Brief note; '01 Beckmen Cuvee Le Bec

WINE TALK
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Brief note: '01 Beckmen Cuvee Le Bec-purple, this does not smell like grenache or syrah or mouvedre-it smells like a CDP. A damned good one. Fruit is towards the darker end of the spectrum at first, but then the midpalate and finish kick in and things brighten just a bit. There is an underlying sense of earth and stems that lends the CDP character. Excellent grip and structure and acidity, with zero flabbiness. Showing no signs of age, this could just as well be an '05 or '06.

I came back from a Calif visit quite a few years ago very enthused about this wine after being tasted on it from barrel. Mikael Sigouin and Steve Beckmen were enthused about this wine too. It sold for a whopping $15. There had been several renditions of Cuvee Le Bec before and they were solid easy drinking reds, but this particular vintage had something magical about it that was evident right away, from barrel. Once it got bottled I bought a case. Should have bought two or three. Whatever line separates a pizza wine from a serious wine, this wine has crossed it by a fair distance. I grossly underestimated how this wine would go the distance.

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Hey Delmar,
It’s good to hear that the 2001 LeBec is still going strong. Alass, mine are long gone but every bottle was a joy to drink and didn’t break what’s left of the 401k. I tried subsequent vintages (maybe through 2005), and while they were okay, they never seemed to reach the level of the 2001. Have you tried any of the more recent vintages?
BP

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Hey Bill. Nope. Delmar got off the Beckmen Club when he found hundreds of bottles of un-drunk black and red labels in his cellar, causing much Delmar-ian consternation. Very solid winery with decent value-never regretted a wine club shipment-but between the frequent shipments and my tendency to order more of what I liked, I ended up with too much. Still working on them. Hell, I still have a bunch of Beckmen’s one-time Hospice du Rhone auction lot '99 Alban Clone that I was high bidder on at the first HdR I attended in '01, not to be confused with the many cases remaining of the half barrel of '01 Carlisle-Novy HdR Syrah that also overfills my limited cellar space.