La Crema is one of those brands we see seemingly everywhere. From wine shop to wine shop, bar menu to bar menu, La Crema is one of those brands it is hard to get away from in the USA.
So, naturally, it sparked our interest, and we wanted to find out if their California Pinot Noir was worth our attention.
For its price, well, this certainly was an interesting one!
Georgian wines are always interesting, especially when they're aged in traditional qvevri.
Vartsikhe Marani's Tsolikouri is one such wine made in an orange style with skin contact for several months. The result of this one is an intensely aromatic wine that showcases the best of the white grape with strong skin characteristics, too.
It is always interesting when trying a grape from Santorini, if only because the high winds and the volcanic soil of the island seems to do wonders in helping the wines retain higher acidity despite the hot climate.
Aidani is one white grape produced on the island that is somewhat hard to come by, and while Artemis Karamolegos' Aidani comes in at a sufficient price point that may give us a moment to pause for buying another bottle, it is an interesting one all the same.
When we visited Douro Valley wineries on our trip around Portugal, we knew we had to taste, and subsequently purchase, many vintage Ports.
Our goal for these wines are to age them to their absolute best, which likely means holding on to many until they're 30, 40, or 50+ years old.
But a few years after we got back, we decided to open a bottle to help a friend taking the WSET Diploma D5 exam (fortified wines). As we had two bottles of Quinta Nova's 2000 Vintage Port, we thought it'd be a good opportunity to see how this one was faring at 23 years old.
It was still incredibly youthful!
Famille Bougrier's Rose d'Anjou was an interesting one to us as the primary grapes in the bottle were a blend of Gamay and Grolleau- two grapes we are not accustomed to see in rose wine compared to widely grown counterparts.
Although the flavors in this bottle were somewhat simple all around, we are interested in trying more roses with this kind of makeup!
19 Crimes is a large wine brand from Australia known for producing large volumes of wine and unique collaborations.
The name 19 Crimes comes from the list of crimes that would get you exiled from Britain and sent to Australia, and most of the core line features one of the crimes on its label.
We picked up a bottle of 19 Crimes Cabernet Sauvignon to see what it was all about and found it to be an easy-drinking wine, albeit a bit too heavy on the oak notes for our personal taste.
Our quest to try every grape varietal in the world has us on the lookout for Italy's hundreds if not thousands of varietals.
Naturally, when we found a bottle of Masseria Li Veli Verdeca from Puglia, we knew we had to give it a try.
With a lovely spread of fruit flavors and a decent intensity, this was certainly an interesting bottle!
We often cite Chateau Musar as one of those wineries that got us into wine in the first place. We first tried them at Wine Bar George at Disney Springs (the '98 red) and had a revelatory moment about what wine truly could be like.
Ever since, we've been on the hunt for Chateau Musar bottles, and particularly old Chateau Musar bottles to enjoy at home.
So when we found a cache of old bottles at the Party Source in Newport, Kentucky, we knew we had to pick up a few, and one bottle was a Chateau Musar Blanc dating back to 1997.
A 26-year-old white wine, made with rare grapes from Lebanon (Obaideh and Merwah- likely ancestors of Chardonnay and Semillon), stored at a facility we know and trust? You know we had to open that one right away.
It is not terribly common to find a rose made from popular red grapes from the Douro Valley like Touriga Nacional and Tinta Roriz, but Quinta do Tedo did just that with their rose blend.
This one hits on all the notes we love in a good rose, with a nice balance between fruit and floral notes all around. Not bad at all for its reasonable price point!
Kerner is an interesting white grape that was bred in 1929 and is a crossing between Riesling and Trollinger. Grown in cooler climates, this one is often found in Germany, Austira, Switzerland, and northern Italy- the latter where we found Abbazia di Novacella's Kerner from Alto Adige.
For those who like a white wine with light phenolic textures, this is one to seek out!
