Hey, welcome back to Barrel to Bottle, The Binny's Podcast. I'm Pat from the Specialty Spirits Department. I'm not really sure why I'm here today. To steal my thunder and take away my intro, you jerk. No, I'm just kidding, I never wanna do that. Who are you? Hey, I'm Chris, I work with wine. And I'm Ray, and I just wandered here, and I also do wine. Happen to stay. Yes. I am Roger, I am here from the beer department. I always enjoy learning something about wine, because it's not necessarily my speciality. So I've got a Rosé in my glass, what are we doing in here? Yeah, we're taking a quick look at some of the new 2023 Rosés that are just hitting the shelves at Binny's. You know, we have probably the biggest selection in the Midwest of Rosé wines. Yeah, it seems like every year this time of year, just a new wine aisle somehow gets created in every one of our stores. That is absolutely true. And just piles of Rosé show up. Absolutely true. The Rosé section is a little bit like an accordion. The old squeeze box goes in and out. We're trying more and more to keep a lot of skews year round because there's no reason not to drink Rosé year round. If you drink white wine in the winter, why wouldn't you drink a Rosé? Yeah, that's a good point. Right now, we've got maybe 160 different skews on hand, and we got loads of 2023s coming in. The bulk of them haven't even arrived yet, but we got about 50 so far. We're going to take a look at a few different styles from around the globe. Yeah, I was just going to say, when you say all those different Rosés, what predominantly are we talking about as far as country? France is huge into Rosé along the Cote d'Azur. Provence is the epicenter of Rosé culture. But you can find them from Italy and Spain and the United States, all the way from California to Oregon, all the way over to New York, and all points in between. Everybody makes Rosé. Literally everybody makes Rosé. If you can grow grapes, you're probably making Rosé. Yeah, and the styles vary and grape varieties vary, and oftentimes they fit into the prevailing dynamic in the region. So if you're making a Rioja Rosé, you're using certain grapes. And if you're making a Provençal Rosé, you're using different grapes. Some people like to extract a lot of color. Some people like it super pale. The regimes are different everywhere. So anyway, we're going to dive in, I guess, with our... Yeah, this first one's pretty pale. It's very pale, and it's from extreme north eastern Spain in the Basque region near San Sebastian, where you get delicious food, pinchos. The cedres? Yeah. All the cider geeks. Exactly. Yeah, you can pour a cedre from about 10 feet away, you know, that big long arm pour. I like Spanish cider. They're often pretty bready and funky, though. Yeah, depends on the producer, some are a bit much. So little footy. Little footy. But the cuisine here is incredible, and the local style of rosé that we're going to taste is something called chakali or chakalina, depending on who you're talking to. And it's made with indigenous grapes, primarily Hondurabi. And there are a couple different ones. There's Hondurabi. Hondurabi. Or hondurabi. Spellings vary, too. This is the area of Spain and also a little bit into France, where they have a language that nobody really understands the origins of, it's loaded with Xs and consonants. You know, I don't want to embarrass Roger, so why don't you tell us how it's pronounced? Didn't your wife spend some time in the Basque Country? She did. She'd be very disappointed in me right now. Does she play highlight? Does not. Tend sheep? No idea. She tends Brophy after he's drank a bunch of highlight. Or hams. I bet tons of customers come in asking for this. Hey, you have that wine with all the different consonants in the name. It's got a bunch of Xs in it. And we're like, yeah, totally. Well, I say Txomin Etxaniz. What do you say, Ray? I would concur with that because my basque is a little rusty. The main thing is that you remember that it's Txakoli, which rhymes with chopping broccoli. Chopping broccoli. Chopping broccoli. That's how you remember how to pronounce this wine. Txomin Etxaniz. There was a lady I didn't know. I am all about him and someone else to get my stupid SNL references. Well, it is by far the easiest way to remember how to pronounce this wine, if you don't know basque. This is a beautiful color. I'll give it that. Look at this. Yes, it is. Salmon coral. Txakoli is the- That's the style of the wine. Yeah, and you can get Txakoli in red, white, and rosé. So it's not- It's the fact that it's grown in this area, just like what makes it a burgundy, right? So it's grown in this area. It's made with particular grapes. Like I said, Ondorabi Belza is a red version, which is predominant in this blend to make the pink, but there's also Ondorabi Zirai, which is the main grape in white. I've never heard any of these words before. Not to be confused with Mesopotamian King Hammurabi. Right, yes. I feel like I'm reading the opening chapter of a fantasy novel. There is a serious code to this, though. Ondorabi's code must be followed. One of the unique things about this is that the grapes are really high in acid, they're picked relatively early, the alcohol is moderate, and they leave a little carbon dioxide. And they're all named for dead kings of Gondor. Right. Droyos Broadsword, sir. So these wines are typically pretty bracing with acidity that Chris mentioned, and with the little CO2, it makes them a little bit brighter and more refreshing. And the tiniest little bit of CO2. Yeah, just a hint, just to make it a little livelier. It is really good. Yeah, super racy is the watchword here. If you like high acid wines, last episode we did on wine, Roger kept mentioning sour beers. This is a good crossover for sour beer too. And because of that acidity and its freshness and brightness, they're excellent with food. And in the area, Pinchos, the local version of Tapas, are super popular, they all have little toothpicks in them, and they vary incredibly widely from seafood to anything you can