With Hart, Steffi, KW, Sean and Tabs.
Bottle from Steffi.

This is the red wine of the night for me. But I have to leave it unrated for various reasons.

In the glass: what an odd wine. In the decanter, this was a deep and almost inky wine. In the glass, this ended up being much more of a bright ruby/garnet with mid/mid- body.

On the nose: deep intense blackberries and ripe red plums. Distinct VA. There’s a deep savory note to this. A very very appealing nose. I’m completely ignorant about the winemaking but I’m assuming there’s oak given the spice.

On the palate: so, the boys all independently conducted our research. Apparently the Sangrantino is a remarkably intense and hyper tannic grape. So we decided to drink this last. Its reputations were accurate. High concentration and intensity of black and red fruits. That INCREDIBLY intense and structured tannin that coats the entirely mouth cavity. That said, the remarkable thing was the nature of its tannins. While it was just so intensely structured and all-coating, it was not harsh / rough. This was an oddly polished and juicy tannin. High alcohol, noticeable on exhale (but not as crazy as that Barbera)

I decided to leave this unrated. This was the red wine of the night for me given the quality of the wine. That said, the tannin intensity of this grape is simply too overwhelming for me. But I didn’t feel like it was fair to penalize the wine, for the very nature of the grape and the wine it is intended to deliver. That would’ve been like complaining about a Riesling’s acidity ya know