Bordeaux and Beyond

Having missed my dream tasting in June, scheduled in part so that I could attend after traipsing around Southwestern Europe, including BDX, as I couldn’t get air in my lungs, let alone wine down my throat, once said respiration began more or less working again, I began agitating to get the band back together. WBW came up with a theme—BDX from good vintages over $200@—and csimm once again generously put his home, every bit as lovely as you’d expect, at our disposals for the event. While some, notably myself, with a couple of racks of lamb, and dcrutcher, with a delicious cassoulet, kept with the French theme for the food, we also had accompaniments of csimmm and M’s savory pork buns, A_M and T’s luxe wagyu and caviar shooters, bsumoba and K’s beef kabobs, WBW’s Patxi’s pizza and diverse crudités which superbly accompanied the vinified fare. We started at 4, my wife and I left at 10, and csimm and the stragglers popped a Tusk afterward, so this wonderful gathering was much more the marathon than the sprint.

Alas, no one brought a ‘10 Haut Briton Blanc, but we had a great choice of lighter hued bottlings from the other side of France.

• 2013 Louis Roederer Champagne Cristal Brut 96 Points

  France, Champagne

  One of new friend Bryan’s generous contributions to BDX+ night and a great early starter of festivities. I’m more of a champagne liker than lover and cop to less confidence in my notes for it than the major varietals of CA, France and Italy. This was my first brush with this label, and I was looking forward to it, as it seems polarizing in the wine world (something I always love!), probably, I think, because it seems to be such a favorite of people with lots of $ who rarely, if ever, seem to contemplate anything too deeply. This was an entirely different animal than I expected, all taut, lithe, lean and long, with tart citrus, minerality and white flowers leading the way, and nary a hint of the usual brioche-apples-fallen leaves, etc. With a bit of time, there was certainly hints of nuttiness, apples and pears, stone fruit, sweeter citrus and maybe even the faintest flicker of jasmine, but electricity and lift rule the roost here, something to savor, if you don’t want to throw this down straight no chaser, more with oysters and sushi than the dessert carte. Nice, compact effervescence. The beam of acidity in this makes me think that this will last a long time and could improve, but if, for you as for me, angularity in an adult beverage is a compliment rather than an epithet, I won’t accuse you of infanticide (I was going to write this in as a comment to PT’s TN per IRBDW, but he seems to have shut down the comments, as he usually does). Maybe every so often the mindless, entertainment rich really are onto something. 95-96+

  Read 3 Comments / Post a Comment / 3 people found this helpful, do you? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 2019 Armand Heitz Meursault 1er Cru Les Perrières 96 Points

  France, Burgundy, Côte de Beaune, Meursault 1er Cru

  One of A_M’s contributions, all of 3 of which I loved. PnP.On the nose and palate, orchard and stone fruits, rocky minerality, white flowers, lesser notes of white melon and marzipan, all given zip and length with backing of tart citrus. Light to medium gold, medium to full bodied, medium++ acidity. VG+ complexity, excellent persistence and intensity. It’s been a while since I’ve had a White Burg that moved me, but this was bang on, wonderfully combining the fulsome and the taut, the flinty and creamy. Timing wasn’t ideal since, unlike the Cristal and Fevre, which I drank at the start, this came, with A_M and T, in the middle when they arrived. Once open, this seemed to be well appreciated by all or most and was fairly quickly consumed, yet even in the span it was open, it notably deepened and balanced, so that this, while perfectly good in its infancy off the pour, will be around and likely at least incrementally improve in the medium term. Right between 95 and 96, but with the uptick at the end, gets the higher score. 95-96

  Post a Comment / 1 person found this helpful, do you? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 2018 Domaine William Fèvre Chablis Grand Cru Bougros 94 Points

