North316 wrote:This is the type of offer that I would love to see offered in smaller quantities. I just hate that every lower dollar per/bottle offering requires a full-case purchase anymore. I understand that sometimes that is why we can get the lower price, but in an offering like this (and most other lower $ offerings, I would pay an extra buck a bottle for the option to just buy 3 or 4 bottles. This is currently $7.90 per bottle, shipped. I would love an option to get 4 bottles for $35 shipped. (just under $9 per bottle).

This sounds like a good wine if you have the patience to decant for 2+ hours (which wouldn't be a problem for me). Unfortunately a case, or even half case, is out of the question for storage reasons.

I don't think the economics work out in our favour for that. The shipping cost for 4 bottles is probably close to $15-18. That means the remaining take for wine woot, Amazon, and the winery is split from $20/4 bottles. It quickly becomes not worth it. Shipping a case is probably (judging by other high-volume shippers) $23, so you've got a higher $ value to split among the parties. ($72 for 12 bottles = $6/bottle, a 20% inrease)

Winedavid39 wrote:Happy Holidays everyone. a 90 dollar case of cabernet from good to great sources, there is gonna be a catch, a rub.

We made sure to be upfront and (somehow, someway) see that a few veterans have tasted it ahead of time.

As always, we believe this falls into the "woot worthy QPR" range or we would not have placed it. is it for everyone? no. but with some patience, it's a great deal.

got a few of these this week (seems appropriate).

The reason I came back after my first purchase (4+ years ago, now) was that I liked it and grew to trust your wine choices. I think that holds true for many, and you've continued to provide interesting and varied wines for us to try. So thank you, and keep it coming!

Yep. I trust WD and his choices as much as the guy I use at my local store for recommendation. But I am still on the fence on this on. 12 bottles of fizzy wine?? Still have some time left to decide I guess. I do really appreciate the effort they made to get a bottle in to hands of wooters so we could have a better picture of what to expect. Unfortunately I found no concensus in the tasting notes as detailed and honest as they seemed to be. Thus my hesitation.

inod3 wrote:Fizzy cab made me think of that exact ww offering. It was fizzy. I tried it, wasn't a fan. I don't know how that compares to this exactly, like you say 90% vs 78% etc.

http://wine.woot.com/Forums/viewpost.aspx?postid=4714187&pageindex=3&replycount=116#post4791582

I have been a fan of Sextant, and bought the previous offering of undisclosed, yet fizzy 09 Sextant labeled cab. I was a little unhappy initially, feeling like I got "duped," but with some time in the cellar and a good long decant, I am quite satisfied looking back.

I would assume these are as-good or better than the previously mentioned, at a fraction of the price, but not willing to take the leap for a case...

Though if some in MN wanted to split, I would entertain the idea.....

andreaserben wrote:What makes me wonder - the CT link does not mention any 'fizzyness' in the only review with tasting notes.
So - Has this been bottled like this intentionally? Are all bottles of this vintage year the same in terms of fizzyness? Are only some affected / are they affected to a different degree?

Full disclosure please from the winemaker (including how much produced and potentially how many are 'fizzy' if not all of them are fizzy).

After reading all the other comments I'm still not sure if I know if the winemaker intended this wine to be "fizzy" and whether or not it is any good. Would someone please dumb it down for me?

mdnorman wrote:After reading all the other comments I'm still not sure if I know if the winemaker intended this wine to be "fizzy" and whether or not it is any good. Would someone please dumb it down for me?

This was definitely not intended to be fizzy. It was a flaw that created a secondary in-bottle fermentation, thus creating the fizz. From what I gather from the comments, the wine is still quite good and drinks well above the $8 per bottle price point as long as you give it time in a decanter for the fizz to blow off and disappear.

This is what I gather from the comments. Not having tried this, I would buy it without question, were I not already 50 bottles over my storage limit. A couple hours of decanting is well worth it for a serious discount in my books.

North316 wrote:This was definitely not intended to be fizzy. It was a flaw that created a secondary in-bottle fermentation, thus creating the fizz. From what I gather from the comments, the wine is still quite good and drinks well above the $8 per bottle price point as long as you give it time in a decanter for the fizz to blow off and disappear.

This is what I gather from the comments. Not having tried this, I would buy it without question, were I not already 50 bottles over my storage limit. A couple hours of decanting is well worth it for a serious discount in my books.

Okay! Now I get it. Thank you! We're talkin' 'bout just a little bit of effervescence here, not a true experimental sparkler.

klezman wrote:The reason I came back after my first purchase (4+ years ago, now) was that I liked it and grew to trust your wine choices. I think that holds true for many, and you've continued to provide interesting and varied wines for us to try. So thank you, and keep it coming!

