Thursday Virtual Happy Hour: Tempranillo

The backbone of some of the best Spanish wines, Tempranillo is a red grape variety grown throughout Spain and Portugal, with smaller amounts grown elsewhere. Tempranillo is a relatively thick-skinned red grape with a high anthocyanin count that makes for deep-colored red wines with moderate tannins and, where rosé is produced from the variety, generally quite deeply-hued, pink colors.

While the variety is often accused of lacking its own idiosyncratic flavor profile, Tempranillo wines can produce a wide range of aromas, ranging from strawberries, blackcurrants and cherries to prunes, chocolate, leather and tobacco depending on vineyard age and mesoclimate. Moderate to full-bodied, Tempranillo generally shows moderate tannins with moderate to low acidity. Temperate climates (or those with good diurnal temperature shift) such as Rioja and Ribera del Duero produce long-lived, structured, often elegant wines. In warmer climates, the variety can take on a darker fruit aspect with high alcohol, high tannins and low acidity.

Oak and Tempranillo marry well together. American oak is the traditional choice of winemakers in Rioja, and Tempranillo's flavor profile integrates well with the vanilla and coconut notes imparted by new American oak barrels. Further west in Ribera del Duero, the fashion is to use higher proportions of French and used-oak barrels to allow Tempranillo's fruit to shine with a focus on more spiced oak flavors. However, with time, the two styles have been gradually consolidating and the consumer can now find complex wines made with an oak regime combining all of these options.

## We have a choice of videos to watch including:

1. https://youtu.be/pX44Kqm49Ps?si=5KgXEQ_r9UBds0dm - A Master Somm's Guide to Tempranillo - SOMM TV (6:51)
   https://youtu.be/JJuSu3ZLWGc?si=Gi1SCL70clWeaA4F - TEMPRANILLO: the King of Spanish Grapes - No Sediment (5:15)
2. https://youtu.be/yPoRJzxrI5Y?si=TgwX8ZaNBTsoNWEd - Discovering Tempranillo: The Heart of Spanish Wine - Wine with Jimmy (8:31)

So, pick up a bottle and watch a couple of videos. Let us know what you’re drinking and eating, and, if possible, the region from which your wine comes. Do you have any comments (positive or negative) about the videos? And, as always, tell us what’s going on in your life - what's happening with you, how you're feeling about things, updates, successes, challenges - as much or as little as you’re willing to disclose. We are in this together. And - thank goodness - we have wine!

Cheers!!