Tasting - Malvasia di Casorzo

 

Name: Malvasia di Casorzo

Variety of the grapes: Malvasia

Country of origin: Italy

Region of origin: Piedmont

Vintage year: 2021

Price: $13.95 

Vintage Cellar Description:
"Sweet, but not too sweet, with balanced acidity. Nice round red fruit of cherries and strawberries. Aromas of roses and a lingering fruity finish. This wine is not fully sparkling, but had a slightly effervesce."

 

Wine Folly Text:
Pages 28 - 31 of the text describes the different aromas of wines. This wine falls into the red fruit category with very noticeable notes of cherry. Page 22 of the text discusses the potential alcohol by volume, ABV, or different wines. At 5.5%, this wine is about as low as wines go. I think this allowed my to get a better taste of the fruity notes of the wine without the burning sensation from the alcohol that some wines and all liquors have. 

My Review:
Although I have not tried many wines up to this point, this was by far my most favorite. I also suspect it will stay very high up on my list. This was the first red wine I have had, and I was very pleased with the sweetness of it. I was also delighted by the notes of cherry in its aroma and flavor. It was also an interesting wine since it was slightly bubbly, but not fully sparkling. This effervescence made the wine more interesting to drink.

Tasting - Schlank Haus Riesling Spätlese

 

Name: Schlank Haus Riesling Spatlese

Variety of the grapes: Spätlese

Country of origin: Germany 

Region of origin: Nahe

Vintage year: 2021

Price: $14.95

Vintage Cellar Description:
"Ripe mango and guava notes are a bit confected but tasty in this juicy, easy drinking Riesling. Medium sweet in style, it's balanced by zesty lime acidity and a hint of earthen minerality on the finish." 

 

 

Wine Folly Text:
The information for this drink is found on pages 158-159 in Wine Folly. This gives a general description of Riesling as a whole. The book highlights that this is a sweeter wine with very low tannins. After tasting the drink, I would agree with this description. I was able to taste the green apple flavor, but i was not able to detect any of the other flavors that the book includes such as lime, beeswax, and jasmine. Page 239 of Wine Folly describes Spätlese as "late harvest" grapes with a high sweetness. 

 

My Review:

Overall, I really enjoyed this wine. The first thing I noticed after the "swirl and sniff" was notes of green apple. Upon tasting, I really enjoyed the fruity flavors of this sweet wine that had no tannic aftertaste. I tried eating some slices of summer sausage while drinking my glass, and I think the pairing worked well. I would recommend this wine to my friends, but I don't have any :(

Josh's Wine Blog Introduction

Hello, welcome to my wine blog!

My name is Josh and I am a senior at VT. I have very limited experience with wine thus far, and I am looking to greatly expand my palate. I have tried a few different bottles of moscato such as Bartenura, Arbor Mist, and Tropical Moscato. All of which I liked quite a lot. I generally have a sweet tooth for the food I eat, so I assumed that this will carry into my wine preferences.  

My only other experience with wine is drinking a lot of Barefoot Fruitscato (if this even counts as a wine). I was first introduced to this drink when I tried my friends Strawberry Barefoot Fruitscato over a game of pong. I enjoyed the drink quite a bit and quickly started buying my own bottles. After drinking a fair number of strawberry bottles, I branched out to the mango flavor a liked that one even more. I soon made it my goal to try every flavor I could find. Thus far, I have tried the watermelon, sweet cranberry, blueberry, peach, pineapple, apple, mango, and strawberry flavors. My favorites are the strawberry, mango, and peach, and my least favorite is the sweet cranberry. Pictured to the left is all the bottles in my "Fruitscato graveyard". As much as I have enjoyed drinking my Fruitscato, I think it is time to put down my bottles and move on to wines that will be more respected in adult settings. Although, I may grab a bottle every once in a while for a little bit of nostalgia. 

Through this class, I hope to greatly expand upon the variety of wines that I like and can appreciate.  I would also like to be able to describe why I like the wines that I do beyond the fact that they do not make me want to gag. I think that understanding wine will make me more comfortable drinking wine in an adult setting, or ordering a drink off the menu at a restaurant without having to google each and every name on the list. And most importantly, this class will be a fun experience that I will get to share with my closest friends in my final semester at VT.

Shark I caught off the coast of NJ