Tag Archives: Mendoza

La Linda Cabernet Sauvignon 2008

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Tell you what: This is the new deal. If you send me a sample of your wine, I will do my very best to provide you a piece of writing which may or may not have anything to do what’s in the glass. Think of it as something for nothing (other than a small ding in your PR budget): you send me wine, and you get (hopefully interesting, probably rambling) free association about the semiotics of your wine, random commentary, and maybe even an actual tasting note.

On to this sample, then, courtesy of an East Coast public relations agency who offered it up unbidden. (I replied thanking them and asking them for information on Australian availability, given that many of our readers don’t live in the eastern USA. They didn’t reply to that question, but they did send a bottle, which is lovely.) I initially agreed because I’d heard of Luigi Bosca; I have vague good memories of them from a weekend in Mendoza that was preceded by an incredibly long bus trip thanks to a general strike at the nation’s airports.

I’ll start by saying this: Screw Flash. Really. It’s just annoying. I went to load their Web site (linked below) and had to wait for a lame-ass animation of YAY A CORKSCREW uncorking white space in my browser. You know what, guys? Save the money and put it in your product. All I want from a winery’s Web site is technical sheets about their products (with tasting notes, perhaps), information on where to buy some, and maybe even a list of upcoming events at the winery. That’s it. And you know what else I really don’t want? One of those annoying “Please enter your birthdate!!!” pages. Hint: It’s the Internet. I’m sure that 20-year-olds will see that pages and say “You know what, never mind. I’m not old enough to drink, so I had better leave this Argentine wine site and go back to talking about Justin Bieber on Facebook with my little sister.” Please. It’s just irritating, ESPECIALLY when you have to enter your birthday using a Flash UI. STOP IT. (For the record, I was born on 1 January 1910.)

On to the wine, but before I begin, I’ll note that Luigi Bosca seems to have erupted in a mad bout of branding, PR dollars, and marketing a go go. This is cool; I loved their Gala wines, but if they want to sell twenty different wines at multiple price points with different branding entirely, that’s just fine. This wine, La Linda, or “the beautiful,” is their cheap stuff, selling for well under ten bucks in the USA. With that in mind, I’ll start by looking at the packaging: the foil is a little cheap looking, the cork has some kind of laser-printed inventory or other number on it, but once that’s gone, you have a fairly splendid looking bottle that exudes class. The label is well printed and looks like a twenty dollar wine; there’s exactly enough information on the back label to help your average supermarket consumer decide if this is the wine they’re looking for (geographical information, a straightforward, honest tasting note, and food pairings (red meats!)). In short, everything is perfect here; it looks like it was destined for Oddbins or any decent supermarket.

So what have we got in the glass, then? A bruiser of purplish-black, inky wine, blackberry sweet on the nose, but with an attractive seam of rich, toasty, vanilla oak (chips?). The real surprise is on the palate, where the wine pivots into something much more interesting (and useful to restaurateurs): a higher-toned, nicely acidic, brightly lifted red wine that seems purpose built for the wine list at an all-you-can-eat churrasceria joint in Dallas or Washington. The palate is classy, friendly, and slowly gives way to a firm but friendly tannic finish that should do incredibly well with charcuterie or, well, huge frickin’ steaks. Oh, and I almost forgot the best part: it’s only 13.5% alcohol, which means you can share a bottle with your partner and not have to call a cab home afterwards.The only competition I can really see for a wine like this – at least locally – would be something like a Columbia Crest Grand Estates Merlot from Washington, which offers an approximately similar drinking experience at a similar price point. Where this wine shines by comparison, though, is the classier packaging, the more complex taste, and perceived value (hey, it’s an import!).

If you run a restaurant, this would be perfect for a steakhouse, upscale Mexican restaurant, or themed Brazilian dining. There’s no reason you couldn’t charge $30 for this and profit handsomely; if I were the importer, I’d concentrate on hospitality sales and avoid retail, where it might not fit in to the standard retail mix (two wines from Argentina, one Torrontés, one Malbec).

Luigi Bosca
Price: $8.99
Closure: Cork
Source: Sample

Viña Cobos Felino Malbec 2008

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Obviously still a young pup – the purple is so purple that it could even give Grimace a run for his money – the nose smells mostly of serious oak with well-tended Mendoza fruit, a very nouveau-riche kind of smell that smells more like a lifestyle candle from Pottery Barn – nay, scratch that, probably something from Theo Fennell – you know the drill: expensive, a little generic, best drunk with a French manicure or cufflinks. Hm.There’s also a bit of smoky-sweet, lifted cheery red fruit here, which is very appealing. Thankfully, there’s good acidity that hits you before anything else does, keeping things moving right along to a lovely, broad, mouth-filling midpalate that offers up toasted coffee, plums, and finely grained tannins. It all finishes slowly, very slowly, definitely quite young, not insanely complex, but with great finesse and subtlety.The wine I’d most like to compare this to would be Michel Rolland’s Clos de los Siete, which is sold at a similar price range, but which is grown, I believe, a bit further to the south towards Lujan de Cuyo. The difference between the two is subtle but important: Clos is fatter, richer, more Parker; the Felino is nervier, racier, less plush, more Robinson. There’s actual space to think about it between all of the notes that must be hit; there’s an elegance and modesty here mixed in with the obligatory new oak and full ripeness. Honestly, it’s damn good for what it is and good value to boot. Recommended.Viña Cobos
Price: $16
Closure: Cork

