TN: Two Turley '94's...(short/boring)

After dumping 5 '94 Turley Zins and 4 other contemporary Zins down the drain, these two were passable (barely):

  1. Turley Zin HayneVnyd/NapaVlly (17.2%) 1994:Very dark color w/ some bricking; some toasty/smokey/oak bit blackberry/boysenberry/jammy/very ripe/Zin rather alcoholic/fumey some cedary/pencilly/oldZin bit complex somewhat tired nose; rather alcoholic/fumey/hot some blackberry/boysenberry/Zin very ripe some smokey/oak flavor w/ light/drying tannins; med. quite soft rather pencilly/cedary/oldZin slight blackberry/boysenberry/very ripe/raspberry rather hot/fumey light toasty/smokey/oak finish w/ light dried-out tannins; alcohol really dominates but still has a bit of fruit and clinging to life.

  1. Turley PetiteSirah AidaVnyd/NapaVlly (14.1%) C&B by Turley/Oakville 1994: Very dark/near black color w/ no bricking; bit alcoholic earthy/dusty/OV slight blackberry/licorice/PS slight peppery light smokey/toasty/oak rather oafish/clunky nose w/ little evolution or complexity; soft bit dried-out hard/earthy/dusty/OV slight peppery/licorice/PS bit metallic/tangy light smokey/toasty/oak flavor w/ light/drying/astringent tannins; med. soft earthy/dusty/OV light PS/licorice/peppery some smokey/toasty/oak metallic/tangy finish w/ light astringent/dried-out tannins; on the downside w/o developing any nuances or complexity; a huge PS in its youth that you just knew would be great but it never became that.

A wee BloodyPulpit:

  1. These two came from a case that had a mixed bunch of '93-'94 Zins. Most were dead, none offerred up much pleasure other than intellectual. Because of the fat Turley btls, three were stored upside down to fit in the case. The ones standing upright had no signs of ullage and the corks were solid but cam out intact. These two upside-downers also had no signs of ullage or leakage and were solid in the btl. But the corks totally crumbled into pieces when extracted w/ an Ah-So and a corkscrew. Go figure.
    Thus endeth my '94 Turley holdings on a not-so-great note. Looked at that '10 Carlisle Zin Papera chirping out “open me/open me”, but resisted its blandishments, declared defeat, ate my samwich, and went to bed.
    Tom

Well, I’m a big Turley fan but expecting a lot from a 21 y.o. Zin is quite optimistic…don’t you think so? [cheers.gif]

I had my last 1998 and 1999 Turley Zins a few years ago and even though they were (mostly) still nice I felt they have reached their end of life.

Yup…I’m a big Turley fan too, Jens. This was when Ehren was ramping the Turley’s down from the HelenTurley style.
I opened these w/ low expectations and that’s exactly what I got.
Tom

Great notes Tom - you do push the envelope! Most of my experience with 20+ year old Zins or blends (mainly from Ridge and Ravenswood, didn’t get on the Turley list until about 2005) has been very positive. Wines like Ridge “Geyserville” and Ravenswood “Old Hill Ranch” age shockingly well. That said, I usually cash in after about 15 years.

Tom, it wasn’t clear from your post - did you buy these on release, or from a secondary source?

On release from the mailing list, Bob. I was on the mailing list afore Parker discovered them.
Tom

Bumski - I have several bottles of the '94 PS Aida (as well as the '94 PS Hayne), but it sounds like I shouldn’t be expecting any kind of revelatory drinking experience when I finally get around to pulling a cork.

Glad I drank my '94 Turleys young. I’m not surprised that they didn’t make old bones.

I’ve had outstanding experiences with a few old zins, but they seem to be the exception. Some early '90s-era Ridge Lytton Springs and Geyserville and some even older late-'70s original Lytton Springs Winery Lytton Springs zins were just fantastic at 10-20 + years of age. But if I want to increase my odds of having a wonderfully complex tertiary wine, I go to Bordeaux.

Old zins can be terrific (had a 91 Williams Selyem RRV zin a few years ago and it was out of this world), but I never felt like the pre-Tegan Turleys were good candidates for aging. Some hang in there, but I haven’t had an older one that felt like it was better than it had been young, and some just got dull and pruney.

