I know Essensia.... a lovely dessert wine but mixed half with a lower end Champaign it makes a wonderful aperitif!

Since these are sweet wines, want to confirm - are these 750 or 375 ml?

EDIT: Sorry, already asked!

geraghms wrote:Since these are sweet wines, want to confirm - are these 750 or 375 ml?

Already asked and answered. They are 750ml.

wordek wrote:It's your woot Birthday - each year in the month that you joined (for you, December)you should get an email to your account address including info to get free shipping for one order anytime during that month.

I'm going to add to this - I just learned from Woot Service that your Woot Birthday is actually the month when you placed your first order vs. the month that you joined. So look for an email with the details then:-) Mine isn't until next month but I think I'm still ordering this today - hoping maybe the winery will take a break from Black Friday shopping to pop into the forum and say 'hi' as well?

wordek wrote:I'm going to add to this - I just learned from Woot Service that your Woot Birthday is actually the month when you placed your first order vs. the month that you joined. So look for an email with the details then:-) Mine isn't until next month but I think I'm still ordering this today - hoping maybe the winery will take a break from Black Friday shopping to pop into the forum and say 'hi' as well?

They did, briefly on the Plymouth ftw! - look for a post from mrsweet

EDIT: f i r s t p a g e = Plymouth ftw? haha

Essensia lives forever:

Most people drink Essensia before it is a few years old. As it ages, there is a dramatic evolution. It darkens more quickly than other sweet whites. This happens because we make it with skin contact (nearly all other white wines are made with only the free-run juice). Skin contact gives us all the flavors which the orange muscat grape has to give. There are flavors in the skin and in the pulp areas next to the skin which skin contact brings to the party. Included are compounds which change from a colorless to colored forms over time. The 1981 vintage Essensia mentioned would today have an amber coloration. What does an old Essensia taste like? Its sort of like Old Maderia and Orange Marmalade. Not the super sweet marmalade but the darker colored sort of bitter type. In fact, the tannins are a little more pronounced in aged Essensia which for some reason it tastes less sweet than a young one, hence the Madeira comparison

A few years ago, Michael Broadbent, the wine director for Christies, commented (in Decanter?) about the 1982 Essensia which we furnished to a wine tasting as an example of an aged California wine. It was his favorite. He likes old wines.

Some other interesting facts about Orange Muscat.

It is now belived that the Orange Muscat (Moscato Fior d'Arancio in Italy or Muscat Flore d'Orangier in France) is a cross between the Muscat Blanc and Chasselas.

It seems also to be related to the Moscato Giallo variety which grows in the Alto Adige part of Italy.

It has the highest levels of phenolics found in any white grape variety.

Andrew

So for some Black Friday price comparison...looks like the winery doesn't sell direct through their site but pricing things out through other sites you are looking at about $21-$24 per bottle before shipping. If you estimate $100 to buy/ship the whole lot you can compare to $55 here and figure out the deal you are getting;-)

With that I am sold on this - in for one!

Correction !!

The French name is Muscat Flore d'Orangier ! not "fior d'arancio"

I remember back in the 1980s at the Westwood Marquis hotel in Los Angeles, they were serving Essensia mixed with Veuve Cliquot Champagne. They called it: "Champensia"

Andrew Quady

About the Black Muscat

The variety is synonymous with Muscat Hamburg a cross between the Black Hamburg and Muscat of Alexandria varieties. Although some references say this cross was done in Germany, my viticulture professor at UC Davis, Harold Olmo, said it came from England. In the mid 1800s Conservatories and Oranageries were all the rage among the wealthy and there was an especial interest in table grapes. Muscat of Alexandria is a large berried Muscat but there were no large berried black skinned muscats. A grape breeder crossed the common Black Hamburg variety with Muscat of Alexandria to satisfy this demand. This is one of the most successful (in creating a new variety)crosses ever. Most grape breeders spend a lifetime making experimental crosses without ever coming up with anything as special as the Muscat Hamburg.