imagine. It's a great wine for that. Interestingly, even though these are lighter wines, because of the region, these are even sometimes eaten with meat dishes because they have such brisk acidity and also they didn't have much else to work with. And there are more sheep than people in this region, so you know, lots of sheep milk products go very well with these. Some excellent sheep milk cheeses. They're great with oysters. Yeah, exactly. Well, so this is right on the northern coast. So seafood is a natural with this. You're talking about the colder waters on the northern coast of Spain. And yeah, there are some fantastic sheep's milk cheeses in the broader area like Idiazabal, which is a mountain cheese made from sheep's milk, aged and smoked. Really nice. And something called roncal, which is always raw sheep's milk. That's a great cheese. If you love manchego, try roncal. I think it's an even better iteration of that style of sheep's milk cheese. Maybe because it's always raw milk, but it's also from completely different pastures and everything. Manchego is from Mancha. This is from cooler, higher elevation areas. Anyway, back to the wine. What do you guys think? I love it. Yeah, this is great. I love that zippy acidity. This is friendly. It's easy drinking. Definitely a Gazebo Guzzler. Yeah, I feel great once the warmer weather hits. I could see the fruit. This reminds me of the refreshingness of a really well-made fruit salad with some of that melon and watermelon. 100 percent. Honeydew. Yeah, it really pops with fruit up front, but there's almost like a pithy, citrusy bitterness to the edge of it. Yeah, there's a lemony acidity to it, for sure. Yeah, it's a really fun wine and a great food. And it does have a little vegetal note, I think, to kind of balance out the fruitiness that is kind of inherent in most Rosés. I totally agree with that. I think there's a savory side to this wine that you may not notice at first. I almost get a subtle hint of cured meat to it, like a Spanish ham, and definitely some herbaceousness. But there is a lot of fruit and a lot of acid, too. And it's, I think, that combination of all those elements that gives it a little more interesting take than what you find in a lot of Rosés that we just call porch pounders that are literally wines that you chill to bud-like temperature. Yeah, I would say one thing that separates this from, say, a typical Provençal Rosé is that they're not using a yeast strain that has loads of fruity esters. It's a very fruity wine, but I don't think in the nose it's like crazy banana-y or fruit salad-y, even though there's a lot of that melon and strawberry and all that kind of stuff on the palate. I think the acidity too, it gives it a level of refinement that you wouldn't pound this. Right. So very fresh, very nice. Glad you guys like it. Excellent wine. What is it going to set us back? This guy is normally $17.99 in the monthly May sale. It's down to $15.99. Very reasonably priced and relatively serious. I mean, this is not as race as a porch pounder per se. And I love the versatility because you can eat, you know, it'll go with your salty snacks or with your cheese or... Tinned fish. Tinned fish, oysters, and as Chris mentioned, even some red meat. Roger, I recently discovered the Tinned Fish subreddit. I've been seeing all kinds of cool stuff. I gotta try. Didn't they talk about that? I heard there's this like very hipster-y place that has like 300 different... Are you talking about the place in LA that's right outside the market downtown? I think that's the one. Yeah, it's like they have a wine bar next door and then a shop filled with nothing, but yeah, tinned meats. This looks like a Hopewell logo. Yeah, it does. Also, we literally have Lemonade next. Yeah. And that is the name of this wine, because the first Vintage was made during the fires of 2020 by a winemaker named Brianna Day, and a lot of growers there got stuck with grapes that they had handshake deals for, but vintners backed out on these handshake deals, so they're stuck with all these grapes, because maybe they were tainted, maybe they weren't, but a lot of people didn't want to take the chance. She just basically said, let's make lemonade. So one of the really easy ways to take grapes that can be smoke-tainted, instead of making red wine, you make a Rosé. And it was so successful. And the smoke taint's not going to come through in a Rosé, generally? Not as much. It won't be as prevalent. Because it's all in the skin? Because you take it off the skin. It's not all in the skin, but yes, it will mitigate that. For the first vintage of a fire, it will be predominantly in the skins, but it does affect the plant. And so you literally won't know. Oh, really? Oh, sure. Because I just always assumed it only affected whatever fruit was hanging. No, smoke will go into the pores of the plant, and it will be metabolized and bound with sugars. And it's very complicated. People can't figure it out. You can taste grapes, you can taste juice and not even notice it. And after fermentation, it just pops out after the sugar is eaten. It's crazy. I had no idea. And yes, it can affect the next vintage as well. I thought it was purely a hanging fruit thing this whole time. No, I mean, the fruit needs to be hanging on the vine for it to happen, but it's not just that it's settling on the outside of the fruit. It becomes... Did you know this, Roger? No, I didn't. It's pretty fascinating. Well, it's a big topic, and it's getting more and more problematic all over the world. All the fires are happening. Yeah, Australia on fire, California on fire, Oregon on fire, everywhere you turn. Pretty much constantly. Anyway, she made the first Vintage, and it was a hit, and it was supposed to be a one-off, and it was so successful that now this is the third Vintage that she's made. It's not all Pinot noir, it's 94% with 6% Grenache. It says Grenache. It might have been Gamay, the previous Vintage. It's not the same every year, because it's definitely something. The tagline on this is, let's all just make the