Winey Tasting Notes: A Special Occasion with Banfi Rosa Regale and Spencer Tracy

I was sent this wine for review purposes. The opinions are all my own.

We all fall into the winey trap at some point in our lives. You get sent a beautiful bottle of sparkling wine to review and you think, “Ooooh, I’m going to save this for a special occasion.” And then life gets in the way and three months later, it’s sitting in the back of the fridge and you are still running around to school meetings and basketball games and doing laundry and cooking and, OK, you get my drift here right?

And then it’s a rainy spring Saturday night and lo and behold, the entire family is sitting in one room. At the same time. Even the doggies. Plus, you have a copy of the Academy Award nominated 1937 movie “Captains Courageous” starring Spencer Tracy and BAM! You’ve got a special occasion. (I would even go so far as to say a priceless occasion, since they Winey son is already off at college and the Winey daughter has only one year left before she leaves us as well. Family times like this are getting rarer and rarer around here!)

So out came the bottle of Banfi’s Rosa Regale (2011, 7%, Italy), which as I said, had been sent to me to review about three months previously. This is such a pretty wine, from color to taste. The pink color gives way to a nose of strawberries and roses. Not thick and overpowering, more like the scent of a summer garden. It pours out of the bottle full of teeny tiny bubbles and tastes of roses and sweet raspberries. The smallness of the bubbles give it a very elegant feel in your mouth, as opposed to the bolder bubbles of drier wine. This was such a wonderful wine to sip on while we watched the movie. I can’t imagine anyone not liking it. Even if sweet wines aren’t to your taste, this is such a subtle, flavorful sweeter wine that you really can’t go wrong with.



Spencer Tracy as Manuel Fidello  (with co-star Freddie Bartholomew)  in Captains Courageous

And about that movie. If you’ve never seen it, I highly recommend that you do. It’s based on a Rudyard Kipling novel of the same name. Spencer Tracy won an Best Actor Oscar for his portrayal of Manuel Fidello, a Portuguese-American fisherman on a schooner in the Grand Banks off Newfoundland. There is a scene where Manuel speaks of his dead father being welcomed into heaven by Jesus, the head fisherman. The Lord tells him that his work is done and it is time to lay his tired head down and rest and that He will take care of the rest of the work that. I don’t think I’ll ever forget the comforting images that Tracy brought to mind in this scene, or the joy on his face as he spoke the words. Amazing.

I guess I’m really trying to say here that there are a lot of “special” occasions in life…sometimes you just have to stop and realize that they are staring you in the face. So sit down with your loved ones, put the movie in and uncork that sparkly bottle of wine!

Cheers!

I was sent this wine for review purposes. The opinions are all my own.