I could see the possibility at least that the Tegan era Turleys might age better, or even improve. But between how good they are young, the hassle of storing bottles that size, and the uncertainty what the upside of aging will be, it’s probably not on my program to see how that goes.

I tasted a '97 Aida PS a couple of months ago that was very enjoyable.

I have also had great experiences with old Zins, especially Ridge and Joseph Swan. Their bottlings from 1970s are pretty reliable, and the 1976 Swan and 1973 Ridge Geyserville are sensational.

I would be surprised if the Turleys had aged well; the 1984/1985 Cabernets of BR Cohn (Helen Turley was the winemaker) are barely holding onto life, but age has done nothing except soften them.

My memory differed from Tom’s – I thought that Helen Turley was still the winemaker in '94, and for at least several years in the mid-'90s, which was why those wines were so huge when released. According to what I can find on-line, that is correct: the winery was founded in '93, and she left after the '95 vintage.

Tom was diligent in trying all the Turleys from the very start and I was there for many of those tastings. Couldn’t stand them! They represented everything I felt was wrong about that era of CA winemaking: too much jammy fruit, way too much alcohol, and too much oak. Pretty horrible stuff. Kind of surprising for me, because at that time I was on the Marcassin mailing list and really liking their wines. I still do, at least from that era. Maybe zinfandel was just not a grape that took to the ripeness that Helen Turley has become famous for and that John Wetlaufer has gone on and on about in their newsletters.

Needless to say, this was not a widely shared opinion in Tom’s group, who were used to some pretty high octane wines. About ten years ago we tried a '94 Turley zin that someone brought as a mystery wine. It was completely over the hill. I’m impressed that Tom managed to find a few complimentary things to say about these wines.

I believe that Aida Vineyard now owned by Vineyard 29 is located in the St. Helena Ava, north adjacent to Turley.

Larry, I hadn’t caught that, but Helen was definitely still the winemaker in '94.

It is only in recent years that Turley is being made in a style that has the balance to age. Zinfandel as a varietal has no problem aging in my opinion/experience.

That, Berry, is probably the key to making Zins that can age well. Think Ridge Geyserville.
Tom

I must admit that I’ve never really followed Turley and haven’t tasted that many outside of 2-3 visits to their tasting rooms in Paso and Amador. I was at their Amador tasting room last fall and the wines were good, though big (many if not most of the ones I tasted were 15%+ alcohol). I know that Zin tends to be on the high end of the ripeness / alcohol scale (and it’s a variety that seems to be able to handle that better than most), and by most standards Turleys are still big, bold wines.

For those of you who have more experience with Turley, is there a quick summary you can give me on where you see stylistic changes taking place, from the Helen Turley years to Ehren and to Tegan? How do you see the balance of the wines and potential for aging having changed in recent years? It’s my impression that Tegan has been handling much of the winemaking duties there for a number of years now, even though it’s only been a couple of years since he’s officially been the head winemaker - is that correct or am I mistaken about that? Tegan’s Sandlands wines are obviously much different from what he does at Turley - just as Ehren’s Failla wines were - but this makes sense given Turley’s loyal following and their customers’ presumed expectations of big, bold wines.

I don’t know when Tegan took control over the process exactly, but the wines in the last maybe 5 vintages or so show considerably less oak, to me. The ripeness and alcohols are still high, but the wines feel much fresher and less creamy/heavy than they sometimes did at earlier times.

I’ve often thought that the more objectionable thing in the category of big/modern/lush reds was more the oak than the ripeness/alcohol. I see some producers these days like Turley, Carlisle and Denner who make wines from grapes that are clearly very ripe, but they seem to preserve their vibrancy by using less oak.

To Tom Hill’s comment about Geyserville, another reason Ridge’s zins age well is that they’re blended with longer-aging black varieties as well. Geyserville is only 75% zin, give or take by vintage, right?

I actually asked about oak treatment when I visited the Turley Amador tasting room last fall, and I was told that it has not changed in many years - about 20% new oak and 80% older barrels. But I don’t have enough experience with Turley to know whether that’s actually the case, or perhaps whether they’ve been using different coopers in recent years.