2006 Bramblewood Zinfandel

Once again I've been a bad blogger... but I couldn't help it.  The past couple of months have been a bit hectic -- we relocated from Cincinnati to Sarasota in late April, so what with the work getting ready to move plus the move plus the getting settled... well, hopefully you get the idea and will cut me some slack ;-)

Anyway, we are (mostly) settled in now and are very excited to be finding lots of new wines for us to try and review here.  With that being said I'll get right to the fun stuff.

First up is 2006 Bramblewood Old Vine Zinfandel from Amador County.  Our new friend Steve, who is the wine consultant for the ABC store down the street from us, recommended it to me as we were discussing the pretty slim pickings in Zinfandel.  I told him that we prefer the racy, spicy zinfandels as opposed to the big fruit bomb style that seems to be more and more common lately.  He promised me that this definitely was not the fruit bomb but that it might not be spicy enough...

Well, he was mostly right.  The nose hinted that this could be more of a fruit forward style than we care for, showing notes of bright red fruit and a hint of eucalyptus which was unexpected.  The palate definitely gave up some fruit - black cherry predominantly - but certainly not a fruit bomb.  Allison said she got some pretty heavy black pepper but to me it was pretty faint.  The interesting thing to both of us was the amount of earthy mushroom and cocoa that we got -- very atypical for a zinfandel.  Interesting, but not unpleasant.  The finish ended with some mild tannins and a hint of acidity.

We both liked this one a lot and would definitely buy it again.  According to our friend Steve it is bottled exclusively for ABC in Florida, but I couldn't find anything to confirm or refute this so I'll just leave it be.  $15.99/bottle here.