Heitz Cellars Ink Grade Vineyard Zinfandel 2013

When I passed the Society of Wine Educators Certified Specialist of Wine exam, my parents promised me they'd take me out to celebrate to wherever I wanted to go. This was my second time taking the exam (I'd failed by two damn points the first time, which was super annoying) and earlier in the day I'd seen that 20nine, a wine bar in town, was hosting an event featuring Heitz Cellars Wines. I'm constantly paranoid about jinxing myself so I hadn't mentioned it before I went in for the exam, but I thought it was an amazing coincidence that one of my favorite Napa Valley producer's wines were being featured the day I was determined to pass the CSW.

Immediately after I got my results back that day telling me I'd passed the exam I called my parents and told them we were going to this event. The wines being poured were Heitz's Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay, Zinfandel, Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon and the Trailside Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon and they were all just as delicious as I remembered their wines being.

It was a nice surprise to go back there this past week and find the Zinfandel still on their list, since it's usually by far my favorite and the most reasonably priced (for my purposes) of their reds (retails for usually under $30).

It's not a typical California Zinfandel, which tend to be very full-bodied and bursting with jammy fruit notes. The Heitz "Ink Grade Vineyard" Zinfandel displays a bit more finesse and elegance. It's medium-bodied with dark fruit notes of black cherry, raspberry and a bit of plum. It spends two years in French Oak barrels and you definitely pick up a bit of the vanilla and baking spices usually accompanied by that particular oak aging on the palate as well. It's a very well-balanced wine with smooth tannins and a medium acidity that give it a lingering finish. I absolutely love this wine and was happy to finally get a chance to write about it!

Empire Estate Dry Riesling 2016

Since getting into wine I've had several different jobs in the industry, some were definitely better than others, but even the terrible ones had their bright moments. Working for Whole Foods definitely falls under the category of terrible, honestly it might have been one of the worst companies I ever worked for, but those three years did have some good moments. Like how much freedom they gave their wine buyers to bring in pretty much whatever the hell we wanted. For a while the locations that Kye and I worked in San Antonio had a pretty amazing selection of both typical and eclectic wines and we were actually pretty damn decent at selling them. These days they definitely don't give the buyers as much freedom or support, but I'm still able to find some random gems on the shelves.

Empire Estate Dry Riesling 2016 is definitely one of those gems. I'm a girl who likes her Rieslings and this one I was most impressed with. It comes from the Finger Lakes region in New York and has a light gold color with notes of ginger, lemon zest and green apple on the nose. The citrus flavors carried over to the palate, joined by white peach, honeysuckle, limestone and powerful (but enjoyable) acidity. While this was a dry wine, the fruit notes balanced it out nicely making it one that even sweet wine lovers might enjoy.