-
2011 Schloss Lieser Niederberg Helden Riesling Spätlese - Germany, Mosel Saar Ruwer
Yummy. This is slowly but surely starting to open up. The nose always remained a bit primary, with sweet grape sugars, apple flesh and white peach aromas touched with a little minerality. Still clearly the nose of a young Riesling. Surprisingly, the palate was showing very nicely after an hour or so in the decanter though. There was a soft, melting balance framing nicely fleshy flavours of white peach and apples with a nice bite of lemon sherbet running behind. This had a really round, early-drinking feel to it, and yet there was also the lovely clarity and cut that I love in Schloss Lieser’s Mosels. Very nice. It was sweet enough to pair beautifully with some Roquefort cheese towards the end of the dinner, yet fresh and lively enough to go with most of the earlier seafood based courses as well. Good young, but give it a few years and it should be even better as some of the nascent minerality and extract that was just about showing on the back palate starts coming to the fore. (92 pts.) -
2004 Domaine du Pégaü Châteauneuf-du-Pape Cuvée Réservée - France, Rhône, Southern Rhône, Châteauneuf-du-Pape
Very nice. This was quite a bit better than the last bottle we had barely a few months ago. For one thing, there was not an ounce of Bretty funk on this - the nose was all dark cherries and ripe berries, then dried earth and mineral and spice, all garlanded with sweet, fragrant scents of garrigue and wild flowers. The palate was very tight at first, all iron and blood and clean, but indistinct dark fruit notes. It opened up very nicely over a few hours in the decanter though. The fruit really filled in with a lovely pure expression of cherries and red berries, almost cranberry, laced with a lovely clean acidity that have the wine such a lovely sense of definition and clarity. There were wonderful complexities wafting out amidst the fruit as well, with gentle drifts of earth and meat, spice and wild garrigue, and a lovely rivulet of iron mineral suffused through the whole thing. Really, really nice. Good finish too, neat and compact, yet with a subtly fresh length, it trailed of with a little Provencal kiss of fruit peel and fresh herb. There was still some tightness in the fruit and a little chew of firm structure from the wine’s fine tannins and bright acidity, but this was otherwise drinking quite pleasantly. I would easily give this 5-6 years more before it hits peak though, perhaps even more. (93 pts.)
Posted from CellarTracker