Kenwood Vintage White Wine 2005 and Chateau Grande Cassagne 2006 "G.S." Costieres de Nimes - My Good Cheap Wines of the Week

First, happy holidays to you all, I hope the turkey was tender, the ham was healthy , and the sweet potato pie was plentiful. Now that we gotten the pleasantries out of the way, I must apologize for neglecting you last week, you know how the holidays get. To make up for my neglect last week, I will feature two wines that I drank over the holidays. Let me introduce you first to the Kenwood Vintage White Wine 2005 (You can find this wine for under 9 dollars). There are two ways to enjoy the Kenwood, you can either invest in a block of sharp or smelly cheese, or if you are not a cheese fan, buy a big peach, take a bite of either, and sip the wine, this will give you an understanding of its characteristics. I know plenty of you reading will probably skip this part, but, I like to smell a new lady before I partake of her, and the same thing is true with my wine. When I smell 2005 Kenwood, the nose holds a round, fruity smell, submerged in lemon peels, nectarines, and a hint of grass. Now that I've taken a chance to breathe her in, my taste buds obviously need to be satisfied. For the price point, this Kenwood 2005 is a gem, the taste is round, with a well balanced medium finish. The Kenwood hits you with a strong mid palate engulfed in citrus light grapefruit and lasting hint of sweetness throughout it's finish. For guys into wine, this is a great date wine for a woman, you may be seeing who you have introduced to wine and is growing pass the muscats, late harvest rieslings, and other dessert wines. This Kenwood is a must for a person just getting into white wines and want to broaden their horizons with a fruit forward wine.

Now it's time to go from the light to the dark side of the force. Sorry, ignore the reference to Star Wars, please, ignore that, I'm a guy, that stuff will come out every once in while. To get to the point, the Chateau Grande Cassagne 2006 "G.S"(online retail price at about 8.99). Costieres de Nimes is a good reflection of a classic french wine. Just like with most old school wines from France, the fruit is apparent but it's all about the complexity, and this wine follows suit. Although upon the nose of the wine you catch dark currants mixed with hints of vanilla, there are also light fragrances of top soil and vegetation. What overpowers the nose is the arrays of ripe fruit, and this is apparent when tasting the wine, and you definitely can tell the balance between grenache and syrah, with bright cherry and rasberry. The G.S. also holds within it's core a great mid palette which does a decent job of lasting into the finish, although a bit dry and tannicky, after a few years of maturation, just like with most old world wines, could be very good. I'm always about expanding you palette, and I believe that these wine have the ability to do so, so enjoy both bottles and let me know what you think, post anything.