French Cab Franc

We have been wanting to par-take in a WBW event for sometime, but never have had the chance. Not only is this our first one; but, it is also about an area we love - French Wines. Gary, from the Wine Library is our host for this event - thanks for picking a great region! We are not sure how to really write about a wine as we usually just drink a lot of it and write about food, so we decided to break it up with each of our comments!

We chose a 2005 Cuvee de la Chevalaerie Bourgueil at the price of $16.00

We opened the bottle and let it sit for about 15 minutes, to "breath". I did take a sip after opening, mind you, only a baby sip. It was hard on the palette - lots of rough tannins and a strong alcohol scent.

15 minutes of breathing ....... I thought the color was a rich ruby and the first smell was earthy almost that of wet dirt. The Tannins were still pretty strong and the alcohol scent was still there. L. (who loves to drink all wine, but really does not know much about them) also thought it was a bit tannic and rather light. He did taste some berries and thought the bouquet was wonderful and well as the powerful color.

30 minutes of breathing ....... I thought the smell was not as intense but still somewhat earthy/mossy. I was getting a bit of a plum scent as well, rather jammy actually as well as a bit of spice, maybe pepper. L. still tasted the tannins and felt the smell was not as pungent and he did taste some earth at this point.

1 hour of breathing and time for dinner..... I thought the wine had really softened up and you could really taste the fruit (berries/plums) as well as a bit of spice that was somewhat green, maybe a bit of a bell pepper. L. thought we should just eat dinner and enjoy the wine!

Overall, we both loved the wine, it really softened up and had lots of flavor, a rather complex wine by changing so much during the evening. We gave it a 3 wine glass rating (out of five)and would definitely drink it again. I feel that it would be a good wine to cellar and try in one year and again in two years - I see it really developing even more.