Hear! Hear!! My exact sentiments as well.

With one exception*, everything I have purchased here has been in my opinion no worse than a decent wine for the price. Even in the situations where there might not be much discount over what the wine could be purchased for elsewhere (if someone spent the added time looking for a better deal), I've been confident that I'm getting a good wine for the price. Which is often different from buying in many other venues where I don't have that same certainty that I'm going at least get something decent for the money spent.

And of course there are many deals that are much more than decent offerings for the price.

----

*the one exception being the zin in the last Cycles Gladiator offering. But the rest of that order was fine, and all of the other Hahn family offerings have been consistently good to great values (including my single all-time favorite woot - the Hahn cab franc). So that zin looks to me like just an outlier.

I ws trying to remember which wine it was in the past that had a slight fizz to it and sure enough now that people are talking about it it was a Sextant wine. Not sure if it was the Cab or Zin I bought. Certainly wasn't a deal breaker with the wine and with proper decanting quite enjoyable. Having said that though nothing was mentioned about the wine being fizzy so I am guessing this takes it a step further.

chipgreen wrote:The key to taming the beast is to understand the beast. My level of understanding was obviously lacking.

I doubt that it will explode on you unless you're stupid about the way you handle it. Like me.

Don't remove the capsule/cork and then put a stopper in it without a proper decant and/or aeration and/or pouring out some of the wine!

As for the winemaker being upfront about it, how much more upfront can you be than to call it a "Fizzy Cab"? Clearly we are being offered a flawed (yet delicious) wine at an extreme discount.

The winemaker does not want to sully their reputation by selling it on the open market and having worked with wine.woot in the past, they decided to salvage what they can from their remaining inventory by offering a screaming deal on a wine that drinks well above its price point but requires special handling.

It is what it is. Take it or leave it. Sincerely, Cliches 'R' Us.

IOW - this is the wine.woot equivalent of "refurbished".

I am intrigued by this offer.

When I used to make wine(not great, but drinkable) wines would occasionally be bottled with some CO2 still dissolved in them from fermentation.

This fizziness would resolve with decanting but would resolve almost instantly with the application of negative pressure. That is, apply the Vacu-vin, wait a few seconds, enjoy $25 cab for $8!

Just a thought......

gtcharlie wrote:I ws trying to remember which wine it was in the past that had a slight fizz to it and sure enough now that people are talking about it it was a Sextant wine. Not sure if it was the Cab or Zin I bought. Certainly wasn't a deal breaker with the wine and with proper decanting quite enjoyable. Having said that though nothing was mentioned about the wine being fizzy so I am guessing this takes it a step further.

They probably didn't know back then. With the feedback they may have figured out it was a batch contamination issue and so relabeled the wine and are selling it off this way. As somebody mentioned above, it's unlikely they want to sell it with the unintended fizz and cause a perception of quality issues. Frankly, I'm surprised this doesn't happen more often. Or maybe this stuff generally gets sold off in the bulk market to the venerable Charles Shaw. I think this approach is better.

The 2009 Mirage Cabernet falls under our family of private labels. The wine is dark, rich, well balanced with good tannin, body & aroma. However, the wine went through a secondary fermentation in the bottle, giving this wine an effervescence that does recede with decanting. This characteristic was not intentional, and that's why it's being offered at this great price today. A little patience and a decanter will make this wine a great everyday drinker.
On behalf of everyone at Sextant, Happy Holidays to all of the Wooters- we appreciate your support and thank you for buying our wine!

gtcharlie wrote:I ws trying to remember which wine it was in the past that had a slight fizz to it and sure enough now that people are talking about it it was a Sextant wine. Not sure if it was the Cab or Zin I bought. Certainly wasn't a deal breaker with the wine and with proper decanting quite enjoyable. Having said that though nothing was mentioned about the wine being fizzy so I am guessing this takes it a step further.

You jogged my memory. I noted effervescence in the La Tribu Grenache in a previous offering. I found that the spritz in those bottles blew off with a couple of hours of decanting.

my own post deleted by me - since made obsolete by winery post that happened in parallel of me having the edit window open - sorry

chatsextant wrote:The 2009 Mirage Cabernet falls under our family of private labels. The wine is dark, rich, well balanced with good tannin, body & aroma. However, the wine went through a secondary fermentation in the bottle, giving this wine an effervescence that does recede with decanting. This characteristic was not intentional, and that's why it's being offered at this great price today. A little patience and a decanter will make this wine a great everyday drinker.
On behalf of everyone at Sextant, Happy Holidays to all of the Wooters- we appreciate your support and thank you for buying our wine!

