So this was one of the fascinating things about FirstLeaf to me, they had some wines that they produced and bottled themselves (similar to Winc) but they also had a couple of bottles that came from regular wineries, that you could go and visit yourself. This puts them kinda in between the new age wine clubs and those that existed long before anyone came up with the concept of bottling everything yourself, like a winery.
Ok, so first, a quick reminder I paid just over $3 per bottle for my first, Firstleaf wine club box (read my FirstLeaf review here). I bring that up, because when taking a minute to research this wine, I’ve found it for sale at a wine shop in Connecticut for $35 and on wine.com for $30. That $35 price point looks like it is actually retail price from the winery, which is probably about $10 under the average for a similarly priced wine from a Sonoma winery.
So yes, that’s an incredible deal.
But was it good? Heck yes. This was an excellent example of Sonoma Zinfandel to me. It was layered, meaning that it wasn’t so bold that you missed other flavors, acidity and the basics, of it being, wine.
Don’t believe me? Here’s that Wine Enthusiast review of the Mariettta Cellars Angeli:
Ok, so what would I do with this? With burgers? Heck yes. Pizza? Yes, please. Really, I think as Americans we try to match Zinfandel only with BBQ and that’s unfortunate, but it is a consequence of the type of Zinfandel that we often have in the country. The Zin that we are familiar with is often bold, extracted and intense. This had some of those traits, but was much more constrained. Was it Pinot? No, but did it pair well with food? Was it enjoyable? Yes to both of those.
So in my wine rating lexicon with this FirstLeaf wine? 2 stars. I’m thrilled it was in my shipment AND, I’d buy it again.
