TN: 2011 Belle Glos Las Alturus Vineyard Pinot Noir

WINE TALK
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2011 Belle Glos Las Alturus Vineyard Pinot Noir: Santa Lucia Highlands 14.5 ABV. It arrived today and in keeping with our inability to wait, we opened one. Pull tab on the wax removed a ring around the bottle, but the top remained. I’ve only had Joe’s Meomi before and haven’t had an opportunity to try his other wines. I was stunned by the color of the wine. Opaque purple like a heavy Syrah. No discernible nose, (wine is cool at 58 degrees). Wow. Smoky, spicy plum on the first sip with a little heat. After 10 minutes in the glass, there is a nose of crushed black raspberries. Still smoky, spicy plum up front with black raspberry on the mid palate, lengthy finish and heat is gone. Carrie also gets hints of roasted meat, which may be the smokiness I detect. Mouth coating flavors with black raspberry the dominant fruit now at 20 minutes. The acidity is masked by the saturated fruit for the first 20 to 30 seconds then presents itself for the remaining 15 seconds on the finish. Again, I say wow. This is a big wine with weight, strength and beautiful fruit and spice flavors. Well done Joey. [cheers.gif]

The anti-flavor elitists and burg hounds should leave this wine to us uneducated, low class, ignorant people who prefer fruit in wine instead of barnyard, loam and pigsty. neener [stirthepothal.gif]

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At 50 minutes, the wine has a big nose black raspberry and a little earth. The flavors are more balanced and the acidity more prominent. The finish is still long and intriguing with fruit, spice, smoke chasing the acidity. Swish it, squish it or chew it, there’s a lot going on here and each changes the profile of the wine. Yep. This one’s in my wheel house.

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I’ll leave it to Costco, which is where these wines seem to get placed in my neck of the woods. I don’t know who Joe is, but apparently he doesn’t care if this is a club store wine.

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Oh. Joe Wagner. Well, why not sell Caymus and other Wagner stuff to club stores? Apparently, they don’t care.

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Interesting TN. Sounds like this has age potential? Perhaps the flame/toasted oak from the barrell is a little too pronounced (not uncommon for a young wine) giving you that smokiness, and needs to mellow out. What are your thoughts on the early 2011’s from central cali overall?

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I like the '10 from this vineyard as well.

  • 2010 Belle Glos Pinot Noir Las Alturas Vineyard - USA, California, Central Coast, Santa Lucia Highlands (5/29/2012)
    A wine that matches the sexy bottling. I went big on the score for one reason, this is great wine. Very dark color. Great nose of spice, vanilla, and dark fruit compote. The palate is stunning with layers of flavor wrapped with vanilla and a long finish. Tannins are very round, this is drinking beautifully right now, shockingly, for such a young wine. Silky mouthfeel and very femine. (94 pts.)

Posted from CellarTracker

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Haven’t had the 2011 yet, but this is mine from the 2010 as well. I love this stuff! Look forward to trying the 2011.

  • 2010 Belle Glos Pinot Noir Las Alturas Vineyard - USA, California, Central Coast, Santa Lucia Highlands (8/17/2012)
    Deep purple ( forgot how dark this wine is) in color; ripe cherry, vanilla, cream soda on the nose; ripe cherry, ripe raspberry, subtle cola, light tannins and light acidity, medium finish that leaves me wanting more.

This is just a wonderful Pinot. The fruit is extracted in a manner that brings out elaborate layers of fruit and complexity but not in a manner to where this feels overdone. Very enjoyable to drink. (93 pts.)

Posted

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At our Costco they sell a holiday gift set with a bottle of Caymus-Meomi-Conundrum In a wooden box. They also have mags of Caymus special section.

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The last bottle of Conundrum I had tasted like filtered pond water.

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Conundrum changed quite a bit some 6 or 7 years ago and has slowly lost popularity.

I find the Meomi is a softer, feminine pinot, but the 2011 Las Alturus was far from feminine and close to over the top at this young stage.

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Thought I’d check out availability after Jim’s comments and sure enough, right coasters who want the wine can hook up with Wine Library at $34.98. That’s 58 cents over our cost. We only have five bottles left, as the 2 six packs of Clark & Telephone and the other 4 six packs of Las Alturus were sold before arrival.

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I am a fan of the Belle Glos wines as well, but for my money the Clark and Telephone vineyard is the clear winner. I buy the meoimi for the non wine geek crowds.

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Yeah. Saw it here, too. I thought there was also a Mer Soleil in the assortment, but I don’t remember exactly. Treana, maybe? Either way, classy wood box presentation.

For this Pinot style and/or this region, I prefer to focus on Loring, Siduri, Lucia and Roar.

