let’s go structuralist and existential rather than adjectivist and pointsy
I had an amazing bottle of wine this weekend and a pretty good one too.
i got a bottle of 2007 Domaine Pascal Aufranc Vieilles Vignes de 1939 Chenas
It was a gift from a patient who owns a beautiful little wine store.
roberto likes context in wine. i like backstory.
the backstory means he knew he was offering up a goodie even if i didn’t know what this bottle was
i always appreciate the yellowtail and santa margarita i get from patients. They know i like wine and they give in kindness
THIS BOTTLE ROCKED
Ferociously good wine. succulent palate with underpinnings of classroom chalk. Nose is earthy and plummy and chalk. Great mineral and balanced chassis of midsweet fruit.
so i go out to italian food last night with a generous friend who has a great, albeit spectatory/parkery lineup of the gems.
grab one out of the cellar. I am weak in aged barolo. 2004 Giacosa? 2001 B. Mascarello?
know your customer.
I grabbed a 2001 Gaja Sperss.
I know, too young. not decanted, moon in quater phase…the wine was certainly good but not ferocious
very fine though.
At this stage, silky is the keyword. the nose is rosepetals, but more of the whole garden with stem and soil. the high point of the nose points to great potential.
palte was silky smooth. sweet soft tannins still present in spades but not overwhelming. bottle gone. it served it’s role well and died valiantly
which was the better wine. discuss amongst yourselves
posted exclusively at wine beserkers
Your note on the 2001 Sperss really struck a chord with me- not for the pleasure it supplied the other evening, but more for the astonishing fact that it was silky and a delightful drink at age eight! This is a great classic vintage for Barolo and Barbaresco, but certainly quite structured, and the 2001s in my cellar I do not want to see on my table for at least another decade. To me this is what makes Gaja’s wines these days so disappointing- they are beautifully crafted, spit-polished wines that can offer up impressive pleasure, but which lack the conviction and seriousness to embrace their regional roots and deliver wines with substantial backbones that will expect patience before giving up all their secret charms.
As good as your bottle of 2001 Sperss may have been the other night, I have a hard time imagining that it will ever reach the heights that the 1988 displayed last year- and which it will continue to deliver for another fifteen to twenty years. The '88 Sperss (Gaja’s first vintage from this vineyard) was a classic, structured Barolo with a nice framing of vanillin oak out of the blocks, and its fine potential was evident from release, but giving immediate pleasure was not one of the items on its agenda. But at the time, it seemed that this bottling was going to be a terrific new addition to the Gaja portfolio. It was followed up by an '89 Sperss that was decidedly less interesting- swamped in Caymus Special Select-like extremely charred oak and much more rounded off tannins- and this from one of the great classic vintages for long-term aging in Barolo. A true triumph of form over substance that '89.
BTW, rather an impressive performance by the Crimson Tide yesterday- they deserve to be #1 and I will be very surprised if they do not end up there at the end of the year. Love to see that kind of inspiration on both sides of the ball for 60 minutes.
Great post Dr. K & great to hear from you. I’m going w/ the Domaine Pascal. What is it exactly? Where is it from?
I’m no Texas fan, but anybody who roots for Boise State sure was relieved to see them pull it out last night. Good thing the 'Horns have a month to get ready for Alabama. They’ll need every second of it…
I have not had any examples of Pascal Aufranc’s Chenas, but based on your enthusiastic post I will add them to my next visit or feature on the region. Do you happen to recall who the importer was on the wine? Chenas in general tends to be one of the lighter and more forward Cru Beaujolais, along with Brouilly and Regnie these tend to be the crus that I reach for earlier on in their evolutions. But its being generally lighter than say, Morgon for instance, does not preclude the village offering really serious complexity, intensity of flavor and impressive signature of soil- all attributes that I suspect the Aufranc '07 Vieilles Vignes offered in spades. It really is such an underrated region these days- even many of the top vignerons do not seem aware of how well their wines drink at ages fifteen or twenty- most usually say ten years is a good window for drinking them. But I have had a couple of examples of Moulin-a-Vent back into the '40s recently that were absolutely stellar and going strong, and I have every intention of letting at last a goodly percentage of my stocks of 2005 crus reach at least age twenty.
The aufranc is imported by wine traditions ltd.
Falls church,va
I got the wine from winetherapy in the LES
I have tried to get the owner to post here
he carries a geeky eclectic group of wines, and what a name for a store