TN: 1995 St. Innocent Pinot Noir Brickhouse Vineyard -- Wow! Stunning wine!

• 1995 St. Innocent Pinot Noir Brickhouse Vineyard - USA, Oregon, Willamette Valley (1/27/2021)
  This was much more youthful and vibrant than expected. Clearly well stored, perfect fill and cork. Minimal bricking with dark crimson color. Energetic nose with some cedar and earthy spice notes. Dark cherry on the palate, still with rather youthful fruit profile. Lengthy finish of cherry, underbrush and cinnamon. Wow. Stunning wine, was not expecting anything this vibrant and youthful. Quite elegant and seamless at this stage but will continue to evolve. (94 pts.)

Posted from CellarTracker

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As an unabashed SI fan your note is appreciated.

This sounds more like an 05 than a 95.

Yes, I would absolutely agree. Added a pic so you can see the amazing color

Excellent note. We enjoyed a magnum of 1999 St. Innocent Brickhouse Pinot Noir for my SO’s bday dinner with friends pre pandemic about a year ago. Wonderful wines.

I remember enjoying some 1995 St. Innocents around 2005. I considered myself quite daring as many people were saying they would be over the hill.

After tasting them I figured they would go the distance. Glad to hear I was right .

I’ll update my note, but after being open 3-4hrs it faded a bit but was still delicious. I’d call it “mature” but a far cry from “old”

Thanks for the great note. Glad the wine showed so well.

Cheers,
Doug

The trick in 1995 in Oregon was avoiding the rot. After 1994’s critical acclaim for ripe, robust wines, there were many who decided to wait out the rains that came in early October. The gamble didn’t pay off for many and the vintage got widely panned as rot-ridden and dilute. Many wineries dealt with split decision problems by doing one-off cuvees at very attractive price points to move through the vintage. My foggy memory is that there was a St. Innocent “Willamette Valley” bottling that Mark made for this purpose. I think I drank a case of it.

I have always had a soft spot for the '95s that got the harvest and sort right. They made some really great wines. I have a single St. Innocent Freedom Hill left from my purchase on release. I have back filled a few of the wines I knew were on the right side of the harvest equation over the years without reservation.

Glad to hear you got a good experience with this one.

Cheers,
fred

I have a number of St. Innocent “Special Selections” from 2005-2007 in the cellar. Very glad to hear of your experience and look forward to opening these wines. Based on your notes the wines from 10 years later should be outstanding.

Had the ‘05 SS seven springs last month. It’s similar to this one but not as deep. Very good though

Interesting note. Sounds kinda like an inverse of 2013.

I remember a Magnum party several years back where there was a pair of '95 SI single vineyards, don’t believe Brick House was one, but similar results. Wines were so good people were inspecting the labels to see if the script font “5” was actually an “8” - some were convinced and it was still early in the night!! '95 was considered a washout, one of the toughest vintages ever. I’ve come to learn - there’s good wine every year, just a matter of who made it and how much. But SI killed it in 1995, dang.

Magnum party? Who came up with that idea?

I think one of them was the O’Connor and maybe the other was Seven Springs?

I also enjoyed this and the 1995 SI Freedom Hill recently. Both were stunning.

Indeed, was a Manning March Magnum Madness™ and yes O’Conner (Zenith) and Seven Springs. What did Vlossak do or not do in ‘95?!?

So O’Conner is now zenith? That’s really helpful. My
Previous quick google watch missed this nugget of information.

It was the inverse of 1993 too. That was a vintage where sitting through weather really paid off. I would guess that the experience in 1993 would have encouraged some less fortunate decisions in 1995.

Last week I opened a 99 St Innocent Seven Springs Pinot. This has always been a substantially structured wine, to put it mildly. Esp early on, this was one of the wines where I learned that less air and more time was better for getting a structured wine to open up (and the reverse caused it to close up even more). Even so, for a long time it was more of an intellectual and challenging wine than an enjoyable one…On the rare occasions, I was glad to have it tho.

Last week, I did a partial double decant (pour ~1.5 cups out and back) a couple of hours ahead. A excellent and interesting wine. Aromas and flavors of red and dark fruit, minerals, game & savory & aged nuances, and what appeared to be a hint of dill. Excellent structure but not overwhelming anymore. Still sound, without any noticeable flaws or off notes, even the next day (in the fridge overnight). Bravo. Thankfully, I still have a few bottles left. I’m not expecting those to all be identical, but equivalent would be terrific

Dill: maybe it was dill, or maybe another savory green herb (I’m quite familiar with dill in wines, this was less clear cut)…it made me think of comments some have made that Mark used American oak (partially). I never knew if that was true/verified or not. But this bottle made me wonder.

Eric, I am particularly sensitive to dill, and stopped buying the St. Innocent wines after 1996 or so because I didn’t like the way they were aging and showing that dill note. I always wanted to like them, but as they aged that seemed to get more pronounced. I asked Mark about it years ago, and at the time he said that Temperance Hill was the only one that saw any American oak, but I got it in the other Pinots, too. If we could get Ken Pahlow to chime in he could give us an answer, as he worked at St. Innocent for a number of years.

We opened a basic WV 89 St Innocent about 2 months ago and that bottle was on fire. if I was extrapolating that one then I would be pretty confident opening SI bottles from the 90s if I know they’ve been stored well.