Marco Real

tasting notes... spicy, peppery nose, boysenberries, tart/ fruit forward, medium dry, light tannins... These were the tasting notes for the Marco Real made from Garnacha grapes - wines I normally like.

Now you often see these notes in a grocery store or a liquor store in the description of the wine. It is kind of like the Amazon.com feature - you liked this book... so you might like these. Just because the wine has dark fruits like boysenberries or a peppery nose - does this really mean anything to you? It might give you some idea of what you might taste if you buy the bottle, crack it open, and drink some for yourself. Those flavors might be well orchestrated with real structure allowing you to savor these tastes, or the wine might fall apart as soon as it hits your palate. The flavors might be muddled, there but undistinguished, or just empty and flat.

This wine was a little muddled. The tasting notes above... tend to be the ingredients of wines that I like. I think that Garnacha grapes make inky, juicy yet earthy wines. But it didn't come together with this one. It felt flat. More mud than earth.

A few years ago I used to drink a Garnacha by the Las Rocas label. It was a wonderful wine and was about 9 or ten dollars. When I last checked, Las Rocas had snuck up to about 15 bucks, probably the victim of a weak dollar and a strong Euro.

What Spanish saint do I pray to, to bring Las Rocas back down to an everyday, Brown Bag friendly price?

RATING: 2 Screwcaps
LABEL: Marco Real
GRAPE: Garnacha
PRICE: $8.99

Sere Marca

When we first tasted this 2007 Sere Marca, Brown Bag Sommelier Dennis immediately remarked that my wife Christine would love this wine. Why? Christine loves jammy, fruit forward wines like California Zinfandels and Syrahs. Dennis does not - he's more of an old world fruit back, terroir kinda guy.

The funny thing about the Sere Marca is that although it seems all those things at first, it really isn't. It has flavors of plums, blueberries, tobacco, and dried strawberries. Things that you would associate with the big bold California zins crunching flavors down in the powerful California sun.

But somewhere through the finish which starts off strong, the unstructured tannins break down. The initially lingering finish falls apart.

I wanted to really like this wine, since it started off for me as the tight, modern wine neither old nor new world that I enjoy - almost like a peppery Argentinian wine. But it couldn't hold together for one reason or another.

Maybe the BB Sommeliers are becoming tougher critics, but at 13 dollars this should have been a real crowd pleaser. It was not.

RATING:2.35 Screwcaps
LABEL: Sere Marca
GRAPE: searched label and internet could not find info other than nebulous "Spanish Red Table Wine" evidently some kind of blend.
PRICE: 13 dollars out the door at Silverlake Wine

Monte Gudello

This 2006 Monte Gudello made from the Airen grape was a wine that simply did not generate a lot of conversation at the tasting. It had a decent enough taste. With a pale hay color and flavors of straw and sea grass and even a little kiwi, it made the grade.

Again, I think that for the most part, the Brown Baggers like red wines. Reds have a lot more range to pop and show - something that whites don't have, at least their shine is not as apparent to casual wine drinkers like our group.

Was this a good wine? Yes. I thought that it was. It had a nice balance and acidity, and would be a great wine on a warm afternoon. (disclaimer: I am partial to clean drinking whites).

The entry in wikipedia about the Airen grape said that acre for acre, it is estimated that there are more acres under cultivation for Airen than any other grape - as of 2004. It is a low density planting meaning other grapes liek Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon beat it out by total yield. Most of the acreage cultivated for Airen is in Spain.

In my years of drinking Spanish wines, I have never noticed Airen wines. Although the Monte Gudello didn't blow the crowd away - I'll probably look for it in the future. There's some intrigue.

RATING: 2.75 Screwcaps
LABEL: Monte Gudello
GRAPE: Airen
PRICE: $9.99 at Silverlake Wine

Txakoli Gurrutxaga

Txakoli Gurrutxaga... no it doesn't mean you've had too much to drink if you cannot pronounce this wine. It simply means that it is Basque. With the only language in Continental Western Europe that did not branch off from the Proto Indo-European tongue( a strange fract that Atlantean conspiracists take to mean that Basques are the survivors of the wreckage of ancient Atlantis) Basques are known for their Gehry designed Guggenheim museum in Bilbao, separatists, and a dish of garlicky, baby eels the width of bucantini. According to the Woodland Hills Wine Company( great wine shop by the way) Twitter feed this wine is made from 30% Hondarribi Zuri, 30% Hondarribi Beltza, 20% Mune Mahatsa and 20% Txori Mahatsa.

