pop & pour

[These bottles were provided as samples for review purposes.]

Summer fun – ideally outside, without rain.

Call it countercyclical marketing or just really bad weather judgment, but I’ve managed to hold off on writing up a patio-wine-themed review duet until the week when we’re due to get utterly deluged with rain.  In the event that you’re soaking wet while reading this, consider it a faint flicker of hope for the future.  So far the forecast has been, as usual, wrong, which will hopefully allow you to disregard this entire paragraph.

I wanted to write up these two wines together because they share both a similar grape source (Garnacha, better known in the New World as Grenache) and a similar vision:  to be a cheap and cheerful source of quality fun out of a bottle.  Of course, they also share a producer, Miguel Torres, whose fifth generation family estate has become one of the most solid wine bets out there, a name that evokes trust regardless of the region, country, grape or style of the wine behind the label.  These relatively new releases are twin 2013 Torres bottlings of Garnacha-based wines:  the De Casta Rose, which blends Garnacha with Carinena (Carignan), and the 5G, a 100% Garnacha representing five generations of the Torres family tree and the winery’s constant hunt for perfection in that grape.  Both are value-priced (under $15 and under $20 respectively) and both are meant for easy and early enjoyment. Read the rest of this entry »