  France, Burgundy, Chablis, Chablis Grand Cru

  One of my contributions to BDX+, picked up from the big box store the day before. I had the sense from others—as well as my own prior Chablis experiences, per the below—that this would need aeration, and indeed it did, tumbling out of the bottle with tart acidity leading lesser notes of river rocks, oyster shell and white flowers around by the nose. After 3 hours of air here, an hour of slow ox in the car, then open again for several hours at csimm’s, this really found its groove, with the acidity dialed down a notch or two and additional notes of green apples and tangerines piping in. This is so clean, pure and fresh. It was a wonderful starter at the tasting, would be splendid accompanying caviar, sushi or oysters, or providing contrast to even bigger reds. An interesting compare-contrast with the Meuersault, it didn’t have that wine’s richness or sophistication, but as refreshment, was hard to beat, hard not to liken it, if placed in a seltzer machine, to the Cristal. While not the WOTN in quality, it was in improvement, making me think that several years more bottle time can elevate this at least a notch or two. I commented in my note for the ‘14 of this cuvée, which is drinking far readier, as you’d expect, at present, about how my father, a lover of all things white from this part of the world, plied me with young, PnP Chablis some 40 years ago when I came back East from the Golden State singing praises of (over) oaked, vanillan and boozy chards, like a concerned parent deprogramming his wayward spawn who’d fallen in with a cult, and like any good cult member, I rebelled, noisily. Well, while you’ll not be seeing my unopened Auberts and Morlets in the garbage bins—at least until I’m deep in my senescence—I’ve at least learned he wasn’t all wrong, either. 93-94+

  Post a Comment / Do you find this review helpful? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 2016 Château Belair-Monange 94 Points

  France, Bordeaux, Libournais, St. Émilion Grand Cru

  Yet another great contribution from our hosts. Unlike most of the other TNs, I found more red than black fruit. My other takeaways: 1) while some booze and vanilla elements are duly noted, they seemed to me, on all but a relative basis for a BDX, pretty light, especially compared to a really screamer in that category, like the ‘19 SQN which finished my evening there, 2) I viewed the acidity as more of a plus than a minus, giving this bottling welcome lift, 3) that said, the elements in this weren’t particularly balanced, let alone integrated, and the fruit-flowers-funk mix of my higher scored RB’ers wasn’t there, perhaps not surprising considering the youth of this bottle compared to them. I don’t know if it gets all the way to the VCCs or Angelus or the CT score, but this is VG+ already with fluctuation in the years to come likely to be solidly to the upside. 94+

  Post a Comment / Do you find this review helpful? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 2010 Château Angélus 97 Points

  France, Bordeaux, Libournais, St. Émilion Grand Cru

  Generously brought to our Grand BDX tasting at csimm’s by Marvin and Henry and was my BDX, Left and Right Bank, WOTN. On the nose and palate, rich ripe (but not overripe) red and black plums, currants, mocha, oak, florals, dark chocolate, wet soil, fig, a bit of the forest with a tar backing. Deep reddish purple, full bodied. Medium+ tannins and acidity, no heat. Excellent complexity, persistence and intensity. Perhaps not a shocker based on vintage, price, reviews and style (a real Napa lover’s BDX) that this would be my BDX winner, but more surprising considering my fairly strong preference in the past for Left over Right Bank wines. Real beauty and gutsiness here, and the relatively rare BDX in my experience just as good on its own as with food, with great savoriness perfectly balancing the slight sweetness. I’m not sure what the decanting ablutions, if any, were here, and as a first time drinker of this bottling and a relative BDX neophyte, my thoughts on this should be taken with the world’s largest grain of salt, but for my palate, this was drinking brilliantly, with the structure complementing but not overshadowing, the fruit unlike many of our other bottles, and with whatever the aeration was, I’d have a hard time not encouraging someone to pop it now, although I’d think it would have a minimum of another decade, perhaps much more, of great drinking ahead, maybe even with some upside. Right there with the ‘09 LaViolette as my all time favorite RB BDX. 96-97+

