2005 Descendientes De J. Palacios Petalos

As part of the Catavino virtual wine tasting, I had a bottle this evening of the 2005 Descendientes De J. Palacios Petalos ($25). This wine is from the D.O. Bierzo of Spain. Alvaro Palacios is a top wine maker in Spain, the maker of the famed L'Ermita wine. Alvaro wanted to make wines in Bierzo from the Mencia grape. One of the wines he created was the Descendientes De J. Palacios Petalos.

On the aroma, you can detect dark fruits and a bit of spice. It is also a dark wine in color. On the front palate, you get a lot of fruit, dark berries. But it then transforms more into vanilla and spice, with even a bit of clove and licorice. It is a full bodied and smooth drinking wine. It has some tannins on the finish which are easily mellowed with some food. There are also some additional flavors that I could not fully identify but which tasted great and worked well together. It is an intriguing wine, that shows much complexity for its price. This may be one of the most complex wines I have had from the Bierzo region.

I actually had this wine with some bacon cheeseburgers and it went quite well with them. So, you probably could pair this wine with BBQ very easily. A definite Drink and Buy.