Tasting - Finca Del Castillo Tempranillo

The fourth wine I sampled on Thursday at the Vintage Cellar's wine tasting was Finca del Castillo Tempranillo. It is a red wine from 2011. This wine is from the La Mancha region in Spain, which is also where the famous literary character Don Quixote is from. The grape variety for this wine is Tempranillo, as it says in the name. The Vintage Cellar has this wine bottle priced at $4.95, which is impressively low to me.

The Vintage Cellar's review for this wine states, "Rooty, spicy and baked on the nose, with aromas that lean toward a raisin. The palate is more gritty and acidic, with raisin, cola, and spic flavors. Darkens up on the finish, which is long and peppery, with adequate juiciness and a final note of tomato."

I attempted to not look at the reviews for any of the wines before writing my own critique of the wine, so looking at their critique now is interesting comparatively. My review of the wine is that when I first smelled it, the aroma of alcohol was pretty intense. I'm not sure what the actual percentage was, but I would imagine it to be higher than other wines based off of the smell. The employee who was doling out the wine also said that the wine had a lot of tannins, so that may be part of it, as well. I definitely got a grapey smell and taste from the wine, but it didn't seem as strong as other reds I've tried have been, so I guess it makes sense that the Vintage Cellar's review described it as more like a raisin flavor than a grape's. Other than the grape flavor, I didn't really detect any other fruits at all.

I'm not a big red wine drinker yet and this wine was pretty intense for me. I definitely think I would have to work my way up first before I could really consider enjoying a wine like this.

I did not pair any food with this wine.