  Read 5 Comments / Post a Comment / 5 people found this helpful, do you? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 2005 Vieux Château Certan 96 Points

  France, Bordeaux, Libournais, Pomerol

  A generous bring from Bryan and Kamryn to CS’s Grand BDX tasting. On the nose and palate, oodles of funk and wet earth, dried florals, black cherries, currants, cassis and plums, chocolate, tobacco, and green leafiness. Reddish brown, medium-full bodied, thick legs. Medium+ tannins which I found better integrated than several recent writers, medium acidity, no heat. Excellent complexity, VG+ intensity and persistence. Very classic BDX, at least in the mind of this irregular BDX drinker, with a lovely and sophisticated funkiness and savoriness but fruit which was findable without an electron microscope. The spine is strong here, promising a long, and possibly happier life, but for my palate, and without knowing the givers’ decanting hygiene here, this is good to go, with plenty of structure to excel with food, especially our cassoulet and rack of lamb, but also quite great as a standalone. Didn’t have quite the purity of fruit to equal the Angelus on this night for me, but a dead heat with the ‘96 Las Cases for second in the BDX category. 95-96+

  Read 4 Comments / Post a Comment / 1 person found this helpful, do you? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 2010 Vieux Château Certan 95 Points

  France, Bordeaux, Libournais, Pomerol

  Another outstanding bring from Marvin & Henry to BDX fest, and a totally different animal than the ‘05 VCC. On the nose and palate, dark berries, woodiness, exotic spice, chocolate, dark roast coffee, mixed nutsand dark earth. Deep purple, full bodied, thick legs. Robust tannins, medium+ acidity, no heat. Excellent complexity, VG++ persistence and intensity. Far more muscular than the almost feminine ‘05–what a treat to have them both together—this robust wine of large elements hasn’t quite balanced, let alone integrated, but is excellent already, and if the tasting were to be redone in another decade, would be candidate for the top of the medal stand. Even with the structure and fruit still jostling a bit, the bit of sweetness and the powerful savoriness are already playing nice together, and, in a wine geek kinda way, was a pleasure to drink. I think I had this A_M’s sublime wagyu bites, but this holds up just fine on its own, even if it, like all of the BDX we drank, was anything but a cocktail wine. Perhaps not a big shock, but this wine and the Angelus show me that, the fascinating but gristly ‘10 Pavie notwithstanding, some of the best labels of this vintage are un the cusp, if not into, prime time, and a long, happy prime time it will be. 95+

  Post a Comment / 1 person found this helpful, do you? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 2015 Château Figeac

  France, Bordeaux, Libournais, St. Émilion Grand Cru

  One of the contributions of the boundlessly generous csimm. On the nose and palate, notes of mixed spice, earthiness, rocky minerality, a hint of tobacco, traces of black currants, cassis, dark berries, but on the palate, the fruit is almost completely MIA, rolled over by tannins and acidity. I don’t know how long csimm had this open, but it never really evolved. Other than A_M’s recent note indicating the shyness of this—and it did eventually open for him, unlike last night—most other tasters, which includes several people whose tastes I find reliable, seem like they were drinking an entirely different wine. I’m reluctant to make any sort of secular call—this could, after all, just have been an off bottle—but otherwise this wine, which seems to be deeply promising, is slumbering (which, as those who read my TNs know, is an ongoing burr for me with BDX) and not something I’d disturb. Cs, if you read this and it subsequently opens, please report. Score withheld.

