2007 Joseph Swan Zinfandel Mancini Vineyard - This bottle has been open about an hour or so. Aromatically it has hints of acetone along with ripe blackberries and some wood. It is well balanced with fresh zingy acidity framing bright red fruit flavors of moderately sweet ripeness. The flavors sort of transform to a darker fruit register on the finish. Overall a very nice wine that has decent complexity now but would probably need 10 or more years to really hit its apogee.
Interestingly Berry I just grabbed one of these off the shelf on a recent trip to K&L. After having a number of remarkable Swan zins this year in the range of 20-30 years old, I wasn’t sure if I should open this or try to lose it, but definitely should have more in my cellar.
It will only get better with age…
I associate acetone with volatile acidity. I gather you don’t think that is the case here?
Tom
@NWTomLee
Yeah I figure it is probably VA from the natural yeast he uses but without a lab test I’ll just report my subject taste impression. FWIW, it blew away a bit in the glass or maybe the fruit grew to cover it. Either way, I don’t find low levels of VA to be a flaw. Most Swan wines have it to a small degree.
VA is not necessary from natural yeast. Acetone is one of the many Volitale Acidity’s(VA) that can take hold in wine. Though natural yeast can be slower to get going and can take longer to finish the lack of heavy So2 can allow some VA to take hold. I worked at Swan for harvest '05 and '06 and the outdoor open top fermentors will always have some VA. All open top fermentors will have some VA, for that matter even closed top inoculated ferments have VA.
I think they have since got fermentor covers to help keep things a bay a little better. Mancini ranch is on Olivet and Piner and makes great wines. I have had the 2007 recently and think it still needs more time could be in a funky stage where its not showing all that well. The 2002 a few years back blew me away so up to 10+ years for the zins they produce is possible and probable for a vintage like 2007. All while being aged 18 months or so with all neutral oak.
The reason I said it might be is that with my natural ferments the Kloeckera that kicks off the ferment seems to kick out lots of VA
We went thru a case of the 2002 when Swan blew them out at the winery for $8/btl. One or two bad bottles led me to plow thru the case and not try to really age 'em but overall they were just great.
What were the bad bottles like?
I don’t recall the specifics, sorry.
NP, thanks.
Oregon treating you well?
OR is cool. Thinking about that case we gave one bottle away and had the remaining 11. At least one of the bad ones had a chemical smell and I don’t recall the other as being corked - might have been stewed. Again, overall the bottles were great and I’d buy in a heartbeat.
We had these by and large over 2009-11.