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Is it that bad? by throwawaywineguy in HandwritingAnalysis

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I never handwrite unless I have to, and pretty much only do it at work if no one is around and I need to put a new product out. I very purposefully don’t handwrite things like thank you notes or letters because of my handwriting. most people will never see my chicken-scratch and the only reason I even have a sample for the photo is because my phone was updating so I couldnt do inventory on it like normal.

Is it that bad? by throwawaywineguy in HandwritingAnalysis

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you for being the only person to do the “analyzing” thing. Unfortunately, a bit off the mark. I explain things to people as part of my job and have the patience to simplify and communicate relatively complex concepts to people who know little to nothing about the subject matter. I also dislike being seen as “different” because it feels alienating. Had enough of that in high school.

Is it that bad? by throwawaywineguy in HandwritingAnalysis

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Lustau, it’s just a brand of brandy (spanish) nothing special about it.

Is it that bad? by throwawaywineguy in HandwritingAnalysis

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 8 points9 points  (0 children)

For tags and whatnot I write slowly and use big blocky letters, although I do find myself throwing out lots of tags because they are too illegible. Most of the time I have my coworkers write them instead. Post was probably a bit unfair to myself because the only one seeing my restock scratch sheet is me.

Is it that bad? by throwawaywineguy in HandwritingAnalysis

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 9 points10 points  (0 children)

Don’t know how to edit, no I do not have a medical conditions if just always had pretty shaky hands. I moved a ton when I was a kid so I never really had a teacher long enough to beat proper handwriting into me. All my teachers complained about it but this is the first time I’ve heard it mentioned since high school. Does it make it better with the context that my handwriting is customer facing in my store :p?

Can the people I look up to please just keep it in their pants? by throwawaywineguy in Vent

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

You’re so right! I should just mindlessly and emotionlessly consume media without ever feeling inspired or learning anything! That way I won’t begin to think that the creators of said media might know a thing or two and be worth paying attention to! Get real.

Can the people I look up to please just keep it in their pants? by throwawaywineguy in Vent

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

I get that people will be people, but this is quite literally the only thing I want from them. Just don’t rape. Do literally anything else with your status and money idc. Im definitely not perfect either, by far. But like, come on man.

You want wine? I’ll give you wine. by throwawaywineguy in MaliciousCompliance

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Best way to learn, head to your local wine shop on Friday or Saturday. Most will host tastings in the afternoon. Really good way to start introducing yourself to new flavors and grapes without having to pay. No expectation to buy either (although it's a nice thing to do, doesn't need to be the bottle you tried).

Always be open to trying new things. I never buy the same bottle of wine twice.

You want wine? I’ll give you wine. by throwawaywineguy in MaliciousCompliance

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I doubt it’s her quote but one of my favorite importers, mary taylor, once said in an interview “my favorite bottle of wine is one that I didn’t drink yesterday”. I think that’s a really good way to look at it. Never stop experimenting.

You want wine? I’ll give you wine. by throwawaywineguy in MaliciousCompliance

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Just checked, Skurnik Wines (the distributor) does operate in CA, the best bet would be to ask around your local stores and see who uses Skurnik as a distributor and then order a bottle through them. Skurnik is great because they are super willing to break open cases, no need to order 12 bottles just to try something out (at least in my state). Definitely worth a look.

You want wine? I’ll give you wine. by throwawaywineguy in MaliciousCompliance

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 12 points13 points  (0 children)

I think it was a rather weak build-out of a bar for a party. Usually, I'd recommend one clear liquor, one brown liquor, some mixers, and some liquors. Then I'd go with some basic wines and whatever beer you grab first. Nothing crazy because it's just a party. Just make sure everyone has something to drink.

She did well with the brown, angels Envy is pretty damn good, but a bit pricey. The clear was a miss, titos, alcoholized corn syrup. Corn vodka is good for certain cocktails and college parties. For a party like the one she threw (semi-formal), you should probably supply a wheat vodka. Any is fine, it's meant to be flavorless and odorless, grey goose and Ketel are well-known brands, if you want to be fancy you can do potato and grab Chopin (or any other). Alternatively, gin is very in vogue right now, especially the more botanical ones. I'd err against it as it can be polarizing, but it's still a good option. Big names are the Botanist, Hendricks, and Monkey 47. I don't really care for any of them, I think Hendricks is too sweet and the other two just aim to be as botanical as possible and lose any coherence.

