Rio HA! Rioja!

Last night we had a great bottle of Rioja.  Rioja wines are one of the oldest, officially recognized wines – in the year 1130, the King of Navarre gave his blessing to this wine that has become world class.  There are 3 wine regions to this tiny Spanish province and they are all officially recognized as DOCa (Qualified designation of origin).

It’s also fun to say RIOJA like they do in Spain.  The J is pronounced really strongly in Spain, unlike the rest of the Spanish speaking world – so you can really hit it hard – also with words like Javier, Jamas (means never!!) and Jose’ ::)  It sounds guttural almost like the Ch in Chuzpah!