Just west of Yakima, in the little town of Zillah, is a small offbeat winery called Paradisos del Sol. Last September, we drove past it on our way to Portteus (a very big disappointment), and on the way back we decided at the very last moment to pull into the Paradisos driveway. Don't look for anything too fancy at this place, but you might just have some fun there chatting with the staff.
We ended up buying some of their NV Paradisos Red Lot 2, which we got on a great sale. Right off the bat, my wife (not a big red wine drinker) tells me she likes this wine, an easy drinking quaffer with a decent backbone. This is a blend of 70% Lemberger (aka Blaufrankisch) from the 2001 vintage and 30% Cabernet Sauvignon from the 2000 vintage. The result is a smooth, dark wine with medium body, easy tannin, nice acid and an interesting fruit blend (which came across like blueberry and cherry) with some earth on the finish.
I have had this wine with pizza, and really enjoyed it. I recently had it with grilled Italian-style sausage, stuffed into long sandwich rolls with sauteed onion and (yellow & red) bell peppers. Another wonderful match.
The back label states they want to make the World's Best Pizza Wine, which shows they have a good sense of humor. There's one drawback with this wine ... the price. They list it for $18, which I thought was a stretch. We happened to get it that weekend at a very attractive sale price.
-- Clark