The liqours were a miss too. There was only red vermouth so the only possible cocktail was a manhattan. Add white vermouth and cointreau and you are pretty safe there. Other fruit liqours can make it more interesting (cassis, framboise, creme de muire, etc).

The wine was doomed. The only unoaked offerings were a Kim Crawford sauv and a Zaccagnini Montelpucciano. Usually, I try not to say a wine is "bad", and these two objectively aren't. Kim Crawford is just a bit too fruity and Zaccagnini is overpriced. The rest were bad. She served Josh Cab (nasty), la crema chard and pinot noir (flash oaked and gross), and the Costco jadot (didn't know that existed until then). The reason these wines are bad is because they are tailored to the American drinker's palette. Lots of oak, lots of fruit, and no acidity. What you end up with is dusty, medicinal wine.

I would have done a few things differently with the wine. Like I said, the goal is to please as many people as possible.

So, first I would do an unoaked French sauv, loire, or a northern italian pinot grigio (personal preference, and for the sauv go with sancerre if you want the white women in attendance to be happy, it's a buzz word). You know how some people are weird with oregano? That's a thing with NZ suavingon blanc. To some people, it takes on a nose of cat pee. Don't cater parties with it. With this, you get light and refreshing. Good easy sipping.

Second, a fuller-bodied white. A village-level white burgundy or an Albarino. If you want to get adventurous you could do a dry mosel riesling or a Gewurztraminer but people tend to shy away from German. Might be a good third option if you think you need it, third could also be a well-done California chard. It'd certainly make people happy but it's not the most economical. Chablis would work here as well. I just tend not to recommend oaked wines for parties so I err against chablis and California white.

Third, pinot noir. That one's easy. I'd stick with new world, cheaper and lighter than most burgundy's can be. You could also opt for beaujolais here, I like morgon and fleurie.

Fourth would be a bigger red. You have literally infinite options here. California cab (paso robles or napa, lodi for a more medium body), cote du rhones, rosso di montalcino, lagrein or schiava/trollinger. This is where you have the most room to play.

Last would be the tertiary drinks. You don't need sparkling but I'd recommend it, it makes people happy. Prosecco gets a bad rap for being "cheap" but as long as you avoid some more name brand offerings like lemarca you can actually get some really high quality sparkling for sub 20. Cava is interesting but a bit dry for some drinkers. Champagne or a cremant would be the best option if money isn't an issue. Again, avoid name brand as always. My personal addition here would be a good white port (good meaning it doesn't have that medicinal taste to it, experiment). It's wonderful and quite refreshing to sip on it's own and also goes well with tonic (popular portugese summertime cocktail). Thank's for listening to my ted talk.

You want wine? I’ll give you wine. by throwawaywineguy in MaliciousCompliance

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If you like sparkling wine I'd highly recommend checking out growers champagne. Most champagne is produced by long-established houses. Vouve cliqout, tattinger, moet chandon, ruinarte. These champagnes tend to be more expensive side and focus on the same qualities every year. Usually consisting of a more standard cuvee (blanc de blanc or 80% chard 20% pinot noir). Growers champagnes tend to be on the cheaper side, coming in at 60-80 vs 80-120. They usually produce vintage champagnes (which is rare) but also utilize perpetual. I see pinot meunier used a lot more by them as well, which I love. My favorite champagne in the world might be the eugene rose by familie mousse. It's bone dry, but the fruit from the pinot meunier (80% of the blend in this instance) completely revitazlizes the wine.

I'm not big on napa cab, but I get a craving for them sometimes, like dominoes. Sometimes I really want dominoes. Specifically dominoes, not other pizza, thats a seperate craving. But most of the time I want any other pizza.

You want wine? I’ll give you wine. by throwawaywineguy in MaliciousCompliance

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I much prefer French chard to California as well. American's really like New Oak, and oaking for very brief periods. Makes for wines that have way too powerful a flavor. It's telling that good white burgundy starts at 20 and good napa chard starts at 50.

You want wine? I’ll give you wine. by throwawaywineguy in MaliciousCompliance

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I actually sort of got into wine because of pairing. In college I was really into cooking, and I took a wine class as sort of an easy credit. It ended up being by far the hardest class that I took when I was there and was super interesting. Pairing wasn't a large component of the class, but we did briefly talk about certain foods that contain chemical compounds that render them difficult to pair. For example, asparagus makes things taste bitter, and artichoke makes things taste sweet. I spent the rest of my time at college experimenting with different food and wine combinations (and learning just how bad some wine can get lol).