Thanks for stepping in - because of your response I will order the wine now with no further ado and no further delay. e.g. lacking to disclose the winery earlier made me very uneasy, but to see that you post here and by that stand by your product is appreciated and earned my trust.

"Speed to First Woot: 1m 43.884s

First Sucker:epishchiker

Last Wooter to Woot:andreaserben"

klezman wrote:The reason I came back after my first purchase (4+ years ago, now) was that I liked it and grew to trust your wine choices. I think that holds true for many, and you've continued to provide interesting and varied wines for us to try. So thank you, and keep it coming!

Completely agreed here. On other discount wine sites I have trouble trusting the reviews, and am usually happy with my order about 70% of the time. Here, I don't have to worry about someone trying to unload a bunch of crap (because it's pretty much described as such when it happens), and in close to 100 orders I've been pleased with pretty much every one. On wine.woot, all I have to decide is if I want the varietal, if my cellar has room, and if the price is worth it, never "will it taste good".

And someone earlier mentioned Sextant--if this is, indeed, from the same barrels as their regular cabs, then this might very well be excellent once decanted/degassed. I wouldn't suggest buying it to age it, though.

chatsextant wrote:The 2009 Mirage Cabernet falls under our family of private labels. The wine is dark, rich, well balanced with good tannin, body & aroma. However, the wine went through a secondary fermentation in the bottle, giving this wine an effervescence that does recede with decanting. This characteristic was not intentional, and that's why it's being offered at this great price today. A little patience and a decanter will make this wine a great everyday drinker.
On behalf of everyone at Sextant, Happy Holidays to all of the Wooters- we appreciate your support and thank you for buying our wine!

Good to see you visit as well. This was for me was an interesting contrast to your 2009 I purchased a bit over a year ago and used as a cousin bottle.

As you confirm, clearly this has undergone a delayed secondary fermentation, as earlier notes make no mention of effervescence at this level. I've experienced other fizzy bottles, your 2009 had a very slight bit, and Meeker's Pink elephant comes to mind as well. With either of these the character didn't seem muted or overwhelmed as with the Mirage.

Other than a generic "secondary fermentation" could you speculate as to the cause?
My observations and thoughts were made clear earlier.
Were they totally off-base, or founded is some reality?
Perhaps a storage issue if/when the wine was not in your custody?
Was there any commonality of fruit, cooperage or equipment with the 2009 Sextant?
I'm struggling to better understand causal factors involved.

Again, thanks for your candor here.

chatsextant wrote:The 2009 Mirage Cabernet falls under our family of private labels. The wine is dark, rich, well balanced with good tannin, body & aroma. However, the wine went through a secondary fermentation in the bottle, giving this wine an effervescence that does recede with decanting. This characteristic was not intentional, and that's why it's being offered at this great price today. A little patience and a decanter will make this wine a great everyday drinker.
On behalf of everyone at Sextant, Happy Holidays to all of the Wooters- we appreciate your support and thank you for buying our wine!

This is exactly what my earlier posting said. After decanting a couple of hours, and maybe it needs even less, this is a very good wine for the money. If you bought it, you won't regret it.

Anyone in the Bay Area want to split? After the LB sale, my locker, and wallet are a little thin.

chatsextant wrote:The 2009 Mirage Cabernet falls under our family of private labels. The wine is dark, rich, well balanced with good tannin, body & aroma. However, the wine went through a secondary fermentation in the bottle, giving this wine an effervescence that does recede with decanting. This characteristic was not intentional, and that's why it's being offered at this great price today. A little patience and a decanter will make this wine a great everyday drinker.
On behalf of everyone at Sextant, Happy Holidays to all of the Wooters- we appreciate your support and thank you for buying our wine!

Thanks for the input, as most know here I'm a Solid Cab guy, bought a case early this morning, can't wait to play around with it.

gtcharlie wrote:Interesting because the regular Christmas Woot generated over 1000 post lamenting the fact that Woot had lost the "old timer character" since Amazon bought it. This shows me the spirit is still alive at Wine Woot which is why 95 percent of my Woot purchases this year were wine. That and I like to drink a lot.

I disagree. Back in the pre-Amazon times of one deal per week, or even several deals per week, this wine never would have made the cut. The need to have a deal per day and to appeal to a broader audience wanting cheap wine has definitely compromised the baseline quality.

