RED BLENDS: PORTUGAL

+MUST TRY+
Charamba Vinho Tinto
Portugal: Douro
Touriga Nacional, Touriga Francesa,
Tinta Barroca and Tinta Roriz (blend)
2007
$6.99
88+ pts
Named for a traditional Portuguese dance, this may just be the absolute best bottle of $7.00 wine on the market in the United States. That is not to say that this is an interesting, complex or life-altering wine (in fact, it is none of those things). BUT what it is--a delicious Old World-style red with a beautiful rich ruby coloring, a nose of red berries and black pepper, and a taste profile that includes strawberries, barnyard and bit of green vegetables--is exceptional for a wine that retails at Binny's for $6.99 a bottle. If your tastes run Old World (bit more earthy and dirty than giant New World fruit bomb), this red from Portugal, at this price, should be in your starting line-up for Tuesday night kind-of wines. I'm a fan!

+MUST TRY+
Quinta do Côa Vinho Tinto
Portugal: Almendra, Douro Superior (northern Portugal)
Touriga Nacional, Touriga Franca & Tinta Roriz, which the Spanish call Tempranillo (blend)
2006
$23.99
89 pts
Very nice! This vinho tinto, a deep, dark red, offers plum and blackberry on the nose, and delivers a wonderful multi-faceted flavor, starting with blackberries and transitioning to plum, with an undercurrent of gentle spice before...wait for it...a chocolate finish! Really. Chocolate. While twenty-four bucks is certainly not a bargain-priced wine, this one earns its keep, with interest, a measure of complexity, and most importantly, great taste. Picked this up last summer at House of Glunz on Wells in Old Town, and I highly recommend it. Tip: Portuguese red continues to offer great quality for the price, with very good wines available for tens of dollars less than comparable wines from France and California. The same is true of Chilean reds.

Chaminé (by Cortes de Cima)
Portugal: Alentejano (Southern Portugal)
Aragonez (Tempranillo) 43%, Syrah 42%, and the remainder Touriga Nacional, Trincadeira, Cabernet Sauvignon, Alicante Bouchet and Petit Verdot (blend)
2007
$13.99
87+ pts
The nose on this Portuguese red leads with fresh earth, with bright cherry undertones next, before closing with a hint of hospital (a distinct chemical or cleaning aroma). In the mouth, Chaminé (Chimney, in Portuguese, named after a feature of the original vineyard), is a light-to-medium bodied wine with a bright, zesty initial attack of candy-like raspberries. This is followed by lots of enjoyable musty earthiness, although the raspberries sneak back in on the finish. The length? Very nice, well above average. At fourteen bucks a bottle (available at Binny's), this is an interesting and fine wine...but one word of caution: the combination of bright young raspberries and soulful rich earth (almost manure-like) isn't for everyone. And while Chaminé achieves a reasonable coherence, a unity, it's also a little disjointed, as if it doesn't know, ultimately, which way to go (fruit or earth), and tries to have it both ways. It works well enough--but not brilliantly. A good wine to try because of its character and originality, but not one you need to keep on hand in the home, IMO.

+MUST TRY+
Dão Sul Cabriz Reserva
Portugal: Dão
Touriga Nacional 40%, Alfrocheiro 40% and Tinta Roriz 20% (blend)
2004
$15.50
89 pts
Picked up this wonderful Portuguese red blend at Lush Wines in Chicago last week. The Dão region, located in north central Portugal, is mountainous with a sandy, granite-rich soil, and is known for reds that are dry, with nice minerality and a gentle, easy red fruit. They're usually food-friendly, since the fruit isn't overpowering and the wines contain decent acidity. The Dão Sul Cabriz Reserva is a nice example of what this region has to offer--and what you can get today in a Portuguese red for just about $15.00 (a very good buy). The color is an attractive rich plum, with hints of bright red on the swirl. As for bouquet, I get red berries up front, and maybe cherries, too, followed by a deep, earthy Old World barnyard scent that is not unappealing. As for mouth feel, it's one of the wine's great strengths: in your mouth, it's soft, smooth silk. In terms of flavor, the initial attack is red fruit, followed by an extremely subtle spice on the mid-palette, and closing with an enjoyable, rocky limestone-like minerality. The finish is definitely dry, with near-maximum pucker quality from the tannins (which I like). Good length, too. There isn't much Old World earth on the taste profile (although it's definitely on the nose), but this wine does offer the balance for which the region is known. A pleasant, easy drinking red that's perfect for those who find the intensity of high-power, fruit driven wines (a more New World style) over-powering, over-the-top. The oak employed in the aging process by this producer is French, and so, happily, this wine also lacks the intense oakiness that can kill the unique terroir in your glass. To like this wine, though, one really has to enjoy serious dryness and a mineral taste profile--which I do. For me, this one's a MUST TRY.

Old Vine Red (by Restoration Wines)
Portugal: Alentejano
Tina Roriz--called Tempranillo in Spain--Trincadeira Preta, and an offspring of Grenache - a blend (red)
2007
$9.99
86 pts
Starts hot on the front, finishes smooth; just a hint of tobacco on the back end; decent fruit, too; a little on the light side for my palette, and a slight flat aftertaste, but still a decent Portuguese red for the price. Available at Cost Plus World Market.