2003 Trinitas Bigalow Zinfandel

The Bigelow Zin is my favorite zin of all time. I first fell in love with the 2002 vintage, and alas, there is none to be had in the whole world, so I'm now drinking the 2003. fortunately, almost a year has gone buy since I reviewed the 2002, and it's time to see if a year in the bottle makes the 2003 equivalent.

The presentation was identical to the 2002; It came in a Bordeaux bottle. It had a real cork. Not much penetration into the cork, and it left only the faintest of tattoos. One difference to the 2002 is that in the '02, there was a fair amount of sediment around the neck; in the '03 there was none.

It had a rich raspberry colour with raspberries and charcoal on the nose. There were lots of legs long and short. after the swirl I got more raspberries and some chocolate. It's still full and rich with a blackberry taste.

We had it with chocolate fondue, and it picked it up fabulously.

The Verdict:

I have 11 more bottles and plan on drinking them all.

Style:	Zinfandel
Varietals:	Zinfandel
Appellation/Terrior:	Oakley Contra Costa County, California
Vintage:	2003
Vintner:	Trinitas
Alcohol:	15.0% by Volume
Price:	$24.36

Trinitas Wine Society

The Trinitas Winery is unvisitable. But it has some of the best wines that I have ever tasted. I initially found them because I was looking for the holy grail of old-growth zins - I wanted to find the oldest zinfandel vineyard in the world and drink it down. What I found was Matt Cline and Erin Jacuzzi's hobby winery. Both the Clines and the Jacuzzi's have been in the California wine business since the days of redwood barrels. The Cline family has huge holdings and makes oceans of wine. Trinitas is what they do for fun, and the Zin I mentioned is from a little vineyard in Oakley that frikkin rocks.

The club gives the usual 20% discount and complimentary tastings at the Meritage resort in Napa.

Shipments are 2 wines each 3 times a year, targeted to cost $65.00 plus tax and shipping a shipment.

They also promise "Special release wines not offered to the public" and "Large format bottles" as well as "Invitation to winemaker dinners in Northern and Southern California and Invitation to our annual barrel tasting"

When I joined the Trinitas Wine Society, it was literally the only way to purchase their wine, and even now most of the wine offered to me as a member is not available from their website to non members. The absolute best Cabernet Sauvignon I ever had came from a Trinitas shipment. It was part of a 47 case production of ancient vine cab. I have also tasted several varietals and cuvées that I would not have tried from anyone else including an old vine Mataro and Black Malvoisie.

I have yet to be offered large format bottles or invitations to anything; but I have only been a member for 2 shipments - lets wait and see what happens at harvest time.

The Verdict:

I love their wine so much that you would have to pry my membership from my cold dead fingers. Since I like their wine this much, and it is not really available to non-members then the membership is completely worth having.

A Trinity of Trinitas: Trinitas 2003 Mataro

Last Friday; My mother, her girlfriend and another of her friends all showed up tonight for dinner. We BBQ-d a couple of tri-tips and needed some wine to accompany. Since my mother and her friends all live in Concord; I figured a selection of Contra Costa wines would be in order; so over the course of the evening we opened 3 different bottles from Trinitas. This is the third bottle of those three.

Trinitas is Matt Cline's Hobby vineyard. Matt is the wine maker for the largish vintner Cline (which owns a lot of vineyards in Oakley). He married a scion of the Jaccuzi family; Erin. The Trinitas label is a partnership between Matt and Erin and Busch and Rodeno families of Oakley. Their goal is to show off the terrior of heritage vineyards in Contra Costa County.

I bought this particular wine based upon my good experiences with their 2002 Bigelow Zin. I opened it without any idea what I was getting into.

The presentation was OK. It came in a Bordeaux bottle; but then this wine is a blend of Rhône; and Burgandy varietals so the bottle cannot be traditional. It came with a real cork.

The labeling was good - all the necessary information is present (Vintage, Vintner, Terrior, Varietal, and Booze content) and in the right places. Oddly, Trinitas has chosen less-used names for two of their grapes; Mataro for Mourvèdre and Black Malvoise for Pinot Noir. The rear label gives tasting notes and history of the region as well as the goal of the vintner; but does not hint at fermentation techniques oak? brix? punch down? etc.)

