Note: This is my second review of this wine. The first review can be found here.
If it isn't already obvious, I am a fan of this Maryland brand as they dig and claw to create something new and wonderful as the state bureaucracy seems bent on destroying indigenous wine.
My Impressions:
Medium red in the glass. A middleweight fighting up one weight class against bigger bolder reds.
Spicebox on the nose with cherries and dark fruit across the palate. Interesting blend but lacking the punch I'd hoped for.
Short herbal finish.
The label is mute as to its constituent wines. My guess is that it is primarily Merlot and Chambourcin, with a low tannic red (Cab Franc, maybe) and maybe an off-dry white to fill in the cracks and round off the edges. Just guessing. But, I'd be surprised if Merlot and Chambourcin were not the primary wines in the blend.
I paired it last evening with pasta with marinara sauce, steamed artichokes and garlic bread. Despite it middleweight status it held up very well against the garlic-infused marinara sauce.
The Barossa Valley continues to provide to provide superb examples of what the Shiraz grape can render when the vintner is not afraid to enhance the grape with the roundness of the Merlot and the intensity of the Cabernet Sauvignon.
Such is the case with the Tait Shiraz blend, the aptly named, "The Ball Buster". The Tait Shiraz was one of a number of wines which I recently enjoyed at the Blue Wind Gourmet during an very inexpensive $6.00 tasting of 12, or so, wines.
My impressions: Very dark garnet in the glass. Dark berries, cherries, spice-box and cocoa prominently on the nose. Moderately acidic: balanced nicely with the immense fruit serving. Mildly tannic leading to a huge, warm, lingering finish which goes on forever.
It is a superb wine. It is full bodied and was a delightful dining companion with grilled steak. If you can find a bottle of the 15,000 cases produced you'd do well to buy it.
Highly recommended.
77% Shiraz, 12% Merlot and 11% Cabernet Sauvignon.
Last weekend my wife and I got away for a short weekend away from the kids and settled in for quick two-day vacation in Lexington Park, Maryland.
Lexington Park has the advantage of being located near a Navy Air Base (where you can hear the sound of freedom) and Port of Leonardtown Winery.
While the F-18s were quiet over the weekend, we did get over to Leonardtown to sample some of their recent offerings.
My Impressions: Medium red in the glass with a spiciness on the nose which I have come to associate with East Coast Merlots. Thin tannins at the end with a brief finish.
The bottle does not disclose the varietal components but, I think there is a strong Merlot base with touches of Cab Franc (noticeable at the finish) and Chamborchin (green vegetable flavor).
We paired the Captain's Table with a hearty pot roast and it stood up admirably to the intense beef flavors. It is a food-friendly wine.
It is true that I spend too much time drinking red wines and not enough time sampling the lighter fare such as Sauvignon Blanc.
I don’t have too much to say about the Rock Rabbit brand. We carried it at Restaurant 213 as a lower-priced Sauvignon Blanc and it sold well.
My Impressions: Pale straw color in the glass. Stone, grass, modest fruit and a hint of spice (10% Gewurtraminer) on the nose and across the palate (The Gerwurtraminer was not co-fermented with the Sauvignon Blanc - I suspect the wine maker hoped to soften its razor-sharp edges). Unabashedly tart, with fruit under-represented resulting in an off-balanced wine. Lingering tart finish. Recommended with conditions: 1) Not a pool-side quaffer and not the sort of wine you’d want to sip on without food, 2) Would recommend with hard cheese (think Parmigiano-Reggiano) and other hearty nibbles, and 3) It might work with grilled white meats.
This is a personal bias of mine: I like some fruit in my wine. The major flaw of this offering is its overly tart nature combined with the thinness of the fruit. There are plenty of acidic wines which I have enjoyed - each having a level of fruit holding the whole package together.
It's not a great wine and it's not a terrible wine. With all of my complaining about many wines lacking a backbone - the 2008 Rock Rabbit Sauvignon Blanc has a cold-steely, razor-sharp backbone of immense proportions. My only caveat: the wine drinker had better be ready to pucker up.
90% Sauvignon Blanc and 10% Gewurtraminer in a handy screw-top bottle
As I have said many times before, "If you like it - it is good wine". And, that axiom also includes summer quaffers such as the Beringer White Zinfandel. Adding to that: don't let wine snobs stop you from drinking something that you like at the dinner table, poolside or at a picnic.
There IS a place for easy drinking wines and the wine buying customer can drink whatever they choose recognizing that there are limits to any wine - including those consumed poolside.
