Hello Friends and Wine Lovers!

Welcome again to the Carpe Vinum Super Fun Happy Newsletter and Announcement of the Fun Super Happy Tasting Tomorrow! Friday! Let’s get to it! What are we having? Spanish wines! Which kind? Wines from the North-Central part of Spain! Hooray–huh? “What? Which part is that?” you may ask. Well, besides the obviousness of its geographic location from its name, it includes the wonderful Rioja, the also wonderful Navarra, and the wines of the Aragon: Somontano, Carinena, Calatayud and Campo de Borja (also, also wonderful.) Boy, that’s a lot of ground to cover.

Yes, “North-Central Spain” doesn’t have the ring that some of the other larger wine regions of Spain have, like Catalunya or Castille or Andalusia. It does include the region of Aragon, which sounds pretty cool, but is pretty small and lumps together with Rioja and Navarra very well. Perhaps we can rename the area ourselves. Y’know . . . something do describe the wines from there. Like “Groovy Delicious Spain” or something. It’s a project we can work on. But until then, here’s a little something about the wines from there.

Rioja, the most important wine of this region is also the most important and oldest wine region of Spain. When the Romans showed up there, the Iberian Celts were already making wine. The Romans showed them how to make wine better and, to make a long story short: We add a couple thousand years, a lot of political strife, a bit of French influence, and you have the most well-known wine in Spain. (For a more detailed history, there are books about that sort of thing.) The region is named after the river Oja (Rio Oja) which is a small tributary of the other two rivers in the area. Why name the region of the meekest river in the region? It sounded cooler. The wines are dominated by the noble Spanish grape Tempranillo.

Navarra is the region directly to the East of Rioja. Constantly living in the shadow of Rioja, figuratively as well as literally considering the sunset, the wines are growing in popularity and slowly catching up to its neighbor. Historically Navarra was most known for its Rosados, but the red production has been ever increasing, which anyone can see is not a bad thing. Still, red or pink, the wines are dominated by the delicious Garnacha.

The Aragon region, a touch further south of Rioja/Navarra, refers to the 4 wine districts surrounding the city of Zaragoza: Samontano, Calatayud, Carinena and Campo de Borja. All being lesser-known regions of fewer exports, there are tremendous values throughout. Tempranillo and Garnacha do reign supreme here, but there is a smattering of other varieties blended in as well. In a bit of irony, though Carinena is the birthplace of the grape variety of the same name, that grape accounts for fewer than 10% of the production of its own region. Hm.

So from those regions, we’re featuring 2 Rioja wines: A white Rioja made with the Viura grape and a red made with Tempranillo, naturally. We’ve got a Rosado from Navarra from Garnacha and Cabernet, a wine from Somontano made with the obscure native Moristel, a wine from Carinena made with Merlot and Syrah (but sadly no Carinena), and a Reserva from Campo de Borja made with a delicious blend of Tempranillo, Garnacha and Cabernet. To finish off the lineup is a wine from Guelbenzu in their own region of Ribera del Queiles, which was originally a part of Navarra but seceded a few years ago. This wine is made with Cabernet, Tempranillo and Merlot.

So Friday, August 11th, between 4:30 and 9:00 PM it’s:

North-Central Spain!!!
Bodegas Breton 2004 Lorinon Blanco, Rioja
Bodegas y Vinedos Nekeas 2005 Vega Sindoa Rosado, Navarra
Alquezar 2004 Moristel, Somontano
Esteban Martin 2004 Tinto, Carinena
Bodegas Borsao 2000 Reserva Seleccion, Campo de Borja

More Groovy Delicious Spain!!!
Finca Allende 2003 Allende Tinto, Rioja
Guelbenzu 2003 EVO, Ribera del Queiles

A stellar deal at $10 for the First 5, $6 for the Extra 2 Premium Pours.
Hope to see you here!

Seize the Wine!

Next Friday tasting is Italian Whites!

M