Hello and welcome to my weekly dig through the pile of wine samples that show up on my doorstep asking to be tasted. I’m pleased to bring you the latest installment of Vinography Unboxed, where I highlight some of the better bottles that have arrived recently.

This past week included a couple of new wines from Aperture Cellars in Sonoma. The first is their consistently excellent barrel-fermented Sauvignon Blanc, which shows its wood contact through texture more than flavors. The second is a new wine made in conjunction with Montage Resort in the Alexander Valley. I don’t have a lot of information about this crisp rosé, including where one would find it to purchase if you weren’t at the resort itself, but the wine is a tasty glass of pink.

Portuguese table wine continues to offer some of the best value in the world, in my opinion. I’ve got a few very good Portuguese whites to recommend this week, chief among which is the utterly dependable, always excellent Vinho Verde from Soalheiro, which does everything you want an Alvarinho to do. Less easy to track down, but worth keeping an eye out for, might be the Antão Vaz from Adega das Flores. It’s got that nice balance between ripe richness and nervy crispness that makes it a pleasure to drink.

I’ve got another amphora-aged wine from Beckham Estate to recommend this week, one of my favorites in their portfolio. It’s a blend of Pinot Noir, Trousseau, and Gamay. It’s light colored—nearly rosé-light in its transparency—with lovely texture and lift. It’s a pleasure to drink, and recommended for anyone looking to expand their understanding of what the Willamette Valley can do.

I recently received some wines from Cimento in the little region with a big name: The Rocks District of Milton Freewater. Just south of the border between Oregon and Washington, this region has become known for its Rhône-style wines in the last decade since the AVA’s establishment in 2015. Cimento is the outgrowth of a major investment in vineyard land in the region by founders David Wanek, Andy Reiner, and Jeff Bond, who now own more than 440 acres of vineyards. For their “estate” project, they’ve hired winemaker Todd Alexander to make what are clearly intended to be luxury-grade, mailing-list-only wines from their vineyard holdings (witness the prices and egregiously heavy, uniquely shaped bottles they’ve chosen despite their negative environmental impact). This week, I can recommend their rich white blend and their Grenache. Both are, in typical Alexander style, ripe, rich, and powerful. If that’s your thing and you don’t mind pricey wines, these might be for you. To me, however, they’re a bit much.

Let’s return to Portugal for some worthy red wines. The Portuguese like to say that Alicante Bouschet may have been born in Spain, but it found its best home in Portugal’s Alentejo region, where it is made into inky, powerful red wines that, at their best, maintain a remarkable amount of freshness. One of the best examples, cut with a good portion of Trincadeira, might be a wine that has achieved mononymity: Mouchão. Consistently tasty, this red blend can teach you a lot about the potential of Alentejo as a region. If you want the full-blooded version of Alicante Bouschet on its own, check out the version made by Dona Maria under the name of Julio B. Bastos in all its rich and dark glory.

Unrelated to the previous Dona Maria, let’s also give a little love to the guardians of the old vines at the venerable Quinta Vale Dona Maria, which bottles its oldest plots as their Vinhas Velhas bottling. This wine is a field blend of more than 40 different grape varieties, mostly red, and perfectly represents what makes the red table wines of the Douro so compelling. Unfortunately, this wine is made in small quantities and may be difficult to track down.

Lastly, switching hemispheres, let’s hit yet one more Doña and take a look at an older reserve Malbec from Doña Paula in Mendoza. Their Selección de Bodega comes from their Alluvia Vineyard at 4430 feet of elevation in the Andes Foothills. It’s big and blowsy, and will appeal to those who want a lot of fruit and power but with good acidity to match. I wish they would use lighter bottles. This one’s empty bottle alone weighs just shy of a kilogram.

That’s all for this week. Notes on all these below.

Tasting Notes

2024 Aperture Cellars Sauvignon Blanc, Sonoma County, California
Palest gold in color, this wine smells of passionfruit and kiwifruit. In the mouth, passionfruit and green apple flavors are bright and crisp as a silky texture moves across the palate. Notes of lime zest and green apple linger in the finish with a hint of florality. Mouthwatering acidity. 13.5% alcohol. Score: between 9 and 9.5. Cost: $50. click to buy.

2025 Quinta de Soalheiro Alvarinho, Vinhos Verdes, Portugal
Pale straw in the glass, this wine smells of green apple, guava, lime, and flowers. In the mouth, candied lime zest, green apple, and lime juice mix with stony wet pavement. Excellent acidity. Bright, zingy, and faintly saline. Delicious. 12.5% alcohol. Score: around 9. Cost: $22. click to buy.

2024 Adega Cooperativa de Vidigueira “Alto IV a Inspiração” Antão Vaz, Alentejo, Portugal
Pale gold in the glass, this wine smells of unripe mango, a hint of banana, and nougat. In the mouth, bright citric acidity, nougat, and a touch of sweet oak linger with vanilla notes in the finish. Excellent acidity. 12.5% alcohol. Score: around 8.5. Cost: $??