My impressions: Pink in the glass. Strawberries and a hint of raspberries on the nose when first poured. Strawberries (again) and soft citrus across the palate with a long syrupy-fruit finish. Its overly sweet character makes it nearly impossible for food pairing as the sweet strawberries will overwhelm almost anything with which it is served. Best enjoyed COLD - served alone before or after a meal. Recommended.
Second thoughts: This wines needs to be served COLD. As the wine warmed in the glass the fruit characteristics disappeared leaving only an indistinguishable muddle of fruit on the nose and medicinal finish. Not food-friendly as it will obliterate any other competing elements in the meal to which it accompanies.
Smoking Loon is another one of those brands for which I have had a great deal of experience with and with which I am favorably disposed.
For a medium-priced wine they have generally provided me excellent value for the price - a good wine at an even better price. Smoking Loon usually scores well on my quality-price continuum.
I was then a little disappointed when I popped open a bottle of their 2007 Syrah Wednesday evening. I did not get the fruitiness which I have come to expect with a California Syrah. What I got was something different: something not quite Syrah lacking the "oomph" and intensity which I crave in this varietal. Maybe Smoking Loon is test marketing Syrah-lite?
My impressions: Medium red in the glass. Cherries followed by pepper, smoke and spice box on the nose. Fruit and noticeable tannins nicely balanced across the palate. Food friendly. Light bodied for a Syrah. Brief finish with spice box again. No fatal flaws. No outstanding characteristics, either. Recommended.
Second thoughts: I know that if you read the words above you'll wonder why I still recommend the wine. Well, it is price-quality continuum thing. While not living up to expectations of a Syrah, it's price point over-rides that consideration. Were this a $19.99 bottle I would not recommend it. At $5.99 it is a great value and I am willing to overlook a technical shortcoming or two.
Brand matters. The quality of the product, its price and how it is represented to the public - when bundled up equals brand. Think about the great brands: Coke-a-Cola, Apple, Disney and Caterpillar: each has a well-defined brand image which they closely control to ensure a consistent unambiguous message to the consumer. A good brand is easily identified. So too is a less
than good brand.
So. Why a short discussion about "brand" when this is a blog site about wine? Well, the answer to that can be found in the labeling of the 2005 Eagle Eye, Muscat Canelli. This is not the label of a serious winery and it send entirely the wrong message to the buying public. In a competitive wine market the last thing a wine producer wants is to be is above average in price and below average in brand.
My impressions: Flowers perfume the nose. Overwhelming - pleasantly so - dose of lychee with a moderate finish. Nicely balanced for a Muscat. My immediate though when sipping the wine was that it would be great with hot Thai or Indian curries. This is far-and-away the most appealing Muscat I've ever enjoyed and not just for sipping poolside. Recommended.
Second thoughts: Of course, wine labeling does not need to be overly serious. Australian critter wines have proven that a light-hearted take on wine can be successful. But in those cases, the wines were aimed squarely at the younger wine buyers for whom the playfulness of the brand was an asset.
Eagle Eye makes some fine wine. I was impressed with this Muscat and have also been impressed with their red blend, "Voluptuous". It is sad then when I all-too-often see bottles of Eagle Eye in the discount bin at the wine shops - customers unsure what to make of the brand.
Maybe I am making too much of a fuss about their branding choices. But ask yourself after visiting their web site: Is this a brand that you'd invest $20 to $40 to sample their product?
$21.99 from the winery. Less in the discount bins.
I am not going to lie and tell you that this wine is of the caliber of a Puligny-Montrachet. Besides, no one would believe it. What I will tell you is that Domaine du Bernier continues to deliver outstanding value with their Chardonnay wines.
I know it isn't much of a review when the reviewer starts gushing over the wine in the first paragraph. Sorry.
My impression: Oak and flowers on the nose when first poured with the flowers fading as the wine warmed in the glass. Citris with crisp, mineral-like, qualities reminiscent of a French Chablis but minus the cold steeliness. Long crisp finish. Wonderful.
I would drink this with typical Chardonnay pairings of cream and butter sauced meats. I would also drink this with cooked shellfish: steamed clams comes immediately to mind.
100% Chardonnay. $7.99 to $9.00 retail. This budget priced French white packs a lot of enjoyment into a very reasonable price. Highly recommended.
I am seldom surprised when I drink a wine. Going in, I usually know what to expect and have confided to friends that I could write a review without ever having tasted the wine - based on the varietal and my experience with the winemaker or winery.
