The winemakers came marching into Dallas. Five of them in four-week period. Then I had two fabulous wine country trips to California providing tons of content. There were numerous Twitter online tastings with three other winemakers to debut new wines coming to Texas. Snooth came a-calling and asked me to be part of a French wine region seminar. The Australians came to town for an in-depth wine seminar and educational session on the region. Then I looked up and realized that it has been about well, uh, er … five months since I did a wine round-up. I still have a closet of wine to taste and lots of enquiring PR folks, but now I’m only a month behind on coverage, so here’s my latest line-up of favorites.
I tasted 20 wines from Spain, France and California and 12 made today’s round-up story. Here are some great bottles to seek out.
Whites and Roses
2015 Tank Garage Winery “Stars Like Ours” Rose – whoa – this personifies Summer in a glass and I can’t wait to get more. I tasted fresh, juicy strawberries, mango, raspberries, flowers and notes of honey. It only comes in a three-pack and you can order it directly from the winery.
2012 Tricó Albariño Rías Baixas – I really liked this aged wine. It had great notes of peach, apricot and flowers with a nice stony minerality. As you swirled the wine in the glass, it continued to evolve.
2014 La Caña Albariño – notes of peach, apple and tropical fruits with the minerality and stone fruit that is typical for this wine.
2014 Vionta Albariño – juicy peach, apricot, green apple, melon, tropical fruit and a nice minerality makes this a zingy, tangy and delicious wine.
2014 Grassini Sauvignon Blanc – a great expression of a beautiful Sauvignon Blanc. Notes of citrus, pear and granite with just the right amount of minerality and balance.
2014 Paramus Verdejo – a blend of flowers, tropical fruit, green apple, pear and herbal notes make this an easy drinking wine that drinks well with food.
Champagnes
Nicolas Feuillatte D’Luscious Rose Champagne – this champagne is blended with chardonnay, pinot noir and pinot meunier, the classic blends for Champagne. I tasted red and black cherry and a burst of raspberry. I loved the elegance and layers of this sparkler.
Nicolas Feuillatte Brut Rose Champagne – another great expression of Champagne in this bottle. I tasted raspberry, currant, fresh bread and blackberry. This had a great acidity, ripe fruit and a great minerality.
Reds
2013 Grassini Equipo – “Equipo” is the Spanish word for team and this wine was made to pay tribute to the team that has been with the winery since the vines were planted. It’s a nice tribute with raspberry, cherry, currant, cassis and notes of chocolate.
2013 Grassini Articondo – named as another tribute to Larry Grassini’s grandfather, this well-made wine is drinkable today with notes of blackberry, chocolate, spice, mocha, black fruit and caramel.
2014 La Crema Virtuoso Pinot Noir – definitely not your grocery store La Crema, I made sure my group tasted this blindly and it received rave reviews. I tasted raspberry, cherry, black licorice, plum, cherry cola and black tea. This was a great wine and the decisions were made by 25,000 participants of La Crema’s Virtual Vintner crowd sourcing program. Pretty cool.
2013 50 Harvests Meritage – this wine is absolutely delicious with notes of chocolate, coffee, red fruit, blackberry and is a fantastic Bordeaux blend. This was made by the Scotto Family to mark the family’s 50 years in the wine business.
