Is there anything better than stopping off at my local wine shop, The Fine Wine Source in Livonia, Michigan?  There may be, but for mere mortals, the options aren’t as easy to achieve.  Some days, I can run in and run out, and other days, it may be an hour interlude of pure bliss.  I also know that I will not encounter any of the wines that I can find at gas stations, drug stores, grocery stores, convenience stores, or beer and wine stores.  Each and every bottle of wine has been curated by the owner, and often by his staff as well.  The selection always offers a wine from the Old World and one from the New World.

Representing the Old World is Bodegas Breca Rosé Calatayud DO, Spain 2021.  Bodegas Breca was founded in 2010 by Jorge Ordonez with the aspiration of creating the finest Garnacha (Grenache) wines from Spain. The use clones of the original vines from the Kingdom of Aragon (Garnacha de Aragon). This varietal is perfect for the mountain vineyards, as it is a very late ripening grape and ideal for the meso-climate of mountain vineyards.  Calatayud DO is located in the southwest corner of Aragon, in Northern Spain.  It was the Romans that introduced viticulture to the region.  The area has what is called a Continental Climate and known for hot and dry summers, but is also known for winters of extreme low temperatures and frost that can last for six months. The vineyards are loose, rock soils with limestone, slate and quartz tossed in the mix and some of the vines have now reached the fifty-year mark.  The fruit for this wine is hand-harvested from multiple mountain vineyards and they use the saignée concept; which is the concept of bleeding off, some of the initial juice from the initial crush, leaving the rest of the (red) wine to get concentrated from additional time with the skins.  They use traditional dry farming techniques with a minimum to no human intervention.  The wine has Initial Fermentation with indigenous wild yeast in Stainless-Steel and concrete tanks.  The wine is described as having a pale orange color with notes of yeast, cantaloupe, and florals.  On the palate the wine offers tones of stone fruit, melon, citric acidity, and a short finish with a dash of salt.

For the New World the wine is Criss Cross Petite Sirah Clarksburg 2020 under the umbrella of Vino del Sol.  Vino del Sol’s mission is to be your trusted source for great wine and they were founded in 2004 and they now market wines from Argentina, California, Chile, Japan, and New Zealand.  Vino del Sol’s wineries are all estate-grown, sustainably-farmed and family owned.  Criss Cross is a joint venture between Lange Twine Winery and Vino del Sol.  The winemakers are Karen Birmingham and David Akiyoshi and they like to say “boot prints, not tire tracks.”  The wine has also achieved the Lodi Rules Sustainable Winegrowing Certified Green designation.  Clarksburg AVA extends into three counties (Yolo, Sacramento, and Solano Counties) just east of the San Francisco Bay Area, in the Sacramento Delta waterways.  The terrain is mostly flat with mineral-rich clay and silt soils; and for years it was considered over-fertile and more suited to high yields rather than high-quality, but this old concept is being challenged more and more.  The wine is ninety-nine percent Petite Sirah or Durif and one percent “other varietals.” There was just over one-thousand-eight-hundred cases produced.  The grapes are picked at optimal ripeness, pressed at dryness, and aged in a mix of French and American Oak.  The wine is a deep purple offering notes of black fruit and spices.  On the palate a fruit-forward wine offering tones of blueberry, blackberry, and plum, along with cinnamon, nutmeg, licorice, and olive juice; jammy with full tannins.