best of this. She is sourcing a lot of this fruit from other growers. She's definitely a smaller producer. She's in the natural camp, but makes really cool stuff. They're interesting natural-wise, but they're always very well-made. Yeah, I agree. This is a producer that, despite using all organic, even biodynamic grapes, working naturally, the wines are always totally clean. I never get any of the off-notes that might crop up. Yeah, yeah. Not gross and underpants. I don't think she's going zero sulfur or anything like that. There's bottling sulfur here, I'm sure. They're very nice wines. She does a great job. What do you guys think? I think not only is the name appropriate for the situation, but the level of acidity and lemon character is reminding me of real lemonade. It's not obviously the level of sweetness of a lemonade, but. I totally agree. There's spot on lemon in this. There's just no doubt about it. It's bright, refreshing. Very dry, just like the last one, bone dry, high acid, really crisp, but really well-made, really focused. Really good. We're just having a crispy boys of wine taste. Worked out perfectly. Well, these are supposed to be refreshing. Right. We could do some major. Refreshing. We could do some guzzling of this, I think, in your gazebo. Yes. Gazebo Guzzler. 1999. Not bad. Still under 20. This is a high-quality producer, and this is actually on the lower end for her stuff, because it is, you know, most of her bottlings are maybe 200, 300 cases, if that. So this has really been a success story. And certainly where I come from in Elmwood Park, it's easily her best-selling wine that we have. She is a Pinot Noir producer, and, you know, that's probably the calling card. But she also does an orange wine called Tears of Vulcan, which is really cool. It's like a tannic white wine. Yeah, it's just really an interesting producer to follow and like someone in the natural movement that I think is getting it right on a lot of different levels. Totally agree. And not only that, she's working with great vineyard sites. I mean, she sources from a bunch of well-known vineyards. And this is not an inexpensive place to buy grapes, especially organically grown grapes. So well done. I'm gonna take the next one, since you're the mountain man. The mountain man. So next, we're gonna go to France. Bill Bransky. We're moving all over the world. Here we are in extreme eastern France, in the Alps, directly adjacent to Switzerland here. This is Savoie. This producer is located in a village called Chenin, Chenin, C-H-I-G-N-I-N, a well-known grape growing village in this area, if there are well-known grape growing villages in this area. Mostly in this mountainous region, you see some grapes you've probably never heard of again, something called Jaquer is kind of a workhorse, Altesse, but then you get some Pinot, Chardonnay, things like that are there too. This is 100 percent Gamay Noir, just like you'd find in Beaujolais. This is a Gamay Rosé. Yes. You will find these in Beaujolais too. Gamay is a nice grape to make a Rosé out of. Yes. This is an Alpine wine though, so grown at altitude, cooler climate. You get that nice acidity. I don't know if I said, but this is Charles Gonnet, 2023, Vend du Sevoir, Rosé. Strawberry note on this is remarkable. Yes. Interesting. I don't find it as acidic as the last two. If anything- No, those two were very, very high acid wines. I feel like it finishes kind of flabby, but it's just because I'm following up those two, I think. I do like it. Nice flavor. Well, to be fair, this is also in 23 on the continent and in France, it was warm. I mean, not only warm, it was hot. So it's like that it retains any acidity, is like it speaks to where it's from, I think. I agree. I think it's pretty brisk on the finish. It's because the other two were so- They were zippy. I would agree with Ray's assessment. I've tasted quite a few Rosés already. The one hallmark I'm finding across Europe is very moderate acidity. Even in things like Sancerre, where you'd expect pretty high acid, they are moderate in acid. So this is a year for people who want a fair amount of fruit and not as much acid. So it's actually pretty good thing that we started out with some really high acid wines for those who are acid heads out there. The color on this is beautiful, too. I mean, if you want that characteristic just, I mean, the pink on this is pretty gorgeous. Yeah, it's shimmering like platinum pink, you know? Yeah, it's beautiful. And really quite delicious, I think, just all around. Just, it's really nice and linear, has good fruit, but you know, very clean. Another wine you can drink by itself, but you know, if you're doing some Mediterranean food, it would be great. This is also a region known for some culinary prowess. Obviously, you have the land of Fondue next door, so I mean, again, you could throw a lot of cheeses at it and some meats. Indeed. In fact, you know, when I used to work on the floor, I would often recommend wines made from Jaquer for Fondue or Raclette. I think they have a great affinity for it, and this would work just as well. You know that salad that's popular in the summertime where it's watermelon, feta, and mint. Yeah. Oh, yeah. That would be really beautiful. It's like the eighth time Roger's brought up this dumb salad on this podcast. It is a very refreshing salad. It's an awesome salad. You get delightful sweet melon against salty, tangy cheese. It's really good. If it's too plain-jane for you, you could put some balsamic on it, especially a reduction. Actually, I think that's a really good call with this wine in particular because it's got a nice kind of saline quality to it that would marry well with something that that's in balsamic for sure. All right. Another cool wine. And what's that one cost? So that one is a mere $14.99. Ooh. From a region probably most people don't know, from a grape that is more familiar, but really cool stuff. And that is the great thing about the wines from this region is that they are reasonably priced, whereas if you go next door in Switzerland, they'll