Costco comes through with decent wines for less than $10

May. 28, 2008 12:00 AM
Every time I visit a Costco, the urge to grab overwhelms me. Although I went into the store in my continuing search for recession-busting wine values, I was shocked that I didn't leave with a heaping pile of batteries, vacuum cleaners, soap and ribs.

Costco has always impressed me with the selection and prices, so today I was surprised that there were not more wines for less than $10. Still, there are agreeable choices among Costco's lowest-priced wines.

2006 Columbia Crest "Grand Estate" Chardonnay, Columbia Valley, Wash. ($7.89) - The color is nothing unusual, just your standard yellow that we all call white. The aroma is a throwback to old-school West Coast Chards with ripe banana and tropical tones. The taste has some of the fruit from the nose mixed with some apricot tartness and a spicy warm finish. It's solidly average and a good value if you like the Chard flavors of the '80s. 84 points
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2006 Cameron-Hughes "Lot 50" Riesling, Mosel-Saar-Ruwer, Germany ($9.99) - With 10 percent alcohol content, this makes for a yummy summer sipper. The color is a pale straw yellow, a lot fuller than your average $10 Riesling. The aroma is muted with a taint of green citrus. The taste is fabulously bright and refreshing with apple and mineral in the finish. It's light but tasty. 87 points

2006 Montes Cherub Rosé of Syrah, Colchagua Valley, Chile ($11.99) - This wine is the color of "passion" pink. It's light with good graduation of color to the finish. The aroma is on the herbal-white pepper end of the spectrum. The taste is dry with tart cherry fruit and some light spicy tones to the finish. 85 points

2005 Kirkland Signature "Meritage," Napa Valley, Calif. ($10.99) - A Meritage is a blend. This one has 69 percent Merlot, 29 percent Cabernet Sauvignon and 2 percent Cabernet Franc. The color is dark, dark, dark . . . very concentrated and slightly muddy. The aroma is very ripe and pleasing with dark, juicy berry fruit and some wood and earth. The taste is yammy/jammy . . . a real crowd pleaser. It's too ripe to be a food wine but makes a good all-around sipper. 86 points.

2006 Fontanafredda "Briccotondo" Barbera, Piedmont, Italy ($9.99) - To find a $10 wine from a good Italian producer is not easy these days. The color is a nice dark ruby with black currant tones. The aroma is like a basket of pressed berries on a hot summer day. The taste is very balanced with tartness, richness and a fine structured dryness. This wine is great both with grilled steaks and as an everyday "house" red. 89 points

2006 Escudo Rojo by Baron Philippe de Rothschild, Maipo, Chile ($10.99) - This wine comes from a noble family of winemakers. The late Baron Philippe de Rothschild transformed and modernized Bordeaux, France, in the last century with his Chateau Mouton Rothschild. Then the family took an early and visionary interest in Chile. The color is fine and smooth, like royal velvet (still reading?). The aroma is of baked and dried berries. The taste is both juicy and wooded in a starkly contrasting way. The feel of this wine is more earthlike, with Bordeaux qualities, than gushy, like most New World wines of the day. For this I commend the winemakers. 86 points

Reach Tarbell, owner of Mark Tarbell's in Phoenix at wine@tarbell.com.

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