Did I ever get that wrong today!
Cantara Cellars will not impress anyone with their building (industrial plaza) or location (Oxnard Plains) but something special is taking place inside their humble facility: that something special is making great wine.
Cantara Cellars is a small winery (I don't think I saw more than 50 French and American oak barrels total in back) which sources virtually all of their juice from the vineyards of family and personal acquaintances in Lodi, California.
With one white and four reds I settled in for a tasting with the very affable owner, Chris Brown.
You know the scene in the old movie where the boy falls in love with the girl? The scene will include fireworks exploding in the sky: well, my first taste of the 2007 Cantara Cellars Syrah was something like that. Wow.
I purchased a bottle of the Syrah and have spent a several hours of quality time sipping, chewing and genuinely enjoying this fine wine.
My impressions: Inky dark garnet intensely colored in the glass. Blackberries and chocolate powder initially on the nose with the chocolate fading way to pepper as the wine opened up in the glass. Profoundly earthy and mouth filling. Deftly balanced with fruit up front and the acidity at the end - just right. Concludes in a long finish with the tannins winning out over the fruit - but, just barely. Superb.
This is a big red and, as such, I would recommend it with the typical pairs including: beefsteak, prime rib, and bison steak.
I have no idea if Cantara Cellars can continue to produce this wonderful Syrah, or for that matter, their also-wonderful Zinfandel year-in and year-out. Time will tell.
For those of you who are not located in the mid-Atlantic region: we have been walloped with back-to-back-to-back snow storms which have put industry and individuals at a dead stop. For my brother in Iowa a 9" snow is not that unusual. It is VERY UNUSUAL in Maryland, where we don't usually get 9" of snow in an entire season. As of this morning we are somewhere around 40" of total accumulation over the past 2 and one half weeks. For God's sake: we are under a blizzard warning. Enough.
So what does one do when the government is closed and you are snowed in? Eat and drink!
Last evening I prepared a chicken-centric version of Beef Burgundy. The changes to the recipe are quite simple, really: replace the dry red wine with dry white wine and replace beef with a whole cut up chicken. What worked for Julia Child in 1950 with beef works for us today with chicken.
My white wine of choice was a 2008 Fat Bastard Chardonnay. The Fat Bastard brand is another example of a vin ordinare being repackaged as an entry-level wine for American consumers who choke on the pronunciation of French vowels. A few weeks ago I double-tasted a Red Bicyclette Chardonnay to disastrous results - undrinkable - so, my expectations were not all that high when I opened this similarly pedigreed wine.
My impressions: Vanilla and flowers immediately on the nose - nice. Full buttery mouth-feel with more acidity than I expect - even in a Chardonnay. Lively. The acidity is pronounced when new in the glass and becomes less impact-full as the wine warms. Vanilla (again) on the long finish. Wonderful.
The 2008 Fat Bastard Chardonnay was a perfect accompaniment to my "Chicken Burgundy" having the backbone to stand up to richly sauced bird. The steeliness of acidity softened somewhat as the wine warmed, and the Fat Bastard remained a desired dining companion throughout. Highly recommended.
My affinity for Marechal Foch, a French-American hybrid red wine grape (a cold-hardy varietal), is well established. As the Rodney Dangerfield of the Midwest wine grape community – it doesn’t get much respect! That’s unfortunate because if you were to investigate Marechal Foch, commonly referred to as “Foch”, you would soon recognize its real potential. Foch is made into world-class wines in Ontario’s VQA region and most notably in Oregon where it is grown next to its relative, Pinot Noir.
Even my wine club, the Eastern Iowa Wine Club, has a soft spot in its heart for Foch. Each year, during our annual amateur wine competition (Eastern Iowa Amateur Wine Competition), we honor the Marechal Foch with a special category and award known as the “Fochy”. A true honor to win this inspiring trophy!
Recently I have taken to learning more about wine appreciation by enrolling in a class at Des Moines Community College. In my VIN 150 class, I am learning about the wine industry, wine appreciation, and sensory analysis of the traditional wine grapes – vitis vinifera. It is too frigid for vinifera in Iowa so we grow cold-hardy grapes, such as Foch. Intrigued by my new education, I sought to learn more about the varietal tasting characteristics of Marechal Foch. In my firsthand experience as a vintner and occasional drinker of Foch I’ve developed my own way of understanding this grape – and use the term “Fochy” to describe it. Not being terribly satisfied with my ability to describe Foch in a thoughtful, wine-guy sort of way I thought I’d spend some time reading and compiling a list of common tasting notes.
