Well now THIS is a pretty little wine. Light and thin and barely ruby, packaged in flint to show off the gorgeous garnet-pink. Clean and vibrant in the nose, zingy with lip-smacking fruit piled on high, a dessert-ish curl of cinnamon, celery and applesauce as background.

No indication on label what’s in it… I’m gonna go with Grenache and Syrah for color & flavor reasons, but there’s a roundness possibly akin to Zin or Mission and a deftness and delicacy maybe from Cinsault or even white–but tasting it might change my mind. Sierra Foothills wines are so grown up now. Gone are the days of burnt, heavy Zins and oddly-nuanced Italian or Bordeaux varieties with major asterisks, and while I am sure those wines still exist up there, I’ve been getting some WORLD-CLASS bottles lately from the region.

More light, bright, beautiful fruit on the palate, far fuller on the tongue than the color would indicate and backed up by sweetened bitter briar and a dark woodsy base. Cherry and cranberry and strawberry POP all over, a not-offensive streak of acid balanced perfectly inside. This is dangerous wine. It’s just so frickin YUMMY. But it’s a geeky sort of yummy–not a Kool-Aid or even Jolly Rancher sort of yummy, although arguments could be made for both descriptors in various areas as it morphs across the mouth. Nice little tannic bite solidifies the finish, but NOTHING gets in the way of the stellar translucent fruitiness. I’m drinking it at 55-60° and although it fits nicely into a *summer-time chiller* red grouping, I see no reason for colder OR warmer. I’m guessin now a sort of a mop-the-floor cellar blend (Carignane, is that YOU?) and also assuming it NOT expensive: this is a spring-time CASE BUY. You literally can NOT have enough of this on hand during the week or in warm weather.

2019 SKINNER VINEYARDS ‘Native Red’ Red Blend El Dorado Sierra Foothills California 13.0

https://skinnervineyards.com/