Someone recently asked me what a barrel sample is. When you go to a winery, sometimes they will offer a taste of the wine while it’s aging in the barrel. Yes, the wine is going to taste very young, so you shouldn’t judge that as the final wine, but rather as its potential. By the time it makes it into the bottle, it’s going to change significantly. Not to mention the fact that, if the wine in the bottle was cabernet sauvingnon, they may add some cab franc to it.

Bev Mo Cellarmaster and wine whiz Wilfred Wong was kind enough to shoot me an email on his way to France, where he will spend weeks sampling new vintages. I’ll post his correspondences here. If you have any questions for him, send them my way and I’ll pass them on to him.

(Thursday, March 30, 2006, over the Atlantic Ocean)
Hi Jessica,

I should be sleeping now while on this jumbo 747 with over
400 people on it as we fly over the Atlantic. Embarking on another journey to Bordeaux to taste the new wines out of barrel (this year marks my 11th consecutive year). The plan is to taste over 400 wines from the highly touted 2005 Bordeaux vintage. The wine world has already been buzzing for months on how well all the red grapes ripened in the entire region.
Only a day away from tasting what could be the vintage of a
lifetime.
Cheers,
Wilfred