Common Marechal Foch Adjectives: unique, distinctive, rugged, hybrid, gamy, herbaceous.
FINAL THOUGHTS: With Foch it seems you either love it or hate it. I cannot help but be inspired by the winemakers of Ontario and Oregon who continue to work with this challenging grape. The wine industry in Iowa is young and the first plants we planted were Foch and frequently the first grapes to be pulled out were also Foch. There is much to be learned by this wine grape, first of which is Patience – patience in learning its peculiarities, patience in learning how to craft delicious, albeit, unique and distinctive wine. And secondly, patience from our vineyard, in understanding and enhancing its growth potential. Finally, there needs to be an appreciation from wine consumers, a daring, a spirit of adventure to try something that is “earthy, gamy, spicy, and smoky” – that sounds like a real treat to me!
It was Phil Spector who in the late 1960s was a producer of music and invented the "wall of sound".
The "wall of sound", was a technique of applying layers of sounds, reverberations and echo over the original track. The overall effect was, as described by a contemporary of Spector, as "bathing in sound".
The Beach Boys song, Good Vibrations is a good example of the "wall of sound" technique.
Why, you may ask, do I begin a review of an Australian red with a primer on Phil Spector's "wall of sound"? Well, because they are so very similar.
Where Spector layered sound, Penfolds layers flavor, depth and intensity.
My Impressions: Inky. Bold. Full-flavored. Mouth-filling. Plums and spice on the nose, mildly tannic, with a (regrettably) short finish. The addition of the Cabernet Sauvignon pumps up the acidity, and rounds-out what would otherwise have been just another flabby Australian Shiraz. Wonderful.
I paid $9.99 for this bottle at my local grocery store and it compares very favorably with the teeth-staining yumminess which I have come to appreciate in the more expensive Shiraz-based Yalumba blends.
At the price and the enjoyment: this wine is a steal. Buy it and drink it now.
Full disclosure: I really enjoy the wines of Ridge Winery. Year in and year out I have found Ridge to be a reliable producer of high quality wines. I have enjoyed reds and whites from Ridge, with my favorites being the hearty, big and stunning Zinfandels from Ridge.
Drinking a Ridge Zin is like coming home, or listening to Brahms, or reading Neruda. It is a warm spring day after a long winter. It is all things right and wonderful in the world.
It is then with that level of anticipation that I opened up one of my three remaining 1.5 liter bottles of the 2003 Ridge Lytton Springs and experienced nearly total heartbreaking disappointment. The wine was past its prime.
Like this author, the wine is in it's long slow and inevitable decline.
My impressions: India ink to dark garnet in color. Blackberries, cherries and strawberries on the nose - but muted, lacking crispness and individuality. A muddle of dark fruit. Absent the brightness that I experienced with a bottle I opened last summer. Less tannic than I recall. Softer than it should be. Moderate finish with cherries.
My experience with this bottle of Ridge highlights one major drawback when you save a bottle of wine for a special occasion. The special occasion may never arrive and your wine begins to slowly fade away. Sitting in the quiet darkness of my wine closet this 1.5 liter bottle had waited patiently for a special occasion which never came. Its biological clock continued to tick away aging slowly from youth to old age without any consideration of my occasions: special or otherwise.
76% Zinfandel, 18% Petite Sirah and 6% Charignane.
This is still a good wine and will kick-butt over many California Zinfandels today. It just isn't as good as it used to be.
Pinot Noir has proven itself to be a challenging grape to grow in California. It has the reputation of being finicky and requiring nearly constant attention in the field and in the winery to coax the magic which hides inside. Absent attention and good luck Pinot Noir is little more than a one-dimensional grape without character, depth or finish.
You will not mistake the 2008 Mirassou Pinot Noir with the 2005 Morgan “Double L” Pinot Noir. They are both Pinot Noirs in the sense that my photography is equal to that of Ansel Adams: Not at all.
My impressions: Light red in the glass. Cherries but not much else going on with this medium-bodied wine. No hint of the other fruit and spice typically associated with Pinot Noir. No depth. An odd chemical aroma which I cannot place. Short astringent-medicinal finish.
I paid $9.99 for this bottle which places this Pinot Noir at the lower end of the price scale for this varietal. Not a terrible wine. Not a great wine.