be at least twice as much if not more. Very true, and these wines have some really nice character. There's some really good Swiss wines, but there's also a lot of chasselas and stuff that's maybe a little more neutral. But you can find good Swiss Pinot Noir and things like that. All right, what's this next one? All right, so... Another fun label. Boy, these Rosés. This is from the gentleman who put Rosé on the map in the United States. His name is Sasha Lesheen, and he was basically the creator of Whispering Angel. So Whispering Angel has since been sold, although I believe he still retains a small portion of it, to a very big, famous wine conglomerate. You may or may not have heard of, but I'm sure you've heard of it. Anyway, this is his new project. It's called The Pale. He had a lot of money after his sale, so he's keeping on with the Rosé theme. So this is The Pale. It's not Provençal, it's Provence in style. It's Vindupé de Var. So wine of the country, not an AOC or AOP wine. This color, this very pale color, and he's calling it out in the name, is very classic Provence-style winemaking. So yeah, Cave d'Esclan is his thing. He made some $120 Rosés. Of course, Whispering Angel was the workhorse. This is an introduction of something very reasonably priced in that style. So basically here he's going for Whispering Angel-styled wine, but not at the price point and still, you know, fun, attractive package. Do you know what's in this? I'm thinking like it's like a bottle on the bottom faceted. Yeah, I was wondering why that was looking that way. Let me see. Grenache, Carignan, stuff like that. Yeah, I believe so. It's the typical blonde. I didn't do my due diligence when we pulled this from the shelf this morning. Neither one of us did. I was just like, oh, yeah, that's Sasha Lashin's new project. And his father was a super famous guy in the world of wine. Do you want to stop doing that with the bottle over there, buddy? It's not a can of hams. Is the pail playing off of the expression beyond the pails? I don't think so. Beyond the pail, literally beyond the fence or outside of the ranch, which would make sense. But I think it's mostly about this classic, very lightly colored Rosé style that Provence is famous for. And people definitely judge Rosés on the color, although it's not necessarily a fail safe way of knowing what you're going to get. For people that buy Provençal Rosé or that style, it's super important that they be as light as possible. The darker it is, for them, they think it's going to be a different style, which it can be, but it doesn't necessarily have, just because it's dark in color doesn't mean it's going to be super heavy. This is very true. Although some of them are like right next to Provence, we have in the Rhône Valley Tavel, which is a famous appellation just for Rosé, and they always extract a ton of color, like electric vibrant pink from Grenache, and they are bigger higher in alcohol. It's a really warm climate there. And you get some of the classic Claret style Rosés are still made around the world, like Cerro Suolo in Italy, and even in Spain you find some really dark ones, and probably there are a few in Bordeaux these days too. What was the grape varietals? So, as we said, neither of us looked it up, but it is 100% likely that it is based on Grenache, with probably something like Carignan's, and so I'm sure it's the big three. I don't think he strayed too far from the path on this. You wouldn't think so. What do you guys think? Do you like this, or is it just... I like it. It's a little subdued compared to the last few. Well, we're definitely more in the porch-pounder category, I would say. And that's really what this wine is meant to be, I think. 100%. Sitting by the pool, sitting at the beach. According to their website, the Pail is premium, stylish, and accessible. You're kidding. Well, if you look at the label, it's all about fashion. They're telegraphing this cafe and lunching lifestyle. So it's made at the same place where Whispering Angels made, at Chateau Des Clans. Yeah, that makes sense. Or owned by the same place. That makes sense. Interesting. Yeah. So what's the price point on this one? So that is also, he's definitely coming in under the current Whispering Angel price. It's generally $14.99. We have it at $12.99. Not bad. Pretty good for $12.99. Pretty nice bottle of wine for $13. Easy going, fruity. If you're going to be on the patio just pounding away, I mean, you know, it's hot outside, it's cold. We assume Roger does that by his pool, but he never invites us. So there's no way of really knowing. Right. Maybe this year will be the year pad. God knows I've brought it up enough. So next up, it looks like we've got a Provençal Rosé proper by the famous Rosé producer, Ott. Mel Ott? Yeah, Mel Ott, exactly. MLB Hall of Famer? Yes, that's correct. This is looking more coral to me than... I believe Brophy has a pair of pants, Bermuda shorts in this coral color. Mine are a little darker. Yeah, they're darker for sure. Still pale, still typically pale Provençal pink. The last one had some Art Deco stylings, the font on this looks Art Deco. All the era of Mel Ott played in. Where are we going with this? 1920s decadence is back or what? Of course it is, it's never been out. The roaring 2020s? Well, you know. Anyway, this is by By Ott. This is kind of their entry level. It's Cotes de Provence, I believe. This is a producer who's been around for over 100 years and they make, again, not unlike Descalon, they make some very high end stuff, but they're a long established company and rightly famous for things like their Chateau Ducelle and Chateau Romasan, I believe it is. Those generally aren't released until, I mean, we hardly see those until midsummer usually. Yeah, they don't hit until the end of summer, but they're more serious expressions. Very serious, much more expensive. And one of them is a Bandol and one is a Provence, maybe Cote de Provence. So I think definitely a little more serious, a little more saline, a little more mouth puckering. Interesting. I