Halloween Party Wines!

We all went to a Halloween party hosted by the people I babysit for and had a fantastic time! There were costumes, lots of snacks, pumpkin carving, ghost stories, etc. There were a bunch of kids there (ours included) but it was also very relaxing and chill for the adults. They really decorated their house well and like I said, there were TONS of snacks, which in my opinion, makes for a good party! We were offered drinks, so of course I went straight to the wine. I was the driver, so only had 2 smaller glasses.

My first was...

This was a J. Lohr Cabernet and was just ok. Pretty standard cab. However, my second wine was fantastic.

I have never heard of Hamilton Estates, but this merlot was top notch. I just wrote about how that Cameron Hughes merlot didn't wow me, but this wine was so packed with flavors! Fruity, tannic, possibly herby and chocolaty. So much going on! Like I said, I was the driver so I had to take it easy, but if I see this wine around, I may just have to pick up a bottle and investigate it further.

Wine and Cheese Party

I was invited to a wine and cheese party held by someone at my school and my first thought was "what wine should I bring???". After much deliberation, I decided I should bring our Chisholm Trail Blanc du Bois because its so delicious, but then selfishly, Stephen and I thought we should maybe keep that one. :/ We won't be drinking our own wine when there are so many options there, so we decided to bring one we wouldn't miss too much lol. We had no idea what kind of party this was going to be! We ended up bringing one of the last Cameron Hughes wines, the chardonnay.

There were a lot of people, and I want to say maybe 20 - 30 bottles of wine there and I wanted to try them all! There were a few repeats and definitely some everyday wines, but some really stood out. We poured maybe 1/4 glasses so we could taste lots. Here were some of the favorites of the night...

All of those were really good! Near the end of the party there was a lot of wine left so we just started our own tasting party. We poured about a sip of each of the wines that were still open and didn't find much we liked. We talked with a few other people about what they liked and it turns out the best wine of the night went pretty fast right at the beginning. Now I know I'm in the company of some serious wine drinkers, and will have to contribute accordingly next year!

The main focus of the night for me was on the wine (and chatting!) but there were definitely some great cheeses too. The theme seemed to be lots of softer cheeses, and I had the chance to probably try 4 or 5 brie looking cheeses of varying deliciousness. MAN I just love wine and cheese tastings like that. A fun time was definitely had!

Cameron Hughes Lot 169 - Merlot

This wine was so hyped up when I got it. We found it at Costco and the lady there said it was a prize winning merlot and was super delicious. We actually ended up getting 2 on separate occasions, not realizing it was the same wine lol. It's from the Napa Valley, which I recently visited, so I was interested to try it. We took it home and had it a few weeks later, and thought it was pretty good. Not super spectacular, but a solid wine. To me though, merlots don't have a distinctive flavor, they sort of just taste like a generic red wine so maybe that's why I wasn't particularly blown away. I think this was around $10.

Messina Hof Port

I wasn't such a fan of the other Messina Hof Port we tried a little while ago, but this one is GREAT! I don't know if it's a different year or what, but this one was actually quite delicious, while the other was almost undrinkable. Yay for Messina Hof redeeming themselves! :)