I discovered a wonderful wine last night. It’s been sitting in my wine cabinet for a year or so. There was something about the label – an unfamiliar name that looked like Latin, with a V substituting for a U – that caused me to pass over it each time I was pulling out a bottle.
Last night I was in the mood for something completely different….and I got it.
Fluminis is a delicious wine from the Montsant region of Spain. I was blown away by its smoothness, its dark ripe fruits – plums, currants and berries – and its gentle tannins that seemed in perfect balance with the fruits. I tend to scoff when people say they detect “chocolate” in a wine…but dammit, there it was, subtle yet haunting cocoa.
A blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Grenache and Carignan, Fluminis is not a gulping wine. There’s a complexity here that demands you pay a bit of attention to it. Yet, it’s not an aggressive wine demanding a red-meat partner. I think it’s the presence of the fruity Grenache that made it so delicious with my dinner: penne pasta tossed with ratatouille, fresh mozzarella and slivers of fresh basil.
Since I know very little about Spanish wines, I thoroughly enjoyed reading about Fluminis and its owner-winemaker Jesus del Rio. Fluminis is, indeed, a Latin word, for river. Same as the Spanish rio.
According to several Web sites, del Rio’s Mas de l'Abundància winery is entrenched in Spanish history. The name translates as “land of the abundant harvest”, and takes its name from a 15th century vineyard in the heart of Montsant which was farmed by monks from a nearby Carthusian monastery.
Jesús del Rio, who says his family has grown grapes in the region since the 1300s, purchased the property with his wife in the early 1990s and started exporting the wines to the U.S. just a couple years ago.
I haven’t looked around in retail markets for Fluminis yet. However, it is available, for about $20 a bottle, on-line at Noble Merchants.
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