A Smooth Red Christmas!
Now that the festivities are over I was just going through my notes on what wines we drank on Christmas day ,and I have to say we did spoil ourselves, but then again if you can’t enjoy a good tipple at this time of year when can you. As SmoothRed have hosted a number of very successful trips to Spain and Portugal I decided to find some old bottles in my cellar from those two regions and some of our old favourites so this is what we had:
Champagne Laurent Perrier to go with nibbles while opening a few presents.
Domaine Laroche, Chablis Premier Cru Les Montmains 2010 – really good Chablis, intense lovely nose, clean dry fruit with a great mineral Finnish.
Vina Real Grann Reserva Rioja 1981 – This was the star of the day, a classic aged Rioja from a great vintage still had loads of spicy fruit with superb concentration in the palate. (And we still have a few bottles left in the cellar)
Vina Real Gran Reserva Rioja 1986 – We should have had this before the 81, it was a lighter wine not the depth of taste as the previous wine it also lacked fruit, perhaps passed its best, or it could have been the bottle.
Contino Variedad Graciano Rioja 1998 – We just had to open this as SmoothRed took one of our major clients there for a fabulous tasting during the 2013 harvest, the wine went really well with our cheese course.
Santos Junior Vintage Port 1983 – Not a port from a major house, but this was from a good year, I think we all thought it was very smooth and harmonious, and having finished the Contino, this port proved to be great partner to go with the Cheese specially the stilton, although I did sneak in the odd chocolate, when SmoothRed take clients to Porto we always recommend pairing Port and chocolate together!
As you can see in the photo we did have another bottle to open, but we decided to save the Saint Emilion Grand Cru 1986 for another occasion.
At SmoothRed we look forward to taking as many of our clients back to the famous wine regions of Europe in order taste some great wines, probably not quite as old as the ones we enjoyed on Christmas Day though!
Contact SmoothRed today for a bespoke Wine Travel Experience: https://www.smoothred.com/wine-tours