Cabernet Franc is best known as a blending grape in Bordeaux blends. While Cabernet Franc on its own is underrated to me, my husband is of the opposite opinion - he does not much care for it - too much cigar flavor for a wine. There is a fabulous South African wine, Ondine, that tastes like someone soaked grapes in leather and tobacco. I love it and well, let's say, he does not exactly care for it. The general American palate must agree with him, which must be why we have a tough time finding a wide variety in our local shops. Nevertheless, we were undaunted and gathered a few friends together to taste a small selection. We tasted 6 wines - 4 from France, 1 from Chile, and 1 from California. We had two of the same wine and, since we did a blind tasting, it was fun to find that they tasted different. We suspect it was mostly due to the temperature difference between them. The French ones were restrained and took some time to open up and we thought they were better with food than by themselves. Coming out on top for many of us was Soda Rock from Alexander Valley. I was pleased, as we had brought back this wine from our recent trip to Sonoma County, California, where we try to visit a wide variety of wineries, but never miss the great wines from the Wilson family wineries. The Wilson wineries have two outstanding winemakers (and 8 boutique wineries) that completely fit my palate, whether it's their Pinot Noirs from the Matrix winery or the Zinfandels from the Mazzocco winery, to the Cabernets from Soda Rock. While you can't buy these wines in our state stores, wine can finally be shipped to our state!
