Vina Croatia at the Astor Center in NYC

Vina Croatia 2013 took place in New York City at the Astor Center. We arrived a few minutes early and waited for several minutes with other media members enthusiastic about tasting the wines of Croatia.

The Astor Center is home to the Astor Wine Shop located on the lower (basement) level of this historic building. A few steps up in a narrow area, a table was set up for registration. People filed to the right into a large a room, picking up  a copy of the Vina Croatia Tasting Booklet 2013. The first few pages include information about the World Heritage wines found in Croatia. Grape discussions are described with a few photographs. The wineries were assigned table numbers 1 thru 20 and each wine was numbered from 1 to 99. The tasting book noted the grape varieties and the Croatian region. Receptacles (dump buckets) were available at each table. With so many wines to taste frequent use was made of the buckets.

Prior to the Vina Croatia event, we planned our strategy. Certain producers were of special interest to us so we made sure to find them, taste their wines and talk with them about their winery. As members of as the Wine Century Club were also interested in tasting grape varieties we had not tried before.

Grape Varieties

Some of the Croatian wines we tasted that are not familiar with many people included Plavic Mali, Pošip, Teran, Malvasia Istriana, Graševina, Babi?, Žlahtina, Kvarner, and Gegi?.

Tasting unusual wine varieties is a great experience – there are just so many delightful wines to try. Many of these Croatian wines we tried are available in the United States, so when you have the opportunity try something unusual and it may just appeal to your taste bud.

Cheers,
Kathy