Gordon, most of the wines I’ve tasted have been decanted at least for several hours, and those I’ve had at home I sample over at least 48 hours. I’m not here to say that 2007 is a poor vintage, I think there are a lot of very nice wines. But for my tastes, the several very high scoring wines I’ve sampled have not lived up to those scores. Most have simply been too ripe and syrupy for me - a characteristic I personally do not believe fades over time. My position is that a wine does not have to be ripe and candied to be deeply flavored. That seems to be the crux of Parker’s position, which I disagree with. One can prefer less ripe wines without being “anti-flavor”.
Cheers
The only one I’ve had is the St. Prefert Reserve August Favier which was markedly sweet – and I mean residual sugar sweet. On the first sip, I wondered if it was some soft Amarone! (It didn’t have the raisiny or bitter qualities of an Amarone.) It was also pretty hot. Seemed like a wine that couldn’t ferment dry.
Parker evidently gave this some huge score. It was defective so far as I was concerned.
I’ve never heard those terms used to describe CdPs!
I hope these will be better with age. I backed up the truck and have 12 cases, I have not tried any yet and plan on putting them away for a few years at least.
I find CDP in general over-hyped, across the board. Robert Parker is constantly saying how CDP was a poor backwater region where nobody could afford to bottle their own wine until he came along and drew the world’s attention to it, thus bestowing the gift of wines like Pegau unto us. So you can either figure that Parker is the Indiana Jones of undiscovered great wine, or that CDP is really no better than any other poor backwater region making bulk peasant wine but just happened to have the good fortune to strike Parker’s sweet spot. If Cleopatra’s nose had been shorter the whole face of the world would have changed, and if Robert Parker’s nose was a little less tolerant of stewed prunes and alcohol fumes then the greatest vintage ever in any viticultural region just might have been something in Beaujolais. Even the comparison to Bandol is interesting since the region is like a rock’s throw away from CDP and grows the same family of grapes, but Parker’s never jizzed over Bandol the way he does CDP, so you never see anyone dropping $500 on double-magnums of Bandol luxury cuvees.
Very astute, Keith, and I agree wholeheartedly. Well spoken, Counselor!
I bought early, and wondering if I shouldn’t cancel my orders at the cost of 15% (still haven’t taken delivery).
I’ve noticed it in 2007 Cote du Rhones, which can be fun but is very jammy for me. And I wasn’t a huge fan of 03 Pegau even though I love it in most years.
I bought some folks I always buy (and like in good years). Does Vieux Telegraph and Pegau also suffer from the general trend?
Alan;
I agree with you that too many of the CdP 07’s were overripe. It is also a characteristic in wines that I don’t like. You’ve heard me comment my displeasure with KB and Loring over this issue. I do believe that WA and WS’s high ratings for super-ripe wines have only increased the making of that style. But I don’t find some of the wines to be over sweet, they are just backwards and not ready to be drank, at this time.
On a side note. This past week I was watching a show about winemaking on the Create channel. A Cal Davis enology prof. was discussing grape ripeness. He started going into this spill about seed ripeness and skin ripeness and that how some grapes may not actually be ripe until they hit brixs of 29-30+. To pick the grapes early would yield unripe wines. He was advocating leaving the wines to hang until complete ripeness, then use cone spinners or water to dilute the alcohol levels. I wanted to shoot him! I don’t want raisin pinot or CdP.
I have only sampled a few, but found the too ripe and overdone for my tastes.
Ditto. I like CdP when it tastes like blood and iron… (cue Viking roar and the beating of swords against shields…)
I like some CdPs but in general the wines are sell outs in my mind. I generally agree with Keith’s observations. I am not a fan of the 07 vintage in CdP, am not a fan of the luxury cuvees, and don’t buy many wines because I don’t find value. I like Charvin from time to time. I am a Pegau fan in some vintages (01, 04, 05) but the 06 and 07 were hot and flabby to me. I think Caillou ‘Les Quartz’ is probably the best wine made in CdP (no experience with Rayas, though). With the exception of Les Quartz and of Domaine Tempier, I have a hard time getting excited to spend over $30-40 a bottle on most wines from S France when there are so many fantastic $20 bottles out there.
Of the 2007 CDPs I’ve had: Mas de Boislauzon, Bosquet des Papes and especially Vieux Telegraph are exceptional. The Janasse (tradition) seemed the ripest, but I wouldn’t say it was overdone or flabby. I really enjoyed it… although it is very young and somewhat monolithic. The Grand Veneur Les Origines and Mordoree, were less spectacular than I had hoped for but I had them almost a year ago and I’m sure they’ve improved since.
I find the controversy over 07 CDP interesting. Whereas I like this vintage, I do think the 2005 BDX vintage is very disappointing. To me those wines are over the top, overextracted, woody, new world wannabes. (When I posted something to that effect on the other board I was attacked by TheBob himself. I told TheBob it was unbecoming of him to personally attack a nobody like me. I was hoping I’d get banned. Oh well.) Did anyone else think 2005 BDX was over-hyped?
Even if you decide you don’t like the wines, you can probably sell them, given all the mania over the vintage.
I don’t think anyone’s mentioned that Eric Asimov gave the vintage a very lukewarm review:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/09/dining/09wine.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
"We found some wines we liked very much, yet on the whole the 2007s left me unexcited. Stylistically, they presented Châteauneuf’s too-friendly side. Châteauneuf is always a big wine, but these wines were huge — full of lush, opulent fruit with powerful, jammy flavors.
If you like fruit-bomb wines, you will love the ’07 Châteauneufs.
… Robert M. Parker Jr., a Châteauneuf lover, has called 2007 “a truly historic and profoundly great vintage.” I was not alone in my puzzlement about the 2007s."
Can anyone ever recall a case where Parker or Miller criticized a wine for being too ripe, too extracted, or too alcoholic? I’m genuinely curious…
Great question. Not that I can recall, and I subscribed for 20+ years, up through early in this decade. Parker has commented on big, “heady” wines, but never judgmentally that I can recall.
+1
I am not a fan of the 07s (in general, there are exceptions, as Paul points out) and will be saving my money to buy 2004s and 2006s.
Yes and no. Actually Parker discovered absolutely nothing, CdP was one of the most famous wine regions in France, the first AOC and so on. Rayas and Beaucastel (and many others) didn’t wait for him to produce great wines.
What happened, though, is that Parker started to distribute points left and right, which had the usual effect of inflating prices, and within a few years there were fewer and fewer wines produced with mostly Grenache, Mouvèdre and a mix of the other 13 grapes, and more and more wines with Syrah, especially at the top end.
I tasted quite a lot of CdP recently at Vinisud and this region is a shell of its former self for me. I’m sure a lot of people like the wines, but I’m still wishing I could find the wines that were produced there only 10 years ago, instead of the race for ripeness and alcohol. I guess CdP will apply soon to become part of California.
I found Chateauneuf just as unpalatable 10 years ago as I do now!