Spanish & Portuguese Wine News 4/5/12: Save the Date! Cool Northern Spanish Wine Tasting in all Three Stores, Saturday 4/14


By: Joe Manekin | K&L Spanish & Portuguese Wine Buyer
Greetings all,
Let's get right back into it after an uncharacteristic buy week last week. Your inbox will not be spared this week! All good things, though, so here we go.
1.) Northern Spain Tasting next Saturday 4/14 - Are the oldest albariño vines in the world really 180 years old (and is wine still made from them?) What the heck is the difference between Guimaro's two Ribeira Sacra bottlings, B2M and B1P? What does 30+ year old CRIANZA Rioja taste like? Don't they only made cider in Asturias? For answers to these questions (and likely, many more) please join us for our Northern Spain tasting in Redwood City, SF, and Hollywood on Saturday 4/14. Yours truly will be in RWC, while incredibly knowledgeable guides for the day are likely to pose some of their own questions based on their in-store line-ups in the other locations. As Kurt Loder used to say alongside Tabitha Soren every week, do try to catch it.
2.) Bottle of red, bottle of white, from Dali-Land - Last spring, my fiance and I spent a lovely afternoon in Cadaques, a picturesque and justly famous town right on the Mediterranean Sea. On the way there, you drive through some fairly steep, granitic vineyard land planted to indigenous varieties such as garnacha, cariñena and macabeo. With non-wine related tourism on our minds (ok, I wanted to do wine stuff but the fiance threatened to smack me on the head with an empty cava bottle if we did any more wine stuff) we bypassed the vineyards, opting instead to walk the town and then visit Salvador Dali's former house in Port Lligat. A shame, but I'm attempting to make up for it by offering these terrific, Catalan government "integrated farming" certified wines. Simple, fun, Mediterranean in a bottle deliciousness.
2010 La Vinyeta "Heus" Blanc Empordá - $14.99
http://www.klwines.com/detail.asp?sku=1088808
2010 La Vinyeta "Heus" Negre Empordá - $14.99
http://www.klwines.com/detail.asp?sku=1088809
3.) Jerez en Rama or, Sherry (unfiltered)
Just a quick teaser for the Sherry fanatics. Within the next 6 weeks or so, we will have not one, but two "en rama" (unfiltered) bottlings, drawn from the cask specifically for us in April, when the layer of flor is at its thickest. There is nothing closer to enjoying these wine in situ than drinking good quality, en rama fino or manzanilla. Coming soon....
Along the Sherry tip - you Sherry fanatics will be sure not to miss the Javier Hidalgo Sherry Tasting Friday 4/20 in RWC. For only $5, you will be able to taste the Hidalgo Pastrana Manzanilla Pasada Sanlucar de Barrameda ($26.99), the "Napoleon" Amontillado SdB ($17.99) the Oloroso "Faraon" SdB ($18.99), and the Wellington Palo Cortado VORS ($79.99). Sweet deal, if you ask me.
Un saludo,
Joe Manekin
Spanish, Portuguese, Latin American Wine Buyer
K&L Wine Merchants
Ph: 877.559.4637 ext. 2748