The Trader Joe’s Reserve Oak Knoll Zinfandel 2019 is a $9.99 Trader Joe’s exclusive sourced from grapes farmed in the Oak Knoll AVA inside Napa Valley. This is a one-off wine; when it sells out, it is gone for good, so if you like it, buy all you need. Oak Knoll is located in the…
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The Peachy Canyon Lodi Zinfandel 2017 can be found at Trader Joe’s for $7.99. This is a mystery wine since it does not show up on Peachy Canyon’s website or have much of a web presence. Peachy Canyon Winery, founded in 1988, is located in the Paso Robles AVA inside California’s Central Coast AVA. It…
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The Lange Twins Old Vine Zinfandel 2017 is an Estate grown Zinfandel sourced from vineyards in the Lodi AVA of California’s Central Valley. The Lange Twins are identical twins Brad and Randall Lange, their family have farmed in Lodi since the 1870s and first purchased vineyards in 1916. They are the 4th generation farming grapes…
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The Story The Fallen Bridge Lodi Zinfandel 2017 is a $6.99 Trader Joe’s exclusive. That is about all the information available for this Zin. The company that made the wine, Sonoma Bespoke, is a custom private-label winery. They make wines for stores and restaurants across the country. If you are in a 7/11 and see…
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The Story PPE, six-foot social distancing, lockdown, masks, wash your hands every time you touch something, cross the street when you see someone walking towards you, so much for your favorite pub or restaurant, and stand in line to enter the grocery store, the so-called new reality. Well, we have our XLR microphones and our…
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The Story The Parasphere Sonoma Zinfandel 2014 is a $7.99 Trader Joe’s mystery wine. There are several things here that do not add up to an aged Sonoma County Zinfandel for under eight bucks. The first point is obvious, Sonoma Zinfandel at 6 years of age selling for $7.99 does not exist in the wild….
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The Gnarly Head Old Vine Zinfandel 2018 is sourced from vineyards in the Lodi AVA of Northern California. Gnarly Head is one of Delicato Family Vineyard’s portfolio of wines. Click on the link above to see their family of wine. Delicato has been around since 1924, they are the sixth-largest winery in the United State….
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The Story The Ravenswood Vintners Blend Zinfandel 2017 is 76% Zinfandel, 21% Petite Sirah, and 3% Mixed Blacks (mixed blacks is the old school way of saying various Red wine grapes) sourced from more than one California grape growing AVA. That actually is the tech notes for the 2016 vintage, about a year ago the brand…
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The Story The Klinker Brick Old Vine Zinfandel 2016 is sourced from 16 “old vine” vineyards in the Mokelumne delta region of Lodi, California. Klinker Brick is family-owned and they are 5th generation fruit growers and have produced Klinker Brick wines since 2000. You hear about old vines when talking about Zinfandel on a regular basis,…
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The Story The Pure Bred Lodi Old Vine Zinfandel 2017 is a $6.99 Trader Joe’s (maybe exclusive). The reason I say maybe is this wine seems to be a close-out wine of some sort. The listed winery on the back of the label, West Coast Wine Group, Lodi, California, no longer has a website. Their URL,…
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The Story The Federalist Dry Creek Zinfandel 2016 is 98% Zinfandel and 2% Carignane primarily sourced from Orsi vineyards in the southern end of Dry Creek Valley about a mile from the Russian River. The Zinfandel grapes came from 6 separate blocks of the vineyard and were fermented separately. The 6 lots were then blended and…
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The Story The Trader Joe’s Reserve Amador County Zinfandel Lot 185 2016 is a $9.99 Trader Joe’s exclusive. Amador County is 100 miles east of San Francisco, as far north as Napa County, but on the other side of Sacramento in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. This is the California Gold Rush country….