  Read 3 Comments / Post a Comment / 2 people found this helpful, do you? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 2019 Château L'Eglise-Clinet

  France, Bordeaux, Libournais, Pomerol

  Brought by Bryan and Kamryn to BDX fest. On the nose and palate, surprisingly vibrant notes of dark florals, dark berries, black cherries, rose petals, forest floor, tobacco, chocolate and a slight citric tang on the back end. Medium to full-bodied, thick legs, quite dark. Medium+ tannins, medium acidity, no heat. VG++ complexity, VG+ intensity and persistence. This was the first wine I had after the Cristal, and, even though it was the youngest wine, it was, counterintuitively, at least to me, the most accessible, at least among the LB BDX, perhaps because Bryan, unlike the rest of us, had the foresight to put it into a decanter. It was also the only bottling of the tasting which I’d not only never had previously but never even heard of, and I was remiss in finding out anything about it prior to the tasting. It was super enjoyable, and perhaps because of the profound floral and chocolate notes, skewed the sweetest of the BDX, (although in that regard, it was a total piker compared to the Materium and SQN), but I moved onto other wines and never revisited. I like to think of myself as a mindful, focused consumer of vinified beverages, which at some level runs head on into having 15-20+ bottles of aspirational wines open at the same time, and of all of the wines at the tasting, I think, I gave this the least consideration, for which, after reading more about this vintage of this bottling, I’m profoundly sorry. I felt like it was a 95+ at the time, but in thinking back, I think that with more thought, it may have been considerably higher, so I’m withholding a numerical score, and just saying that it was excellent, and if I’m lucky enough to have it cross my path again, it will surely have my highest attention.

  Post a Comment / 1 person found this helpful, do you? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 2018 Château Ducru-Beaucaillou

  France, Bordeaux, Médoc, St. Julien

  Brought by M&H to BDX fest. On the nose and palate, gentle notes of red cherries and currants, a dried blackberry and black currant note that comes across as somewhere between scorched earth and mocha, dried flowers and mixed spice bouquet. Medium++ acidity, but more on the medium side on other attributes. This was another wine I tasted at the beginning and didn’t come back to, and in reading pro and CT notes afterward, along with Bryan’s comment on the wine’s relative development during the evening, I’m withholding a formal score. But my summary from my taste is 1) Lighter bodied, with more red fruit and lift than most of the other bodies, and 2) although the fruit was far more present than in the ‘16 bottling, it was still, consistent with limited prior experience with this bottling, subtle. Whether that would lead others to find this elegant or lacking will depend on their perspective. I don’t know if there’s more waiting to come out—I note CT friend Mark’s comment to Bryan that this has become, relatively, more modern since ‘16–or, per my note on the ‘96 which I drank a couple of years ago, if this is destined for what I’d consider perpetual shyness. 92 if scoring, not likely to go down, but also not certain of extent of upside.

  Post a Comment / Do you find this review helpful? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 1996 Château Léoville Las Cases 96 Points

  France, Bordeaux, Médoc, St. Julien

  Brought by the ever generous A_M as one of his 3 outstanding wines (the wagyu beef and caviar didn’t suck, either). On the nose and palate, moderate to light notes of black currants, cherries, cassis and mixed red fruit, dark florals, mixed spice and earthy minerality. Medium to deep ruby, medium bodied, thick legs. Medium+ acidity, medium tannins, well-integrated and fairly silky. VG complexity and persistence, good intensity. I know A_M said that this took some time to come to heel, but by the time he arrived at csimm’s, this was drinking with elegance and sophistication, with notable balance among its elegance. The ever so gentle Yin (12.5%) to the cacophonous Yang of the ringer ‘19 Maybach Materium also in A_M’s bag of tricks, this wine nails its spec and could be the illustration of what I think of a classic LB BDX. I’m not sure I had it with any of our culinary fair, but it has enough acidity on the one hand and gentleness on the other to work with most food, yet its balance makes it outstanding on its own. Held solidly during the several hours it was open making it likely it has many years of quality drinking ahead. Not what I’m in the mood for all the time, but really good stuff for when I would be. 95-96

  Read 3 Comments / Post a Comment / 3 people found this helpful, do you? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 2018 Château Montrose 95 Points

