Category: Tempranillo and blends

The slow and at times discombobulating hold of the Covid virus has certainly whacked the already less than impressive energy levels and made the last couple of months at times seem like a drizzly English weekend. Eventually the sun comes out again as the virus loosens its hold and a bottle comes along that just brings a smile. The 2018 of this was very good, this is a paragon of what good Rioja Tempranillo can do if there’s not too mucking about in the winery. Spank me, it’s fresh. Just right ripeness, carefully extracted and delicious. Bright red fruits, strawberries and cherries with a swirl of healthy dirt. Makes the mouth happy with sparkling acidity and a well sharpened blade of fine tannin. Probably has the weight to gain with age but such a cheer up as of now. Seize the day and a bottle. This maker is consistently very good.

14% alcohol, perhaps can’t read my writing. Not that it matters if the balance is there. Diam. $26.60 in a Murphy’s six.

92 or 93 points.

My inbox gets a bit clogged by all the retail wine shops, wholesalers, reviewers and wineries I seemed to have invited to send emails. A favourite importer, The Spanish Acquisition, happily offer some irresistible, and perhaps Monty Python inspired, unexpected discount clearances. Six packs of your choice of colour for $90 was too good to miss. Thanks to a good friend and fellow wine nut some good things landed on his veranda to share. This is just the sort of energetic blast of clean fresh joven that scratches that need for red wine itch. Tempranillo seems to cover the soft spice and aroma of things like Shiraz with the grunt of Cabernet all in one go. Bursts forth with just picked red berries, very ripe strawberries and a bit of blueberry. Flicker of nutmeg spice. Lots of extract and some depth. Richness cut by mountain sparkling acidity and bristling skin tannins. A lick of savoury sulphide bitterness too that might get a bit too noticeable with time in the bottle but so good for now, why wait? Yet another dream of one of those Spanish bars, a glass of this and a tapa of Iberico, one day.

13.5% alcohol. Screw cap. Normally about $26 to $30 but for $15 brilliant.

91 points.

Another six bottles from Dan Murphy’s. Trying to find something untested is getting difficult. Time to resort to a Tempranillo from Spain as there’s no new Mencia or Garnacha. Very clean, quite extracted with chunky ripe strawberry into plum fruit. Made in the technical text take no risks way. The shape carries the method with a good thunk of Greek coffee like silty tannins and firm acidity with no room for anything wild. There’s grace in the way of some well grown fruit quality flickering in the making. Certainly a notch up from the $12 or thereabouts basic Tempranillo imports. The sort of Joven you’d be happy about served cool in the glass in one of those much missed Spanish bars. Maybe a bit like some of those Nero d’Avola made in the same way. Good mouthful of simple fruit, a firm bit of muscle but not a lot of complication. Could be an unmerited quibble. What was I expecting for $15 on special? Happy to finish the bottle, a recommendation perhaps. Five more bottles to go.

14% alcohol. Screw cap. $15.20 member’s special.

89 points.

After five different bottles from Bodega Badiola, all of them delicious and beautifully made, it’s time to try the last available. A blend of two different vintages which the label says was a common decision in times long gone. I googled to see which vintages and thought I saw a reference to 2017 and 2018. Tried checking but nothing pops up, maybe I imagined it? Details aside, this Conjunto de Varias Consechas appears to be another clean and nicely understated expression of just so Alavesa Tempranillo. A little rounder than the 2018 white label, rich but in no way jammy strawberry and cherry fruit fits neatly into an even flow of mouthwatering acidity mingling seamlessly with fine crisp tannin. Savoury notes of spice and chalky earth. Gentle but satisfying. Softly voiced but speaks a clear authenticity. Of all the value imports on Dan’s heterogeneous shelves, Badiola and Mommessin stand out for consistent quality. Hope there’s some new vintages to explore next month as I think I’ve exhausted the current options. Always cheered by new shiny things to buy. Silly really.

14% alcohol. Diam. $19.

91 points.

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.

Tempranillo can be just the thing when you crave a decent mouthful of uncomplicated red fruit and a satisfying cut of fresh acidity and tannin grunt, particularly in the joven bottlings like this. This has that lovely dual nature of spice, cola and a good chunk of straightforward red fruit cut by tea bag tannin and firm just there ripe acidity. A little detail of strawberry and toffee prevent it being too monolithic. Curiously reminds me of Sicily’s Nero d’Avola in it’s no nonsense full red fruit. Really the sort of good value red you want when the company, food and convivial chat are more important than the drink. It happens apparently.

14% alcohol. Screw cap. $20.

91 no quibbling honest points.

Well, as it’s a recent vintage, I’d assumed it was a new treat. Apparently not as I reviewed it a few months ago. Unusually consistent notes which is sort of reassuring for a dodgy old palate.