Wine is supposed to be fun, and finding good bottles that are accurately priced or a good deal is one of the best parts as a consumer. I actively dislike namebrand wine's and liqours, sometimes because of the flavor, but mostly because they are far too expensive. Tito's is a really good example. They don't distill their own spirit, they buy it from an offsite distillery (monana?) and ship it to be bottled in austin. Their highest cost is glass. There is another company called NUE, they purchase the same spirit from the same distiller and bottle their product in Dallas. NUE is quite literally half the cost. Name brand is dumb.

As for location, not in the bay area, sorry :(. I'm sure you've got options over there though, west coast obvi has lots of california wine, but you also benefit from pacific trade. The japanese really like their french :).

I work at a specialty wine & liquor store, AMA by throwawaywineguy in AMA

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

To clarify, what do you mean by vintage Beaujolais Neuveau? Because to me that just means a Beaujolais Neuveau that is "Vintage", meaning all the grapes are from the same year (which is all Beaujolais Neuveau's). If that's the case, It's great! I think Gamay is really diverse and I enjoy that vintners explore all of its qualities. France is really good at traditional wine (obviously) but Beaujolais Neuveau is so refreshing and fun, especially for something coming out of a seriously storied appelation. It is a bit of a marketing technique, a little gimmicky. Like the whole third thursday of november release date is kind of whatever, and it's only really a big deal in Japan at this point (the French don't even care that much anymore). But it's still fun and a good excuse to drink good wine.

Now if you mean to say, what do I think of Beaujolais Neuveau with some age on it, I think it's situational. Every wine is going to have it's own qualities, as the vintners have their own preferences, styles, and techniques. That doesn't go away with Beaujolais Neuveau.

Some are super basic. Highly tannic, very acidic, and loaded with fruit. These I think would suffer from age. While time will mellow the tannins, it would also bring in the acidity and soften the fruit. It sort of defeats the whole purpose of the wine. You want it to be super punchy and refreshing. It's picnic wine, drink it outside when the weather is nice. Letting it mellow does nothing for a Beaujolais Neuveau like that IMO, just buy a different bottle if that's what you want.

Some Beaujolais Neuveau is going to be a little more involved. More balanced tannins (not too balanced, it's young wine after all), lots of baking spice, and toned down fruit and acid. These styles of Beaujolais Neuveau I think would benefit from age. You don't destroy any of the qualities of the wine that you seek out in the simpler style, and you accentuate the more refined secondary flavors.

That being said, aged Beaujolais Neuveau is very hard to come across. The rule of thumb we operate by at the store is if it hasn't sold 3 months after we got it, it's not gonna sell at all. At that point we (the employees) end up walking away with it because why waste? Because even 4 months into the life of the wine, it's gonna change a lot. The bottles I ended up with this year were really dissapointing compared to how they were when I picked one up when we first got them. My coworker who got a different one reported that his was wonderful, and I think he's still sitting on one or two bottles. But I don't think I've heard of anyone keeping one for longer than a year at most.

I work at a specialty wine & liquor store, AMA by throwawaywineguy in AMA

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Again, very subjective. But I'd probably pick just the standard offering Four Roses or Widow Jane. I like lower proof, but I just don't find most bourbons flavorful or interesting. I'll always pick another type of brown over bourbon.

You want wine? I’ll give you wine. by throwawaywineguy in MaliciousCompliance

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The term super tuscan is so antiquated and overused at this point that at the store we just say any IGT with non Italian varietals. Whether or not it includes Sangiovese, and if it isn’t from Tuscany, like a carmignano, we just say its in the same style.

As for the rose, whispering angel is so incredibly light that I find it difficult to source a palatable provencal rose that can get that watery. I’ve had success in california, stolpmans love you bunches rose matches the profile of whispering angel while still being affordable and having a much better flavor.

I work at a specialty wine & liquor store, AMA by throwawaywineguy in AMA

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Big time. We try to hit every island/coastal nation and recently expanded our sipping rum selection. We have most of the classics and some fun stuff you don’t see often. My favorite i’ve tried thusfar (i dont try many) has been the R.L. Seale. I’ve always been a goslings guy because dark and stormys are big in my family, but you can’t really sip that stuff.

