Equipo Navazos

La Bota de Florpower 57 MMXII Palomino Fino

9.1

Delicious and complex - oxidized but unfortified palomino fino. There is lush white fruit but then of course the salt, the lees, the brine. Outrageous value at $18 and might I say a perfecto sushi wine. BYO to Okina. — 7 hours ago

Severn liked this

Equipo Navazos

I Think Manzanilla Jerez-Xérès-Sherry Palomino Fino

Connor Smith

9.2

Sanlúcar de Barrameda was the port that Christopher Columbus set off from in 1492. Just 1 year earlier, duties on wine exports from Sanlúcar had been abolished to take advantage of English merchants desperate for new supply after the loss of Bordeaux.

It began a centuries-long romance between Sherry and English wine lovers, as immortalized in Shakespeare's Henry IV Part 2, when Falstaff glorifies sturdy Spanish 'sack' over thin Bordeaux 'claret' and Rhine 'hock'.

But the honeymoon, quite literally, was not to last. Henry VIII's divorce from Catherine of Aragon drove a wedge between England and Catholic Europe, and left English wine lovers in need of a new source once again. But Sherry fanatics wouldn't have to go entirely without. When Sir Francis Drake sailed into Cádiz and burned the Spanish fleet in 1587, he carried away 2,900 butts of Sherry - enough to supply London for years - as his most famous prize.

(This is adapted from notes for Le Dû’s Wines ‘History of Wine 1453AD-Present’ seminar, where this wine was poured) — 3 months ago