Tonight it’s a controversial French pinot noir from 2009 that will cost you about $10.
This wine is famous, not for its taste, but because there was a huge controversy about it a couple years back. It seems that the French actually sold about a kagillion gallons of fake pinot noir to the maker of Red Bicyclette, which affected 2006 and previous vintages.
So I bought a bottle, thinking “maybe now, it will be awesome for the price, to help give this label a credibility come-back.” In my optimism, I ignored the absence of maker’s name (Gallo) on the bottle. I ignored the winemaker notes, which admit that this pinot is still cut with 14% merlot and syrah. And I ignored this, on the back label: “Bottled by: Reh Kendermann Gmbh Weinkellerei — Bingen, Germany.” (????)
Rather than awesome, I felt it was just bland, sweet, fake cherry water that failed to resemble pinot noir. I poured most of the bottle down the drain. My bitterness from wasting $10 on this wine is lessened only by the satisfaction of writing those last two sentences. If you don’t have a wine blog, but you, too feel burned by Red Bicyclette, please feel free to leave a comment on this review. Or if you work for Gallo, and want to vent at me for being an unqualified wine-swilling jerk, please feel free to leave a comment.
Unfortunately this pinot is:
Not recommended.
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