The 2008 TINTO, under Carm’s own branding from the Douro Superior, is often a nice value point in the Douro and this certainly delivers this year again. A blend of Tinta Roriz, Touriga Nacional and Touriga Franca, this regular Tinto is quite lovely this year, flavorful, but beautifully structured and quite intense, a very worthy competitor to the ‘07. A touch light in the mid-palate, it is nonetheless pure and delicious, with touches of strawberry and rhubarb, while seeming very serious and intense for its price range. Its sibling reviewed this issue, the ’08 Coa regular Tinto, is also nice, but I’d give the edge to this, which responded better and thinned less after about 2 hours of aeration. Drink now-2019. As previously indicated, note that I’ve dropped the parenthetical clarification I previously used for CARM’S producer name (explaining that CARM means Casa Agricola Roboredo Madeira). The “Roboredo Madeira” is clear enough on most of the labels now anyway.Importer: Grape Moments, a Division of Sintra Imports, New Bedford, MA; tel. (508) 997-0100.