Spring Wine Club Wines Announced
Too impatient? Join the club now!
As always, I'm really excited to announce the lineup for WineSkipping's next wine shipment!
🍷2021 Ottavino St. Laurent (red)
Shalini Sekhar is one of my favorite winemakers. She makes Pinot Noir for one of my favorite labels but also has her own label "Ottavino" where she focuses on Austrian varietals. Her Gruner is a lovely food-pairing white and this year she's just released her first red: made with the St Laurent grape! St Laurent is a dark skinned aromatic varietal that is an offspring of Pinot Noir. It is originally from Austria where it is the 3rd most planted variety. It is rather obscure world-wide, so don't beat yourself up if you haven't heard of it! But now you need to try it!- Color: Gorgeous color! Very intense ruby to this wine, medium opaque.
- Aroma: Intense aroma of blueberries, black cherries, strawberries, cranberry-orange, lavender, rose petal, bakings spices with slight notes of bramble.
- Structure: Medium body, medium+ acidity, very light approachable tannins, medium finish.
- Flavors: All the same as on the nose with some cocoa and blackberry flavor to boot.
- Overall impressions: This is a sophisticated wine with some punch; it's as if Pinot Noir and Syrah had a baby. It was powerful and spicy yet delicate and velvety. I really loved this wine!
🍷2017 Oremus Late Harvest (sweet white wine)
Tokaji is the wine producing region in Hungary known for its legendary sweet wines. Aszú refers to both the wine style and the botrytized grapes (grapes 🍇 infected with noble rot, which produce a wine with honeyed 🍯 sweetness) it's made with. The wine is made by mixing sweet, mashed botrytized grapes (aszu) with a dry wine. This late harvest is more approachable, made with late harvest grapes and a significant amount of aszu. This makes it more approachable from a price and flavor standpoint. I am so excited to be able to share this wine with club members as it's so very special and delicious!
- Color: Light gold
- Aroma: Honey, jasmine, citrus
- Structure: Full bodied
- Flavors: Candied honey sweetness!
- Pairing: As a desert wine you can pair this with your favorite sweet treats but I think it will go nicely with those more delicate sweet foods with a vanilla element like vanilla iced cream and angel food cake. But you don't have to stop there, this wine will also go great with savory foods such as dried cheeses and meats, foie gras, crab salad and so much more!
🍷2021 Emme Wines Carignan (red)
Carignan (“care-in-yen”) is a med bodied red wine from So France. In Spain it goes by Cariñena or Mazuelo. In Sardinia Italy: Carignano del Sulcis. Usually used as a blending grape, it's not often a single varietal. But what fun when it is! Carignan is usually a fruity wine, with flavors like cranberry, strawberry and raspberry. Sometimes floral notes like rose petal or violet show up. I've tasted so many Carignans looking for one to pull into the club... I wound up choosing this 2021 Carignan from Emme wines in Sebastapol. It was my favorite!
- Color: opaque and purple.
- Structure: Med body, light but well integrated tannins, long finish and high acidity
- Pairing: This would make a great food pairing wine! It went well with hard aged gouda and (oddly) pumpkin chocolate chip cookies! I think it would also go nicely with a floral chevre like one from @harleyfarms. They had me at "lavender". 🥀
- Flavors/Aroma: pomegranate, raspberry, strawberry, cherry jolly rancher, sour cherries, rose petals, lavender, spring rain/ forest floor and some smokey minty quality as well.
I love Rosalind's low intervention approach toward wine & her raw authenticity and enthusiasm for her craft.
Learn about these wines!
For the full tech specs on these wines, visit the Google Drive.
The whole point of a club is to interact with others and feel like part of a community, right?! That's why with each WineSkipping wine club shipment, members are invited to join a virtual party to talk about the wines in a casual setting. Our next virtual party is Thu April 6, all club members invited.
If you love the idea and want more, members can enjoy a 20% discount on any of my virtual private tastings. Grab some friends and customize a wine tasting class with me!