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My neighbor gifted me a bottle of the 2011 Belle Glos Clark & Telephone Vineyard Pinot Noir for Christmas. Like you, I was stunned by the ink-like color of the wine. Like you, it reminded me of a heavy Syrah. Unlike you, I thought the style was execrable…especially for a Pinot Noir. If I had tasted this blind, I would never in a million years have identified the wine as a Pinot Noir. My first 10 guesses would have been “bad Aussie Shiraz.” This was a fat fruit bomb that for my “elitist” taste was undrinkable. Admittedly, I don’t have much experience with pinots from this microclimate or the Santa Maria Valley, but if this is representative I’m not going to waste the effort. I recall the 1977 Sanford & Benedict pinot as a big structured wine, but at least I could recognize it as Pinot Noir. And what’s with the huge red wax “cape”? Is this one-upmanship on Dunn? I didn’t get the sense that this wine had long aging potential anyway, so why put a wax chastity belt on it?

Mind you, as much as I love most styles of Burgundy, I also appreciate and buy other variations on Pinot Noir, mostly from the Santa Cruz Mountains northward up to Oregon. I just didn’t understand what Joe Wagner was doing here, or how this style made any positive statement of what the grape was about. In that regard, it reminded me of some of the wackier experiments David Bruce undertook, like making a dry Riesling at about 17% alcohol. I think Dr. Bruce did that more for fun (like a kid with a chemistry set) than as a commercial proposition, but this particular Belle Glos struck me as the child of a well-thought out business model to commercially exploit the Sideways pinot phenomenon by making a Parkerized hedonistic CdP kind of wine with pinot grapes, and dressing it up like a Dunn cab. To Wagner’s credit, at least he hasn’t priced this too pretentiously. My guess is that his grandfather would not have liked this wine one bit.

So, Randy, long story short: There will be more Belle Glos for you and Carrie to drink and enjoy. I’m throwing my cards in. [wink.gif]

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We love the 2010 Clark and & Telephone. We tried the 2011 and it isn’t as good but we have hope for the other bottles we have. We bought two bottles each of the 2010 Taylor Lane and Las Alturas but haven’t had the opportunity to drink one yet. After reading these reviews, I am looking even more forward to it though.

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I’ve had Belle Glos Las Alturas since 2007 and have some of each year in my cellar. Granted, it is more Syrah-like than Burgundian, but I love it for what it is. Its character is similar to many of the other Santa Lucia Highland cuvees. I do not believe it has much aging potential. My 2007 is over the hill with loss of complexity, balance gone to almost the syrupy side with low acidity, basically what is to be expected in aging any over-ripe grape. The 2008 is still drinking good, but with less intensity and complexity than it had on release. The 2009, 2010, and 2011 are all still wonderful.

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That is a great price from Gary!

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I’m drinking the 2010 B.G. Las Alturus right now. My wife sells it, and I was kind of poo-pooing it when she brought it home. This is now the third time I’ve had it and I think it is excellent. It’s a big wine, no doubt, and I like a lot of Cal pinots. Within that group, I think this one is not feminine but has some nuances, isn’t hot, and is clearly pinot. It might be warm-weather syrah like in body and color but I don’t think I’d mistake this with an Aussie syrah. I’d agree that a burg-elitist shouldn’t bother, this is a different wine. But if one likes more than a few Cal pinots this is a nice wine for a price that is significantly less than many pinots. I do agree that the acid is low, so I wouldn’t count on aging it 10 years, but it should drink fine till five years out. My glass is actually from a bottle opened Sunday and it’s still fine.
Btw, does it really matter that it’s a Wagner product or sold in Costco? My Costco sells first growth bordeaux too, and as a chain they’re by far the largest wine retailer in the country.

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John,

Even taking into account the subjectivity of wine tasting, and appreciating the humility so nicely expressed by Harry Waugh (“Have you ever mistaken a Bordeaux for a Burgundy?” “Not since lunch”), I still stick to my guns in expressing amazement that anyone with experience drinking Pinot Noir could identify the 2011 Clark & Telephone as a Pinot Noir if tasted blind.

BTW, I only made the reference to Wagner because I remember some Pinots that Charlie Wagner made in the 70s, and those were tasty wines that you would know were Pinot Noirs, even the 1976 Special Selection, which was quite extracted for a Wagner wine because of the hot vintage. I assume (perhaps incorrectly) that Joe would know something about his grandfather’s skill at winemaking, and might have given some thought to applying that knowledge when he started Belle Glos.

I must have missed the Costco reference in other posts; I agree that it is irrelevant that Belle Glos is sold there. Given that there appears to be a consensus that the wine is not made for cellaring, the fact that the storage conditions at most Costcos are less than optimal should not overly deter those who like this style of wine.

Cheers,

Harry