like it. It's a powerful wine, much like, you know, old Mel Ott in his 500 homeruns, 300 career average. You could really, he did it both ways. This is power and finesse in this wine. Well, this is a producer that definitely hits it out of the park on a pretty regular basis. That's true. I mean, it's got plenty of fruit up front, but there's some serious texture. You can feel little just tannin from the skins. Yeah, it's bright and fresh and focused. I really like this. I think that's good. Did a really great job with this. The florality that's in here is really nice. Masterful. Master Melvin would approve. I find it a bit more savory though. Yeah, for sure. Oh, yeah, the last one was tutti frutti. This has fruit, but it has savory elements. I think you're right, Roger. It's not unusual to find, say, lavender in a wine like this. I think this is a serious approach to rosé and it's quite good. This is something you might have with a nice bouillabaisse or a salad nicoise or something like that. Salad nicoise, yes. Sure. Yeah, olives. Again, it's like you get that fruity and crisp acidity against a salty, tangy. It'll go well with green olive pizza, you're saying. Yeah, perfect. There's also a mineral aspect to this, too, like a savory, wet stone earthiness. I'm going to venture a guess that that one was a little more pricey. You are correct. So that goes for $24.99. As opposed to probably over... Very serious wine, though, it's good. Yeah. There are other products that we'll see later in the season are probably... Interesting little mix of grapes in this Paso guy we're trying to make. Yeah, so this is Tablas Creek from Paso Robles. But the interesting thing about this, this is a project that was started between the importer of Chateau Beaucastel and the parents from Beaucastel themselves. Right, the Haas family and the Perons. They are a Chateauneuf de Pape producer in Paso Robles. And they literally propagated all 13 Chateauneuf de Pape varietals that had not been propagated in the United States when they moved into Paso. And so obviously because they're Chateauneuf de Pape focused, it's more red than anything else, but they do have white. And this is their Rosé, the 2003 Patelin de Tablas. 71% Grenache, 20% Reved, 8% Vermintino, or some say Roll. In France, you would call this Roll, Vermintino in Italy. And 1% Cône Noir. Cône Noir, I've never heard of Cône Noir before. That's a common Rhone varietal used for blending. I mean, longtime listeners will know that homie's favorite wine is Chateauneuf de Pape, of course. So this should be right up my alley. Well, so Chateauneuf du Beaux Castels, one of the most famous producers in the area and also famously known for still using all 13 varietals, red and white, in their wines. All the whites go into the red. So they're really old school about that. And they did California a huge service. They did all the work. They set up a nursery. They put things through quarantine. They got rid of viruses and they propagated all of these great cuttings from France. And people are using them all over California now. Yeah, it's a pretty interesting project. It's a great place to visit. Have you had some of the finished wines? Yeah. Obviously. I mean, I've been there. I've been there many times. Yeah. So I mean, your takeaway, you know, upper level in a nutshell, what a big difference between these Chateauneuf-du-Pope style wines made in California versus the real thing. One of the reasons they picked Paso was specifically because they liked the soil and the climate in comparison to Chateauneuf-du-Pope. Similar? Yeah. I mean, I think that's what they were shooting for. There are, of course, differences, but both are very warm climates. And these grape varieties, particularly Grenache, does really well in warm climates. So yeah, I don't know. What do you think, Ray? It's definitely a new world take on Chateauneuf-du-Pope. They're not trying to replicate exactly what they did in France. They know better than to try. Right, they're smart enough to lean into nature and the terroir they have. Of course, any smart wine maker is not going to try to force something into a box, a predetermined box. They're going to go with the fruit they get. Yeah, it's its own project. It's its own thing. It looks to Chateauneuf-du-Pope for its inspiration, but it's not trying to be a new world copy of it. And they definitely do things differently. They got to come up with a new coat of arms to emboss into the glass. Right. Well, to that point, they are also incredibly prolific. They bottle so many things, single-varietal wines. Their main jam is these blends, these Chateauneuf or Coteron style blends. But, I mean, they will bottle the weirdest things on their own and sell them in the winery. Like Coulnois? Yeah, exactly. There's a lot going on in this wine. This is an awesome wine. The fruit complexity is pretty amazing. And there's some racy acidity here that is nice. Talk about earlier on when we were talking about beer that sour beer fans might dig. Yep. This is nice. What do we sell this for? So this goes for, again, $24.99. Not bad. This is a very complex Rosé. It's a very serious Rosé. It's got a lot of depth of character and a pretty long finish. Mm-hmm. Screw cap, which is always nice. Yeah. It's got a really nice, reminds me kind of of, kind of like underripe white raspberry and some stone fruit notes. Sure. I also get a lot of kind of citrus that's resonating in the orange family, tangerine or something. This is definitely a more full-bodied, richer style of Rosé, unlike a lot of the previous wines we've tasted. And, you know, this would even do well at the Thanksgiving Day table, even though you wouldn't think, oh, who's going to pour Rosé for Thanksgiving? It's going to be cold out. But, you know, this is a wine that is so versatile and it has the structure to hold up to, like, all those big, heavy foods. And, you know, it can go with so many different cuisines. And that's what Thanksgiving dinner is. That's what, Ed, you need a Swiss army knife of a wine for Thanksgiving. And this is one