You know how when you meet someone once, and yet they make a lasting impression? That is what I thought of Adam LaZarre when I spied him as a fellow judge during the Long Beach Grand Cru competition in 2015 and met him in an elevator following the evening’s celebratory dinner. We may have shared a cab ride back to the hotel all the judges stayed in, that part is blurrier. But what I do remember was his easy and casual style when he spoke to me. I knew he was a winemaker that the fellow judges respected, and after that meeting, I sought out his wines the next time I visited Paso Robles.
Fast forward to last year, when he was coming to Las Vegas to share his wines at Rock ‘n Grapes Wine Pub in Henderson’s trendy Water Street District. We reserved a couple of spots, got to spend a lot of time catching up with Adam, tasting all the wines he brought, and came home with several wines that benefitted from his talents. Adam has his own wine label as well as being the winemaker for Portlandia, Broadside Cellars, and others.
One of the wines we purchased that night was a 2019 Lazarre Moshina. I had loved the flavor then, cellared it, and popped one open at home recently, and it was just as good as I remembered.
Tasting Notes
Color: Inky purple, red edge and completely opaque.
Aroma: Black plums, blackberry, slight pomegranate, black licorice, cigar smoke, char on a filet, ash, worn leather, dark chocolate, cracked black peppercorns.
Flavor: The same dark black fruit from the nose is very clear on the palate as well – the plums, blackberry, and blueberry as well – that dark chocolate was there too, with an extremely pleasant and long finish of both lively spice and drying tannins. I have one more bottle left in our cellar and will try my best to hold onto it a bit longer!
From the back label
Mosh Pit Blend
The wines of Angie and Adam LaZarre are crafted from grapes selected from some of California’s most well-known and respected vineyards. All are handcrafted in very small lots with minimal intervention.
70% Petite Sirah
20% Cabernet Franc
10% Petit Verdot
From LaZarre Wines Website
Adam is one of the most accoladed winemakers in California, with Best-of-Show wins at the most prestigious wine competitions in the world including the L.A. International Wine Competition where he is the only three time winner of this respected wine competition. In 2005, Adam was named “Winemaker of the Year” in the Sacramento Bee and was also named “One of the Top Five Winemakers” in the San Francisco Chronicle in 2006. Earlier in 2012, Adam was ranked #69 on IntoWine.com’s “100 Most Influential People in the US Wine Industry”.
Eve Bushman has a Level Two Intermediate Certification from the Wine and Spirits Education Trust (WSET), a “certification in the first globally-recognized course” as an American Wine Specialist ® from the North American Sommelier Association (NASA), Level 1 Sake Award from WSET, was the subject of a 60-minute Wine Immersion video (over 16k views), authored “Wine Etiquette for Everyone” and has served as a judge for the Proof Awards, Cellarmasters, LA Wine Competition, Long Beach Grand Cru and the Global Wine Awards. You can email Eve@EveWine101.com to ask a question about wine or spirits.
