Late to the party ... alas, the craziness of V-day weekend and aftermath continued in full swing till quite late last evening, and the best I could muster was a few sips of our current BTG pinot. It's not one of my favorites, mostly because it's a typical California styled pinot noir, and I really tend to prefer those from Oregon/New Zealand/Burgundy, not necessarily in that order.

Still, no one should cry for me, because, given it's stylistic aspirations, Etude's Lyric is quite successful. The fruit is mostly berry, all ripe, and the pinot noir dead-giveaway aroma of cola was front and center. Beyond that, secondary/mineral/earth notes were well far away in the background, as they tend to be in Cali. pinots (in my opinion).

I love your approach to this one, thenewgreen, and totally envy the assortment you lined up. Setting regions and labels side by side is really the best way to let stylistic differences show up. Everyone was off the IRC by the time I tried to link up (or else I just failed in an epic fashion), but I'd love to know how they performed. Also, I'm really curious to know how you liked the R. Stuart & Co., humanodon. I'm not familiar with that house, but the region is my favorite for the grape, and it looks like it might just be a stellar specimen.

Anyway, happy to be involved, even if disjointed in time as well as space. I'll lift my next glass as well as previous to you all, just to make sure I haven't missed anyone. Cheers!