That’s right… to YOU. For just the same reasons that John and Dorothy of the Wall Street Journal started Open That Bottle Night (OTBN), I think it should be done for just about any occasion or not necessarily an occasion at all. Well, for my birthday last night, I went to cellar and looked for those bottles that we had been “saving”. I don’t collect wine for investment purposes, only for drinking purposes. Though, for those worthy wines, we will let sit for a few years to allow bottle aging to work its magic and give us, hopefully, a special experience, or at least a learning experience. Tonight was the night to pull a couple of those wines from the rack. I considered quite a few, and you’ll actually notice some were kind of young, furthering my explanation that we don’t keep a lot of older wine.
2002 Silver Oak Cabernet Sauvignon – I won this in a bet that the Gators would win the 2006 National Football Championship, so this wine represents sweet victory in my mind and it also reminds me of a nice 98 Alexander Valley I had with my wife for new year’s a few years back. Silver Oak is one of our favorites
1999 Gaja Conteisa – Just recently got this for a decent deal and really only looked at it for a second. I’ve never had it but hear it’s one of the best, so I put this one back for next time, maybe next year?
1985 Chateau Palmer – Recently got this with some close wine friends at an auction. At Jack’s Bordeaux Madness tasting, which I will be blogging about here shortly, we tried it along with 1979 Ch Margaux. So, since I recently just tried it, thought I’d wait on this one too!
2005 Willakenzie Estates Pinot Noir Kiana – We have quite a bit of Pinot Noir from Oregon (mainly Willamette Valley) from our trip last fall, so there were a lot to choose from.
However, many of them are still too young and are just beginning to come into their drinking window. This one stood out, however, and looking back at my notes from our trip, this one was plump full of cherry, not too big, some earth and spice. We also have the 2006 vintage.
2005 Chimney Rock Cabernet Sauvignon Ganymede – Chimney Rock is probably right up there for me with Silver Oak. This winery reminds me of one of my first trips to Napa and is almost always the source of the “feelings” I get when I experience wine, especially that signature Napa style Cabernet that makes me sometimes want to move out west. Though I gave this one a hard look, it’s just a little early in the drinking window and we had just opened a 2004 estate (not single vineyard) last Thursday.
In the end we took the Willakenzie and the Silver Oak with us to the Atlanta Fish Market for the birthday dinner where corkage fees were only $15 and we were well rewarded with these 2 choices. They both grew and blossomed throughout the meal and we had a blast. So, what are you saving that bottle for? You can’t take it with you when you die so “Just Drink It.”