There were some legs, and a rich nose. The colour was brilliant. It tasted of strawberry jam followed by booze. The boozy taste makes me say that this wine is unbalanced, but it is good.

The Verdict:

I enjoyed this wine, but with the alcohol after taste am not sure I would choose another 2003 - When they release the 2004 though I will likely try it to see if 2003 was an exceptionally sugar rich harvest (accounting for the extra booze)

Style:	Meritage
Varietals:	Mourvèdre, Petite Sirah, Pinot Noir
Appellation/Terrior:	Contra Costa County, California
Vintage:	2003
Vintner:	Trinitas
Alcohol:	14.5% by Volume
Price:	$21.75

A Trinity of Trinitas: Trinitas 2004 Old Vine Cuvée

My mother, her girlfriend and another friend all showed up on Friday night for dinner. We BBQ-d a couple of tri-tips and needed some wine to accompany. Since my mother and her friends all live in Concord; I figured a selection of Contra Costa wines would be in order; so over the course of the evening we opened 3 different bottles from Trinitas. This is the second bottle of those three. Read yesterday's post for the first.

I bought this particular wine based upon my good experiences with their 2002 Bigelow Zin. I opened it without any idea what I was getting into. This wine is a piece of California history - reading the blend of grapes in this puppy is like pulling layers of history off of California's plantings. I would love to believe that this is a field blend of grapes from vineyards that have evolved over the centuries (19th, 20th and 21st).

I am very glad that I had cow on the BBQ as one sip and swirl was enough to see that this wine was meant for beef. The tri-tip was on indirect heat with dried lavender thrown onto the coals to generate smoke (sort of an "Herbs de Provence" smoker) and the lavender really complemented the wine. By accident I ended up with a superior pairing.

The presentation was good. It came in a Rhône bottle; but then this wine is a rather odd blend of Provençal; Rhône; and Zinfandel varietals so the bottle cannot be traditional. It came with a real cork.

The labeling was good - all the necessary information is present (Vintage, Vintner, Terrior, Varietal, and Booze content) and in the right places. The rear label gives tasting notes and history of the region as well as the goal of the vintner; but does not hint at fermentation techniques oak? brix? punch down? etc.) Oddly, Trinitas has chosen less-used names for two of their grapes; Mataro for Mourvèdre and Black Malvoise for Pinot Noir.

There were some good legs, and a nose full of jelly. The colour was a brilliant burgundy. This is truly a heritage wine; the richness of the old vines really shines through.

The Verdict:

Awesome for accompanying smoked meat a BBQ. Well drinkable at other occasions as well. at less than $20 if you are having meat - buy it. I am planning my next BBQ now just so I have an excuse to drink my next bottle of this superior vintage.

Style:	Heritage
Varietals:	Zinfandel, Mourvèdre, Carignane, Petite Sirah, Alicante Bouschet, Pinot Noir
Appellation/Terrior:	Contra Costa County, California
Vintage:	2004
Vintner:	Trinitas
Alcohol:	14.0% by Volume
Price:	$15.66

A Trinity of Trinitas: Trinitas 2002 Bigalow Zin

My mother, her girlfriend and another friend all showed up last night for dinner. We BBQ-d a couple of tri-tips and needed some wine to accompany. Since my mother and her friends all live in Concord, I figured that a selection of Contra Costa wines would be in order; so over the course of the evening we opened 3 different bottles from Trinitas.

Trinitas is Matt Cline's Hobby vineyard. Matt is the wine maker for the large vintner Cline (which owns a lot of vineyards in Oakley). He married a scion of the Jaccuzi family; Erin. The Trinitas label is a partnership between Matt and Erin and Busch and Rodeno families of Oakley. Their goal is to show off the terrior of heritage vineyards in Contra Costa County.

I first became interested in this particular wine when I started to drive past the vineyard on my way to our ski cabin in Kirkwood. You will see it on your right hand side as you are about to cross the Antioch bridge across the Sacramento river on your way out of the Bay Area. It contains what may likely be the oldest Zinfandel vines in existence. When most of CA was ripping out wine grapes during the "Great Experiment" of prohibition; the vines of Oakley remained in the ground. The Bigelow vineyard contains mostly 120 year old zinfandel vines. Not even Dalmatia can claim an entire vineyard of this grape that old.

