This Tasty Rioja is Our First Rosé of the Season!

With the temperature forecast to hit nearly 80° tomorrow, Rosé season is officially here!

From the Eguren family and their flagship estate in Rioja, today's 2024 Sierra Cantabria Rioja Rosado is our first Rosé of the season. As pale in color as Rosé gets, this refreshing wine offers all the crispness and character that makes dry pink wines so much fun. At $11.79, it also happens to be a serious steal.

Read on for the tasting notes, and for a crack at the impressive 2016 vintage of Sierra Cantabria's Rioja Reserva, then hit quick on that Big Yellow Button before the temperature spikes!

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2024 Sierra Cantabria Rosado
Rioja, Spain
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The Eguren family has been making wine in Rioja for five generations. Most famous for their lush, dark reds (such as the 2016 Reserva featured below), they have really done a great job on this light, silvery-pink Rosé.

Made entirely from estate grown fruit, it offers juicy red berry flavors, peppery minerality, and a lifted, joyous finish. It literally is spring in a bottle.

We had this charming new release open at last week's “Spain Night” event. Importer siblings Monica and Victor Ordóñez took turns pouring it, and it was delicious. The Wine Advocate review is spot on...

“The very pale 2024 Rosado looks almost like a white, and rightly so, because it was produced with a majority of white grapes: 60% Viura, along with 35% Garnacha and 5% Tempranillo. It has a subtle floral nose and a textured palate from the maceration with the white skins. It's very tasty, finishing almost salty. It has good freshness and balance and is very apt for the table. 70,000 bottles produced. It was bottled in January 2025. Drink Date: 2025 - 2028”
          - 90 Points, Wine Advocate (2/27/2025)

Looking online we found 25 listings. Our price beats them all. Grab a few bottles to drink now and all summer long!

Vin Chicago Price: 11.79

Plus Sierra Cantabria's Gorgeous 2016 Rioja Reserva!

2016 Sierra Cantabria "Reserva" Rioja
Rioja, Spain
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From the highly acclaimed 2016 vintage, the Sierra Cantabria Rioja Reserva is deeply concentrated, bold and complex. Earning 94 points from Vinous, it is the most highly rated bottling since that publication first reviewed it nearly 30 years ago!

“These are wines that combine the best of the modern and traditional schools of Rioja, especially when they have some age.”
- Vinous, January 2021

This nine-year-old wine was raised for 26 months in a combination of French and American oak barrels, of which only 20% were new.

Pouring a deep ruby garnet color with more opacity than you’d expect for an aged Rioja, this youthful wine jumps from the glass with tempting aromas of fruit, earth, spice and wood. Bold flavors of dried black cherry, black raspberry preserves, cigar box, cinnamon, sweet roasted fennel, and smoldering fire pit are layered and complex, supported by an impressive structure of medium-plus tannins and acidity.

“The 2016 Reserva is 100% Tempranillo sourced from San Vicente de la Sonsierra and Labastida, Rioja. Aged for 18 months in equal parts American and French oak barrels, this garnet wine unfolds balsamic, mint and bold garrigue-like aromas, accompanied by licorice and briar notes and a sour cherry core. Dry, chalky and juicy on the palate, the delicate and flavorful flow lingers long with a savory finish. Complex and nuanced, the 2016 captures the essence of Sonsierra Tempranillo. Drinking Window: 2024 - 2035.”
          - 94 Points, Vinous - Joaquin Hidalgo (12/2023) 

“The 2016 Reserva shows ripeness and jammy fruit with plenty of spice and a powerful, full-bodied palate. It has 14.4% alcohol and a pH of 3.66. They used a little new oak here, 20%, with used 50/50 French and American oak barrels for the aging of 18 months. This was a superb vintage, with quality and quantity, a cooler year with more freshness, and the wines seem to be evolving at a slower pace. It's harmonious and clean, classical and expressive, spicy, with a polished palate and resolved tannins. It is fine-boned, more elegant and has a very good balance—a textbook traditional Reserva from a very good year. Drink Date: 2023 - 2029.”
          - 93 Points, Wine Advocate (2/29/2024) 

Beyond Rioja fans, this deeply colored red will appeal to drinkers of Bordeaux, Brunello and even old-school Sonoma Cabernet. (Fans of Silver Oak Alexander Valley?!) Absolutely delicious, priced right, and available in limited supply.

Vin Chicago Price: 29.99