Advent Wine Blind Tasting Attempt Three!
It seems, based on a quick inspection of my Advent boxes o’ wine, that I wrapped MOST of them to disguise the labels. Which really makes my Advent wine calendar a month-long blind tasting experiment. That’s good though. I desperately need the practice. And it also lends an exciting sensation of fear and trepidation every time I reach into the box.
Today’s wine is missing the capsule. I must have thought that would give me too many clues as to its contents. That says to me either the wine is foreign and I wanted to remove any tell-tale DOP indications; or it’s domestic but I put only one wine from that producer in the box and was worried I would remember which one. My mind refuses to retain all the nit-picky details I need to know for my Italian Wine Scholar test. Heaven forbid I remember any new vocabulary from Greek class. But I surely know that two months ago I put only one bottle of wine from Vino Dessera in the box and that it was a Cab Franc! Removing the capsule was therefore a smart move.
My guess: Cool climate, young, mid-range price, European grape… Turkish Cabernet Franc. Sigh. The only way I could have got this more wrong would be if I’d said the wine were white.
Azienda Agricola Adalia Valpolicella DOC, 2015
I believe that I let thinking about that Vino Dessera Cabernet Franc get in my head. I could not think of anything else. And honestly, while I liked the nose here well enough I did not like the wine at all. That alone should have clued me into Valpolicella!
Appearance: medium opaque purple-ruby
Alcohol: 12% abv
Nose: Blackberry, black cherry, plum, nutmeg, red bell pepper
Palate: Very thin, zero tannins, medium acidity, kind of sour. The palate lacked any of the intensity displayed by the nose. Flavors of sour cherry, Black pepper, and green bell pepper. The palate showed a little more development as the wine opened but the retained the thin sour cherry character.
I remember reluctantly buying this (and then not drinking it) as part of studying for WSET L2. Amarone, Recieto, Ripasso…love them all but I have never enjoyed straight up Valpolicella and this one did not change my mind.