As with the Basque language, these grapes are completely alien to me. Also according to the Woodland Hills Wine Co, this wine is produced in a small run of 1000 cases having been fermented in steel tanks.

I liked this wine. Light-medium bodied with hints of grapefruit, honeysuckle, and sweet tarts it also carried a great mineral flavor that you find in tradition packed European wines. That mineral kick would make it ideal for pairing with oysters or any briny shell fish.

This was a really great drinking wine, low in alcohol, and a lot of the Brown Bag Team members really enjoyed it.

There's only one problem: it is over our price point. You see, every group needs a rebel, and the elite Brown Bag Sommeliers are no different. Our rebel is Aaron. He has a great sense for great wine. He knows what he likes, and he has introduced me to wines I would never have bought.

For example, one blazing LA Summer our power went out for days and compromised Aaron's wine fridge. He was concerned that the bottles he was keeping in a temperature controlled environment had been ruined and the only way to be sure was to open and drink all of them.

Christine and I had the good fortune of being wine guinea pigs ( we always volunteer).

I suppose it's good to throw 17 dollar wines into the mix to make sure our palate isn't just rotting from a steady schedule of Night Train.

RATING: 3.2 Screwcaps - minus 2 screwcaps for flagrant price point violation
LABEL: Txakoli Gurrutxaga
GRAPE: Blend of Hondarribi Zuri, Hondarribi Beltza, Mune Mahatsa and Txori Mahatsa
PRICE: $17.99

Dibon Brut Reserve Cava

This was the winner of the night. It also happens to be the wine I brought to this knife fight, which makes me happy since I have had two major duds in our four meetings.

The name "Cava" comes from the Latin "cava" which means cave which were used in early production of the Spanish sparkler. It usually uses a blend of grapes including: Macabeo, Parellada, Xarel·lo, Chardonnay, Pinot noir, and Subirat.

The Dibon is a blend ofXarel-lo, Parellada and Macabeo.

The Dibon Cava was a crisp, refreshing sparkler. With a lemony nose and a hint of vanilla, this wine presented a lot of possibilities. It could be very successfully combined with shellfish, oysters, white flesh fish, or even a salad course.

Team members thought it would be the perfect cava to use in a white sangria. Overall, he consesus was that this could become a go to wine in everyone's arsenal: the cava to have on hand for occasions which though maybe casual still called for a sparkling wine to be festive.

Bravo Zulu* Dibon.

* = military code for job well done.

RATING: 3.35 Screwcaps
LABEL: Dibon Brut Reserve
GRAPE: blend of Xarel-lo, Parellada and Macabeo
PRICE: $8.99

Spain Tasting

After Australia, Brown Bag Sommelier set its sights on Spain. Spain is a country that in the past, I have had mad success in the $8.99 to $10.99 sweet spot - even with the mad run-up of the Euro last year, I was still able to find some bargains.

Something was off for the Spanish wines this night. Perhaps, the BBS team members were turning crack commando unit - up from the dirty dozen willing to drink anything that came in a brown paper bag, was made from grapes, and got them happily buzzed after a few sips.

Personally, I think it was a conspiracy. I had the winning wine, and I really believe everyone was giving out shitty scores to purposely depreciate the value of my win. Kind of like the year Rocky won best picture. Yeah it was good, but Stallone would never have won in a year against Scorsese and Coppola.

The huge plus of the night, including of course the company, was the food. Spain has dishes just geared for having with wine. Salty, flavorful, tangy, Spanish snacks have it happening all over the place.

Now the wines...

Four Sisters

At the end of a long night of powerful shiraz wines, there was Four Sisters Shiraz. This '05 Shiraz had its work cut out for it, since the crowd by this time was really sick of shiraz wines. These wines tend to be strong, dusty, fruit forward. Some of them were totally overpowering - like the inky darkness I brought to the party.

Four Sisters won some fans in the group. It was jammy like a zinfandel with tastes of preserved fruits and dried cherries. Some found the taste a little sharp, but still the feeling of the group was that this was a nice balanced wine.

With its zin flavor, this is a wine you could serve with something like a rib-eye steak with gorgonzola butter and smoked paprika. It's tannins would cut through the steak and the cheese cleaning your palate so that you could enjoy each savory bite.

At $8.99, this wine is a solid value.

RATING: 2.75 Screwcaps
LABEL: Four Sisters
GRAPE: Shiraz
PRICE: $8.99