Another month and another six random import bottles from Dan Murphy’s chosen on the basis of a bit of prior knowledge and member’s special prices. Must admit to gazing at this bottle on the shelves for a while but have shied away as basic supermarket Rioja can be a little too engineered with American oak and extraction for my precious taste. I should have got my glasses out and looked at the back label to see it’s made by Badiola whose more expensive bottles have been exemplary in terms of gently expressive winemaking, see previous reviews, particularly the blancos. This stays true to the model. Just medium bodied, perfumed strawberries, toffee and chalky length. Some would say cola? Not having indulged in a cola drink for years, I suppose my strawberry and toffee is close to the US’s gift to the world. Light touch in the making again. Gentle infusion compresses those clean, precise flavours well into an end of refreshing ripe acidity and ripe tannin of silky poise. Cool fruit from up on the Alavesa and Rioja of character not caricature. There’s a black label version of two vintages blended, I’m in.
13% alcohol. Diam. $18.10 in a six.
91 points but so elegant as Iggy would say.
Well, the Rioja was good but the squat bottle of 2019 Tinazzi Ca’ de’ Rocchi Valpolicella pictured in the six was very much less so. Opened with a reductive pong that cleared to a washy lift of spearmint and vague red berries sprinkled with a sort of cooked brown sugar coating. Fades quickly into some unappealing green acidity. Left a day and not much improved. Most of the bottle ended up cleaning the plug hole. Looking at Tinazzi’s glamorous website, they say the Ca’ de’ Rocchi range is made for those not used to the sharpness of traditional Valpol, the tech sheet says it’s got nearly 5 grams of RS. Don’t think Quintarelli or Allegrini ever needed make up to make their stuff drinkable?
13% alcohol. Diam in a very narrow necked bottle, struggle to remove, impossible to put back in. $23 down the drain.
85 points but subjectively less.
At the end of the last century, Potensac was a reliable and good value taste of Bordeaux as prices were starting to rise dramatically. Now it has a second wine it seems. So a 2017 Chapelle de Potensac which was $30 on special, down from $40. Oh well, Domaines Delon have a good portfolio it seems from the back label, so I decided to risk a Bordeaux from what seems an uneven vintage. Mostly Merlot for immediacy perhaps? Reductive with a smell like those old cap guns us kids in sixties UK used to shoot each other. They’re probably as rare as good value Bordeaux these days. Nice shape to the wine in terms of gentle just OK acidity and fine gravel tannin. The flavours dilute with cooked red berry and mulberry flickering in and out. Sweet green herb and leaf. Finally a small nudge of the sort of earthy richness that I’ve enjoyed in a limited experience of more celebrated Bordeaux. Oh well, I enjoyed the Rioja so much more and it’s much cheaper. This is so careful and polished as to be anodyne. At least there was enough to make it through the bottle. Anodyne can mean boring, dull or insipid or pain numbing. At least a few glasses were anodyne in the sense of taking off the edge off spending $30.
13% alcohol. Diam again. $30 on special.
90 points, maybe in a blind line up 88, it’s a classic label and I’m a snob at heart.
Cognitive Bottle Therapy 