“This wine is too good for toast-drinking, my dear. You don’t want to mix emotions up with a wine like that. You lose the taste.”

– Ernest Hemingway, Author

Buenos Aires – I had the opportunity recently to drop in on the guys who run 7 Spirits, one of the few wine import companies here in Buenos Aires. They carry a selection of wines from Spain, Italy, France, Australia, New Zealand, the United States, and Chile, as well as some particularly difficult to find Argentine wines. The afternoon’s event was to taste a quartet of new Spanish imports. I have this urge for the tasting notes to copy the site out there that simply posts a picture to “illustrate” each wine’s taste – not something I’d do regularly, but perhaps just this once…. nah, but I’m going to limit myself to three descriptors each and an opinion….

• Gran Víu Cariñena Selección 2001 – blend of grenache, cabernet sauvignon, syrah, and tempranillo.raspberry – milk chocolate – red bell pepper
  really quite good (and the same wine I was drinking on election night)
• J.A. Calvo Casajús Ribera del Duero 2005 – 100% tinto fino, or tempranillo.blue plum – cocoa – root beer
  also quite good, if perhaps a touch fruity for my tastes
• Oscar Tobía Rioja Reserva 2004 – 90% tempranillo, 10% grenacheblack raspberry – old leather – floral
  excellent, my favorite of the tasting
• Heras Cordón Rioja 2004 – 90% tempranillo, 10% gracianolicorice – tar – red cherry
  I simply didn’t like this wine, even with decanting, which lessened some of the odd notes, it was still not pleasant – the importers think it might have been an off bottle

See, that was painless.