TN: 2021 Halcon Estate Syrah (USA, California, North Coast, Yorkville Highlands)

I left the Halcon for a week in the fridge corked and the tannin is still unrelenting, structure is crazy.

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Just finished listening to both parts this week. Really interesting stuff and ended up buying a 3-pack afterwards :upside_down_face:

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Really enjoyed Chris’s Pax interview, especially the story of Pax’s separation from Dean & Deluca (and resulting severance) - fascinating and darkly humorous.

Hearing Pax mention Baron Ziegler and the Banshee brand, in the context of a conversation about Halcon, made me realize for the first time that the Halcon label is basically a version of the Banshee label. Impossible to unsee once you see it.

Opened one of my Garagiste Halcons and was not disappointed. Really good stuff and an absolute steal at that price.

I see this for $30 now at K&L Insider price. Looks like they have ~200 bottles.

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Good price to stock up and cellar for 15+ years but damn buying these at $80 must hurt.

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My dummy bf opened one tonight because he was feeling his mid-week whimsy and didn’t believe in my TN. Thank the lords these only cost $30 pre-tax now to restock because the disappointment of tasting only brambles and its stems was galling. All the beef fat and butter in this world couldn’t blast through the wall of puckering tannins.

Hide it actually, bury it in the depths of your cellar. Maybe by the time y’all drink down your wine they will wake up from this long ass shutdown.

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Were they selling at $80? I do not recall seeing much buzz.

The original price pretty much killed the buzz.

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Thanks for the update - PNP or did you give it any air?

Being a big fan of both this vineyard and Pax’s winemaking, I am not surprised to hear that it is ungiving right now. I wouldn’t even touch it for another 5 years, more likely 10.

Fwiw, the 2016 Wilde Farm Halcon is signing right now. Perhaps a bit biased. :wink: Still same vineyard and winemaker if you want a before/after comparison.

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Is that an offer @loren.grossman? I’m in.

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PNP was okay, then I guessed some air really brought out the tannins. This is some Cornas-Côte Brune structure. Let them hibernate.

Also these bottles are pain in the ass to store and hold, I hope producers switch to thin and skinny economical bottles instead, and put the saving into some extra Taransaud or François Frères :zany_face:

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I bought at $50 from K&L and still got salty when they marked down to $30 lol. Can’t imagine the original buyers’ feelings.

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I was an original buyer. if I felt it was too expensive I wouldn’t have bought it. In hindsight, I paid what I paid but when it showed up for 30 bucks in the secondary market, I made a choice not to remain on the mailing list.

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I still have one bottle of the 2014 from BDVIII that I keep meaning to open. Have you had one recently?

I prefer the Halcon Alturas in the 8-12 yr range.

It has softened a bit, added texture and some nicoise olive and grilled game elements I dig - nuance beyond the black fruit, violets and bramble. It is firmly in the window.

Thanks, Loren; I dig those too so will put it in the rotation.

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You can buy a bunch more to average out the cost :zany_face: I think it offers tremendous value at current price.

Popped a 2017 Wilde Farm Halcon last night - very good juice but still a bit young and unruly on night one. Night 2, this is :fire::fire::fire:… I only have 1 bottle left and wish I could follow these over the next 15-20 years.

My note:
3 years since the last. Lovely, although it shows a bit of fine grainy sediment - should have stood this up for a few days before opening. Elegant, evocative nose - crushed black berries, peonies, brushy herbs. Good concentration of black fruit, blackberries, blackcurrant; lively acidity, and still formidable fine-grained tannins that build upon the gums. Plenty of savory interest - green olive, mint and a few drops of angostura - maybe just a touch too much. No trace of brett, this is just old fashioned, high quality cool(ish) climate Syrah. 92

Day 2: Wow - what an overnight transformation! The grainy sediment has sunk to the bottom, leaving a pure, brushy, stemmy purity - my favorite expression of Syrah. Impeccable balance - juicy acidity without any sensation do sourness, purity and transparency to the fruit, a bit of meatiness but more of the civilized side, with enough tannic grip to hold things nice and tight. Still angustura but now without astringency. And the finish just goes on and on - dries roses and cherry chapstick. This is a banger of a wine. 94++

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