Andrew Quady

You are welcome and thank you for the opportunity to introduce our wines to the Wooter community

Andrew

mrsweet wrote:Essensia lives forever:

Most people drink Essensia before it is a few years old. As it ages, there is a dramatic evolution. It darkens more quickly than other sweet whites. This happens because we make it with skin contact (nearly all other white wines are made with only the free-run juice). Skin contact gives us all the flavors which the orange muscat grape has to give. There are flavors in the skin and in the pulp areas next to the skin which skin contact brings to the party. Included are compounds which change from a colorless to colored forms over time. The 1981 vintage Essensia mentioned would today have an amber coloration. What does an old Essensia taste like? Its sort of like Old Maderia and Orange Marmalade. Not the super sweet marmalade but the darker colored sort of bitter type. In fact, the tannins are a little more pronounced in aged Essensia which for some reason it tastes less sweet than a young one, hence the Madeira comparison

A few years ago, Michael Broadbent, the wine director for Christies, commented (in Decanter?) about the 1982 Essensia which we furnished to a wine tasting as an example of an aged California wine. It was his favorite. He likes old wines.

Some other interesting facts about Orange Muscat.

It is now belived that the Orange Muscat (Moscato d'Arancio in Italy or Muscat fior d'aracio in France) is a cross between the Muscat Blanc and Chasselas.

It seems also to be related to the Moscato Giallo variety which grows in the Alto Adige part of Italy.

It has the highest levels of phenolics found in any white grape variety.

Andrew

Exactly. I'm no Michael Broadbent, but I do appreciate mature wine. I think it may have to do with having had mature dessert wines (1920 was such a good year for Port!) as well as mature Bordeaux ('28s and '29s) and mature Cabernet Sauvignon ('35, '41) as well as younger wines when I was learning to drink wine in the late 1950s with my grandfather and oenologist great uncles and their owner/oenologist friends.

I was a huge fan of your Zinfandel ports, and was a bit sorry when you stopped making them in favor of the traditional port varietals.

Your work is among the most important in California dessert wine over the past 40 years. I think it's wonderful some of your wines are available on wine.woot for what I think is the first time.

Cheers!

wordek wrote:So for some Black Friday price comparison...looks like the winery doesn't sell direct through their site but pricing things out through other sites you are looking at about $21-$24 per bottle before shipping. If you estimate $100 to buy/ship the whole lot you can compare to $55 here and figure out the deal you are getting;-)

With that I am sold on this - in for one!

I think the Quady winery does actually sell directly through their website.

http://www.quadywinery.com/purchase.html

But your ballpark estimate of aprox $100 is about right.

Let's get some Vya vermouth included in this Woot deal!

wordek wrote:So for some Black Friday price comparison...looks like the winery doesn't sell direct through their site but pricing things out through other sites you are looking at about $21-$24 per bottle before shipping. If you estimate $100 to buy/ship the whole lot you can compare to $55 here and figure out the deal you are getting;-)

With that I am sold on this - in for one!

Just got on -- would have offered you a more local wootleg, but, perhaps with the holidays you'll be in NH soon anyway.

I think I'll be ordering some for myself anyway, wife and both daughters like the desert/sweet wines and the cocktail with the champagne sounded good. We have a Xmas tradition of doing Pousse Rapiers (sp?) which is probably similar.

Flybranda wrote:Just got on -- would have offered you a more local wootleg, but, perhaps with the holidays you'll be in NH soon anyway.

I think I'll be ordering some for myself anyway, wife and both daughters like the desert/sweet wines and the cocktail with the champagne sounded good. We have a Xmas tradition of doing Pousse Rapiers (sp?) which is probably similar.

Yeah NH works with me heading up there for the Holidays in a few weeks - thanks for the offer though!:-)

I almost passed right by this unknown (to me) variety pack, but after seeing RPM's glowing endorsement, I had to do it, in for two!

Thanks for the endorsement RPM, and Happy Thanksgiving to all

NOOOOOOOO!

I was all set to buy two, until I realized they can't ship to Tennessee. I've enjoyed the Electra and Essensia and was really looking forward to the other two. Oh well, I guess I just have to be sad.

