Went over to my good buddies house for dinner tonight so I took a trio of wines from 1980 to sample side by side. He and I are both 1980 vintage ourselves, so I thought it would be cool to try these with him.
1980 Franciscan Cabernet - Walnuts, oak, plum, and cassis on the nose. Smelled old, but still kicking. Mid weight on the palate and a decent finish. Cedar notes came through too. Probably the better of the two though it took a few minutes for it to awaken.
1980 Sebastiani Cabernet - Smoke, currant, dried blueberries. Fuller and more round on the palate with some dried herbs too. Dries up on the finish, but still fun to drink.
1980 Smith Woodhouse VP - Cherry, blackberry, hint of alcohol, Plush raspberry and caramel. hanging in very well and showing like a ruby port. Put on some weight with air, but started to fall apart after a couple of hours. Very tasty and the best 1980 VP I have had. Probably the wine of the night.
All in all not a bad evening. None of the wines were amazing, but glad to see they were aging as gracefully as we are!
Have you had the 1980? Or are you referring to newer vintages? I don’t think the newer ones will go 30 years, but you never know.
Also, I’m not familiar enough with franciscan’s history, but this one said Private reserve. So it might have been a special bottling? Or maybe they just put that on every bottle?
Yeah I’m not sure if Private reserve means it is actually a special bottling, or if they just put that on every bottle. Like…Yellow Tail reserve or something.