2020 Giguiere Estate Pillars of Hercules Red Blend

This is typically not the type of wine we seek out, the big bold, hodge podge red blends from California.  But we have seen this bottle on all of our latest trips to Costco, and several readers have written in about it, so for the sake of this site, we picked one up.

Costco’s price is really good at $12.99 as retail looks around $20, and online it’s discounted to around $16.  93 points from Wine Enthusiast too.

The blend is unique and another reason why our interest was piqued. This wine consists of 54% Petite Sirah, 27% Petit Verdot and 19% Teroldego.

Teroldego is a hardy, dark skinned red grape that you often see in Italian wines (Trentino region) but it is popping up more and more in California, which is an interesting trend to watch.

Once we got into this wine, it was about what we expected.  It is a dark ruby in the glass with big black fruit and cigar box on the nose; full bodied and big in the mouth with young juicy dark fruit; blackberry, jam, plum; some chocolate notes and pepper into the finish.

Overall, a fairly interesting blend and one that we are glad we tasted.  For fans of the big bold California red blends, this one might be up your alley. 

Although not directly comparable, we have enjoyed the Smith & Hook red blend that is back in stores, as well as the Tenshen red, both a little more expensive but worth it.

CostcoWineBlog.com Rating: 87 points

Costco item number: 1606354

Purchased at Costco in: Atlanta, GA (Cumberland)

Alc. 14.3