  France, Bordeaux, Médoc, St. Estèphe

  My primary bring to the BDX blowout, bought at the Chateau (well, kinda, when someone asked me, knowing I’d just come back from BDX if I bought it at the Chateau, I said, yeah, Chateau Costco) about 9 months ago. On the nose and palate, graphite, earthy minerality, and the slightest hints of cassis, black cherries, black currants, and tar, and if you waited 48 hours, dark chocolate and tobacco. Medium bodied, thick legs, purple crimson. Medium++ tannins, medium acidity, no heat (as an aside, I smile when I read about wines like this being “big” or “boozy”, as I find this to be about as big and boozy as a Cain 5, even though it admittedly has higher abv). Medium complexity until 48 hours of air when it bumped up its game, VG persistence and intensity. Well, I had some terror when I saw the spec for this tasting, as the only 2 BDXs I had which fit the cost spec, this and a ‘16 Fig (which, based on the ‘15 Fig, may have had the same problem), and if an ‘08 of this bottling I had in BDX seemed largely unready for human consumption, what hope did this have? I opened it at 10 pm the night before, and it was pretty gristly, so I slow oxed it until late morning on the day of the tasting. It was seemingly equally unyielding at that point, so I pulled the cork out, although I opted not to decant, and checked in on it pretty much hourly until departure time at 3, when it still felt like finding fruit, with occasional brief mirages, was like trying to get blood from a stone. I prayed to Dionysus that, during our hour drive to csimm’s that this would open and not humble me in favor of my fellow wine lovers, but alas, it was not to be, even being kept uncorked for 5 hours at the shindig. And then, after another 16 hours of slow ox back at home, the remaining third of the bottle, somehow, some way, not unlike the singing frog on that wonderful Bugs Bunny cartoon, started crooning. Now, I’m not just saying this to provoke the ire of my friends, nor to ensure my place on the invite on a future list by insisting that my quaff was only suitable for going into the cassoulet, but this wine at that point did a lovely job of combining BDX classicism with an almost New World richness. None of the others writing on this wine seem to have had to go through these hijinks, but for those of you scoring at home, this was about 32 hours of slow ox and 8 hours of bottle aeration to come not just to a place of excellence (even if that excellence was well below the 6 97+ pro scores, including a 100), but just basic acceptability. While the equation between bottle age, aeration, slow ox and decanting is devilishly complicated and probably not even in the same proportion from wine to wine, I’d urge all but the most determined to put this in a cool, dark place until self-driving cars, and perhaps jet packs, rule the planet. My rating, needless to say, reflects the last day third and not what preceded, and as nicely as it has come around, I think that there could be upside, perhaps with a lot fewer ablutions and gymnastics. 95+

  Read 5 Comments / Post a Comment / 3 people found this helpful, do you? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 2015 Château Léoville Las Cases 95 Points

  France, Bordeaux, Médoc, St. Julien

  A csimm contribution to BDX fest, all the more welcome to compare-contrast with its 19 year older sibling. On the nose and palate, medium powerful notes of cassis, char, pencil shavings, black cherries, camphor, anise and graphite. Medium to dark purple, medium bodied, full legs. Medium+ tannins, medium acidity, no heat. VG++ complexity, VG intensity and persistence. Impressively open and giving for its relative youthfulness, this was among the more modern of the LB’ers, with a nice mix of sweet and savory, a great complement to the rack of lamb, but also balanced and generous to be really good standalone drinker. Per Bryan’s note and probably where our relative tastes skew more generally, I had a slight preference for the ‘96, which I found a bit more elegant, but this wine, at most at the very start of what should be a 2 decade drinking window, should have a glorious future. Also interesting with the ‘96: the 2 really did taste, and to a slightly lesser extent, smell, to me like siblings, with some obvious non-trivial amount of age between them. No worries about this being puma-pawed by anything, cs, it absolutely held its own, even if I did have a slight preference for the Pomerols for a bit sweeter fruit, florals and that Bordelasian funk. Thanks again for this stellar bottling!

