Nice wines I have drunk recently - Red or White

Going off piste ...

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First time trying this warm climate Portuguese variety. I really like this, nearest approximation is Chardy, but more fruity & acidic, not buttery. Oak barely evident. $11
So impressed also secured the 'lesser' Pato Frio Antão Vaz $9 & Pato Frio Seleção $8 all through Dan's though now sold out. Certainly worth a look & should work well in Oz.

Also enjoying De Bortoli Bianco Vermouth, against old prejudices against Campari. The base spirit is quite sweet & pleasantly finishing with bitter herbal aromatics with none of the oiliness that I associate with Vermouth.

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Yep 2l cask :cool: @ $14. Great on its own, will investigate coughtails, mixes etc. (The Rosso version is ok as a drink, have tried mixing with sangria to no real success. Shall persevere.)

Edit: everything glitching badly, posted to ensure saving only. Glitches not connected to above imbibings 🥴
 
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There is but it seems to be closed for further comment.
What a great thread. I have a few that I would have posted....
 
Hey @henleybeach sounds like it’s not worth picking up. I just saw that it is the Underwraps Hawkes Bay and was thinking of getting, but glad I saw your review!

The 2010 and 2011 get pretty poor reviews. 2016 should be a cracker ! Their Gimblet Gravels Syrah and Te Kahu Merlot blend are great wines.
 
Antão Vaz 2015 take #2

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Seleção is like an OTT Sauv blanc, well made but not to my taste. Presumably the unfamiliar to me Arinto & Siria must be very fruity/aromatic. Would be fun to put in a blind tasting 👿

The straight Antão Vaz 2015 is much sharper & more austere like a young Semillon.

Note all under cork, the first Seleção had cork taint, like sucking through wet cardboard - awful 🤢. Would give a poor first impression to those who've never encountered that yukiness. I've had a decent run with cork recently but surely romance & tradition are not worth the letdown/waste.

Neither as good as their premium Grande Escolar, but well worth checking out & putting in a few cuttings. A varietal that may well do well here.

Edit: I think my phone hates me.
 
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Had a Italian week by myself at home since last Sunday,why? 2 of the bottles (benevelli and Cappellano barolo) had some bad reviews online,flawed. So I decided to open some early to test my luck. All these wine is from auction and sent to me at the same time.


Cappellano , most flawed comments out of all, the cork looks very good, I slow ox this for 4 hours ,light red colour, great nose on the glass,A bit rough to drink at first ,red sweet fruits and a bit of wood, Creamy cherry And earthy on this medium bodied wine,I’m not sure if this has gone to secondary yet ,a long finish .this wine lasted 4 days with air vacuum pump.

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Benevelli , 4hr slow is,Good cork,this is ready to drink , not As rough as the previous barolo, a little darker on the colour, sweet dry fruit sort of flavour ,I like this more for now than the Cappellano,a good finish. This wine also lasted 4 days .

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now that I’m not worried as much, I decided to open a few more bottles.

Roberto voerzio, cork looks brand new ,a Nebbiolo that I thought I could drink it young, nope,First glass wasn’t pretty, rough, big tannins , I can’t get any nose out of it, when it comes to wine like this , I stopped and move on to the next wine . second night matters most , lovely dark fruit and a little bitterness of dark chocolate, it’s more smooth on day 3 and there’s nothing left for day 4.

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Olek vino Rosso, a new wine that I’m looking forward to try, but when I pull out the cork, something is not right , wine marks across half way of the cork.

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I didn’t get much fruit on the nose, it was sour and weird ,I can only guess this is heat damaged, not drinkable at all. Very Disappointed. Well I rather have this corked than the other 2 barolo.

to make it up I opened another bottle, Mayer Pinot 06, ran out of Italian wine.

Oh this is awesome , almost doesn’t look like aged , creamy woody on the nose, that earthy red fruit goodness almost like a extract that explodes in your mouth. Yummmy.
 
I reckon you would have been safe decanting those Barolos in the morning and would be opening up nicely come dinner time.

I just stood up a 1982 Produttori del Barbaresco in the cellar for next Friday night. I'll take the decanting approach mentioned above for this too.
 
I reckon you would have been safe decanting those Barolos in the morning and would be opening up nicely come dinner time.

I just stood up a 1982 Produttori del Barbaresco in the cellar for next Friday night. I'll take the decanting approach mentioned above for this too.

I will do that with the next group, i only stood up my bottles for 2 days, only the Cappellano with lots of sediments at the end. Do tell how it goes next week on the PDB, i always wanted to get a older bottle to try, just not sure which year to go for.
 
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I will do that with the next group, i only stood up my bottles for 2 days, only the Cappellano with lots of sediments at the end. Do tell how it goes next week on the PDB, i always wanted to get a older bottle to try, just not sure which year to go for.

I'll definitely post an update. Hopefully the cork gods will be kind to me. While I'm confident if corked I can get a refund, it will still be a shame. I actually might just stand up a second '82 Barolo as a backup.

You can just Google for what are the better vintages. I also like to check CellarTracker to read a few reviews and get a feel for what other people think in general. Obviously with such old wine you're going to get huge bottle variation.
 

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