This wine might work out to be a serviceable Cab with some TLC. But a wine with a major flaw is still just that, a flawed wine. Needing a two hour decant is not a good quality in an every day drinker from my perspective. And the fact that the fermentation was unintended means there is a much greater chance off aromas and flavors were produced by less favored microrganisms.

gcdyersb wrote:I disagree. Back in the pre-Amazon times of one deal per week, or even several deals per week, this wine never would have made the cut. The need to have a deal per day and to appeal to a broader audience wanting cheap wine has definitely compromised the baseline quality.

This wine might work out to be a serviceable Cab with some TLC. But a wine with a major flaw is still just that, a flawed wine. Needing a two hour decant is not a good quality in an every day drinker from my perspective. And the fact that the fermentation was unintended means there is a much greater chance off aromas and flavors were produced by less favored microrganisms.

The point I made does not speak to the quality of the wine. It speaks to the overall character of the site. Wine woot will still offer something out of the ordinary that doesn't necessarily appeal to the masses but can still offer something unusual or of extraordinary value to customers who are looking for something not available elsewhere. Like a Big ol' Celebration. I probably won't end up ordering this wine simply because I don't want 12 bottles of it but I am damn glad they offered it. And look forward to WineDavids future offerings.

gcdyersb wrote:I disagree. Back in the pre-Amazon times of one deal per week, or even several deals per week, this wine never would have made the cut. The need to have a deal per day and to appeal to a broader audience wanting cheap wine has definitely compromised the baseline quality.

This wine might work out to be a serviceable Cab with some TLC. But a wine with a major flaw is still just that, a flawed wine. Needing a two hour decant is not a good quality in an every day drinker from my perspective. And the fact that the fermentation was unintended means there is a much greater chance off aromas and flavors were produced by less favored microrganisms.

Thank you for reaching deep into my brain and putting into words what I felt was really wrong about this offer.

Now, I have had sparkling Shiraz plenty of times can attest to its awesomeness, especially to those who don't care for sparkling whites. But I don't need an accidental version of it, or a wine that is flawed and may head further downhill with additional months in bottle.

gcdyersb wrote:I disagree. Back in the pre-Amazon times of one deal per week, or even several deals per week, this wine never would have made the cut. The need to have a deal per day and to appeal to a broader audience wanting cheap wine has definitely compromised the baseline quality.

This wine might work out to be a serviceable Cab with some TLC. But a wine with a major flaw is still just that, a flawed wine. Needing a two hour decant is not a good quality in an every day drinker from my perspective. And the fact that the fermentation was unintended means there is a much greater chance off aromas and flavors were produced by less favored microrganisms.

I believe the classic woot! baseline would be the Big ol' Celebration. Heavily discounted items of reasonable quality was the name of the game which brought us this great site. This offering seems to match well. Side note, I'm having a hard time understanding your stats 140 quality posts in 4.5 years with 10-24 purchases.. this site is more than just forum. Woot needs to please the buyers.

nealkb wrote:Anyone in the Bay Area want to split? After the LB sale, my locker, and wallet are a little thin.

I can take 3 bottles if you end up going in.

ajrod27 wrote:I can take 3 bottles if you end up going in.

I'd also be interested in 3 bottles as well. Let me know. ajrod beat me to it though.

I just have to agree with gcdyersb on the fact that this is just a flawed wine plain and simple. At least they are disclosing it I guess. I know if I buy a wine and it has undergone secondary fermentation and has bretty flavors that bottle is going back.

It just seems like a strange offer but what do I know??

Winedavid39 wrote:Happy Holidays everyone...........
got a few of these this week (seems appropriate).

Happy Holidays, WD! More unique bottles coming up? You could have run an "Island of Misfit Wines" Plus deal on them!

I wish I had looked in my wine files before now, but here goes. I used to belong to the wine club for Burrell School, out of Los Gatos, CA. When I received their 2008 Class Reunion, there was this note with it from Dave Moulton their winemaker: In a few bottles we have some carbonation or effervescence. This is a minor defect and can be corrected by decanting the wine. I found the best way to "degas" the wine is to vigorously shake the wine in the decanter or the bottle and the carbon dioxide gas will bubble out of the wine in less than thirty seconds and the wine will be stable and ready to enjoy. Happy sipping.

For those that have chosen to not buy this wine, because of the effervescence, you have missed out on a very good wine that at $8 is great for everyday drinking. No one every claimed it was a $40 bottle of cab. Let's not foget that it's a $20 bottle that is now $8.

I have a case coming and would be willing to share a few bottles - near NJTpk exit7 or delivery in I287 exit5 vicinity

jmdavidson wrote:
For those that have chosen to not buy this wine, because of the effervescence, you have missed out on a very good wine that at $8 is great for everyday drinking. No one every claimed it was a $40 bottle of cab. Let's not foget that it's a $20 bottle that is now $8.