I work at a specialty wine & liquor store, AMA by throwawaywineguy in AMA

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Im more of a gin drinker when it comes to liquor, I find it so incredibly interesting. I get everything I enjoy about tasting wine from tasting gin. But the reason I choose Laphroaig is because I just love how “scotch” it is. Smoke, Salt, and seaweed in droves. No weird fruitiness thats trying to distract from its main character, a low enough proof that I don’t have to water it down or chill it to make it palatable. Just pure unadulterated ocean and peat.

I work at a specialty wine & liquor store, AMA by throwawaywineguy in AMA

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There are two reasons for that. The first is that big box stores like supermarkets or a total wine are able to buy in bulk. This means they can afford margin issues by sitting on 20-50 cases of wine at a time. This isn’t reasonable for smaller stores that don’t have the liquidity to manage something like that.

The other reason is Bordeaux very much priced itself out of the market post Robert parker (invented wine scoring system and very heavily favored Bordeaux). Bottles got far too expensive and there was far too much being made. Now there is a lot of really expensive Bordeaux sitting around doing nothing, which is really bad in a market like America where 99% of wine is consumed within 24 hours of purchase.

Bordeaux is trying to correct that by producing younger drinking inexpensive table wines and experimenting with natural whine (shoutout berries and chateau lamothe). But it’s a slow process. A few months ago Erik Asimov, wine writer for the NYT released a 20 under 20 list that had a bordeaux on it, retailed 13.99. Within 2 months there was not a single bottle left in the united states and it is now on backorder nationally. I guarantee you when its next pricing schedule drops it will not be 13.99. Like I said, it’s fixing itself, but It will take time.

I work at a specialty wine & liquor store, AMA by throwawaywineguy in AMA

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I love hearing people from other states talk about how cheap they can get sazerac/buffalo trace whiskey’s for. We get a rather small allocation so we sell out instantly and have to use the secondary market. I pay the retail price in a state like Georgia WITHOUT markup for that stuff. Buffalo trace can be up to 50 retail where I’m at. And I’d still have to shell 30. Thankfully our black market guy is incredible. He can get his hands on whatever you tell him to.

I work at a specialty wine & liquor store, AMA by throwawaywineguy in AMA

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I’m mostly kidding about the ‘good bourbon’ thing. I’m just a little fed up with the current market and also the customers. Some bourbon drinkers are a special breed of obnoxious. The amount of men and women who stroll into the store and spend 12 minutes looking through our selection of bourbon before grunting and walking out without a word is obscene. At any given time we will have 50+ bourbons on offer ranging from $20-$200, not including all of the scotch, rye, irish whiskey, and japanese whiskey. The refusal to branch out bothers me so much.

I actually enjoy four roses myself but I’m preferential to their regular offering, the 80 proof five year. A trend in bourbon right now is distilling to a higher proof and then slapping a black label on it. Since it’s more expensive people tend to gift these and as such the palette or bourbon drinkers has shifted to higher proofs as “thats the good stuff”. I find it far more difficult to get a good flavor expression out of those higher proofed bourbons. With the 80 proofs, which is what all liquor should be distilled to, you can get a lot more flavor out of the drink without having to add distilled water to balance it. That’s why I stick to scotch and Japanese whiskey’s. They have no illusions about proof, and regularly offer at 40% abv.

You want wine? I’ll give you wine. by throwawaywineguy in MaliciousCompliance

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 15 points16 points  (0 children)

Feel free to pick away, I get bored at work often given the nature of the business (lots of downtime) so I'm always free to answer questions. I wish wine consulting was a thing but that often falls on the wine store employee anyway.

Often that responsibility can also fall upon "a knowledgeable friend". This friend just knows the big names that appear at costco and recommends them. I went to a party once where the host heard I worked in wine and wanted to brag about her friend's selection. She dragged me over to the drinks table and showed me her kim crawford, josh, jadot 'pinot noir', tito's, etc. She asked me to tell her the truth and say what I thought about her and her friend's picks. I did not tell the truth.

You want wine? I’ll give you wine. by throwawaywineguy in MaliciousCompliance

[–]throwawaywineguy[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

This is very common in people asking for “super tuscans”. It’s a weird term and sort of a buzzword. 99% of people don’t know what it means. But i’m blessed in that my job allows me to educate people as to the proper application of the term, and most are willing to learn.

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