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The Story The Nick Goldschmidt Fidelity Alexander Valley Railroad Estate Zinfandel 2017 is 88% Zinfandel and 12% Petite Sirah sourced from the Railroad Estate vineyard in Alexander Valley, Sonoma, California. Nick Goldschmidt is the head of a vineyard and winemaking family, everyone get involved, including the children. They have vineyards and wineries in New Zealand,…
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The Old Moon Old Vine Zinfandel 2016 is a $5.99 Trader Joe’s exclusive, part of the Trader Moon series of wines produced for TJ’s by a family owned vineyards and winery located in the Lodi AVA, the gnarled vine on the bottom of the front label is a clue to the producer. As with most Trader…
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The Gnarly Head Old Vine Lodi Zinfandel 2016 is sourced from 35 to 80 year old grapevines farmed in vineyards in the Lodi delta region. Gnarly Head is one of the labels from Delicato Family Vineyards, a family owned winery and vineyards founded in 1924, some of their other brands include Both Box, Handcraft, Twisted, and…
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The Rancho Zabaco Sonoma Heritage Vines Dry Creek Zinfandel 2014 is 94% Zinfandel and 6% Petite Sirah sourced from vineyards in the Dry Creek Valley AVA inside the Sonoma County AVA of Northern California. Many of you may remember Rancho Zabaco for their Dancing Bull line of wines (mainly Zinfandel), E & J Gallo split Rancho…
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The Artezin Mendocino County Zinfandel 2016 is 84% Zinfandel, 14% Petite Sirah, and 2% Carignan sourced from well-respected old vine family owned vineyards in the warmer Ukiah Valley section of Mendocino County. Mendocino is north of Sonoma and much of the growing area is under the cooling influence of the Pacific Ocean which is great for a grape…
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The Cline Old Vines Lodi Zinfandel 2015 is sourced from 70 to 50 year old vines in vineyards along the Mokelumne River in the delta section of the Lodi AVA in California’s Central Coast AVA. Lodi is south and east of Napa Valley. Cline is a family owned operation, founded in the early 1980s, with properties…
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The Scarlet Path Lodi Zinfandel 2014 is a $7.99 ALDI exclusive. Lodi is south and east of Napa County with most of the vineyards planted in the Delta region which is a series of river valleys coming from the San Francisco Bay and ending at the Sierra Nevada foothills. This area is 100 miles inland and…
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The Crimson Roots Old Vines Zinfandel 2013 is a $9.99 ALDI exclusive sourced from grapes grown in the Dry Creek Valley AVA of Sonoma County in Northern California ALDI is very good at hiding the actual producer of the wines they sell and rarely provide technical notes, so that I will come up with my own. Why are…
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The Into Zin Zinfandel 2012 is a blend of Zinfandel, Cabernet Sauvignon and Petite Sirah (remember for a wine to be labeled as a single varietal, that grape must count for at least 75% of the blend) grown in Oak Ridge Winery estate vineyards in Lodi, California. Oak Ridge Winery is the oldest operating winery in Lodi…
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The Trader Joe’s Petit Reserve Paso Robles Zinfandel 2013 is a $7.99 Trader Joe’s exclusive sourced from 3 sections of a single vineyard in Paso Robles, California. A different Zinfandel clone was grown in each section, so this Zin is a blend of three Zinfandel variants. The back label says this wine was “vinted and…
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The Coppola Director’s Cut Dry Creek Valley Zinfandel 2012 is 80% Zinfandel and 20% Petite Sirah sourced from vineyards with 40 to 80 year vines located in the Dry Creek Valley AVA inside Sonoma County in Northern California. Dry Creek Valley is 20 miles from the Pacific Ocean which gives the region cool evenings and…
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The OZV Lodi ZInfandel 2012, OZV stands for Old ZInfandel Vines, is 96% Zinfandel and 4% Petite Sirah sourced from 50 to 120 year old ZInfandel vines located in the Lodi AVA, east and a little south of Napa. The OZV Zinfandel is produced by Oak Ridge Winery, started in 1934 as a wine co-op and…
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The Renwood Amador County Old Vine Zinfandel 2011 is 90% Zinfandel, 5% Primitivo (an Italian twin of the Zinfandel grape), 3% Syrah and 2% Barbera sourced from Renwood Estate vineyards and other old vine vineyards in Amador County. Amador County is located east of the Lodi AVA in the Shenandoah Valley of Northern California. Amador…
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