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The Rock
Been drinkin some heavy stuff lately, and switched it back to effervescent and lovely. NOT to say Bardolino is *light*–far from it. And several other young, fresh reds pack the kind of concentrated wallop in a thin, transparent body: Cru Bojo, some Chinons, multiple Sicilians, carbonic Pinot and new-world Valdigue–to name just a few. But Corvina manages an almost Aglianico or Grenache seriousness…
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Alto Marzipan
Massive sweaty, poopy bottle-funk on first pour, a delicious nod to old Italian but blowing off into bright Jolly Rancher watermelon hard candy tinged with green tips of vegetal. At the core, dark berry sulks from a glass headed far more garnet than ruby. Still and calm in the mouth, dirty Pepsi muddiness controlling acidic strawberry and apricot. Citrus wash eases light tannin into perspective,…
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The Full Monty
Oh the glories of Bardolino! A perfect grab from the cellar to cap the week. So comforting, so generous in its simplicity, so rewarding in its complexity. Beautiful smoky fruit fresh and vibrant: enraged with acid; curls of green vegetal and pretty floral tying nectar to structure. A cat’s-tongue rasp smoothing down sweet plum and cherry. Bardolino DOC is half the price of Cru-Beaujolais and…
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Related by Marriage
Couple little pinot orphans tonight–one I knew I had and one I had forgotten about… both somewhat anomalies in the American market. Spatburgunder doesn’t exactly grow on trees in California wine-shops, and always presents an inexpensive expression of extreme–but pure–pinot characteristics a lot of American palates find *awkward*, but I adore it for those reasons. The Shasta Daisy is from a…
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Boxing Elena
Ahhhh Lagrein… where alpine snow meets Italian warmth, creating a black, dense wine: cold at its core and sunny in its concentration. Dark, dark ruby with a bright purple rim, nose headed stemmy and tomato-vine with definite poopy barnyard, but papaya and avocado-pulp at the round center. The pits of plum and peach are ground finely to a woody extent, neutral barrel taking this nuance and running…
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Peas in a Pod
Couple little playthings I found today–very similar price–one a very close local and, well… one NOT. Just couldn’t resist. The red-striped screw-top opened with a bit of barnyard bottle-funk, blowing off quickly to clear, slightly stemmy austerity in the nose, ashy with tiny honey-ridden points of tropical and stone-fruit. One thing for certain, they are easy to tell apart in the glass: the…
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Crew Bardolino
Sometimes slightly before the turn of the LAST century, the wines from the eastern shore of Lake Garda in Veneto became known as Bardolino. This is Corvina country, and it is the dominant variety in not only the Chiaretto rosé, but the DOC and Bardolino Crus and of course the–probably a bit better known–Valpolicella a little further east. Tucked up against the foothills of the southern Alps, and…
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