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AMERICAN WINE SOCIETY
A non-profit corporation

Northern Virginia Chapter

“For the majority of people, wine is like sex:
They've been partaking for years,  deriving tremendous pleasure from it,
but still do not come close to understanding all of its complexities.”

 -- Bob Blumer, The Surreal Gourmet Entertains

SEPTEMBER MEETING: 

The National Tasting Project was the order of business last month, and Merlot was the topic.  We tasted many of the same wines as all AWS chapters throughout the nation did, and our chapter scores are now being tabulated with all the others.  We first enjoyed four social Merlots to get our tastebuds in synch with the grape and then moved onto the tasting, all bottles being presented blindly.  The first wine was a calibrating wine where we discussed how wines should be scored and what we should notice.  The remaining seven wines were scored individually with any discussion afterwards that would not to influence or change the individual scores.  The wines tasted were as follows, including the average group scores:

Year
 Producer
 Region
 Cost
 Score
NV
 Concha y Toro
$   6.99 Social
NV Barefoot Cellars
$   5.69 Social
NV Carmen
$   5.99 Social
NV Banrock Station
$   5.99 Social
2000 Cellar 8
$ 11.99 Calibrating
2002 Bogle California $ 11.99 14.2
2001 Frei Brothers Reserve Dry Creek $ 12.29 13.5
2001 Talus California $   6.79 13.3
2001 Wild Horse Paso Robles $ 12.99 13.9
2002 Smoking Loon California $   8.99 13.3
2001 Franciscan Oakville Estates, Napa Valley
 $ 16.99 15.7
2001 Sterling Napa Valley $ 16.49 14.7


I do think that everyone had an enjoyable evening and even learned a bit more as to what they specifically should be looking for in wines as they evaluate them. There were a few surprises when the bags were taken off the bottles!  It should be interesting to see how our chapter matches up with all the other chapters when these results are published later in the year or early next year.

OCTOBER MEETING: 

There is a nip in the air, so we must begin to fortify ourselves for the oncoming winter weather.  And, what better way to fortify oneself than with Port?  Walt Rachele will be presenting an overview of Port wines, so if you ever wanted to know the difference between a Ruby and a Tawny and an LBV, this is the meeting to attend.  You will learn the differences and taste them yourself.  The meeting is scheduled for Friday, October 15, 2004, at St. Mary's Church.  The gathering will begin at 7:30 p.m. while the formal meeting should get underway at 8:00 p.m. Please RSVP at least 24 hours in advance if you are planning to attend so we will have enough of everything.  Call 703-941-2384 or complete the following RSVP form.


See you on the 15th!  Also, mark your calendars now for the following chapter meeting on Friday, November 19th.

Cheers,       
Dave Barber
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