2007 St. Innocent Momtazi - Why is this a Controversial Wine?

WINE TALK
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So this is starting to point to the provenance of the notorious ‘Saxon’ (unfortunately now Diven) bottles.

Seems like the Seattle group may need to do another blind flight with a differently sourced 07 St I Momtazi in it.

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Rodenstock?

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Kelley Fox and Michael Stevenson both made wines from this vineyard in 2007. Anyone had those to compare?

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So did Todd Hamina.

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I recently had the 07 Kelley Fox and St I. Momtazi Pinots (along with 05-08 Thomas and 02 and 05 Eyrie Reserve Pinots).

The St. I showed well…i.e. didn’t have any of the issues described here. The Kelley Fox and St. I both had a lot going on…other than that, they couldn’t have been more different wines. The Kelley Fox was a delicate, elegant and pretty wine. The St I was big and somewhat brooding.

The 07 Kelley Fox and 05 Eyrie were my favorites from the tasting. All of them (with the possible exception of the 02 Eyrie) could benefit from more time, esp the Thomas.

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my last two bottles were same…very nice for $20. yes…definitely not burg but for the price… :slight_smile:

and dude…don’t call me “mr” i know i am old but not that old [middle-finger.gif]

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Filched today from a ‘competing’ board (not e Bob)…WineLovers Discussion Group • View topic - WTN: Willamette Valley: Pinot Noirs day 2 (long) suggesting massive bottle variation…

Mamtazi vineyard 2007 pinot noir 13.5% abv $30 (on sale) bought 3 bottles

Ruby. Effusive nose of barnyard and cherries in perfect balance. Midpalate has good structure with ripe cherry fruit, refreshing acidity and layers of flavor. The finishing touch of cherries fading into an acidic glow was a nice touch. Nice balanced wine and a good ager, I think.

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4 of the St I, and 2 Bethel Heights were ‘barnyardy’ to this person, and in some cases it ‘blows off’.
I’m guessing he means a touch of SO2?

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Oh yeah. Drinking another bottle of this. Outstanding. I really wish we could all taste all the bottles together because this seems like more than palate/nose preference. This bottle (unlike Charlie’s) is way burgundy friendly. It has the high toned cherry but also a nice rusticity. Not big fruit. Lean with elements of roses. I would probably guess Savigny-lès-Beaune if pushed. Pretty rare I have a sub $20 pinot I enjoy this much. This bottle is drinking more like its original price point.

I can’t say for sure but I think this is an envoyer bottle. Does anyone recall if the Envoyer bottles had a sticker?

J

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Mark V. says the stock of a certain CA distributor was cooked and sold at a discount. This makes sense since everyone reporting the problem seems to have the same source.

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?? A lot of us with good bottles had our wine come from the same source as steve

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07 in Oregon Pinot Noir is in my experience, either a blissful or miserable experience (see: 2007 Lemelson Thea’s Selection Pinot Noir in reference to miserable). We did a blind tasting of 6 or 7 Pinot Noirs from throughout the world and Lemelson was our Oregon representitive and it came in dead last. Overoaked, underripe, no fruit and no dirt, just watery oaky awfulness. Funny because when we tasted it to bring it to the shop, we bought like 20 cases at deep discount for holiday displays, and none of us had thought that it was truly awful. When we were given the wines and asked to guess where each was from, I initially thought that must have been the $11 Uruguayan.

That said, we’ve been carrying the 07 Momazi from St. Innocent at the shop and I’ve thus far had 0% negative feedback. I wasn’t the one who tasted it and decided to purchase it, however based on my experience with the vintage, it seems to be so bottle to bottle, so unpredictable that I would honestly rather not even risk buying it for myself.

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To disprove it you need to find someone who has the same problem with different provenence.

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Mine are Envoyer bottles… didn’t I get yours there for you???

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a bit of thread drift…Tasted 2007 Pali Momtazi at Pinot Days and picked up Brett.

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huh!? I think it’s adequate proof enough that many of us who bought it at the same time as Steve have had no problems. I’m sure there is a batch of bad bottles, but your quote saying that a stock was cooked at sold at discount would have afflicted many bottles not just Steve’s.

Wouldn’t it be easier to just believe that the problem for the minority of owners of the bottle isn’t a mass spread problem that Mark V had insinuated?

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Well, unless brett can migrate 700 miles between wineries, that’s not likely a related issue.

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I think there is truth to that assertion. $20 per bottle means the winery knew it had shit, couldn’t move it, and was liquidating inventory. I tasted through a ton of 2007s next to the 2006s during my last trip to Oregon. I think most of the 2007s had far more subdued fruit, more mineral notes, way more acidity (to the point of flaw in some cases), and more green notes. That being said, some wines were still rock solid. I have had the Momtazi, and do not think anyone can say it is one of the better wines from St. Innocent. They produced a number of nice wines, but clearly shit their pants on the Momtazi.

They produce enough really solid pinot to have acknowledged a poor product and scrapped it.


As to the Harvey Steiman comment earlier, that guy routinely blows it. One of the worst of the big publication critics in my opinion.

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Well, if that is the case, some of us lucked out in that it wasn’t all crap. Does that really make sense? Do you know the winery `liquidated’ this? It seems that many of us in the South have had a good experience with the Envoyer bottles at $20. Is it weird that no one from down here (and I might be missing someone… I admit) has had a bad bottle???

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Fixed. [berserker.gif]