring that if SHE has challenges figuring it all out, NO WONDER I can’t do it! Still, it IS frustrating, feeling that one ought to be able to do something, yet finding progress elusive. Perhaps this is an interesting legacy of the Web– on the one hand it is the world’s Open Forum; on the other hand, why then should we be surprised that it so often manifests as Chaos?
Nevertheless (which is what I suppose people really mean when they say, “that said,” and then contradict everything they have just said….what’s that about?!) here we are, and I can report that progress is being made with the online store. Please stay tuned…
This week’s tasting
Giovanna Madonia Chimera ’03 Italy $16
Honeyed, tropical, and with intriguing scents of caramel and dried apricots; combines luscious sweetness with bracing and refreshing acidity.
Montes Classic Cabernet Sauvignon ’10 Chile $10
Medium- to full-bodied; delivers solid varietal character, with cassis, ripe plum, graphite and medium tannins adding grip to the finish.
Langmeil Three Gardens SMG ’09 Australia $16
Rich, silky-smooth, and round, delivering a generous wave of red berry, cherry, spice and licorice that plays out through a long, harmonious finish. Shiraz, Grenache and Mourvèdre.
Tarima Hill Monastrell ’09 Spain 91pts $14
100% old vines monastrell; Opaque ruby color; powerful cherry and cassis aromas, intense dark berry flavors, with spice and violet pastille notes; gains sweetness and depth on the subtly tannic, very long finish of smoky mineral and floral notes.
Lummi Island Wine Tasting Presidents’ Day Weekend February 16 ’13
Library Fundraising Drive Continues!
We have heard from many of you that our blog last week was helpful in raising awareness about the challenge and opportunity the library remodel project represents to our community. While no one took us up (yet!) on our offer of purchase credit to anyone committing to four months of online donations, we DID sell about $75 worth of Pat’s special chocolate mendiants (SO delicious!) and helped stimulate numerous cash donations. In addition, thanks to those who stepped up to sponsor about $1000 of individual doors, windows, and bookcases with targeted pledges (each with commemorative plaque!) Btw, there are still lots of opportunities for “adopt-a-furnishing;” ranging from children’s stools @$75 each to solar (skylight) tubes @$750 each…stop by the shop this weekend and check out the options!
In case you missed it, let us reiterate our offer from last week: you donate, we give you a treat!
- Go to the FOIL Website;
- Click on “Donate” at the top of the page;
- Select one of the “monthly donation options” from the dropdown list (dig deep, my friends, dig deep!);
- Hit the Subscribe button and complete the form
- Print out your receipt (Important for what happens next)!
- Bring your receipt to Artisan Wine Gallery this weekend and enjoy a Token of Appreciation:
| Your monthly donation |
Your credit at the wine shop |
| $10 | $3 |
| $25 | $5 |
| $50 | $10 |
| $100 | $20 |
Presidents’ Day
The celebration of Washington’s Birthday (February 22, 1732–nearly 300 years ago) began during Washington’s last year in office as the nation’s first President, 1796. It became an occasion for celebratory events that has continued since, becoming an official national holiday in 1880. Lincoln’s Birthday was February 12, and was first honored nationally the year after his assassination in 1865, but was never anointed as an actual National Holiday. In 1968, however, the observance of Washington’s Birthday was decreed as the third Monday in February, beginning in 1971. This new holiday, now floating arbitrarily between February 15 and February 21, has also become known more generically as “Presidents’ Day,” maybe because it never falls exactly on either the 12th or the 22nd, but constantly oscillates between them. To make matters even more confusing, by the standards of the calendars in use during Washington’s life, his actual birthday was February 11! In any case it isn’t every day that a bunch of dudes get together and, like, start a new country, so it is probably fitting that at least one of them should have a commemorative holiday, and posterity (ours truly) is annually grateful for a three-day holiday in February. Read more
Valentine’s Day Origins
While some believe that Valentine’s Day is celebrated in the middle of February to commemorate the anniversary of Valentine’s death or burial–which probably occurred around A.D. 270–others claim that the Christian church may have decided to place St. Valentine’s feast day in the middle of February in an effort to “Christianize” the pagan celebration of Lupercalia. Celebrated at the ides of February, or February 15, Lupercalia was a fertility festival dedicated to Faunus, the Roman god of agriculture, as well as to the Roman founders Romulus and Remus. Now THIS sounds more like it; after all, most long-established holidays date back to the seasonal rituals of our agrarian
ancestors thousands of years ago. Supposedly in some places, young women would place their names in a big urn; to be picked by and paired with local bachelors for the coming year. Oh, those pagans!
Now, however, instead of rutting in fields or sacrificing goats, all of that has been replace with an estimated 1 billion printed Valentine’s Day cards sent each year. It is hard to avoid the conclusion that somewhere, somehow, something important to our human nature went terribly, terribly wrong…! Read more
This Week’s Wines: Don’t Cry for Me, Argentina!
Crios de Susana Balbo Torrontes ’11 Argentina $14
Enticing aromas of peach, melon, floral, and tropical fruit. Medium-bodied, dry, savory, and nicely proportioned, this lengthy effort
Manos Negras pinot noir ’09 Argentina $14
From Patagonia; Native fermented in 20% new barrels, showing toasty oak, earthy mineral, rose petal, cherry, and raspberry aromas and an elegant, smooth-textured, varietally correct Pinot with good balance and length.
Baguala Malbec ’08 Argentina $8
Rich, elegant, and full-bodied, with ripasso-like notes of raisins, cassis, and a dash of bitters.
