We love wine so much that we went to Wine School at the local winery where for about 4 years we made our own at the winery.. ( www.grapeexpectationsnj.com) Everything from selecting the grapes, crushing, punching, learning about PHs and yeast types, straining, racking,bottling, barrel selection and most importantly tasting We have about 25 cases of all kinds as a result!
We "specialized" in red wines-- my favorites are blends like
Meritages - cab/merlot/cab franc - claret/ Bordeauxs
Cab/Merlots
My "love" is Chateuneuf du pape a complex wine of about 5 different grapes
and Triovinos of Barberra, Sangeovese, and Treibbiano .. oh and a nice Chile Malbec blend.

We give away alot of it for holiday gifts, etc.. at first folks are a little leery of it thinking it's made in a basement and taste like white lightning -- they dont believe its home made hooch after trying it.

Schatzi, that's awesome!!! You are amazing!

I had some wonderful homemade zinfandel (not white...it was dark red and yummy! ) this past weekend at our retreat. One of the women brought several bottles of wine that her husband makes. Really good!

Thanks for the ideas...I've had good success trying different mixes of wines. There's a wine here called "Eclipse" made by Heron Hill Winery (a local winery). They have a white and a red, and both are mixes of three different kinds of grapes. The bottles are gorgeous, too...the red wine one is a black bottle with light yellow/white stars and a crescent moon.

Oooh, I learned something new by reading a wine article in Cooking Light!

Shiraz only shows up in Australia because that's the Australian name for Syrah! Same wine, different name. It's called Syrah everywhere else, apparently.

Anyone found any great wines recently?

I am new here so I cant wait for phase 2!!! Started Sunday, so far so good. I do love wine and some of my favs are red: merlot and shiraz-white: pinot grigio and chardonnay- I like vineyards from Australia, very good and inexpensive, i.e.- "Alice White" is a good label.

Samra1962. Wine is one of the great treasures of life. I like Australian wines too although we now produce very good wines here in Ontario. I don't know if we export much to the USA but Pelee Wineries and any of the Niagara ones are excellent.

The other day I had an inexpensive red by Jacob's Creek. It's a Grenache Shiraz blend. It was really good and about $8-$9. I'll definitely buy it again.

oooh, we had a Da Vinci Chianti last night... This one is a straight Sagiovese .. I was looking for a Chianti we had at an Italian restaurant the other week... It was DaVinci brand, but had Merlot-Syrah grapes in addition to Sangiovese... but this one was excellent! Not a real heavy bodied one, and very smooth... it was $12.

Great thread!

I'm a wine lover too, and like Samra1962 I'm patiently awaiting Phase 2!

My favorite reds:
Pinot Noir (Mark West makes a great, affordable Pinot - around $10/bottle)
Zinfandel (Ravenswood makes a great one)
Cabernet Sauvignon
I also love Red Truck - it's a blend of several different reds - I think the label reads "California Table Wine"...

My favorite whites:
Pinot Gris (particularly Adelsheim Winery)
Sancerre
Orvieto (super, super light)

Yum... now I'm thirsty!

I'm very tempted. I may have to buy a bottle of Lambrusco before the end of the week, because I had one Sunday at the Olive Garden (hush. I know.) and it was soooooooooooo good. If I'm going Ph1 next week, I can't have any alcohol at all. STOP TALKING ABOUT WINE.

I'm not a South Beach Dieter, but I do enjoy wine so I hope you don't mind me posting.

For reds, I like Chianti; one of my favorites is "Castiglioni" Frescobaldi 2002

For whites, I enjoy Reisling, especially on a hot day. Evolution is a blend that is very similar to Reisling, but it's pretty light and not too much like a desert wine.

I rented a video not too long ago, John Cleese's Wine for the Confused that I felt was informative and entertaining for the beginner as well as the seasoned sommelier. There's a part where a bunch of people have to try to differentiate between different wines from a wide price range (I think it ranged from $10 to the hundreds of dollars) and try to guess which wines were cheaper or more expensive judging only by taste. It was interesting to see the results.

Chubby! Yes that movie was as educational as amusing! I agree, a nice light crisp white on those hot days is delish.. I like California Blancs ... a nice blend of French Columbard, Chenin Blanc & Muscat ... I'm not much of a sweet wine /dessert drinker.. I've yet to find a Suaterne or a Port that I like ... Maybe I'll try "evolution"...is that a label for a Reisling?

I'm with Schatzi, I can't stand sweet wines now. It's weird that just at christmas I was drinking strawberry Arbor Mist ! Now I can't even stomach a white merlot. But from what I've read most wine drinkers start cold, sweet, and cheap and then their palates adjust and prefer the real stuff. Now I like red and dry....but still cheap ! I got a subscription to Winespectator.com and they have so many good value wines that score higher or as good as the expensive wines. The most I've ever spent on wine is about $20 but usually its $10-$15. There are plenty of decent wines at that price. Can't wait for my redo of P1 to be over!!

I love Merlot, then Sauv Blanc, then a really good buttery Chard, and lots of others too. Okay, so I love good wine. I stick pretty much with the locals as Oregon is doing some really good wines now and so is Washington. My favorite Merlot is Russell Creek out of Walla Walla, Wa, a bit spendy but worth every penny. I still have a week to go before I cork anything for me. I will just have to live vicariously through my customers for another week.

Oooh, Red Truck is definitely good.

If you like Rieslings, let me put in a recommendation for Finger Lakes (NY) Rieslings...they are among the best in the world. Dr. Frank's Riesling is quite good, as is the one from Hazlitt 1864.

We tried Smoking Loon's Merlot two nights ago. It was really good and fairly inexpensive.

I still like white wine, but I've really grown to love red, which I never did before. Sheesh...before SBD, I would have gladly had ice wine with dinner! The sweeter the better... now I have a much broader idea of what good wine tastes like.

Thanks for the great recommends, chicas!