I thought Maryland was finally cool about shipping wine now, but it's not on the list today! :'(

mia137 wrote:Wait!! BIRTHDAY COUPON?? I LOVE birthday treats and my birthday is next month! I've been buying for years and never got a birthday coupon. Hmmmmm....

Woot Birthday coupon


You must be signed up to receive the newsletter to receive the B coupon or e-mail address at the bottom of above page. That box has a habit of unchecking itself so check before you B month.

Some other Quady Wines

To find out more about our other wines, please visit www.quadywinery.com. We do some special things like Vya Vermouth and Deviation.

Here is a link to a Utube video on Deviation:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2ljqsEXAhQ&feature=youtu.be

Andrew

Want to try Deviation ? Vya Vermouth ? Vintage Starboard ?

Order direct from www.quadywinery.com.

Visit:
http://www.quadywinery.com/purchase.html

Andrew

Oh how I love Essensia and Electra! this has got to be the BEST wine.woot ever! One or two, one or two...

Will we see any champagne/sparkling wine anytime soon?

I bought wine from the Quady website early this fall and joined the wine club. I was very happy to see they were on wine.woot today! Always willing to pick up a few more bottles at a good price.

mrsweet wrote:Want to try Deviation ? Vya Vermouth ? Vintage Starboard ?

Order direct from www.quadywinery.com.

Visit:
http://www.quadywinery.com/purchase.html

Andrew

Indeed, thanks for being here, and with rpm's and others endorsements...
In for two on the woot offer.
Any chance we could get some "woot" pricing on other items and concurrent shipment?

rpm wrote:Quite the coup for WineDavid39 and wine woot! What a Black Friday treat and surprise!!

The Essencia lives forever (I still have some 1981 in the cellar...) and is a beautiful wine!

All of their wines are fabulous. Through the 1979 vintage, Quady made a truly remarkable, extremely long-lived Zinfandel port, the best ever in California IMHO, and I tried every Zin port I could get my hands on back in the '70s and early '80s. Again, I still have some of the '79 Quady in my cellar, to be used on the same sorts of occasions I'll use my '70 and '77 Ports.

If you like dessert wine at all, or think you might, this is an (increasingly rare with all the offerings...) rpm MUST BUY.

Done, for 3! I hate most american sweet wines for being sickly sweet, but if you like it, it will have the required quality. I wasn't going to look again, but your definitive knowledge here, along with the huuuge .9 TA makes for this to be a delight in store!

Incidentally, the Orange Muscat variety compose at least one of the offerings from Temecula's Bella Vista winery, which since 2004 or so is now run by a delightfully idiosyncratic Hungarian couple who are uch more experimental than most American winemakers, (late harvest Cab Sauvignon anyone? or LH Petite Sirah!!!) and realise the SoCal climate, even high up, needs something more than just Cab / Chard. I reviewed the trip here in the forums, ad there's a large set of notes on the Bella Vista. Their Muscat Canelli based wines were even better.

And finally, I had a Muscat de Rivesaltes last night, for the first time in probably 20 years. Amazing stuff too, and yes, I was young when I last had it. Its primary flavour on the palate is of pears. Sweet, but with a fine, acrid acidity and mid-palate which, come to think of it after reading the Quady description, could be described as quite phenolic. I'm thinking it might therefore use the Orange Muscat grape. Worth looking for if you like fine balanced dessert wines. Made by a few chateaux near Rivesaltes, it's worth a pop for those for whom, say a Muscat de Beaumes de Venise is just too much!.

Incidentally, Rivesaltes is a French town twinned with Clitheroe, Lancashire, the principal town in the Borough of Ribble Valley where my mother was mayor in the late Thatcher years and in which rural district I grew up, back in the 80s. Hobbits can on occasion be spotted by those who know where to look.

mrsweet wrote:The acidity is fairly high in Essensia, Elysium, and Electra, about 0.9 grams per 100 mls measured as tartaric acid. Our philosophy is the same one that mother nature uses when she makes fruit taste good. Balance sweet with fruit acidity.

