SAXUM, AGHARTA - (9/20/2010)
My wife and I wanted some hedonistic, non-contemplative wines over the weekend. These fit that bill.
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2005 Saxum Heart Stone Vineyard - USA, California, Central Coast, Paso Robles
Purple in color with some ruby hues. The nose is explosive on this. Lots of black raspberries, black pepper and some grilled meats. Seamless and delicious. The bottle was emptied in no time at all. Yes, there is a good amount of alcohol, but you certainly can’t taste it. In a very good place right now, but has lots of life left. (94 pts.)
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2004 Agharta Wines - USA, California, North Coast
This was much tighter than one a month or so ago (and that was quite tight). On Day 1, it has a very pinpoint nose with plums and leather. Great texture but hugely monolithic. On Day 2, it has expanded a bit. The texture is so good, we keep drinking it, but it is very tightly wound. No more of these for a while from my cellar. (93 pts.)
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I agree with you on both accounts. We opened an Agharta last week and it was showing nicely, but not a lot, after a pop and pour. There was a full glass left in the “Target” Riedel decanter, which just sat on the table until the morning. MY wife wanted to tossit, but I decided to drink it. It had definitely started to blossom and open up. The olengthy wood treatment is there, along with a lot of spice and earthiness, and with assorted red fruit flavors. I need to drink other things and leave the rest of these alone.
As to the Heart Stone, my note from April:
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2005 Saxum Heart Stone Vineyard - USA, California, Central Coast, Paso Robles (4/3/2010)
Still developing, and it deserved more than a pop and pour, but I loved this wine. Very dark in color in the glass. A melange of cherries, raspberries on other dark fruits, with some undefined spice and a meatiness that gives it extra body. This is 44% syrah, 33% grenache and 23% mourvedre and I think the mourvedre gives it that meatyness to add to the fruit and spice of the other two varieties. I drank this wine at the end of an adrenaline-filled 8 hours of preparing for and then conducting a Passover Seder at my Temple for 120 people. I admit that this wine is not for wimps who prefer to search in the bushes to find a bit of flavor, but it was a great wine to drink at the fourth glass that night to end the day. (93 pts.)
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