Wine: Club W Shipment - Brethren Syrah and Oliver Row Cabernet Franc

I must say that I am pretty disappointed with these two wines, which is why they are sharing a blog post instead of getting a singular one for each.

I will say the the Brethren of the Road Syrah was ridiculously disappointing and possibly the worst red I have had in a long time if not ever. It's initial palate and aftertaste was an alcohol fumed red - dry and akin to rubbing alcohol. As I said before I was not impressed. The Hubs, who loves Syrahs, spit his back into his cup and blankly told me he would not drink it.

Club W Describes this wine as "Berry Tart". I disagree. "Berry Tart" would have provided a flavor notes at the very least.

The Cabernet Franc was marginally better.  If anything it was unimpressive in the sense that it was similar to a table red - a 5$  table red, so this would be over priced at 13$ a bottle. There were no tasting notes that struck my palate - this is something I look for in every wine I drink and is part of my wine consumption experience.

There were no notes that struck my palate or made this wine remarkable in any sense. It's quite disappointing to have one wine, out of the three, be a worthy wine (see Cosmopolitan Sauvignon Blanc).

I have one more Club W Shipment coming in a few days and I am hoping that this one is more impressive (mostly because their newsletter caught my eye with an illusive Cinsault - not a varietal massively produced here in the US).

Believe me, I will let you know. But at this rate I think it's more important to support wineries directly. Go wine tasting. Find a winery you like and sign up for the wine club. Tasting wines before you buy them is a safer way to guarantee you will enjoy the wine experience.

Wine Clubs: Club W

Over the summer, I vaguely remember reading about Club W. It wasn't until I saw an add in my Facebook feed that I thought "I need to try this".

Club W offers a wine club experience that is not exclusive to one winery. They select wines for you based off of a quiz you take when you sign up. It's personalized to your palate. Pretty cool right? It is.  Their website is pretty slick too, streamlined for ease of navigation and includes a fabulous stockpile of recipes for pairing with the wines. 

I got my first shipment last week. First shipments are discounted, you just pay for shipping and sales tax. So for a total of $28.85 after shipping ($6.00) and tax ($3.85), and a $20.00 discount. I would definitely recommend having it delivered to your place of work if you live in a small town. Since it is alcohol, signature's are obviously required at time of delivery. They shipped this shipment via Fedex (not sure if they consistently do that), which can be a pain if you live in a small town  that doesn't have a Fedex and the closest one is 40 miles away.#smalltownproblems. 

 Anyway, shipping was pretty quick. I am just letting my wines rest a week. I am a firm believing that travel makes the wine disturbed and resting it will allow it to settle, and the flavors to recover from shock.

I am, however, very excited to try these wines:

2012 Oliver Row Cabernet Franc - Columbia Valley WA

2012 Brethren of the Road Syrah - Mendocino CA

2012 Cosmopolitan Sauvignon Blanc - United States (literally, that's what it says for origin).

Keep an eye out for updates!