Wannabe Wino

I got a lot of wine this Christmas. I took about a case to CT with me for holiday dinners and such and I returned back to VA with 2.5 cases of wine. People really like giving a wino more wine apparently!

This bottle was a 2005 Francis Coppola Diamond Collection
Ivory Label Cabernet Sauvignon. (Wow, that's a mouthful of a name for the wine.) It clocked in at 13.5% alcohol by volume and had a real cork closure.

The nose on the wine was minty (something I've noticed in a a few Cabernet Sauvignons lately), and had vanilla and strawberry aromas. I thought this was oddly light on the nose with only a bit of spice, not what I usually expect from a Cabernet Sauvignon. In the mouth the wine was a bit darker. I found muted blackberry and thought the wine was a bit earthy. After a while some strawberries and black currants came through. The second glass of wine (drank about an hour after the first) was much better and more developed than the first.

We actually stopped in at the Coppola Winery on our first trip to Sonoma, but we didn't taste. They have lovely grounds and a beautiful patio with a restaurant, which is where we ate lunch one day. A lovely way to spend an afternoon, with sweeping views of the vineyard.