My Pleasure
Blanc Nantaise | Castillian Mencia
The listicle must be the last refuge of the craven lifestyle journalist, who having spent most of the week attending events realizes he has a deadline and must make some sense of the pages of scribbles he’s made on his knee at so many tastings. So, here are five red wines I have tasted in the last couple of weeks that continue to linger in my imagination.
My late father-in-law was an advocate for rights of the much discriminated against Roma people of Eastern Europe. He banned the G word from his house on the grounds that it is a hateful slur. His family has tried to keep this convention. I am breaking it warily because, in this case, the wine is so good it needs to be written about, and I believe it was named in good faith and sympathy with society’s outcasts.
The name comes from an isolated Stellenbosch vineyard of Grenache, which leads this GSM blend. It was illicitly planted in the late 1950s from cuttings, and the neighbouring farmers were absurdly afraid that the vines might contract phylloxera and wouldn’t grow vines around it. To Ken Forrester the isolated vineyard seemed like a Gypsy camp, ostracized and removed from society.
In any event it’s the Syrah in the 2012 that dominated my senses with a lovely septentronial cured meat note over red and black berry fruit, and somehow quite light on its feet and elegant. I tasted it over dinner, and Ken opened a 2008 as well, which was lovely as well, and maybe more Grenache focused and meridonial. For whatever reason, the 2012’s siren song was just a little bit more enticing to my ears.
2022 Sassicaia
Priscilla Incisa della Rocchetta, Toronto, May 206. If I was extravagantly wealthy and had given up the pedestrian chore of buying my own wine, I might instruct the staff to keep a standing order with the Tenuta San Guido, so that every room in all of my various abodes might have a bottle of Sassicaia on hand. When my guests had noticed that I was once more serving the original Bolgheri gangster Cabernet blend, I would humbly submit to them that I was a simple man and had never been disappointed by a glass of red from this horse farm by the sea.
Since I am not yet fabulously wealthy, I have to remember how fortunate I am to be periodically invited to taste Sassicaia, especially when it is poured in the company of Priscilla Incisa della Rocchetta, who was in Toronto this week with her famiy’s wines. (Watch this space for an interview I conducted with Signora Incisa della Rocchetta.) Since it was more than a year since her last visit, she poured both the 2022 (sold out) and 2023 (to be released in the fall). I am sure that if only the 2023 had been poured, it would be on the list, but the 2022, from a notoriously hot year, was just that much more approachable at the moment. It really was like a first growth claret seasoned with just a touch Mediterranean herbal scrub. So good.2024 Sorelle Bronca Valdobbiadene Rive di Farrò Extra Brut Particella 232
Henry Jeffries has written some unkind things about cheap Prosecco, so in order to restore balance in The Winoverse, I will write some kind things about fancy Prosecco. This single vineyard bottling from my favourite women-run DOCG bubble makers has absolutely zero sugar, despite a modest 11% of alcohol by volume. It’s about yellow fruit and white florals, and a fine, almost silky mousse of a perlage. I would take a glass of this over any of the usual Duty Free Champagne suspects any day.
2016 Bertani Amarone
Apparently I didn’t just need to be reminded how much I like Prosecco, when it’s good. I also needed to be reminded how much I like Amarone, when it’s good. I didn’t mean to stop at the Bertani table at the Tre Bicchieri show, but I went over to chat with their importer who more or less pushed me over to their export manager who poured me a taste that stopped me in my tracks.
The Bertani Amarone was perfectly in balance and surprisingly fresh with acidity. I was expecting a big black fruit monster, but instead encountered a red fruit sprite of a wine. At ten years, it was very much alive, but structurally settled and calming, with dried fruit and black secondary flavours emerging on the finish. It knocked the snob right out of me.Le Fonti 2023
Viticoltrice Vicki Schmitt-Vitali of Le Fonti, Toronto, May 2026. There were lots of very fancy Riserva and Gran Selezione wines at this year’s big Chianti Classico tasting. Thirty wineries took part, and most sent their winemaker or export manager to chat up the wines, which all were happy to do. There was no “best wine” at the tasting. There were lots of excellent and interesting wines at the tasting, including quite a back vintages into the 2010s and 2000s, along with what has just been released.
I got to the Le Fonti table as things were wrapping up, and my palate was tired. I remember tasting the 2023 Annata and being woken up. Juicy cherries, fresh acidity, some tannin holding it all together. Even the “regular” Le Fonti is still pretty fancy, at $32 a bottle. But it’s democratically fancy, nuanced but accessible. It stuck with me.
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WINE RECOMMENDATIONS
Réserve du Chiron Muscadet Sèvre et Maine 2024
Price: $16.95
Channel: LCBO Vintages
Producer: Maison Couillaud
Country: France
Region: Loire Valley
Appellation: Muscadet Sèvre et Maine AOC
Grapes: Melon de Bourgogne
Alcohol by Volume: 12%
Sugar Content: 3 grams per litre
Poor old Muscadet has three strikes against it. First, it sounds a lot like “Muscat”, which it could not be more different from stylistically. Second, it’s made form a weird sounding grape, that sounds like a breakfast fruit from Burgundy. Three, if it’s known at all, it’s invariably linked to oysters, since its made so close to the mollusc beds of Brittany. Muscadet is very good with oysters, but it’s also very good with lots of other things, especially in the contemporary style that’s heavy on resting the wines on its lees (sur lie), which is Muscadet’s secret weapon that transforms these high acid wines into a more mellow and mid-palate pleasing gastronomic wines.
I might rebrand Muscadet as Chablis d’Atlantique, if the authorities would let me. But then, we might have to pay Burgundian prices for this very much underrated jewel of a white wine. Look for classic crisp white wine notes of lemon citrus and apricot. This is a wine to have on hand in case a friend stops by in the late afternoon. If you don’t have any oysters, a piece of hard cheese and a few crackers will be fine.
https://www.lcbo.com/en/la-cave-du-coudray-r-cserve-du-chiron-muscadet-s-rvre-et-maine-2024-413757
Lagar de Robla Mencia 2023
Price: $18.00
Channel: LCBO Vintages
Producer: Vinos de Arganza
Country: Spain
Region: Bierzo
Appellation: Castilla y Leon CdO
Grapes: Mencia
Alcohol by Volume: 14.5%
Sugar Content: 2 grams per litre
My Spanish no es bueno, but I think this wine is a kind of de-classified Bierzo, which is why it’s $18 and not $25. The producer is from Bierzo, and they’re making wine with the region’s signature grape, Mencia, in a style that seems to me to be in line with the appellation (in wine speak, it shows typicity). So, I’m not sure why it’s marketed as essentially table wine. It was in barrel for just 10 months, which is pretty short by Iberian standards, so maybe that’s it.
Not that we should care. Heather McDonald once described Mencia wines to me as “delicate but powerful”, and this is it. Super bright red fruit just barely kept from exploding by firm tannins, obscure the high alcohol count. It’s a bit dangerous that way, but it’s likely perfect for a boisterous dinner party. Delicious stuff.
https://www.lcbo.com/en/lagar-de-robla-coleccion-4-hermanos-mencia-50391