I’d sooner save up my money I’d spend on five bottles of this wine to buy one bottle of a really good Pinot Noir.
It was in July of 1980 when I was first in France that I drank red wine from Burgundy. I was traveling from Naples, Italy to Den Helder, Netherlands via train when I stopped over in Paris for three nights. Staying at a one-star hotel above a butcher’s shop I explored the city, ate well and drank well for not much money.
As a young man from rural Michigan I’d not experienced anything remotely like the wine which I enjoyed that trip. My experience with red wine was limited to marginal Italian reds and California reds. I remember two things vividly about that moment twenty-nine years ago: First, the overwhelming mouth-filling flavor of the wine and how it seemed to be everywhere in my palate. It was rich, ripe and flavorful: more so than I’d known before and without the overly acidic or overly tannic flavors which characterized much of the low-cost California reds which I’d consumed up to that time. Second, was how common and accessible the wine was even at inexpensive side-street cafes. I was having lunch at decidedly non-upscale restaurant and the wine was listed as, “Vin Rouge - Burgundy” on the menu. As I dined at that sidewalk cafe my appreciation for wine changed forever.
I preface this review of the 2005 Morgan Double L Pinot Noir as this wine is a close to any French Burgundy which I have enjoyed originating this side of the Atlantic. It is simply a wonderful wine which strives, quite successfully, to emulate the great French pinot noir’s of Burgundy.
My Impression: Medium plum in color. Intense but not overly so. Cherries, raspberries and spice box with just the right amount of acidity. Closing out with a luxurious, long and lingering finish that goes on forever. Superb.
The 2005’s are at their peak right now and should be consumed in the next year or so. Only 800 cases of the 2005 Double L were produced and it is available on-line for prices between $49 and $56 per bottle.
The 2005 Morgan Double L Pinot Noir is, at it’s price point, a “trophy wine” and the sort which is reserved for special occasions. And that is a shame as great wines are to be enjoyed in any circumstance. It is the wine that makes the meal special!
Christmas Eve I paired it with homemade pizza and boiled chicken gizzards, firmly believing that for those few fleeting minutes that no man on earth was dining as well as I.
The first thing you should know when you visit Wholefoods Market is it's nickname: "whole paycheck". Wholefoods Market is an expensive place to shop for your groceries. The Porches, Mercedes and Volvos in the parking lot tell you all you need to know about the demographic which shops at Whole
Paycheck.
So imagine my surprise when I saw a bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon at the endcap of check-out counter for $4.99. The wine, a non-vintage Harthill Farms is a California appellation is of an unknown origin. I tried searching for Harthill Farm Winery on the web, and all I could find was a horse farm in Ocala, Florida. I am left with assuming that some middle-man has aggregated a lot of juice and brokered a high-volume deal with Wholefoods Market. Think of Harthill Farm as the upscale version of "Two-Buck Chuck".
My Impression: Medium red in color. Thin nose with very little fruit across the palate. Moderate soft tannins on the woody finish. It is a pretty simple wine without much going on other a little fruit and a respectable amount of tannins at the end. No real flaws.
I paired the wine with a bowl of chili this evening. In boxing terms, the wine was fighting outside of it its weight class. While I found Harthill Farms Cabernet Sauvignon acceptable, it did not have the intensity to stand up to the spicy beef, beans and tomatoes. All-in-all, at $4.99 for a 750 mL bottle with no critical faults the NV Harthill Farms Cabernet Sauvignon is a very good value and worthy of a try. Just be careful when you park your truck next to the Porche.
Gotta love the name: SKN which is an abbreviation for Screw Kappa Napa. I have been aware of the brand for a few years and first tried a SKN Sauvignon Blanc a last year.
SKN is another of several affordable down-market brands for Don Sebastiani & Sons. Other DS&S brands include: Smoking Loon, Mia's Kitchen, b-Side and and Pennywise.
My impression: Garnet to dark plum color. Red fruit and a hit (not unpleasantly so) of grass across the palate. Finished by long, soft, and lingering tannins on the dark berries. Very pleasant. It drinks like a more expensive Napa Valley cabernet sauvignon.
I am serving this wine with Beef Burgundy this evening. I think it would pair nicely with all of the typical pairings: beef, bison, lamb etc.
I paid $8.99 for my bottle at Dover Air Force base package store. Locally, I have seen it priced at $9.99 and $10.99 - so they are trying hard to keep it affordable. At this price and quality, the 2007 SKN Cabernet Sauvignon is an outstanding value.
