San Sebastian Winery

I love going to the San Sebastian Winery once a year, as if on a sacred a pilgrimage. Granted they are a purveyor of Florida muscadene grapes, which are tangy & sweet, but they have been introducing a hybrid to make a nice dry red. The Castillo Red. Did I happen to mention that I like red wines? California reds, preferably Sonoma or Napa Valley Cabernets are my favorite, but I do like Merlots as well for variety. I don't mind whites as long as they are dry. I can't tolerate a sweet wine. When attending a wine tasting, always drink your wines from dry to sweet. Sweet wines & ports are desert apertifs my friends, remember this. Never Never Never serve me a sweet wine prior to desert Better yet, never serve me a sweet wine & we'll get along just fine. As for Reisling. Bleck. Don't even get me started. But I digress. The gentleman to the right in the above picture is Ray Brilli. An Astoria, New York native, he moved to Florida about 7 years ago & took up residence here in St. Augustine. He has won the honour of having a piece of his work commemorated on a bottle of wine from this winery twice. I lucked out this past weekend and he was at the winery signing bottles. Fortunately for me, the vino of choice this year was the castillo red, which I happen to like.Did I mention that I like red wines? He did two labels for the above painting, one with a blue mat & one with a red. We chose a blue for him to sign. It nestles nicely in one of our wine racks at home. Granted it is a young wine, a 2003, so I will let it sit for a while before opening it. I will cherish the bottle once the wine is gone because it is a Reserva wine and has won awards. I always enjoy the tours at the winery. They are for the most part self guided & you get to try a little bit of everything they have to offer. One of these weekends I'll be able to go to their jazz nights, as I love azz blues as much as I like red wine. I'm always grooving to some medley of jazz or blues, I enjoy. And we all know that I like red wine by now. http://www.sansebastianwinery.com/index.html