Taste a 100 pt Wine

Taste 2005 Bordeaux
Including a Wine Spectator "100 pt" Wine
Saturday March 27th, 2010
11am-8pm


Featuring:
2005 Leoville Las Cases (Wine Spectator 100 out of 100 pts) - only one bottle at each store!
2005 Chateau Le Bon Pasteur
2005 Chateau Fontenil
2005 Chateau Fontenil "Le Defi de Fontenil"
and a few other surprises!!

Michel Rolland is like Glenn Beck and Nancy Pelosi rolled into one, not that anyone would want to envision such a frightening spectacle. Just imagine their offspring; no, don't do that, it's too scary. Okay, in truth, even if they mated, their children wouldn’t look anything like Rolland, who is the huffing, puffing, bearded boogeyman of the amusing wine film Mondovino. If you've seen that movie, you already know everything about the controversy that surrounds Rolland like flies on stinky cheese. If you haven’t seen the movie, trust me: Rolland is like Beck and Pelosi. His very visage is enough to send large portions of wine geeks into a frenzy of accusations: he's destroying wine! He's making all wines taste the same! He's in league with Parker! Well, he might be a bit of all those, but like Beck and Pelosi, it's easy to find supporters and defenders. Indeed, the market has long ago spoken in strong and fulsome praise of Rolland's wines. It isn't just Parker, though Parker's highest scores and Rolland's wines seem to keep closer company than Glenn Beck and his chalkboard or Pelosi and her grin. People who love rich, fruity, intense, dense and unctuous red wines are fans of Rolland's stable of wines, either the wines on which he consults (too numerous to name) or the wines he and his family own or control: Château Le Bon Pasteur, Château Bertineau St-Vincent, Château Rolland Maillet, Château Fontenil, Château La Grande Clotte, and estates in countries as diverse as Spain, South Africa and Argentina. For decades, Rolland has improved the fortunes of innumerous wineries around the world, and if you read and follow Robert Parker, you've long ago learned that any wine Rolland makes is likely to garner high scores. But there have always been rumblings especially among American wine circles, and especially among the traditionalists in those circles. The thinking has been that, by increasing ripeness and intensity in wines, Rolland smothers the nuanced differences among the world's traditional wine-producing regions. French traditionalists too aren't persuaded, even by Rolland's great market successes. Even in the face of France's recent massive losses of share in the world market, there are plenty of French bureaucrats who don’t appreciate Rolland's innovative methods. As one example, Rolland covered some of his vines in plastic to protect them from rain. The Bordeaux authorities promptly denied Rolland the right to call his wine Chateau Fontenil, Fronsac, Bordeaux. But Rolland having all the humility of the two aforementioned personalities, decided in 2005 to bottle the wine from those covered vines under the label "le Defi de Fontneil". "Le Defi" roughly translates to "the challenge", but think "defi-ance" and you are close enough to the appropriate meaning. How does it compare to the actual Chateau Fontenil in 2005? Well, that's for you to decide. This Saturday, we'll taste the two next to each other. Oh, yes, along with another Rolland estate, the great Le Bon Pasteur 2005. Oops! We forgot to mention one other wine we'll be tasting: 2005 Leoville Las Cases. It's one of those wines that Wine Spectator scored well in their blind reviews. How well? Oh, let's say, 100 out of 100. Happy Tasting and we'll see you Saturday! Cheers, Doug Frost, MS MW Master Sommelier & Master of Wine