Colome Amalaya ‘09 Argentina $14
From one of the highest and most remote vineyards in the world (8000 ft). Cherry liqueur, menthol, violet and spicy oak on the nose and palate. Suave, supple and energetic, with a sugar/acid balance giving the mid-palate insidious intensity and good definition. Nicely rising, fine-grained finish shows good length and a light touch. Malbec, Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah and Tannat.
Lummi Island Library Benefit Wine Tasting Valentine Week ’13
Getting Serious About Our Library Fund
As most of you now know, the Island Library is long overdue for upgrading. The original home that was purchased by FOIL (Friends of the Island Library –– essentially all of us) back in the mid-nineties took several years to pay off. Lots of necessary upgrades were postponed to an indefinite future. Fifteen years later, a remodel design has painstakingly evolved that incorporates building code and access issues, needs for a more functional children’s space and “teen room,” necessary electrical upgrades to support modern information technology, and public meeting facilities for island organizations. Construction can begin when the target budget of $200,000 has been raised, and we are close enough that one final push can make it possible!!! And You can help!!!
Take The Pledge and “Wine” a Prize !
Being “joined at the hip” to a long-time member of FOIL, I can tell you that for the past year your little committee of bookophiles has put in many hundreds of hours (I am not exaggerating even a little bit) struggling to raise the funds to make your new Library a reality. Thanks to their tireless efforts and many generous donors, the project is now within $40,000 of reaching its target...Huzzah! Well done, both volunteers and donors!!
At this point my personal thought after seeing how hard a few people have worked for us all, and how generously a few people have donated for us all, is that it would be really nice if the rest of the funds could be pledged right now, without FOIL members’ having to invent, plan, organize, and realize yet another event. Non, non, non, mes amis, I think it’s time for the rest of us to dig deep and get this thing over the top! Right? Are ya with me? The Really Simple way to make this happen is for ALL OF US to pledge a small, painless Monthly Donation for just the next four months (through May). Come on, people, let’s just DO this!
Here’s all you have to do:
- Go to the FOIL Website;
- Click on “Donate” at the top of the page;
- Select one of the “monthly donation options” from the dropdown list (dig deep, my friends, dig deep!);
- Hit the Subscribe button and complete the form
- Print out your receipt (Important for what happens next)!
- Bring your receipt to Artisan Wine Gallery to collect a Token of Appreciation! (see below)
Valentine’s Day Week at Artisan Wine Gallery
If YOU make a pledge, WE will thank you! Along with many of you, we have committed ourselves to bringing the library renovation to fruition, and we are actively recruiting everyone who has an interest in our community, in books, in reading, or in literacy to join in this community effort. In gratitude for your support, we are happy to offer you a small “merci” to acknowledge your generosity. Just bring in your receipt from your online donation by Feb 16, and get a little credit for it:
| Your monthly donation |
Your credit at the wine shop! |
| $10 | $3 |
| $25 | $5 |
| $50 | $10 |
| $100 | $20 |
Our Own Chocolate Mendiants: another way to enjoy giving!
Curiously, the French term mendiant means “beggar.” So it seems entirely appropriate to offer Pat’s handmade Artisan Wine Gallery chocolate mendiants as part of our fundraising effort. Each mendiant is made in the traditional style, a disc of intense French chocolate dotted with a different combination of cashews, pecans, raisins, cranberries, pineapple, papaya, and ginger, and Oh, My, are they good! And all proceeds go to, you guessed it, the Library Fund!
$10 per individually wrapped pack of two
Masquerade Wine Company
This afternoon I was in Bellingham for errands (amazing how rarely I go to town anymore!) and found myself in the neighborhood of Masquerade Wine Company on Iowa Street. You may recall that the owners, Bill and Jennifer Kimmerly, did a tasting of their wines with us last June when we hosted a leg of the Schooner Zodiac’s Wine Tour of the San Juans. It was great fun! So today I tasted through many of their new releases, and I have brought home to you a case of their just barely released 2009 Red Mountain Cabernet Sauvignon.
I mean, this is so freshly bottled that I had to put the labels on myself (kinda fun, actually!). Their 2005 cab was a big hit with me– a very alluring, feminine style; and the 2007 cab was popular with almost everyone…we sold out rather quickly. This one, the 2009, has the soft complexity of the 2005 along with the staying power of the 2007, and I’m thinking this may be their best wine so far! So in honor of this new arrival, we will be featuring several of the Masquerade wines in this weekend’s tastings!
This Week’s Wines
Masquerade Viognier ’11 Washington $16
A luscious and full bodied wine, off-dry with slightly less than 1% residual sugar. Aromas and flavors of white peach, apple, and Asian pear, balanced with a hint of grassiness and an enticing aroma of lavender.
Masquerade Syrah ’07 Washington $22
From Burgess Vineyard in Pasco, this syrah is substantial, fruity, and crisp, a great accompaniment to winter fare.
Masquerade Cabernet Sauvignon Red Mountain ’09 Washington $28
This just-released cab combines the best elements of their soft, alluring, somewhat feminine ’05 cab (which I preferred) and the more structured, robust, and popular ’07; like an orchestra with every instrument in its place, this lovely wine will seduce you with its harmony of flavor, texture, balance, and length. Very, very nice.
Masquerade Gewürztraminer ’11 Washington $13
This floral, fragrant dry wine exhibits flavors reminiscent of pineapple and passion fruit, with a seductive aroma of spice, clove, and rosewater. Great match with Thai or Indian food!
2072 Granger Way