1990 Patrick Jasmin Côte-Rôtie - France, Rhône, Northern Rhône, Côte-Rôtie (3/10/2024)
While this wine's best days are behind it, it was charming nonetheless. Clear ruby in color, with surprisingly little bricking, the wine started off somewhat dilute and shy. After decanting and swirling a bit the nose picked up nicely, with lovely red fruit, some savory spice notes, a hint of earth. On the palate this was light, with fully resolved tannins, with a quite short finish. Drink up if you got 'em! (89 points)
Interesting. A lot of 1990 Rhone wines were problematic, as I understand a few containers were left over a holiday weekend in the heat. I’ve had similar results of premature aging. with a number of them including Chave, Jaboulet and Chapoutier, all wines I tasted several times when I visited the producers in the Rhone just before and after bottling. The wines that came here did not have same verve and character, in fact I wondered if one producer had switched wines after a stellar review.
Which brings me to the Jasmin 1990, which I purchased in Europe as part of a small cache of the his wines. I’ve had the 88 and 89 from the cellar, both of which were stellar. A couple of days ago opened the 1990, to go with some short ribs. I had been waiting for a cool weather meal, and thought this would be the perfect wine for it.
And it was. First came that haunting nose of smoked meats, herbs and leather. It bloomed on the palate adding some floral stuff, and finishing beautifully with a long layered finish. Neck and neck with the fabulous 1988, and a hair better than the 1989. This is archetypal traditional Cote Rotie.
Also, certainly in the 1980s, there were significant lot variations, with wines bottled at different times, and limited blending for consistency. And there were also differences between importers – e.g., Kermit Lynch got somewhat different Chave blends than the East Coast importer did in those days. And there were several releases of '83 Jaboulet La Chapelle over a year or more (I remember because the first one sold out but I found some freshly imported bottles a year later).
I’m not sure if or how much that had changed by the early 90s when the 1990s would have been bottled. But the differences you experienced might not just be due to abuse.