Tasting - Emeri Sparkling Shiraz

Name: Emeri de Bortoli

Variety: Sparkling Shiraz

Region: South East Australia

Country: Australia

Year: N/A

Price: $9.95

Vintage Cellar's notes: A relatively light fresh style of sparkling Shiraz, with berries and hints of chocolate picking up just a touch of sweet vanilla on the finish.

This was an interesting wine. I had never had a sparkling red wine before this one. It was like a more full bodied champagne. It was pleasantly crisp, and not overly sweet. Tasted very fruity, like maybe cherries and strawberries. Also tasted flowery, and light. It made me think of sweet red grape juice cut with a little bit of sprite. Quite an enjoyable wine.

Tasting - Tres Ojos Garnacha

Name: Tres Ojos

Variety: Grenache

Region: Calatayud

Country: Spain

Year: 2011

Price: $6.95

Vintage Cellar notes: This wine has a brick red color with a bouquet of red raspberries, spice, and white pepper. The palate is incredibly concentrated and rich. The modern styles of Garnacha in Spain are continuously being perceived worldwide as wines of extraordinarily good quality. This wine is fruity, juicy, and shows great depth, ripe tannins, length, but yet with wonderful elegance and lightness. Enjoy with sausages, roasted meats, aged cheeses, etc.

This wine smelled delicious. It was fruity yet not overly sweet smelling. It was acidic and dry, yet also a little sweet and fruity. Very full bodied, this was one of my favorites in the lineup. Did detect a little bit of spicy to it It reminded me a lot of many of the dozens of bottles of wine I had while hiking through Spain last summer. I had to buy a bottle of this. I imagine this would be a great wine to cook with as well.

Tasting - Montebuena Temprenillo

Name: Montebuena

Variety: Tempranillo

Region: Rioja

Country: Spain

Year: 2010

Price: $8.95

Vintage Cellar notes: Ripe cherry and black currant on the nose and in the mouth. Pliant and seamless in texture with good heft and back-end energy. Finishes smooth and sweet, with fine grained tannins, providing shape and grip. Still on the young side, but this wine drinks very well with an hour or so of decanting; it's an excellent value for Rioja.

This one smelled quite strongly at first sniff. I could smell a lot of alcohol coming through, which made me wary of what was going to come. Smelled sort of jammy as well. Not as hot as I expected it to taste like, fairly good balance. It was dry yet still a little sweet, definitely caught the cherry notes, also thought of blackberries when tasting. Good wine, would like to try again after another year or two.

Tasting - Sainte Victoire

Name: Sainte Victoire Cotes de Provence

Variety: Grenache Syrah Cinsault blend

Region: Provence

Country: France

Year: 2011

Price: $8.95

The Vintage Cellar's notes: Bright salmon pink; typical of the fresh but warm Provence style. Refined and complex on the nose, with summer fruit and floral notes. Dry and crisp, with a delicate flavor and full texture.


This rosé was different from ones I have had before.  It had somewhat of a pungent smell, almost like smelly feet (not overwhelmingly so, just notes of feet). It tasted not terribly pleasant to me, very dry and acidic, maybe a little buttery but still acidic which was an interesting experience. Overall not my favorite wine of the bunch.

Tasting - Canyon Road Chardonnay

Name: Canyon Road

Variety: Chardonnay

Region: California

Country: USA

Year: 2011

Price: $6.95







The Vintage Cellar's notes are as follows: Medium bodied wine, with notes of crisp apple and ripe citrus fruit, with a hint of cinnamon spice. Delicious complement to grilled chicken, lighter pasta dishes, or mild cheeses.

This smelled quite sweet right off the bat. It had a very pleasing taste. It was a little buttery, very smooth, and had some oak tones in it. It was fruity, and a bit tart, yet smooth. Definitely would be good on a summer day on its own or with some nice picnic type food.

Tasting - Potluck Sweet Malbec

The last wine this week was a sweet Malbec from Potluck, also from the Mendoza Province in Argentina. This was a 2010 vintage, couple years old. There isn't a lot to say about this wine, everything about it is pretty self-explanatory. The shop's notes are short and are as follows: Deep red brilliant with violet hints. Complex, fruity, and predominant red fruits. Easy to drink, round with persistent sweetness, very well balanced with sweet tannins.