No offense, but none of the descriptions describe it as effervescence, and a reputable one described it as tasting like bacterial spoilage in the bottle. That's something I'd be unhappy about in a dollar of 2 (3 around these parts) Buck Chuck. I'd be in for a bottle or two at half the price per bottle, but I couldn't see wanting a case of wine that needed a couple hours of foresight to make it drinkable, and has a good chance of exploding in my wine rack (or pile of cardboard boxes) some time over the next year or two as it continues doesn't the road towards 0% Rs.

I'm pretty sure this is the definition of "commercially unsound wine."

mother wrote:No offense, but none of the descriptions describe it as effervescence, and a reputable one described it as tasting like bacterial spoilage in the bottle. That's something I'd be unhappy about in a dollar of 2 (3 around these parts) Buck Chuck. I'd be in for a bottle or two at half the price per bottle, but I couldn't see wanting a case of wine that needed a couple hours of foresight to make it drinkable, and has a good chance of exploding in my wine rack (or pile of cardboard boxes) some time over the next year or two as it continues doesn't the road towards 0% Rs.

I'm pretty sure this is the definition of "commercially unsound wine."

Seems like the winery should have had more involvement in the discussion.

jmdavidson wrote:Seems like the winery should have had more involvement in the discussion.

I really don't know how it could have helped. Flawed wine is flawed wine. The company made out like bandits recouping so much money on something that would otherwise have been written off. If people end up happy with their purchase then everyone wins.

jmdavidson wrote:I wish I had looked in my wine files before now, but here goes. I used to belong to the wine club for Burrell School, out of Los Gatos, CA. When I received their 2008 Class Reunion, there was this note with it from Dave Moulton their winemaker: In a few bottles we have some carbonation or effervescence. This is a minor defect and can be corrected by decanting the wine. I found the best way to "degas" the wine is to vigorously shake the wine in the decanter or the bottle and the carbon dioxide gas will bubble out of the wine in less than thirty seconds and the wine will be stable and ready to enjoy. Happy sipping.

For those that have chosen to not buy this wine, because of the effervescence, you have missed out on a very good wine that at $8 is great for everyday drinking. No one every claimed it was a $40 bottle of cab. Let's not foget that it's a $20 bottle that is now $8.

Except that in rjquillen's most excellent post, he tried shaking the bottle, and got way too much foam as a result. Which speaks to it being a major defect, not a minor one.

If this had been 2 bottles instead of a case, it might have been more interesting. And as Mother posted, for a wine that needs two or more hours of decanting, it's not a daily drinker. And we all know how quickly I drink my wine.

billyum wrote:I believe the classic woot! baseline would be the Big ol' Celebration. Heavily discounted items of reasonable quality was the name of the game which brought us this great site. This offering seems to match well. Side note, I'm having a hard time understanding your stats 140 quality posts in 4.5 years with 10-24 purchases.. this site is more than just forum. Woot needs to please the buyers.

Good point. Credibility shouldn't be based on quality or content of what you have to say, but how much money you spend. [sarcasm]If it works for corporate lobbyists in making an efficient federal gov't surely it must work elsewhere, right?[/sarcasm]

Believe it or not, wine.woot forums used to be much more active. Hence the possibility of accumulating a lot of posts without buying every offer. Since wine.woot's approach to selling wine has become more and more like selling widgets, I've found other retailers better serve my needs.

Those comments aside, I don't think a refurbed laptop sold with a defective video card would pass muster, even at woot, even if the flaw was disclosed. Especially if sold at a price similar to functional, albeit basic, laptops. Maybe it would appeal to a few people who'd like to tinker by replacing the video card, but most would pass on it. Maybe there's a better analogy than this, but it's what comes to mind.

gcdyersb wrote:

Those comments aside, I don't think a refurbed laptop sold with a defective video card would pass muster, even at woot, even if the flaw was disclosed. Especially if sold at a price similar to functional, albeit basic, laptops. Maybe it would appeal to a few people who'd like to tinker by replacing the video card, but most would pass on it. Maybe there's a better analogy than this, but it's what comes to mind.

Those laptops are the ones thrown in to the Bunch of Cheer#39;s.

OK here it is the review everyone has waited for. It's less than 8 bucks a bottle, the label looks impressive to low information friends.....it's 13.9% alcohol....and it will get you buzzed. NTM you can pawn off whatever you don't chug as Secret Santa in the years to come.

cortot20 wrote:Those laptops are the ones thrown in to the Bunch of Cheer#39;s.

$90 is a pretty expensive Big ol' Celebration.