The Bear from France

Ok, the winter break is over.  Back to work... and, more importantly, wine!

Tonight's wine is from France, specifically from Minervois.  We got this in a relatively new restaurant/wine bar in Glendale called Palate.  They have a wonderful tapas menu with some great wines. Great food and an excellent wine list with a broad range of types and prices.  Only complaints would be smaller portions than I'd like for the prices, and an odd decor.  After dinner, we wandered into the wine shop/wine bar in the back which is a whole different world where they sell many of the wines on their menu.  Next time, I'd like to spend all our time back there.

Anyhow, one of the wines we got from the wine shop was a 2006 Luc Lapeyre Minervois called "L'Amourier", a blend of Syrah, Grenache, and Mourvedre.  Couldn't find any info about the blend percentages on the web.  According to Silverlake Wines, the wine maker is called "The Bear."  Apparently, Luc "The Bear" Lapeyre lives and makes wine in Minervois, a small appelation in the Languedoc region of France.  As I write this, the palate website is down so I don't recall how much I paid, but at Silverlake, they list it at $16.50 - That sounds about right.

Our overall impression was... ok.  Very soft wine.  Not a big, smack you in the mouth blend.  It was much better with food, as is the norm with french wines.  It had a mild version of the earthy syrah funk which I've noticed in hot weather syrahs.  Soft tannin, silky, medium length.  Nothing wrong with it but didn't excite us.

Happy New Year to y'all!  I promise to drink and post more now that the holidays are over.