Wannabe Wino

*Disclaimer: I received this bottle of wine from WineQ as a sample because I'm a member of their Beta Club.

The bottle was a 2004 Joseph Family Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon from the Alexander Valley. It clocks in at 14.4%, had a real cork closure and can be purchased from WineQ for $39.99.

I've got two pictures of this bottle because I wanted to make sure you could see the very nifty drawing of a mountain lion on the label. Also very cool was the mountain lion head on the foil and again on the cork. However, when I went to read the back of the label, I must confess that I have no idea what a stone fruit is, and the bottle says the wine is characterized by fleshy stone fruit.

On the nose I found lots and lots of berries of all kinds. Blackberries, blueberries, huckleberries....I also got vanilla cream and some underlying hints of leather. In the mouth, more blueberries and blackberries, with black currants and vanilla.

I served this bottle with what I knew was not going to be a fantastic match (parmesan baked tilapia and cheese risotto), but it didn't so much matter as the wine needed much time to air/time to breathe before it was ready to drink. After about an hour in our glasses it was great and is very drinkable now, though I would guess that with some more time in the bottle this will be a fabulous bottle of wine.