of those things I would even go so far as to say that you could probably pair this with the Central Coast classic Tri-Tip and Santa Maria beans. And that would work really well. You get that pico de gallo and, you know, a nice oak wood grilled piece of beef. I don't think this wine is going to be overwhelmed by that. I think it'll handle it just nicely. It's an excellent bottle. Yeah. Yeah, these guys, these guys do great work. I mean, there's no two ways about it. It's worth mentioning that it's, you know, there's still for people that are, you know, maybe not as well tuned into the wine world that I think people unfairly make some assumptions about Rosé at times, you know, and they'll think it's overly simplistic or on the sweeter side. But it's nice to show how versatile it can be. And that was really expressive. There's some good acidity. I mean, everything we've had so far has been pretty much bone dry, which may change shortly. Coming around the table is Roditis. Once upon a time... Isn't this like real sweet Greek stuff? So once upon a time, when you went down to Greek town, and there was, I don't know what, like half a mile of nothing but Greek restaurants, and there was the... This is from Spiros Hatziyiannis. Yep. Yeah, so we just got this in. Our Greek buyer, Bill, was just recently, he's been looking for a Roditis, hasn't been able to find one. And yes, traditionally in Chicago, they were off dry and they had some sweetness and you know, everyone, you'd go to the Pegasus and everyone would sit together with, you know, 10, 12 of their closest friends, drink big crafts of Roditis and you can Oh, whoop-a! Yeah, knock back some Terra Masalata. But Roditis is really a pink skinned grape. So it naturally makes a wine that is pink. Indeed, it's one of those weird grapes that doesn't ripen to full red. It's pink and often it's made into a white wine because of that, but pink is what we know most well in the States, I think. Yeah, most often it is made into white wine. Well, it definitely isn't sweet. To be fair, it does say dry on the outside, so. Oh yeah, and it's got like a sharpness in the back though. I don't know, what is that? Is it the alcohol that's hitting me? There's like a sharpness on the back of the palate here that I really don't like. It's an interesting, it's kind of a vegetal, like. Yeah, I was just gonna say very, very green on the finish. Which, you know, you could add some RS to cover that up. Well, that may be why that happens frequently. Yeah, I wouldn't doubt it. I mean, it would be a way to correct it, yeah, for sure. So good eye, Roger, like we said earlier. This is brand new on the shelf. Knowing that I know nobody's tried it. This is the first time I've ever had this. Except for maybe the Rosé buyer. But it does proclaim boldly that it's a dry wine. I like this. I don't think it doesn't have the structure of the previous wines, but it's refreshing and very easy to drink. You could have it with Saganaki. Sure. Anything on fire, you can have this with. What are the most popular dishes that everyone gets at the Greek restaurant down the road? Grilled octopus. That would be great with grilled octopus. Skordaya. It's that garlicky potato stuff. Oh, yeah. Taro Masalata, the fish roe dip. Yeah, I think people like the chicken over there and lamb chops. I mean, it'll go with lots of stuff. Do you have this with some moussaka? Moussaka. There you go. Pastizio. Anyway, the good thing about this wine is it is not very expensive. It is not expensive at all. This is a mere $8.99 a bottle. $110, woo-woo. The new porch pounder. Roger has a nice price guarantee. So adjust your expectations. We just came off of Tablas Creek, which is certainly at working at a high level. You really set it up to fail there after the most structured and complex, you're like, let's try this $9 Greek wine after it. I kind of debated about where to put this. And yeah, I mean, if I had it to do again, I would probably put it earlier. But I wasn't really sure what we were going to get. So we could read the front label. That would help us in the future. I didn't think it was going to be the Greek town style Roditis. I thought it would be off dry, personally. I just don't think that style really exists anymore, even though there are people that still ask for it. But I would say the good thing about this wine at $8.99, if you're looking for a Rosé that's not tutti frutti under $10, which is kind of hard to find. That's true. This would be a good bet for you, because it is dry and dry and herbal drinking. This is spritzer material, baby. Oh, yeah. Nice. Little club soda. That'll be all right. Okay, last one coming around, as I hit the mic. This is Sierra Cantabria Rosé. This is Grenache, right? So, interestingly, this wine is Rioja. This wine is largely the workhorse white grape of the area of Vajora. It's over 50% Vajora, known to Cava drinkers as Macabeo. So, Macabeo in Cava and Vajora in Rioja. And then it is also made into a Rosé by the addition of Grenache and Tempranillo. These are all classic grape varieties of the region. Very, very subtle pink to this, if any. Yeah, it's pale. It's very pale. I mean, it is over 50% white wine. Now, one thing we have to make clear is in the European Union, you cannot take white wine and red wine or pink wine and blend them together. They have to be co-fermented into the pink wine. We mentioned there was Vermintino in the Tablas Creek. That is a white grape. They call that roll in Provence. You would not be adding a separate wine or vinifying it separately. It would just be in the tank with the others. It was pretty good. I like this one. Back to a more pointed acidity here. It's different. It's very, I feel like it's a standout amongst the bunch. Yeah. It sits in its own. I find that the texture's a little fleshier than some of them, a little rounder, but it does still have brisket city, kind of peachy. Yeah, it leans more stone fruit, less of that like overt strawberry. I like it. And it's Spanish, so I assume it's pretty inexpensive. It is pretty inexpensive. We're looking