Here I sit in the Toronto Pearson International airport because I missed a flight to São Paolo.  It’s St. Patrick’s day, but I’m not drinking green beer with the rest of the traveling masses.  Instead, I’m thinking about friendship, how lucky I am, and the wine I drank last weekend thanks to a fine friend.

Friends who enable you to enjoy your vices are the best kind.  So, corks off to you, Allen Yee.  Thanks for buying me this precious bottle to enjoy. You knew this is one of my favourite bodegas – as evidenced here, here and here.

Made of Tempranillo 75%, Garnacha 15%, Mazuelo and Graciano 10%, and aged 6 years in 225 litre US oak barrels, this wine is medium garnet and shows its 14 years of age with developed aromas of dried red fruit, sour cherry, cigar box.

The palate is dry with the refreshing acidity you expect from a López de Heredia, medium body and velvety tannins that divide and conquer evenly.  Flavours of dried strawberry, cherry and Japanese plum, tobacco leaf and leather glove are persistent.

Elegant, evolving, nuanced, right on the window of its prime and well within within its drinking window (until about 2018), it’s WSET Very Good plus.  On the third day, it was at its peak with deeply layered dried red fruit, tobacco and leather and an extended finish.  A beautifully balanced creation – kind of like true friendship.