Very sweet smelling, this wine would be a great dessert wine. It smelled like cherries, like pure cherry juice. It was very sweet, but not painfully so. Overall, a pretty boring wine, tasting a little like strawberries and cherries. Would be great with a chocolate cake, or some nice truffles. $7.95 at the Vintage Cellar.

Tasting - Domaine de Grange de Payan

This wine is a blend made with mostly Grenache grapes and comes from the Cotes du Rhone region in France. This was a bottle from the 2011 vintage, so still fairly a young wine. The shop's notes include the following: Intensely spicy and precise, with lively red berry flavors and a hint of black pepper. The Grenache, which makes up the majority of the wine, is deeper and more powerful, offering cherry and black raspberry qualities lifted by zesty minerality.

This was a pretty complex big red. It smelled pretty fruity, a little bit of the spice came through on the nose, but does not prepare you for how much spice is present in the taste. The peppery tastes came through right up front, which created a bit of heat. The after taste was quite pleasant actually. It most closely reminded me of an orange cream soda that has been sitting in the car all day, is warm, and you take a swig after eating something a little spicy. I would have liked to try this wine after decanting it for a couple hours, and maybe after another year or so of aging. This wine was selling for $8.95 at the Vintage Cellar.

Tasting - Tinto Figaro

The next wine was a Figaro from the Tinto Winery in the Calatayud Region in Spain. This Figaro is made from 100% Grenache grapes (Garnacha in Spanish). This was a 2009 vintage bottle, so a little more than 3 years old. The shop described this was as the following: Figaro is 100% Garnacha, made from a selection of the best grapes grown in the oldest vineyards. While not truly an "oaked wine", a short stay in oak barrels provides a nice spicy flavor boost. Bright violet. Dark berry and cherry aromas show a jammy aspect. Supple and gently sweet, with good lift to its black raspberry and boysenberry flavors. Smooth and broad on the finish, leaving behind a hint of spiciness. Extremely easy to drink and an excellent value.

This was one of my favorites in the bunch. It smelled pretty earthy, woody, slightly leafy maybe. It tasted a lot like blackberries to me, and was fairly jammy. It wasn't particularly high in alcohol, but I could feel a good bit of heat coming through. It was slightly oaky, but not overwhelmingly so. This bottle was selling for $6.95.

Tasting - Maipe Malbec Rosé

The second wine this week is a Malbec Rosé from the Maipe Winery in the Mendoza Province. The Mendoza Province is one of the most important wine regions in Argentina. As we learned in class, a rosé is made by reducing the time the grape juices stay in contact with the skins of the grapes. This bottle was a 2011 vintage, so a couple years old, still fairly new. The shop's notes are as follows: Intense pink color with violet hints. Fresh red fruit bouquet, strawberry and cherry flavors, balanced acidity, dry and lingering finish. Excellent with tuna or green salad, pasta, spicy Asian dishes.

I didn't get a lot of smell from this one, it had a light fruity scent but not much came through. After tasting it however, I thought it had a pretty full body for a rosé, despite not having much smell. It was very dry, made my mouth feel parched. It had fairly clean flavors of berries and maybe raspberries. This wine was for sale for $7.95 as well.

Tasting - Cortenova Pinot Grigio

Hello all, it's good to be back. It has been about a month since my last tasting, so let's get back into it. The first wine this week is the Cortenova Pinot Grigio. This Italian winery is in the Veneto Region, and produces many different kinds of wine. We had one of their wines a few weeks ago in a previous tasting. This Pinot Grigio is a 2012 vintage, so it is very new and made ready to drink when it leaves the winery. The Vintage Cellar's notes on this wine are as follows: Brilliant straw color with emerald reflections. Fresh and floral bouquet with a hint of pears, apricots and bananas. Fresh and inviting with bright fruit and an easy drinking style with a pleasing hint of almonds in the aftertaste.  Pairs well with seafood dishes, risottos with scampi, spaghetti with clams, sole in white wine Perfect also as an aperitif.

Right off the bat, when I smelled this wine I thought it smelled very earthy and somewhat yeasty. It had a sweet smell on top of that as well, like apples. It tasted nice and light and fairly sweet. It was almost a bit buttery too, while still being light. It did taste like apples, and a bit nutty. This would be a great wine to have in the summer with a variety of dishes. This wine was $7.95 at the Vintage Cellar.