at $11.99. Pretty nice. Down to $9.99 for the month of May. Oh, even nicer. So this is a high quality producer. Sierra Cantabria, well known Rioja producer. You can find their red wines on our shelves sometimes. And yeah, I think this is pretty well done. And again, it's got fruit, but it's also got a savory side to it. It's not all tutti frutti. In fact, most of these wines are surprising for their lack of tutti frutti esters. Yeah. Yeah, this is actually pretty brisk. And yeah, I was expecting that. Is that what you're going to find more in like Tevelle? Tevelles are very big and structured. They're wines that will see some oak quite often. But richer in color, though. Yes. Deep in color, high in alcohol, like 14 plus percent alcohol. They're really more like winter rosés. Yeah, red meat rosés. OK. So where do you find most of the tutti frutti ones in the US? Provence is very famous for their really, or broadly, southern France for their tutti frutti, mostly driven by yeasty esters. In that style, you kind of have to drink them relatively young because those esters can kind of fade over time. Roger, what fruit liqueur did you just add to your wine? I was going to say that I could see- He's adding strawberry to this rosé. It doesn't have enough fruit to it. I was thinking of making a cur out of this, and if only we had the cassis, but we have the framboise instead. Roger, how is your Matilda Raspberry liqueur-infused Rioja Rosé here? I think it's quite lovely. It definitely brought the fruit to the fore. It rounded it out. It's obviously adding a little bit of sweetness. I barely put anything in there. I put a couple drops just to... I mean, it didn't even change the color of it hardly. A cur, so a lot of people know cur royale, is when you're putting cassis into sparkling wine. Oftentimes, I do that with a cava. So I was thinking it would be fun to try this with a cassis. And I usually have Mathede's, the brand of cassis that I think if you're interested in cassis, that's one of our best things we have. So I turned around just by chance to see if we had any. We don't, but we did have the Framboise. So I figured, why not give it a chance? So traditionally, in France, what they would use for the still white wine base would be Elagote from Burgundy, which is kind of a grape that has been lost to the annals of time. It is coming back a little bit now. There are people that really believe in it and never ripped it out. There are people that believe in it and are even starting to plant some in areas where they can't grow Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. But because you get so much money for Chardonnay and Pinot Noir if you're in Burgundy, unless you really love it, you're not going to plant some other grape. But there are, like I said, people that really do love it, but most of it got ripped out towards the end of the 60s, I believe, just because it was being made mass produced. And that's why, and it was really thin and acidic. And so they would add a little, you know, liqueur syrup here and to fatten it up, give it more fruit, just like what Roger did instinctively. And you know, it's, I don't know, was it good? I'd try some, put like a tiny bit. Well, we did give you guys a lot of kind of austere style rosés today. And it was, this was definitely more an exploration of probably a more serious side of rosé, which isn't what everyone always thinks of when it comes to rosé. Definitely wasn't the porch pounder episode, but you know, we already had hams today. Ray, we have this term we like to use over here called flavor blasting. So if you're going to do some flavor blasting, why not with one of the finest French liqueurs that we have in our shelves? Brof. All right. I'm flavor blasting right now. Isn't that like a pizza flavor? Yeah. The joke is that it's companies do it with like artificial bull. Flavor blasted. Like Doritos and Goldfish and all that. Oh, yeah. I have had those Goldfish. Yes. It's good. Of course it's good. I could drink that. I might spritz it up a little bit though. Yeah, I could use a little lift maybe. When I started working in the office a couple of years ago, I quickly instituted something I started calling Ancient Wine Friday. Because on Friday afternoons, the buyers tend to bring out samples, taste through them. We assess them, think about what we want to do about buying them. What I find is that people have a misconception about older wines. Some people that just think that any wine will get better with age, or that it will get better somehow, but just be more of the same, only better. But old wine changes quite a bit. It's a whole different thing unto itself. And a lot of people in America love young wine. Even if you might think it needs some time, traditionally people love exuberant young fruit. So whether they say so or not, what their taste actually reveals is that they love younger wine. Yeah. And it's the same with a lot of things. People historically say they love dry wine, but they like a little residual sugar in it. You know? Hard ciders that way. They don't actually want dry cider. They just want cider with acidity and sweetness. Right. There are some people, of course, collectors, who age their wines, but I think we've really gotten away from that as a society. And I think we also just don't have time for it, don't have the room for it. People want to buy a wine, bring it home, drink it tonight. And so wine styles have changed. We've backed off on tannin. We've accentuated fruit, especially in the States. So what I got here is a really oddball thing to do for most people's eyes, which is I aged a Rosé. This is not an experiment. This is something I do. This one may be leaning a little old. We'll see. But this is from a producer called Chateau-Predot, very famous, very serious producer in Bandol, where some of the best and most age-worthy Rosés come from. Roger isn't familiar with where Bandol is in France. You want to explain that? Sure. Bandol is in Southeast France. It is in Provence. They work largely with Mouvedre here. It's kind of getting