It was pure pleasure to stroll into The Fine Wine Source in Livonia, Michigan, because for the last couple of weeks, I had basically been seeing my internist, with a side trip to the oral surgeon to have a wisdom tooth removed, and I don’t know how much more wisdom I can afford to lose.  I was picking up the wine club selections as well stocking up on another wine that just tickled our fancy, more of that wine later.  

The first curated selection from The Fine Wine Source and representing the Old World was Quinta do Paral Branco-Blanca Alentejo, Portugal 2019.  Dieter Morszeck, the former president and grandson of the founder of the luxury luggage brand Rimowa. He splits his time between business in Switzerland and the United States and winemaking in Vidigueira, Alentejo, Portugal.  In 2017, he acquired eighty-five hectares of vineyards in Alentejo and started his Quinta do Paral project producing wines and olive oil.  The soil is a mix of fertile clay, granite and slate.  This wine is an equal blend of Antao Vaz, Verdelho, Vermentino and Viognier; which are all forty-years of age.  The grapes are manually selected in whole cluster, then destemmed, pressed and fermented and aged in temperature-controlled Stainless-Steel vats.  The straw-yellow colored wine offers notes of tropical fruits and tangerine zest.  On the palate this medium-bodied, well-balanced wine displays tones of passion fruit, pineapple, green apple and lemons, followed by traces of clove, cinnamon and oak blending with bright acidity and ending with a medium-count finish of fruit and spices.

The Fine Wine Source Club selection for the New World is Gambler’s Ghost Cabernet Sauvignon North Coast 2021, and is part of the portfolio of Precision Wine Company, which was founded by winemaker Trevor Sheehan.  This label produces two wines, a Cabernet Sauvignon and a Sauvignon Blanc.  This wine was listed by Wine Enthusiast as Number 36 of the Top 100 Wines of 2024 Best Buys.  This wine is a blend of eighty percent Cabernet Sauvignon, with fifteen percent Merlot and five percent Petit Verdot and the fruit is from vineyards located in Lake County and Sonoma County.  The wine was aged for ten months in American Oak, of which sixty percent was new.  This deep violet-colored wine offers notes of dark fruits, with hints of coffee, tobacco and black molasses.  On the palate this medium-bodied, well-balanced wine displays tones of black cherry, blackberry, blueberry and plums, followed by vanilla and espresso blending with soft tannins and ending with a medium-count finish of fruit and spices.

I was asked if I was up to trying some new wines, and I had a dinner engagement after, so I said perhaps one, they counter-offered with two.  One was Chateau Haut-Batailley Pauillac 2016, a Fifth Growth Medoc which I will discuss at another time.  The wine that totally captivated me was Clos René Pomerol 2016.  While Clos René is not a chateau in the traditional sense, it is held in the same esteem.  Pomerol is noted for their “blue clay” followed by “crasse de fer” an iron-oxide rich soil.  The “hill of Petrus” is the center of the blue clay, and around that area is the crasse de fer, which is where Clos René is located on.  Clos René is located on the western side of Pomerol and operated by the Garde-Lasserre family, which also controls Chateau Moulinet-Lasserre and Chateau La Mission.  The estate covers twelve hectares of vineyards planted to seventy percent Merlot, twenty percent Cabernet Franc and ten percent Malbec; the vines average about thirty-five years of age, and the mix is basically the normal blend found in each vintage.  The harvesting of the fruit is partially manual, and the Initial Fermentation is done in temperature-controlled cement tanks, followed by eighteen months of maturing in French Oak, of which twenty-five percent is new.  This deep purple colored wine offered notes of red and black fruit, followed by Sous-bois, vanilla and other spices.  On the palate this full-bodied, well-balanced wine displayed tones of black cherry, blackberry and blueberry blending with velvety tannins and ending with a very long count of fruit, terroir and truffles.