Andrew

Just what I love, and huuuge acidity. how do you manage to get that on the vine?!! Is it the variety, or the weather that helps keep high sugar AND high acid?

I look forward to a nice mouthwatering long honeyed ending to some of these... like good South African late harvest Rieslings in balance. Incidentally, If you can find a bottle (I'm on my last one, possibly the last in the world, though I hope not), the noble late harvest Fleur du Cap is to my mind even better than Neethlingshof or Robertson's of that ilk, in case you ever get some from that way. Sadly more recent vintages are now predominantly chenin blanc late harvest, and while I'm sure it's good...

Anyway, I digress. Thank you again. I often despise Californian attempts at sweeter wines, which tend towards confectionary rather than artful grapework. Given rpm's endorsement,and that his palate is slightly mroe austere than mine, but mostly congruent, I fear not one iota for this selection.


and, related, to [b]rjquillin[/ub]
I'm not sure if rpm bought any of the Vinito del Finito, but having had my first bottle of it - and loving it hugely- it's of rpm's quality. He generally likes his wines to be more austere, but in sweet wines is a sucker for LHZ; while the VdF is the most delightfully blackcurranty sweet wine I've ever had, but it has a nice if not overly huge acidity, and some phenolic heft to it to balance it out, and I'd recommend it to him wholeheartedy. Mind you, these Quadys may well be a level up from that.

mrsweet wrote:Want to try Deviation ? Vya Vermouth ? Vintage Starboard ?

Order direct from www.quadywinery.com.

Visit:
http://www.quadywinery.com/purchase.html

Andrew

Perhaps having tried these, the California contingent may like to make a winery visit en woot masse at some point. How do you like that idea?

I had no idea there was anything good viticulturally in the Central Valley. The closest decent dry wines I know of to there are from Shenandoah Valley, or Amador County, somewhat to the north!

Perhaps you chose your Madera, CA location because it sounds a bit like Madeira!! 8-)

iByron wrote:WOW! Essensia and Elysium are classics in their own right, and well worth anything good you may have heard. I've not had the other two, but they're Quady and that means the highest quality sweet wines.

This is an excellent entry point for those who haven't experienced the pure luxurious opulence of a good sweet wine.

I'd reckon they'll age well, too. I hope so, because I have a bottle of '88 Essensia in my cellar. ;)

iByron

et tu Bruté?

jimjacks66 wrote:I agree with Cesare, I have had the Elysium Black Muscat and it is yummy. Was also First Sucker even with latency issues between Jakarta (vacation) and the USA. Woo hoo!

"My wife came with me on holiday to Indonesia"
"Jakarta?"
"No, she insisted on it!"

Been a long time since my first and only purchase. I can't ignore the respected wine-wooters who are throwing in their praises for these selections. Good gift wines for the winter. And by gift, I mean for myself.

I've been here since 2005 and made 10 purchases so far, this being one of them. Needless to say I'm picky. That's my testement to how good the wine is. I adore sweet wines.

sotallytober wrote:I've been here since 2005 and made 10 purchases so far, this being one of them. Needless to say I'm picky. That's my testement to how good the wine is. I adore sweet wines.

love the name!

My two four packs of Quady arrived yesterday. I noticed that many of these are sold in 375ml bottles, nice to have the big boys

Being my first Quady purchase, I was excited to try one of these. After some reading on the Quady website, I decided to try the Elysium.

First had a small glass to test it out, and wow, if's delicious!

After looking at the Quady newsletters, I decided to try making a martini out of it (and it was a nice excuse to use my Steuben crystal martini shaker and glasses I used two ounces of Elysium, and one ounce of Seagrams orange vodka, and it turned out terrific!

If anyone is reading this, do you know once one of these bottles is opened is it like a normal wine whereas you should consume it within a few days, or being a fortified desert wine, will it last longer??

I tried these out last night with the wife. It is fantastic stuff. I've never had sweet white wines with as much complexity as these. And I've never been a dessert wine guy... until now.

The wife and I just had a bottle of the Electra.

Delicious! Even slightly tingly on the tongue. Great stuff. Glad I bought two samplers!