If you love a good Rhone red blend the way I do, you may wonder if any other regions in the world can make a killer blend that would stand up to these famous French wines.
In South Africa, producer A.A. Badenhorst makes a pretty delicious bottle that packs a bit more of a punch than you'd expect thanks to being a blend of Syrah, Grenache, Cinsault plus Tinta Barroca and Touriga Nacional for good measure.
This one certainly did not leave us wanting more for complexity!
It only took a while after arriving in Washington that we realize this state produces some pretty incredible grapes. Not only that, but Washington wineries tend to produce similar to two renowned Old World styles- namely Bordeaux and Rhone blends.
As we are fans of all things Rhone wine (less so Bordeaux, if we are being honest), we were drawn to sampling as much Grenache, Syrah, and Mourvedre as we could in Washington.
So when we were visiting Latta Vineyards outside of Seattle (after trying a bottle of their amazing Grenache), we found ourselves heading next door to Rotie Cellars immediately thereafter. As the name comes from one of the best wine regions in the Rhone (making arguably some of the finest Syrah in the world), we knew we had to give them a try.
As it turns out, their Southern Rhone Blend was a winner!
We have becoming bigger fans of Grenache the more we drink it, especially Grenaches grown in Washington and Oregon in particular.
When we had a chance to try out Willamette Valley Vineyards Griffin Creek Grenache courtesy of wine service Divvy-Up, we jumped on it and opened the bottle for Thanksgiving dinner just a short while after it was delivered.
When it comes to rose wines, we can enjoy them any time of year for any reason with (almost) any food pairing. But some rose wines rise above the rest and become something truly special worth savoring and pairing with the very best food.
Jaine's Sustainable Vineyards Rose is one such wine, and this 100% Grenache rose may go down as our very favorite yet.
Every time we travel, there is almost always a winery that we find by chance and fall in love with. During our trip to Washington, that winery was Latta Wines.
We stumbled upon this one when shopping for a bottle to take to a nice dinner as the corkage fee was reasonable relative to the heavily marked-up bottle prices. We stumbled upon the Latta Grenache Upland Vineyard 2015 at a nearby store. We saw it had stellar reviews and was at a reasonable price, so we jumped on it. What a wine it was!
The wine left such an impression on us that we immediately had to look up where the winery was, and we found out they are based in the south end of Seattle outright (as many wineries in the state buy their grapes from various vineyards)! Naturally, we visited, adored all the wines we tried there, and left with even more bottles of the Upland Vineyard Grenache, 2016 vintage, to take home with us.
It was just a few weeks later that we opened our first bottle, and wanted to share more in this review!
I have a general rule that if a friend whose tastes I trust recommends a bottle of wine, I'll do what I can to find it. Agriolas Turriga 2016 was one such bottle, and my friend Strictly Sardinia recommended it as one of the most acclaimed wines from the island.
This one is a blend of Grenache (85%), Carignan, Malvasia Di Casorzo, and Bovale Sardo and can only be described as an intense wine. But even in drinking this one at five years old, for our next bottle I think I'd let this one sleep for another five if not longer!
Chateau Maris La Touge is a lovely Syrah and Grenache blend from Minervois in the south of France. As we are coming to find out, we're quite enjoying wines from this part of the country!
Chateau Musar is one of those wineries that we have to buy a bottle of every time we find them in a liquor store- especially the aged bottles which the winery does not release until they are ready to drink (making them somewhat hard to come by).
Our first experience with this winery was enjoying a lovely '98 at Wine Bar George at Disney Springs, and ever since then we've been on the hunt for bottles. We found a great Chateau Musar 2006 at a store locally and struck gold when visiting family in Ohio where we found half case of Chateau Musar 2010 and the Pere et Fils 2012 as well.
We bought one of each, went back to my mom's house, cracked open the 2012, and knew we had to go back to the store the next day to buy more- this Carignan, Grenach, Cinsaut, and Cabernet Sauvignon blend offered everything we love about the winery in an attractive price point as well!
If you like high acid, low tannin reds that have some delicious red fruit notes that open up to darker fruit (especially with meat-based dishes), you definitely should give the Els Vineryons Saltamarti a try.
This Tempranillo and Garnacha blend will have what you seek in an easy-drinking format.
Partida Creus is an interesting winery in Catalunya, Spain, that is run by Italians and uses grapes acquired from old and sometimes abandoned vineyards. These are then farmed organically and produce some seriously delicious natural blends.
Vinel-lo, denoted VN, is a red field blend of six different grapes in various quantities- specifically Grenache, Mourvedre, Tempranillo, Sumoll, Trepat, and Cinsaut. As wines from Partida Creus have initials in a rather recognizable format on the label, it should be noted that they have VN bottles for red (this review), white, and even sparkling- so you may come across any of these if you are simply searching out “Partida Creus VN”.
So, what is the red blend like? Well, this one had a nice complex aroma and was relatively straightforward on the palate.