2024 Adega das Flores “42.5 Almudes” Antão Vaz, Alentejo, Portugal
Light to medium gold in the glass with a hint of bronze, this wine smells of wet leaves, citrus peel, yellow plums, and spices. In the mouth, grippy tannins coat the mouth and flavors of yellow plum, pear skin, citrus peel, and 12% alcohol. Score: between 8.5 and 9. Cost: $??

2025 Aperture Cellars “Montage Estate Vineyard” Rosé Blend, Alexander Valley, Sonoma, California
Pale peachy pink in color, this wine smells of citrus peel, hibiscus, and a touch of pomegranate. In the mouth, crisp and bright flavors of crabapple, strawberries, citrus peel, and lemon juice have a nice zingy brightness thanks to excellent acidity and a faint salinity, which is very compelling. Quite tasty. 12.5% alcohol. Score: around 9. Cost: $??

2023 Cimento “Tenuta Blanca” White Blend, The Rocks District of Milton-Freewater, Columbia Valley, Oregon
Light gold in the glass, this wine smells of nougat, baked apples, lemongrass, and sarsaparilla. In the mouth, rich flavors of butter pastry, chamomile, bee pollen, cooked apples, and oatmeal have a nice brightness thanks to very good acidity. There’s a light yellow-herbal bitterness in the finish. A blend of 42% Piquepoul, 35% Clairette Blanche, 16% Rousssanne, 5% Viognier, and 3% Bourbelenc pressed directly to neutral French oak barrels to ferment and age for 16 months. Bottled unfined and unfiltered. 14.2% alcohol. 112 cases made. Nasty, heavy bottle weighing 1.69 kg when full. Score: between 8.5 and 9. Cost: $95.

2024 Beckham Estate “Amphora Noir” Red Blend, Willamette Valley, Oregon
Light, hazy ruby in the glass with garnet highlights, this wine smells of cherries, bubble gum, dried herbs, and flowers. In the mouth, faint, gazy tannins wrap around a core of plum and raspberry fruit as bright citrus-peel acidity keeps the wine fresh. Light and lithe, with a nice herbal note in the finish. A blend of 43% Pinot Noir, 34% Trousseau, and 23% Gamay fermented and aged in terra cotta amphorae. 12% alcohol. Score: between 8.5 and 9. Cost: $44. click to buy.

2023 Cimento “Orselli Estate Vineyard” Grenache, The Rocks District of Milton-Freewater, Columbia Valley, Oregon
Medium garnet in the glass, this wine smells of mocha and strawberry jam. In the mouth, strawberries and mocha notes mix with a hint of dried herbs and cola. Decent acidity and faint gauzy tannins round out the picture. The mocha-oaky notes linger in the finish with some bitterness. Destemmed and fermented with ambient yeasts in stainless steel. Aged for 16 months in 50% new French oak. Bottled unfined and unfiltered. 14.2% alcohol. 66 cases made. Nasty, heavy bottle weighing 1.69 kg when full. Score: around 8.5. Cost: $225. click to buy.

2020 Julio B. Bastos Alicante Bouschet, Alentejo, Portugal
Dark garnet in the glass, this wine smells of black cherry and blackberry. In the mouth, warm blackberry and cherry flavors carry heat into the finish with fine, fluffy tannins. Sweet oak lingers on the palate. Dark and powerful. 14.5% alcohol. Score: between 8.5 and 9. Cost: $150. click to buy.

2018 Heredade de Mouchão Red Blend, Alentejo, Portugal
Very dark garnet in color, this wine smells of plum and blackberry and a hint of struck match. In the mouth, bright plum and blackberry flavors have a juicy, bright acidity and lightly fleecy tannic texture. Great acidity and freshness, with excellent balance. A blend of 55% Alicante Bouschet and 45% Trincadeira. 14.5% alcohol. Score: around 9. Cost: $67. click to buy.

2023 Aveleda – Quinta Vale D. Maria “Vinhas Velhas” Red Blend, Porto e Douro, Portugal
Dark garnet in color, this wine smells of bergamot, black tea, wildflowers, and black cherries. In the mouth, fleecy tannins coat the mouth, as flavors of black cherry, black pepper, black tea, and dried herbs linger for a long time with floral notes. The tannins stiffen with time, and a stony quality emerges in the very long finish. A field blend of 41 different grape varieties aged 20 months in French oak. 14% alcohol. Score: between 9 and 9.5. Cost: $??

2020 Doña Paula “Selección de Bodega – Alluvia Vineyard” Malbec, Gualtallary, Mendoza, Argentina
Very dark garnet in the glass, this wine smells of blueberries, black cherries, and espresso. In the mouth, black cherries, blueberries, blackberries, and chocolate-covered espresso bean flavors are wrapped in fleecy tannins and shot through with very good acidity. Slightly high-octane in character, which gives the wine a slight hollowness as the flavors float up off the palate. 15% alcohol. Nasty, heavy bottle weighs 1.70 kg when full. Score: around 8.5. Cost: $80. click to buy.