Our poker venue moved back to Tom’s for a late September game. While I was thoroughly outplayed in the main game, I did manage to win some cash in one of the several after-hours games that blossomed up after the main game wrapped up. So, not all was lost and certainly the wines made up for my bad cards and poor reads! As usual, all wines in the main tasting were served blind.
2002 Donnhoff Riesling QbA Nahe. We opened up with this Riesling that is pretty quiet and reserved on the nose, with moderately diffuse aromas of wet stones, lemon rind, and graphite. It has a rounded mouthfeel to it, but some soft tooth-coating acidity gives it an interesting grippy feel. Flavors of lemon sourball and pulverized minerals are pretty but fairly straightforward. It has medium weight and a decently lengthy finish, but sort of seems like it would have been more substantial a few years earlier.
Flight 1:
2005 Radio Coteau Pinot Noir Alberigi Vineyard Russian River Valley. Both of the wines in flight 1 are obviously Pinot Noir, with this first one a bit duller and more faded in color than its flight-mate. The wine is very woodsy and raw, with aromas of wintergreen, sassafras, fireplace ash, dried grape stems and dank earth riding above the fruit notes of rhubarb and pomegranate. In the mouth, it is much the same, with sticks and stones taking center stage away from the sour cherry and citrus fruit notes. It features a big core of sour-tinged acidity that runs right through the wine. Yet, there is a weighty glycerol feel to the texture and body that gives it a more limpid quality that serves it well. A big hit of barrel spices carries through to the lively, tangy finish.
2005 Hartford Court Pinot Noir Land’s Edge Vineyards Sonoma Coast. This wine offers up aromas of root beer, blackberry, light incense, cigar ash and tree bark. In the mouth, it shows some chocolate notes and lot of briary blackberry and black bean flavors that seem to totally coat the teeth with extract and tannin. It is a low acid, rather chewy-textured wine and also shows a lot of wood influence and too much alcohol right now. It was my least favorite wine of the tasting.
Flight 2:
2005 Siduri Pinot Noir Clos Pepe Vineyard Santa Rita Hills. This flight is also obviously Pinot-based. The nose on this wine is the richest and creamiest of the four in this set, featuring fuzzy blueberry and blackberry jam and black cherry fruit aromas to go with notes of dark smoke, chocolate and jalapeno pepper. It is rather thick and dense in the mouth, with a chalky texture and a lot of rich berry fruit flavors. A tiny sliver of acidity comes in toward the finish, but otherwise this is loaded with overt fruit and framing spices. It is outgoing, cohesive and large-framed for those who enjoy this bigger style.
2005 Kosta Browne Pinot Noir Garys’ Vineyard Santa Lucia Highlands. I get a lot of creamed cherry, spearmint, birch beer, cool ash and pink citrus notes on the nose of this wine. It has a lot of character in the mouth, with excellent weight and cohesiveness. It is medium-bodied with a lot of fuzzy spices and abundant cherry and raspberry fruit all nicely packaged together. It has a very good spine of acidity and feels rather lively and driven despite the dense and rich character of the enveloping red fruit. It also feels like it can go for a while in the cellar. My and I am pretty sure the group’s favorite Pinot on the afternoon.
Flight 3:
2004 Behrens & Hitchcock Everything But…The Kitchen Sink Napa Valley. This opens up with a lot of chocolate and mocha aromas on the nose, but pretty soon earthier aromas of creosote, tar, lava rocks and forest greens come in to change up the profile. It then turns more lifted with extended air, bringing in sweet dark cherry, flowers and roasted pepper skin aromas that seem to almost blast off up the nose. It is kind of a wild ride aromatically. In the mouth, it is super polished and smooth, sliding across the palate with glycerol lusciousness. It is medium to full-bodied, with flavors of chocolate, oak and sour cherry that occasionally veer into cherry cough syrup. Some late chalky tannins and a bit of sour acidity bring it back to earth toward the finish, where it seems more streamlined. I wavered back and forth on this one, really enjoying the complexity and mouthfeel but not always the high-octane character. An interesting wine, to be sure.
