La Clarine Farm – 2012 – mourvedre “Cedarville”

WINE TALK
1

La Clarine Farm – 2012 – mourvedre “Cedarville”
This is one heck of an interesting wine. It is not often that I post notes but this one motivated me to the keyboard. The nose is that of a Loire valley red with green hay, plums, and earth. The entry is all dried leaves, earth, loam and a crunchy red fruit profile similar to cru beaujolais. The finish is somewhat similar to nebbiolo with dried leaf, soy, and beef stock elements. This is definitely for the AFWE crowd and darn is it entertaining. On the second night the last sip is the best of the bottle. Glad I took a flyer on it when I saw it on the shelf of a local shop and thanks to Ken Zinns and the Grape-Nutz crew who wrote up their visit to La Clarine Farm and for encouraging all of us to seek out those undiscovered regions and new producers.

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Thanks for the note. Glad to have a few of these. Overall, do you consider it a good one for near-term drinking, or best to wait?

3

Is there anything in the tating note that suggests waiting?

4

Had a bottle, totally PO’ed I have 5 more and not 11 more.

5

Glad you enjoyed the La Clarine wine, Walt! Hank Beckmeyer at La Clarine Farm is doing some really interesting things with both his farming and winemaking (and Jonathan & Susan at Cedarville do a fine job of farming that Mourvèdre for Hank). Definitely worth checking out La Clarine Farm’s wines if you’re looking for something out of the ordinary from California’s Sierra Foothills.

6

I had this one over the holidays. Really interesting, unusual Mourvedre. I think there’s enough tension in the wine to allow it to age for some time, but the note here is correct. Think Loire or cru Beaujolais, not Bandol. A beefy, meaty bruiser this is not (though I think Hank noted somewhere that it’s larger scale than usual). I found it graceful and yet coiled enough to unwind for several years.

7

I don’t think it will improve much beyond 5 yrs. But that is just me speculating. Second day was even better than the first so give it a nice decant and you are good to go.

8

I don’t think I have had a LCF wine that wasn’t better day #2 yet.