This is one of my all time favorite Zins. 2002 was a great year, and this vineyard produces the richest fruit one could imagine. Kudos to Matt and Erin for preserving this vineyard from the city of Oakley's machinations to turn it into a Wal-mart.

The presentation was ok. It came in a Bordeaux bottle rather than a Zinfandel one. It had a real cork. There was a fair amount of sediment around the neck; enough to leave a faint tattoo on the web of my thumb indicating that this wine was stored up-side down (This is good).

The labeling was good - all the necessary information is present (Vintage, Vintner, Terrior, Varietal, and Booze content) and in the right places. The rear label gives tasting notes and history of the region as well as the goal of the vintner; but does not hint at fermentation techniques oak? brix? punch down? etc.)

There were some good legs, the nose was prominent of loganberries. With a brilliant colour, this is a wine full of fruit. The term "Jammy" in this case refers to a spread that you would put on toast. If only there as a jam that tasted like this, PB&J would never be the same (skip the PB!) You can really taste the old vines in this wine. Imagine if you bought a single Jelly Belly jelly bean that somehow ended up with all the flavour of the whole bag - and that's the type of grape that this wine is made of.

The Verdict:

The only Zin that comes close to this one is Trinitas's 2003 CCC Old Vine Zinfandel. Buy it at any price. I would pay upwards of $50-$75 for a bottle of this, so at the $25 I paid for it it's a steal (but don't tell Matt or Erin I said so)

Style:	Zinfandel
Varietals:	Zinfandel
Appellation/Terrior:	Oakley (Contra Costa County), California
Vintage:	2002
Vintner:	Trinitas
Alcohol:	15.0% by Volume
Price:	$24.36

2005 Rosenblum Heritage Clone Petite Sirah

Wednesday at lunch some co-workers asked me if I wanted to join them for lunch at Rosenblum. It sounded like fun, so off we went. Little did I know that that lunch would be liquid only, but lots of fun was had.
Previous to this, my only exposure to Rosenblum's products had been at restaurants, and my company's informal monthly wine tasting events. My impressions there had been that every Rosenblum was young. What I found at the winery did not change that impression (indeed even the guy behind the counter agreed with me) - Rosenblum's releases all would benefit from another 8-18 months in the cellar. What did impress me is the gigantic selection of individual wines - Rosenblum makes an awfully large number of single vineyard vintages. They currently list 34 different 2004 wines for sale on their site. Wow. I am a big fan of single vineyard vintages - you get a much better feel for the terrior that way IMHO. The other thing that I like about Rosenblum is that they source a good number of their grapes from Oakley - and the flavours that the ancient vines in this region, combined with the earth and the sun and the river air of Oakley impart to a wine make it amongst the yummiest terriors I know of.

I would normally not drink a wine this young, but the tasting room left me craving more.

The presentation was good. It came in a typical Rhône bottle. It had an agglomerated synthetic cork.
The labeling was fair - all the necessary information is present (Vintage, Vintner, Terrior, Varietal, and Booze content) but in odd places and sometimes inconsistent; for instance the booze and appellation are both listed on the rear label - and the appellation is listed as San Francisco Bay, but the verbiage states "...from Napa and Sonoma to the base of Mt. Diablo." I'll give you that Oakley is at the base of Mt. Diablo, and within the San Francisco Bay AVA; but Napa and Sonoma are not - and given the listing of the San Francisco Bay appellation, grapes from Napa and Sonoma combined can only make up less than 15% of the fruit used in making the wine, so why list it? The only reason I can think of to do so is to market this wine to consumers who have no clue about wine regions outside of Napa; but then again with this wine only available at the winery - are they likely to get any consumers like that?


There were some legs, the nose was medium, and oh what a body! It had the body of a desert wine, and was extremely yummy. With a colour like purple lipstick, this is a wine full of fruit. Plums and Mangoes. Pomegranate and Blackberry. If this wine was a jam, it would be awesome spread upon a scone with or without clotted cream.

The Verdict:

With the discount that I got at purchase time (I joined their wine club) it is highly worth it. This wine is wonderful now, will be superb at Thanksgiving and truly great next year.

Style:	Rhône
Varietals:	Petite Sirah
Appellation/Terrior:	Oakley (San Francisco Bay), California
Vintage:	2005
Vintner:	Rosenblum Cellars
Alcohol:	14.4% by Volume
Price:	$14.69