2005 Inman Family Pinot Noir Olivet Grange Vineyard - A bit sleepy when first opened but woke up with a few hours of air in the bottle. At this point in its evolution it is still nicely elegant with pretty red fruits but the oak-gloss is a bit too strong for my taste. If the fruit lasts long enough for the oak to settle this will be great. Right now just good in my opinion.
Interesting - I didn’t know she made a Pinot Noir from the Olivet Grange Vineyard - I presumed most of the fruit was for the ‘Endless Crush’ Rose, which many of us (myself included) enjoy.
How are the florals on the wine, if you recall? That’s one of the aspects of Kathleen’s wines that really sets them apart to me. I would have wished for lower abv, but I still come back with the great nose and flavor profiles.
Exactly!
RT
I assume this will settle down, as the 03 and 04 did before it. This drank strikingly well young, too.
Definitely there is a great floral component to these wines. I really dig the vineyard.
Todd, the “Endless Crush” is actually only produced everyother year, and with only about 20% of OGV fruit. The majority of OGV fruit (which is Inman Family’s estate vineyard) goes into the OGV Pinot every year.
Berry, I’ve had the same issue - especially right after opening a bottle, the oak in the '04 & '05 seems to be sticking-out right now. But I have found that just opening the wine and letting it slow-ox (no decanting), seems to do a lot of good to that end. I think the wines may just be at an awkward stage. I did also have a bad experence after decanting an '06 recently - the wine seemed to go completely out of wack, with no real improvement six hours later. After that I resigned myself to never decant Katheen’s wines again - slow-ox and then enjoying the wine over several hours seems to be the ticket.
BTW - nice to see you back on the boards Berry!
For what it’s worth, Kathleen has told me she doesn’t think her wines should be decanted; they don’t show well … and I’ve found that the slow oxygen exposure in bottle works better.