La Granja Cava Brut

We bought a bottle of this La Granja Cava Brut at the Winter Park, Florida Trader Joe’s to drink for New Year’s Eve 2016 – HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! 

David, already excited and we have not even popped the cork!

I picked it out because we really like another La Granja wine so this one caught my eye (oh my goodness, I don’t think I have reviewed the other one we like!!  Shame on me – add that to my increasingly long “to do” list…).  Anyway, I figured if La Granja makes one really good wine, maybe this one would be equally tasty.

We do not usually buy sparkling wines, but since it was NEW YEAR’S, I figured we should follow tradition.  Don’t wanna screw up the whole year just by drinking the wrong thing at the stroke of midnight, ya know???  Instead of champagne, we went with this.

Pop this in the fridge and wait until New Year's Eve....

First off – the label is ADORABLE.  David says, “It looks like a duck (with blue feathers) that has just exploded!” (In all honesty, he made that observation after he had already drunk a bit of the wine…).  We served it chilled with an omelet, hashbrowns, eggplant, and broccoli. 

Adorable exploding blue duck.  Or goose...  

Here is my take:  sparkling wines and champagnes are usually not my favorite, but this is very good!  It is not too dry and not too sweet.  It is not so bubbly that it “hurts your mouth”.  It is just a nice taste with a bit of fizz.  I like it!  it is good for a special occasion.  I give this a 4.5.

David’s opinion:  This actually has a fair bit of fizz – it is in the champagne zone.  Most “good champagne”, which I tend not to like, has lots of bubbles and very little taste.  It tries to be “ethereal” that way.  But this one has a lot of TASTE, and I like that in a wine.  So sue me – I like a little taste in my wine!  J  Susan is right on all accounts: the bubble-age is correct for us, the flavor quotient is fine (nicely balanced between brut and sweet), and so if you hate champagne, you will love this!  Champagne is so over-rated!  But if you would like a sparkling wine, have a sparkling wine!  I give this a 4. 

CHEERS! (And yes, I know the glass is the wrong shape for a sparkling wine.  Hey, we are rule-breakers!)

We both agreed that this is a good choice to drink for a special occasion and that it would be nice to drink while sitting outside on a hot summer night.  We drank it in FLORIDA, so while it was warm, it was not HOT and we were not sitting outside, we were sitting INSIDE on a sofa (watching Anderson Cooper giggle at Kathy Griffin on CNN).

Significantly cheaper than other "fancy" wines, but just as tasty (in our opinions)

I also want to tell let you in on a little New Year’s Eve tradition that we have: at the stroke of midnight (when the ball drops in Times Square), we each eat 12 grapes.  It is a tradition from Spain, and they say if you eat 12 green grapes at midnight and finish them within one minute, you will get 12 wishes in the New Year.  MY take on it is if you eat 12 grapes (either green or red, I don’t police the color) and finish them within one minute, you will have a good new year!!  (Cuz why limit the goodness to 12 wishes, right??)  It is a very fun tradition and I recommend you try it!  It makes me giggle every year (which makes gulping the grapes harder, but I haven’t choked on any yet (knock on wood).

Here you see my patented TWO HANDED GRAPE EATING technique.
I do not want to take any chances of not finishing all 12 grapes in one minute, folks!

And let me tell you about ONE MORE THING while we are here – look at my new shopping bag!  Isn’t it fabulous??  I ordered it online at http://emilymcdowell.com/ . I had seen some cool pins that she was selling and when I went to get one for my big sister Sherry (I got her the one that says “Kicked Cancer’s Ass”, it was a hit) I saw this shopping bag and, well, I had to have it.  I carried to Trader Joe’s last night (and secretly was disappointed that people didn’t notice it and chuckle). 

My new Emily McDowell tote bag!  You need one!  Website listed above

But back to La Granja Cava Brut:  if you are not normally a champagne drinker, but you want to pretend like something is “fancy” and therefore calls for bubbles, grab a bottle of this.  It will do the trick.

Price:  $6.99

Rating: 4.25