Luca Syrah Laborde Double Select 2006

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There is absolutely no reason whatsoever for anyone to be using a bottle this heavy: to do so is just rude. It makes it harder to hold and pour, more expensive to ship, and of course there’s the whole doing right by Mother Earth thing to consider. Worst of all, buying this wine will make you feel like a total prat. After all, what idiot wants to be seen buying the biggest, heaviest, most ostentatious bottle in the shop? Please.On to the wine. Shortly after opening the bottle, I noticed that I had a huge sticky smear of something all over my left hand (I’m a southpaw). Yuck. I retrieved the cork from the garbage and sure enough, there’s a bunch of sticky, gooey mass at the end of the cork and smeared up the side of it. I haven’t had the pleasure of this experience before; I trust the wine is OK and that this is just an one-off, a production oddity.The nose is curiously slight: if Vosges made a chocolate bar called “Gentlemen’s Dark Chocolate with Cedar,” then this is what it would smell like. Oak oak oak and oak… and yet, there’s a pleasant, fleeting floral sourness hiding in there somewhere too. Still, I don’t get a real sense of place, just a sense of cash flow: this wine smells like money.Amazingly purple-y youthful, the wine looks ravishing. Tasting it, though, leaves me a bit less a-flutter: it seems just a bit insubstantial in the mouth at first, quickly hiding behind massive woody tannin and finishing on a slightly sweet note, again managing to taste more expensive than anything else.In short, this is a wine for a hedge fund manager with a penchant for bling. This wine would be absolutely perfect with a steak dinner at the finest steakhouse in town: I’m thinking El Gaucho in Seattle would sell cases of this to Microsoft marketeers dining prospective clients in town to visit the Executive Briefing Center. Drinking it on its own is a bit of a chore, rather like gargling with lavender water and sawdust, but add a fine cut of meat and even a cigar and now you’re talking serious money.Luca
Price: $20
Closure: Cork

Cavas de Weinert Gran Vino 2002

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Gorgeous, rich pretty cherry black in the glass, you could almost mistake this for raspberry sauce gone missing from your cheesecake. However, trepidation sets in on the nose: there’s a slightly raspy note promising difficult acidity, a somewhat off-putting charred, smoky note, and just the briefest hint of a curious sweetness I generally associate with yeasts that may or may not be intentional. Very strange.Round and full at first if somewhat unstructured, it quickly resolves into a clunky, tannic finsh that leaves you with that tell-tale did I just accidentally lick a hamster? feeling. Again, the odd yeastiness is briefly here and there, just not consistently; I wish I could better describe what it is what I’m feeling here, but it’s (to my mind) very much a marker of New World winemaking. Over time and with additional air, however, the wine does open up a bit, turning into cherry coffee tincture with chewy tannins.Ultimately, I suspect that there’s a very, very low level of TCA contamination here, which would account for the odd, fleeting, yeasty-sweet off notes, I suspect. Sometimes this wine taste like a serious contender for well-judged, nicely ripe New World Bordeaux; sometimes, it tends more towards telltale wet cardboard. It’s a shame I don’t have another bottle to compare against this one; for now I’ll chalk this bottle up in the ‘might be good but I don’t think I can honestly judge it’ category.Bodega y Cavas de Weinert
Price: $20
Closure: Cork

Recoleta Malbec Bonarda 2007

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For a moment I found myself transfixed by the nose of this wine… it smelled familiar, and yet not. But what was it? Ah, there we are: scented permanent markets, just like the ones we used to huff in elementary school. Childhood memories… Seriously, it smells like children’s fruit candy: plums and raspberries and nothing too complicated or unusual. There’s also a slight hint of camphor there as well; on the whole, a promising start.

In the mouth, it’s just this side of off-dry (as I’m coming to expect from fresh&easy’s own label wines), with a fleeting sourness and not much else in the way of flavor, save for something that’s reminiscent of raspberry flavored wax lips candy. There’s a bit of tannin on the finish, probably more from pressing the grapes too hard than any kind of barrel fermentation, and then it’s gone. It all works reasonably well and would be a fantastic accompaniment to spicy barbecue or good old fashioned meat loaf. Amazing value and recommended for your next braai.

Recoleta [but really fresh&easy]
Price: US $2.99
Closure: Short, low quality cork amusingly labeled “estate bottled”
Tasted: November 2007

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I’d like to note that I won’t always be tasting bargain basement wines from Tesco’s new US chain stores; it’s just that they happened to open their doors here two weeks ago, which prompted me to buy a case of their least expensive wine just for the heck of it. So far, I’m impressed by the QPR [quality price ratio] but haven’t found anything I’d drink on a regular basis. Thankfully, I’m down to only a few bottles – the most expensive one almost breaking the ten dollar mark – and when they open one near my home in San Diego, I promise I’ll go back and try their high-end own-label wines [I think I remember seeing a $15.99 Napa merlot, for example].