It is a curiosity. The Yellow Tail wine brand accounts for nearly 10% of the imported wine market in the United States. Think of that! One of every ten bottles of imported wine consumed in the U.S. is from one Australian brand which is panned by the wine press. When is the last time you read anything positive about Yellow Tail in Wine Spectator? for that matter, when was the last time you read ANYTHING about Yellow Tail in Wine Spectator?
There may be a good reason for the dearth of positive reporting as Yellow Tail breaks with the popular conventions of the wine business because their product doesn't taste like a conventional wine. You have heard me talk about acidity in almost every commentary which I have posted. In some cases the acidity of the wine has made it a food friendly winner. And, in other cases the acidity has made it usable only as a drain cleaner.
Yellow Tail approached the wine market by taking aim at the segment which does not like the tartness or acidity which is typically found in wine. That is, they produce wine for people who don't like wine. By neutralizing the natural acidity in the wine they removed a barrier which kept the vast majority of individuals from drinking wine. In one article I read several years ago in Wine Spectator, the author estimated that only 15% of Americans actually like wine. If true, that means an overwhelming 85% of Americans do not like wine. At least they do not like wine as they know it.
My Impression: Monumentally huge, overwhelming cherries and oakiness on the nose and and equally flabby red fruit on the tongue with a brief almost sweet Luden's cough drop finish. For an instant I was transported in my wine-time-machine to the summer of 1974 and drinking Mogen-David Concord grape wine coolers at the Reno Bar in Greenville, Michigan. The Yellow Tail is like that: and, almost as embarrassing.
It is brilliant that Yellow Tail identified an under served portion of the market and developed a product specifically to address that segment. There must be marketing executives shaking their heads in disbelief that such a simple approach could succeed so easily. So, what is their secret? It is simple really: give people low-priced, low-acidity wines that are easy to drink.
At $6.99 for a 750 mL bottle it is reasonably priced. However you are part of that 15% of the American wine consuming public, you should pass on this low-priced Shiraz.
I don't expect much when I buy a bottle of Rose and am always pleasantly surprised when the bottle provides more pleasure than I expect.
Gallo owns the Red Bicyclette label and is using that brand to sell "vin ordinare" to US citizenry. I recently double-tasted a Red Bicyclette Chardonnay to disastrous results - it is simply un-drinkable. So, my expectations were very, very low when I cracked open a bottle of the 2008 Red Bicyclette Rose yesterday to be served at the Thanksgiving Day dinner table.
My impression: Strawberries and raspberries immediately and intensely upon the nose. There is good acidity which provided enough food-friendly structure for the wine to stand up pleasantly with my oyster-infused turkey dressing.
I expect the Gallo brand to provide reliable, unspectacular every-day wines at reasonable prices. The 2008 Red Bicyclette French Rose exceeds my expectations and is keeping with more pricy Rose (primarily from Australia) which I have sampled these past two years. Whereas their 2007 Chardonnay is un-drinkable, this 2008 French Rose is a food-friendly surprise and and at its very reasonable price point ($6.99 750 mL) a bargain.
The important difference with the Oriel brand is that they employ well-respected wine makers who have made their mark with other premium brands to make their wine. The 2004 Oriel Setena Red's wine maker is Xavier Clua - a fourth generation winemaker. Clua is the current winemaker for Celler Xavier Clua which specializes in wines from the Terra Alta region of Spain. The Setena is a blend sourced from Terra Alta.
My impressions: Setena is a full-bodied, richly colored red wine with ripe cherries and spicebox on the nose. Plums and spice on the finish with moderate tannins. My immediate impression was that I was tasting a Ch̢teauneuf du Pape with softer, more rounded edges. This shouldn't be too surprising as Setena is 40% Grenach Рthe workhorse grape of a Ch̢teauneuf. The wine is more tannic, and less rustic, that you'd find with the typical Ch̢teauneuf, and I think this is a likely positive outcome resulting from the 20% Cabernet Sauvignon used in the Red's blend.
This wine is engineered to be paired with foods of intense flavor such as bison, venison and rack of lamb. It would also pair very nicely with a dry-rubbed beef roast. Two summers ago I had a morel mushroom bisque served over foie gras at Citronelle in Washington, D.C. - This wine would have paired very well with that intense, flavorful bisque.
You can find Setena for about $18 (750 mL bottle) at retail and at that price it is a very good value and worthy of your consideration.
Terry post:
