Ciao Berzerkers,
Last night I zipped up to Yardley, PA for dinner with some old friends.
They had a bottle of 2011 Barboursville (VA) Chardonnay open for an aperitif. Wow, what a delicious wine, buzzing with fresh crisp apple and citrus fruit, light bodied, aromatic, crisp and clean and not a touch of oak. Wonderful stuff. Grade: B+.
Dinner was butterflied leg of lamb on the grill. I had decanted the 1985 Castello di Neive Barbaresco Riserva, “Santo Stefano” at my place about 4 hours before dinner, cork was solid, and I removed a large amount of sediment and put the wine back in the bottle and recorked. I also checked the color in the natural sunlight, and it was as hoped, a gorgeous, vibrant rust/garnet/brick red with a slight orange tinge, clear, healthy, and mature.
At dinner the nose was beautiful with violets, spicy red cherry/red raspberry fruit but also a strong suggestion of orange peel, smoke/incense and light red licorice. On the palate it drinks medium bodied, it’s lithe and lean, tannins have resolved but there is good acidity, cherry and orange fruit, and a long, silky finish. The wine has held up and matured beautifully at age 26+, although I think it has peaked and does not improve from here. This was my last bottle (a Wasserman stash wine) and was showing a bit more orange and age than the previous bottle two and a half years ago. This wine is what I would consider classic old school Barbaresco and the style I prefer. Grade: solid A.
Ciao, dc.