greg drinks

Tag: Italy

  • Wow, I could have had a Vigna Traverso!

    Seriously, this wine was like drinking your vegetables, which I love very much. This is the 2005 Vigna Traverso Refosco from the Colli Orientali del Friuli appellation of Italy. This DOC is in the province of Udine in the north east corner of Italy. Basically on the back of the boot rim. Red wines only account for about 35% of the wine production in this DOC and the main grape is typically merlot. But this one, obviously, is produced from the refosco grape. This is a deep violet colored grape with slight bitterness and powerful tannins. It is also know as the terlan or terlano grape and eastern France it goes by the name mondeuse.

    I just fell in love with this wine. It was the first time I’ve had this grape or any wine from this region, for that matter. It has the characteristic deep purple color. The nose was earthy and bright with hints of red cherries, twizzlers and a bit of forest floor. It really pleased me on the palate. Talk about old world! It was nicely balanced with fruit and vegetables. Think hints of raw green peppers blended with a can of V8 and some red cherry juice shaken on top. Very intriguing and delicious. It certainly had solid tannins but they weren’t overpowering in any way. It was really well balanced. I would say it will last at least another 6-8 years.

  • A nice Tuscan

    What goes better with pizza than a nice chianti classico? Friday night was pizza night at our house and I opened up a 2001 Fattoria Le Fonti chianti classico. If you don’t know about chiantia, it is the largest region in Tuscany. This is made largely from the sangiovese grape. This bottle was pretty darn good. It had a nice color just edging on brick red. On the nose were aromas of berries and red fruits. Interestingly there was a subtle hint of furniture polish, kind of like lemon pledge. Strange, I know, but it wasn’t a bad thing. The palate was very interesting. It was earthy with a medium body. There was a pronounced acidity that cut through the red fruits and I liked that very much. It had a solid tannin structure but they were nice and soft. There were nice hints of mocha and rusty nails dancing around my mouth. This was definitely a classic chianti classico in all respects.

  • A couple of decent ones

    I had a couple of wines last night that impressed me. Let me talk about the Cellar No. 8 first. This is a wine from the Asti winery in Sonoma. This label offers a very good QPR for what it is. They are not serious wines but are certainly quaffable and I picked up a few bottles of the 2005 zinfandel on a sale for $8 last week. So many of the zins today are coming in with way high alcohol and big candy-like fruit. Sometimes I feel like I’m drinking dessert wines, they are so sweet. I have been missing that black pepper that first made me fall in love with this grape. Well, for an everyday wine, the Cellar No. 8 brings something to the table. It had a nice cherry and raspberry nose but it was the black pepper on the palate that won me. I love that! It wasn’t super complex but it certainly had a good structure. Dark fruits, raspberries and plums were present and it had a nice acidity that was obvious. It also had a nice clean lingering finish that was quite pleasant. Overall this was a good buy at $8.

    Let’s get a little bit more serious now. I don’t remember where I picked up this Leone de Castris Salice Salentino Riserva, but it’s been in my cellar for a while. Current wisdom (aka cellartracker) suggested that the drinking window for this wine was between 2005 and 2007, so I popped it open and decanted it for an hour. This was an interesting wine. Full of an earthiness mingling with red fruits on the nose and the palate. It had very smooth tannins and a good weight in the mouth. I noticed hints of asparagus and sour cherries too. Quite complex and difficult to describe. Definitely an old world style that I very much enjoyed. It paired well with a green olive stuffed chicken breast and polenta.

  • ReNoto

    Feudo Maccari ReNoto 2005 Syrah from Sicily

    Red raspberries forever on the nose and the palate. Nice hints of chocolate. Anise, nice acidity, opens up very well, some dry wood. Nice wine – 88 pts.

  • Over the Hill

    Sometimes you keep a wine too long and it is past it’s prime. Tonight I had such a wine. I bought this 1995 Brunello di Montalcino a few years ago and kept it stored away in my cellar. I’ve been waiting for a special occasion to open it. It happens to be my birthday, so I a grabbed it. It was good but I would say it fell flat with regards to my expectations. You can see in the glass below that the color was a bit over the edge. It was almost orange in color with a deep brick red. You could tell it had some age on it. On the nose you could not really discern any fruit other than perhaps something akin to warm stewed prunes. It had some barnyard manure smells and it just reminded me of old earth. On the palate it presented with a flash of fruit right up front along with a mineralness of rusty barbed wire and an interesting sharp acidity. It had absolutely no tannins to speak of. The fruit was not identifiable and it was a bit thin on the end. To its credit it opened up a little bit with some air to present more cherry notes in the flavor. I enjoyed it with a rosemary chicken creamy pasta.