Tinto y Blanco- Adventures in Spanish Wine

Vallado 2007

By Dave Worthington ⋅ July 30, 2009 ⋅ One comment

The 2005 edition of this wine was, and still is, one of my favourite wines from the Douro Valley in Portugal. It had everything, balances, tons of flavour, only 13.5% alcohol, and seemingly higher than normal acid for red wine from the Douro. You could say it was atypical, but I think it gives us a look at what is possible. I skipped the 2006, I thought it showed to many green characters, but Jamie Goode has just written it up and gave it 90. Now this 2007 is more typical of the what is becoming the classic Douro red: around 14.5 % alc, warm fruit, and the acid takes a back seat…

Campo Eliseo 2004

By Dave Worthington ⋅ July 29, 2009 ⋅ Post a comment

Now, everything about this wine is big. A comes in a big, heavy bottle, the wine itself it fairly big and it has some big, French names on the front label:Lurton and Rolland. I know a little about Mr. Rolland’s winemaking, but I’ve not knowingly had one of his wines…

Tribal wines ViRAT 2005

By Dave Worthington ⋅ July 28, 2009 ⋅ 2 comments

Thats a bloody big looking dog on the front of the label, and if you didn’t know that Virat is the wild dog of Mallorca you’d be wonder why on earth you’d put that picture on the front label of a bottle of wine. I was anyway.

Cuatro Pasos 2006

By Dave Worthington ⋅ July 27, 2009 ⋅ 4 comments

The name means four steps. Just about everything about this wine is done in 4s: the grapes come from 4 different villages, 4 different types of oak are used etc. The vines are over 80 years old, wellthat’s a multiple of 4…

Pittacum Mencia 2005

By Dave Worthington ⋅ July 22, 2009 ⋅ 3 comments

There is nothing like a bit of old vine Mencia in winter. I keep hearing that mencia is the next big thing to come out of Spain, and I’m already convinced that the wines are great, but I never hear much about them in the press. Eric Asimov from the New York Times has writen up some interesting things about mencia in his trip to Ribera Sacra. It’s a good read, but go and have a look for the photos. They make me want to get on a plane…

Salamandra Tempranillo 2007

By Dave Worthington ⋅ July 21, 2009 ⋅ Post a comment

This is a new one from Ce Soir. From what I can find out, this is a Jacques Lurton wine from Castilla y Leon, actually in the DO Rueda but the DO is for white wines only at this stage. All tempranillo with a dunk in french oak for 3 months.

Bodegas Muga Reserva 2004

By Dave Worthington ⋅ July 20, 2009 ⋅ 4 comments

Robert Parker (and Jay Miller) states that Muga is one of his favourite bodegas in Rioja in a couple of his tasting notes, and it’s one of the few things that I agree with him on. Not that there is anything wrong with that, the world would be a rather boring place if we all agreed. I’d love to sit down and go through a couple of bottles with the big fella, he seems like he’d be a laugh with a few in him.

Laudum Monastrell ‘Barrica Especial’ 2006

By Dave Worthington ⋅ July 17, 2009 ⋅ Post a comment

I’ve done a couple of blind tastings this year with monastrell and blends of monatrell with things like cabernet, merlot, tempranillo, syrah, even some viura. But I come to the same conclusion each and every time: I’m a much bigger fan of these straight Monastrell wines than the blended wines. I think that says more [...]

Latente Crianza 2004

By Dave Worthington ⋅ July 16, 2009 ⋅ Post a comment

Here’s anther good Rioja Crianza in $20-30 bracket, this time from Ce Soir Imports. This is about the price where you get an interesting, wood aged Rioja in Australia. We are fortunate that we don’t have the same issue as the guys in the UK. There is truckloads of cheap and not so cheerful Rioja in the supermarkets and booze shops over there. Kind of like NZ sauv blanc here…