that brickier color to it. Now, I've had these at three to four years old that I thought were brilliant. This one is a 2018. So it's getting close to six years old. It might be over the hill. So we're going to have to see what's going on here. What I got out of them when they were younger, this vintage in particular, was particularly in the body, tons of creaminess, strawberries and cream, oranges, orange pith bitterness. And like I said, three to four years, they blossom into a really beautiful wine that is just incredibly versatile food, drinks more like a fine white wine. Anyway, this one's looking pretty orangey at this point. Yeah. It's more like liquid rust. Yeah, yeah, for sure. It's also very cold because I left it in the fridge. The wines that I am most familiar with are fortified wines. And I'm a huge Madeira fan and sherry fan. And the nose on this kind of reminds me of that oxidative character. I really like the nose. Check out the body, the roundness, the creaminess of the body. It is icy cold, though. So some Rosés you want to serve at this temperature, probably, like that Roditis. Yeah. This is a real disservice to this wine, too. To have it icy cold. I'm enjoying it. Yeah, it's good. I'm just kind of holding it and letting it warm up. I'm swirling it a bit. Ray, what are your thoughts? Yeah, I'm definitely enjoying it, but it's too cold. So yeah, I'm trying to warm it up between my hands right now. But definitely right on that it is oxidative, which, you know, not a shocker at, what are we, six years of age, almost. I actually really like the color. It's pretty. It's super cool because you don't really see a lot of wines outside of the fortified segment. Although this kind of... Ray, what Rosé did you mention earlier today? And you said we're definitely not going to have any of that. Oh, the Lopesta Heredia, yes. So long ago. In the traditional Spanish regime, like a lot of things, even the Rosés were aged for years in oak and super oxidative. Yeah, if you get traditional whites and reds from producers like Lopesta Heredia, they are very oxidized. This happened in the bottle. This was not meant to be an oxidative wine. And it's definitely gone too far. But I think you could still happily drink this with some hearty fare. Yeah, it's not matterized. I mean, as this warms up, I am starting to get almost like some almost like Nebbiolo notes. Interesting. You know, it is more Vedra. So it can be pretty gamey, olivey, like black olives. True, true indeed. Yeah, I would have been much happier if we were tasting maybe a 2020 rather than 2018. It's just one of these things. This is this is the the Russian roulette you play with Ancient Wine Friday. Yep. Often there are forgotten bottles that, you know, I bought several of. And there's one lingering in the corner of a cellar. And I bring it out just to see. There are some been some amazing surprises at Ancient Wine Friday. Believe me, some things just absolutely off the charts and some things dead as a doornail that I thought would have survived. You know, this still has some fruit that's still that's still hanging on there. Apricot. Definitely. That's what kind of part of what it reminded me to. It almost says Sertial because there's big acidity here. Yeah. Yeah, I think it's still an enjoyable wine, albeit over the hill. Yeah, the right food here. I think we could we could still work. Oh, you could easily enjoy this with the right food. So this is just a little a little aside in that. If you is this a brand we sell? It is. I have no idea whether we're getting it this year. But there are other famous Bandol's that we do get like like Domaine Tempier really sought after Rosé, which is probably the most sought after Rosé that we carry on allocated Rosé. Yeah. Only a handful of stores get it. Not too much. Yeah, I got I got six bottles last year, I believe. And, you know, as soon as I got them, they were they were gone. But this just is just a little demonstration that all Rosé does not have to be the freshest Rosé. Sometimes they improve. I guarantee you, if you try this wine on release and you try it one year after release, you will prefer it after one year. Yeah, the interesting thing about the Bandol's is quite often they're they're much better the the next year or maybe even two years. Yeah. Then upon release, they can they can be a little tight and dumb when you when you first get them that they need like at least six months before they really I agree to drink. But I think you can easily go out four years with with a really good example for sure. Yeah, six may be pushing it. That's the show, I think. Yeah, that was fun. That's I've never tasted anything like that really. No, yeah. Thanks for sharing that. I've never I don't know anybody who ages Rosé besides you. Well, so yeah, it was enlightening, though, and it's still it's drinking. That's fine. I mean, I don't know. I enjoyed it. Yeah, I mean, I kind of feel like an idiot for enjoying it because I'm not supposed to enjoy it. Sure, you are. You're supposed to like what you like. I mean, if you had some grilled octopus, I would throw it on right now. The bottle would disappear in like 10 minutes. Challenge accepted. Let's just take let's take an open bottle down the street with us and try to order some grilled octopus. Eat it on the street. All right, listeners, hope you enjoyed these more serious takes on Rosé. Maybe we'll come back with a residual sugar Rosé episode. Well, we do have residual sugar Ray on. Exactly. I'm getting sweeter all the time. Hope you learned something new. If you got any questions about Rosé, hit us up. Comments at binnys.com or at Binny's Bev on the social media of your choice. If we answer your question on the podcast, we will give you a $20 Binny's Gift Card. Till next week, tell everybody you know about the show. Tell them to listen to Barrel and Bottle. Leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. Tell your mom we said hi. We'll see you next week. I'm Pat. I'm Roger. I'm Ray. And I'm Chris. Keep tasting that Rosé, because they ain't all the same.