2013 LangeTwins Family Winery & Vineyards Teroldego
Teroldego Grape History
Teroldego is an ancient grape variety that has been grown in Italy for hundreds of years. Teroldego is a deep colored red grape that grows in the northern region of Italy, mostly in Trentino. The wines there are deep ruby in color, almost inky in color, with intense fruit characteristics. Right after bottling the wine is soft and needs very little aging but can be cellared for up to 10 years. Teroldego is known for its spicy red fruits, faint aromas of pine & almond and edgy acid. Aromas of dark cherry and blueberry are present through the finish. 97% of worldwide production comes from Italy and 2% from the United States. The remaining 1% is spread between Australia, Argentina and Brazil and Canada. Of the 629 bearing acres of Teroldego in California, 70% is from Sacramento and San Joaquin counties (per Wine Institute 2018 figures). 97% of the world production comes from Northern Italy from the Trentino-Alto Adige DOC. In California most of the Teroldego comes from Lodi, Sierra Foothills, San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbera.
The Wine
This is a wine from their highest quality barrels, comes a handcrafted single barrel wine. This is a limited release of some of their most prized wines. This was from barrel #2 and is bottle #266. This Italian varietal is fruit forward with texture and solid tannins to be a real winner. The grape is a dark skin, it comes out originally soft and with age develops character. Recently discovered to be a relative of the peppery Syrah thru DNA testing. On the eye it is intensely inky dark and almost black looking down into the glass. On the nose & palate, it can be a bit bitter, but paired with a solid piece of beef, it is remarkable. It is complex, spicy and chocolate flavors abound. This is not a stand-alone wine, but one to be consumed with hard cheeses, red meat, red sauces and cured meat.
LangeTwins Winery has undertaken a commitment to bring forth single vineyard production of varietals. One of those varietals being Teroldego. Their Teroldego has some of the traditional flavor profile, but also adds some cranberry and blackberry with some black pepper and cinnamon. Not an everyday wine for all foods, but that is excellent with anything that includes bacon, pork, BBQ’ed chicken or beef.
Today LangeTwins offers the 2017 Teroldego from Jahant Woods 02 Vineyard in the Jahant AVA. Retail is $32.
Food and Wine Pairing
One of our neighbors, Denise LaBrie, prepared this excellent spaghetti sauce and was kind enough to share. It was seriously one of the top five Italian sauces I have enjoyed. The sauce included chopped sausages, fresh tomatoes (skinned, seeds removed, chopped), tomato sauce, tomato paste, red wine (Tempranillo), sugar to balance acidity, yellow onion, celery, shallot, cloves of garlic, dried oregano, basil, bay leaf, rosemary and fresh ground salt and pepper to taste. Sausage could be beef, Italian or chicken.
Sláinte,
Michael
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