Flight 4:
1996 Chateau Montrose Saint Estephe. Man, I really like the nose here. It opens with a rather strong note of sweaty horse that slowly folds into the mellower notes of fine leather, tobacco leaf, bacon fat, roasted green pepper and turned earth–with cool and dark red fruit held in reserve. In the mouth, it features the fruit more prominently than it does on the nose, with plenty of large-boned cassis, mixed currant and sour cherry flavors that are kept lively by a fine streak of acidity running down the spine of the wine. The earthy elements provide the bass note to this beauty, giving it solid grounding. It is just really engaging and finely-flavored in the mouth—my Wine of the Night.
1996 Clos du Marquis Saint Julien. This wine feels tight on the nose to me, only slowly opening up over time to show glossy black fruit and earth notes, a bit of tar and some ash. In the mouth, it is again tight, and also a bit rough around the edges. The attack is moderately rich, but it has a bitter astringent edge through the middle and finish. Taut, chalky tannins frame the dark fruit and earth flavors and a massive shot of acidity comes in to provide a bit of additional length. Overall, though, this is not the equal of the previous wine by any stretch.
Flight 5:
2001 Beringer Cabernet Sauvignon Private Reserve Napa Valley. There’s a bit of mustiness on the nose of this at first, but that goes away fairly quickly and is replaced by real nice aromas of soft downy earth, black currants, red hot candies, creamed black cherries, white pepper, charcoal and worn leather. I find just a hint of mustiness on the palate, as well, but again it is soon overwhelmed by other elements—in this case, a boatload of young fruit, dry tannin and acidity that taken together really fill the mouth. Fuzzy raspberry, dark cherry and red currant fruit flavors are rich, voluptuous and large-structured and lead to a drier finish featuring pretty big tannins. This is a very young wine with real big upside.
2001 Zahtila Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon Beckstoffer Vineyard Georges III Napa Valley. CORKED.
Bonus bottle:
1997 Huet Vouvray Cuvee Constance. Served from 500 ml bottle. There is just a hint of mustiness off the top here, but nothing that seems too extreme. Otherwise, the nose offers up aromas of hard caramel, dried apricots, musk and copper that take a bit more coaxing than expected to come forward and never really reach the heights I think I was hoping for. In the mouth, it has a lot of complex flavors of tangerine, apricot, sweet pineapple and lime juice that are overt, large-framed and plenty sweet. It has that rich fruit, but also a nice airy quality at times that give it pretty nuances. It is a nice treat, but I can’t help but say it never really lived up to my lofty expectations. I’d love to have another crack at this down the road a while.
After-hours bottles:
2002 Chateau Montelena Cabernet Sauvignon The Montelena Estate Napa Valley. Man, this is young, but it certainly shows a huge amount of upside for those who can remain patient. Right now, the nose features aromas of silky black currants, blackberries, black licorice, creosote and a hint of jalapeno that are taut, lithe and a touch brooding. It feels even younger on the palate—where a big solid structure lends a chewy edge to the black currant and semi-sweet chocolate chip flavors. Teeth-coating tannins dry out the palate a bit, but a fine streak of acidity bubbles up from the depths to keep it just fresh enough to find some solid enjoyment in it now. No question, though, sit on this for like another 10 years.
2005 Beaulieu Vineyard Tapestry Reserve Napa Valley. Here we have a nose of dark cherries, graphite, spiced plum, fruitcake and a strong hit of something halfway between mint and eucalyptus. Like the previous wine, it is young and strapping, though this one is a bit more lifted on the nose after a while in the glass. My guess on the palate would be that this is a California Merlot, with all of its rich creamy mocha and chocolate fudge flavors contrasting with the brighter black cherry and other glossy black fruit notes. It is full-bodied, thick and rich, but has a certain cool quality that descends upon it after a while and gives it a bit more restraint. Still, a hint of alcohol slips through the cracks from time to time and provides another reason for me want to wait on this another 4 or 5 years.
-Michael