Our tasting was held at the Quarry Bar (adjacent to cafe Artemis in the Park Plaza Hotel) on February 7th at 8:00. Thank you Zoe for hosting, Kevin for your great info on the wines and Marc for the fantasatic Tapas. We sampled 5 wines:
Lena, Tinto, 2005, Spain
Mapena Tempranillo, Argentina, 2005
Dominio de Atuata Ribera Del Duero, 2004
Finca Villacreces Ribera Del Duero, 2004
Conde de Valdemar Crianza, 2003
The Lena was a why bother wine, the Mapena a quaffable one, the Dominio solid but overpriced, the Villacreces an age worthy, balanced crowd pleaser and the Valdemar good but forgetable. Overall, these wines were well crafted, approachable and great food wines with enough acidity and tannic structure to go with a wide range of cusine. The night didn't change my life but will make me look at the Tempranillos on wine lists a little more closely in the future.
Sunday night with dinner, Tim brought a 2003 Altano Douro Reserva that would have trumped any of the wines in the tasting for about 1/3 the price of the Villacreces. Portugal in particular is putting out some big and impressive wines at very reasonable prices (if you can find them).
2 comments:
Way to spread the Thunder!
Kathleen Lisson
If you want a nice Tempranillo, try the Forlorn Hope "Mil Amores" Tempranillo by Mathew Rorick Wines. Very small production, VERY big tempranillo.
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