No point for Turley, but the thread is about what happens when high alcohol wines age. They don’t necessarily go to hell. And I second Alban as another example of a very age-able high-alcohol wine. I’ve even had some RRV pinots (Martinelli, Williams-Selyem) 15 years old that were still drinking well. Again no reason to age them that long, but I wouldn’t worry about them going over the hill.
Martinelli pinots with age are divisive. Some people love them, as this recent thread shows. Others of us find them wildly over-alcoholic and out of balance:
Worst wines you’ve ever had
Thread on Martinelli zins and pinots
I opened another one of my CDPs last night. 2015 Pegau labeled as 14% alcohol. Im a fine wine noob so I wanted to compare it to the Clos St Jean that motivated this thread.
I could still feel the heat from the alcohol but the wine was in much greater balance than the CSJ. I can see the Pegau evolving pleasantly even though right now its not my favorite wine.
#DrinkingInTheNameOfScience
Last night, I had a 2018 grand cru Burgundy from a well known producer in Gevrey whose name I will omit to avoid giving him a bad rep. Raw, disjointed with no meaningful varietal characteristics noted because the harshness of the wine overpowered anything interesting that might have been hiding in the background. There was obvious stem inclusion that added to the harshness, and I thought I would need a tweezers to remove the oak splinters from my mouth.
The Jaffurs SBC Syrah '08 I just posted was a great example of a high-alcohol Syrah that matured beautifully.
OTOH, I’ve had 4 Alban reds from '00-'01 that didn’t show very well w/ lots of alcohol and no real development, just
still very primary. TN’s to follow.
Tom
Just as a counterpoint I opened a 1995 Turley Zin at one of my blind dinners a few years ago and everyone agreed it was an alcoholic overripe mess.
That’s sorta typical, Jay. I find it damnably tough to predict how those high-alcohol wines will age. Guess I don’t have enough data points
to predict!! Gotta pick up the pace, I guess.
Tom
Everyone? I missed that dinner but the group we are talking about thinks that 14% is a swear word.
And your point?
Sounds like what I’d expect from a top young Burgundy that needs 20+ years – lots of tannin, acid, perhaps some stems and oak. Maybe it has great potential, maybe it doesn’t, but by not naming it, you’re preventing anyone with knowledge of the wine disagreeing with you. Perhaps instead it’s just your preference for bigger, riper wines.
Turley has come down a bit with Tegan at helm tho, hasn’t it?
Love this line, will borrow this for future TNs. ![[cheers.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/0/0ff9bfcdb0964982cd3240b6159868fbdf215b1a.gif "cheers"){kind=small}
So everyone says, but I’m not sure that’s true. I had the '17 Turley Bedrock zin this week and it’s marked as 15.7% and tastes like it. We tasted it against the Bedrock Bedrock, Ridge Hooker Creek (from a part of Bedrock) and a Once and Future Bedrock – all a percent or more lower in ABV – and the Turley ranked last. (A Wilde Farms “natural” Bedrock was more feral than natural, so I don’t count it.)
Not a data point, just nuts. Maybe try taking a brand new Ferrari 8-track racing… Perhaps it would’ve been better blending in some Coke or Sprite?
You agreed 
What was this? I thought I was aware of all of the Wilde Farm wines but unaware of a “natural” Bedrock. Unless they are all natural and I didn’t realize it. I haven’t had any bottles yet that I thought were feral but I have liked some vintages more than others.
Sometimes wines designed for 20+ years of aging take a while to come together. They usually do, especially from well known producers with strong track records. Sometimes they simply suck…but not that often…unless big, hot, ripe, low-acidity wines float your boat. In which case, I’d imagine that most all young Burgs suck.
RT
I simply don’t get wines like that, but more and more accept that others not only do, but find aging increases their appeal. I foolishly bought a bunch of middling 2005 Right Bank Bordeaux and have been culling them at parties, gatherings, charity auctions, etc. I’m psyched that guests enjoy what I don’t.
RT
Yep. That’s actually what I expected. I wasn’t making a claim for all Turleys all the time. Some of the younger wines were far more advanced. Part of it has to do with where the wine comes from - they do a lot of sites. And part of it has to do with the year, and part of it I really don’t know. These were all Moore. The 1999 was a mess. The 1994 was fine. It had transformed into something quite delicious. Still ripe, but not obnoxious at all. And maybe ten years ago Mark Squires brought one to dinner, don’t remember which, maybe Haynes and maybe 1997? and it was already passing its peak.
As an aside, I really don’t know the history of Turley all that well, but this was one more data point for my theory that 1994 - 1996 was the inflection point for many CA wines.
No, I was not at that dinner. I have never had an Abatucci white. O was at your dinner where you poured one Abatucci, I think the Ministre Imperial.
My point, of course, is that one would never expect a 2018 GC Burg to be drinkable right out of the bottle, so you would age it. Why you believe that a different result is inevitable from a Cali wine just because it has a high ABV is completely lacking in evidence when the only think you offer is the reviews of people who hate those wines in the first place.
Actually, my point was that our assessments of other people’s tasting notes and comments are colored completely by our own preferences. Of course, there was no 2018 GC Burg. Even I am not stupid enough to open one. I was just making a point that people expect that California wines should be opened right out of the box but then they complain about age-ability with no evidence in a constantly predictable pattern, while no one who had the same response to a GC Burg would get the same commentary.