Archive for Daily Drop
Merinas Verdejo 2014, Ucles, Organic
12%
€12
Appetisingly fresh and crisp with zesty lemons and light yellow fruits. The perfect aperitif or served with mussels.
Available from On the Grapevine, Dalkey; Drink Store, Manor Street; Red Island, Skerries; Nectar, Sandyford; Green Man, Terenure.
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Merinas Tempranillo 2014, Ucles, Organic
14%
€12
Juicy rounded dark cherry fruits; a great easy-drinking everyday wine for drinking solo or with food. Ours went very well with a cheesy pizza.
Available from On the Grapevine, Dalkey; Drink Store, Manor Street; Red Island, Skerries; Nectar, Sandyford; Green Man, Terenure.
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Graf Josef Grüner Veltliner 2013, Niederösterreich, Austria
12.5%
€14.99
Available from Donnybrook Fair; Gibneys, Malahide; Hole in the Wall, D7; Market 57, Westport; No.21 Off licences; Coopers, Cahir; Shannon Knights, Limerick.
Light and refreshing with peaches and grapefruit zest, finishing bone dry. Great on its own or with fish and lighter white meats.
I was a little concerned by the vintage when I received this sample; however, the Graf Josef was showing no signs of fading away. In fact, I tried the 2009 vintage at a recent tasting and t was still very much together. This is, I think, the least expensive Grüner Veltliner on the market, and in most vintages, it offers great value.
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Lidl Chianti Classico Riserva 2009
€10.49
Available from Lidl.
Supple soft red cherry fruits and a tannin-free finish. Simple easy-drinking all-purpose wine.
Chianti usually falls into one of three categories; the first covers most of the cheap versions. These are acidic, scrawny, nasty and undrinkable. Then there is the second category, usually but not always from the posher sub-region of Chianti Classico. These are sublime wines, with lifted dark cherries, good acidity and plenty of tannins. They are great with red meat and game. They are also expensive; expect to pay €20 and more; a lot more for the very best. The third category covers a small group of wines that are soft and supple with lush sweet ripe fruits. They don’t taste very like Chianti, which tends to have high acidity. Nor do they have the complexity of a top Chianti Classico. But they are very gluggable on a Wednesday night. The Lidl version is a part of this grouping; inexpensive and light with very easy rounded fruits. For €10.49, you can’t really go wrong.
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Golden Valley Grasevina 2014
Pozega Valley, Slavonija, Croatia
13%
€14.79 from Marks & Spencer
Floral, with unusual but attractive spicy melon fruits, good acidity and a clean finish. Interesting well-made wine. Drink on its own, or with herby fish dishes.
This wine is made from the Grasevina grape, the Croatian name for Welschriesling. You may not have heard of it, but it is widely grown across central Europe, the Balkans, and Italy. It is typically used to make sweet wine, but can make very gluggable dry white wines too.
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Porteno Malbec 2015, Bodegas Norton, Mendoza
14%
Available from O’Briens for €10.95 for the month of February
This is a really tasty wine, relatively powerful, and rippling with layers of dark fruit. No oak and no tannins; just a big mouthful of pure supple fruit. At less than €11 for the month of February, this is a real bargain.
Argentina is famous for it’s Malbec. Fragrant, rich and powerful, the wines provide a perfect match for all of these barbequed ribs, steaks and other pieces of smoky charred protein. Cheapskate that I am, I often prefer the less oaky, less extracted mid-priced versions. There is some good inexpensive Malbec around too. The Aldi Exquisite Collection Malbec is worth checking out. It isn’t as good as the Porteño though. This is made by Norton, one of my favourite producers in Argentina.
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Prova Regia 2013, Arinto, VR Lisboa, Portugal
13%
€13.95
Stocked by a large number of independent wine shops and off-licences.
I have been enjoying this wine on and off for many years. Plump tropical fruits with pineapples and peaches, and a good fine crisp acidity. If you are tiring a little of Sauvignon Blanc, this is the perfect replacement. Drink on its own, or with fish. Arinto is widely grown in various regions of Portugal. The grapes retain a good acidity even in hot climates.
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Andreza Reserva 2013, Douro, Portugal 13.5%
€13.99 from Wines on the Green, Red Island Skerries, Blackrock Cellars, McCabes, Martins Fairview.
Made from local grape varieties (Touriga Nacional, Touriga Francesa and Tinta Roriz) this is a very well-priced wine that will go down perfectly with red or white meat dishes. Spicy dark fruits with good acidity, some vanilla oak and a good dry lightly tannic finish.
If you ever take the Ryanair flight to Porto for a long weekend, be sure to take a trip up the Douro valley. Car is probably the easiest means of transport but if you have time, train or boat will add atmosphere. The Douro is an incredibly steep valley with breathtaking landscapes and ancient vineyard terraces dug into the slopes. These vineyards are mainly used to make Port, the drink unfairly blamed for causing our worst hangovers. These days producers are increasingly making very good table wine, such as the Andreza Reserva above.
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Kaapzicht Chenin Blanc 2015, Stellenbosch, South Africa
13%
€12.95
Available from Whelehan’s Wines, Loughlinstown
A big smiling mouthful of wine, refreshing and attractively fruity with a snappy dry finish. Perfect to sip on its own or with lighter fish and chicken dishes. Very good value for money too.
Chenin Blanc is the greatest chameleon grape of them all, happy to be made into sparkling sweet or dry white wine. In its home territory of the Loire Valley, you will find it in every style and in all its wonderful glory. But today we are in South Africa the only New World country to have significant quantities of Chenin Blanc. At one stage it made up a third of all vines planted. Familiarity seemed to have bred contempt, as for many years South African winemakers seemed completely uninterested in Chenin. This has changed over the last decade; you can now find some seriously good examples. You may come across the odd sweet wine but the vast majority are dry, ranging from light and crisp to rich and textured. Today’s wine could not be described as serious. It light and fruity, but I enjoyed the quality of the fruit; none of those confected fruit popsicle flavours you get from so many inexpensive white wines.
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Artuke 2014, Rioja
13.5%
€15.70
Delicious wine; ripe strawberries on the nose; supple easy sweet ripe strawberry and red cherry fruit on the palate with surprising concentration and depth. Lovely easy-drinking wine and very much my style. Sadly the retail price of this wine increased to over the €15 mark at the last minute.
I love unoaked Rioja, mainly I suspect, because I like Tempranillo. Too often it is swamped with oak, and you cannot actually taste the grape. Artuke are a producer worth looking out for; based up in the Basque part of Rioja, Rioja Alavesa, Arturo and Kiki (hence the name) are sons of Miguel Blanco who set up the winery. They make a number of single vineyard wines, and Pies Negro, which featured in Wilson on Wine last year.
Available from: Liston’s, Camden St.; 64wine, Glasthule; Clontarf Wines.
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