“These two are both good wines at very good prices.”
Click image to enlarge.
I ran across a couple of good buys in red wines this weekend that I would submit for your consideration. Both were in full bins (there was at least a case of each on Saturday) and those Costco prices are always attractive.
It’s been a few years since I’ve last had any Palazzo della Torre. I used to sell a lot of it, and we drank a fair amount of it as well, going back to at least vintage 1999. When I saw this one, it was another one of those “how bad can it be” purchasing decisions, and I’m happy to report that it is in fact very good indeed.
2020 Allegrini Palazzo della Torre Veronese I.G.T., 40% Corvina Veronese, 30% Corvinone, 25% Rondinella, 5% Sangiovese, 13.5% alc., $15.99: Deep and dark in color, with a pleasant nose of dark berries, black cherries and a hint of something like underbrush and forest floor. Full bodied and well-structured for at least as few years in the cellar, yet drinking pretty well already, with a rich, fairly intense core of black berries, black currants and black cherries, shaded with some sticksy underbrush that balances nicely with the ripe fruit to set the tone to the wine’s personality and appeal. I’ll always try to give a wine like this some time to age and develop, but this gets better and better with air right now, so it’s a drink or hold, whichever way you care to go with it. An eminently satisfying red, and even better than I hoped it might be.
Harvested by hand in two stages: the first involves the collection of the berries destined for drying, the second of those immediately destined for vinification. The wine is produced via the technique of double fermentation: most of the grapes are vinified at harvest, while the remaining part is left to partially dry (appassimento). In January the wine produced, blended with the crushed grapes, begins a second fermentation. It then ages in second use French oak barriques for 15 months, in large barrels for 2 months and is fine-tuned for 7 months in the bottle. Find this wine
Imported by Maze Row Wine Merchant, Healdsburg, CA
It’s not everyday that you can find a good Pinot Noir for under $20, but this one rightly fits that bill. It’s been quite a while since I’ve had anything from Starmont; I had to search the old Gang of Pour archives to find that it was back in 2007, when Starmont was the entry-level range of Merryvale. It’s still owned by the same Schlatter Family that owns Merryvale, but somewhere along the line the decision was apparently made to separate the brands. That separation certainly doesn’t seem to have adversely affected the quality of this one.
Click image to enlarge.
2020 Starmont Pinot Noir Tri-County, 47% Monterey County, 46% Santa Barbara County, 7% Napa County, 13.8% alc., $16.89: Here’s a wine that shows good varietal typicity; it’s not too ripe and fairly well-balanced. It has a nice core of black cherry and cranberry fruit, shaded with a little earth and a little more tar. Medium-to-medium-full-bodied, with the tannin and acid structure to age for a few years, but drinking well now with some air. This is a good glass of California Pinot Noir for a more-than-decent price. Find this wine
These two are both good wines at very good prices. I highly recommend getting some while they’re still available for such relatively low prices.
Reporting from Day-twah,
Bastardo
