TN: 2019 Halcon Vineyards Syrah Elevacion

  • 2019 Halcon Vineyards Syrah Elevacion - USA, California, North Coast, Yorkville Highlands (6/11/2021)
    I’ve been hearing great things about the Halcon syrahs so I was looking forward to this. Unfortunately this bottle at least did not live up to the hype.

Lactic on the nose, spirity and ripe on the palate. I was quite puzzled by the comparisons I’ve read to Gonon. I opened it as part of my monthly blind Zoom wine tasting group and everyone was surprised that I owned such a modern styled wine.

Posted from CellarTracker

Jay, curious if you decanted at all? Or if you have any left to try in a day or two. What you describe is not like what I’ve tasted, from earlier versions or this 2019.

not super stemmy and tannic?

Very stemmy as well but I don’t mind that.

Hmmmph. Good to know. Thanks, Jay. I think I currently have what is probably the least-favorable CT note for the '18, but I mostly think it just needs a lot more time; hopefully that’s what’s up with the '19, too.

The lactic note is what strikes me as off for a Halcon wine.

1 Like

Someone scored it 74 on CT today.

Given the date and the “small bottle” reference, I assume it was from the same bottle and same Zoom tasting as Jay’s report.

1 Like

I’ve only tried two Halcon wines–2018 Esquisto and 2019 Alturas–both were good, unlike this clearly off bottle.

However, they struck me as fairly burly and monolithic, yet within a cooler climate framework. Quite different from the generally more supple cool climate style I’m accustomed to from Santa Barbara and Santa Maria.

I’m inclined to lay down wines in Halcon’s style, unless looking for a young, coiled sort of wine.

Not worth extrapolating much further from a flawed bottle, other than the sense of scale is not totally out of place.

We love the 2017 Elevacion and it’s just entering the drinking window for our palate. These Halcon’s in general need a few years sideways.

I have both the 19 alturas and elevacion in the cellar but have only followed one 750ml alturas over the course of 4 days. In that instance it was best on day 4 and reminiscent of the 2018 alturas in profile, just on a higher level compared to 2018. This suggests to me that the 19s will be the vintage that you can age for quite some time. (Note - I found the 2018 alturas to be more approachable in its youth).

It would surprise me that the 19 elevacion would be so different by comparison unless it was a compromised bottle or outlier.

I can only say that I drank a 19 Elevacion over several days just a few weeks ago, and ordered some more.

Quite clearly very different from my experiences as well. We drank a lot of syrah the week we were in Cali end of May… and the Halcons from 2019 were easily the best we tasted. They are a bit tightly coiled when new, but none of the notes you called out were experienced. I do not tend to like heavy/extracted/ripe wines either FWIW