  Post a Comment / Do you find this review helpful? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 2000 Château Léoville Poyferré

  France, Bordeaux, Médoc, St. Julien

  Brought by friend and former colleague dcrutcher to BDX night. Fairly muted nose and even more muted palate of dried dark berries, scorched earth, black currants and a trace of black plums. Medium tannins, light acidity, no heat. This was a head scratcher for me, after loving the ‘10 of this bottling on the trip to BDX in June. Unlike the balled up Montrose and Fig, but more like the seemingly inert ‘16 Ducru, this wine seemed to struggle to find a pulse. I don’t know if it’s in a dumb stage, finito or this was just an unfortunate bottle, but with this wine’s lineage and the quality of this vintage, it’s a mystery I won’t be seeking to solve with my wine spend. Rating withheld.

  Post a Comment / 1 person found this helpful, do you? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 1961 Château Pichon Longueville Comtesse de Lalande 93 Points

  France, Bordeaux, Médoc, Pauillac

  Super fun wine from the year of my birth brought by friend and former law partner dcrutcher to BDX Fest. On the nose and palate, powerful notes of old library books, grandma’s sock drawer, funk, plums, figs, mixed red fruit cocktail and earthy minerality. Medium to dark sherry colored, medium bodied, medium to thick legs. Medium+ acidity, medium tannins, no heat. VG+ complexity, good intensity and persistence. Bryan captures the mood of this wine well. It started as a curiousity piece—after all, how often does a 60+ yo get a chance to taste a wine from the year of his birth (and an excellent vintage at that)?—with fairly low fill, although not unexpectedly so, considering its age, and a cork seeming ready to decompose completely upon contact with any opening contrivance. Well, on the latter point, big props to ever versatile csimm, who so expertly navigated the ah so that the intact removal of this cork, such as it was, might well have been called the Immaculate Deconception. Expectations weren’t exactly stratospheric, but this was a surprisingly elegant if slightly quirky (think the Maggie Smith character on Downton Abbey) but totally drinkable bottle. Contra to my experiences with other 30+ year old bottles, this actually stayed pretty much in one place over the course of several hours of air. At this age, storage hygienics become absolutely essential and even if immaculate, variation becomes meaningful, so smoke them if you’ve got them, but if you do, you’ll likely be in for a treat. 93+

  Read 3 Comments / Post a Comment / 1 person found this helpful, do you? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 2018 Château Pichon Longueville Comtesse de Lalande

  France, Bordeaux, Médoc, Pauillac

  Another generous contribution from our hosts to BDX night. On the nose and palate, medium notes of red and black currants and berries, char, dark florals, earthy minerality, lead pencil and green leafiness. Medium bodied with medium to thick legs. Medium++ acidity, medium tannins no heat. VG+ intensity, VG complexity and persistence. Another bottle I didn’t return to, I remember thinking that this had among the best lift and energy of the wines, was somewhat tight and seemed a totally different animal than its ‘61 kin (I supposed considering the age difference, how could it not be?). I’m withholding a formal numeric score, both because of the one time, small taste, but also, because, like Bryan, I have a memory of this being more red fruit dominant, which seems at odds with what most of the other TNs and pro reviews mention, which makes me question my memory. If scoring, I’d put it in the 93-94+ range, with the thought that there should be good upside in 5-7 years, then excellent drinking for sometime thereafter. Would welcome revisiting this.

  Post a Comment / 1 person found this helpful, do you? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 2016 Château Ducru-Beaucaillou

  France, Bordeaux, Médoc, St. Julien

  Brought by the ever generous A_M and T along with their 3 stone cold winners to BDX night. As mentioned in my note for the far more open business ‘18 of this bottling, other iterations of this have fallen on the wrong side of my just too subtle/where’s the fruit side of my BDX tasting experiences, and this was on the far side of even those. There’s a hint of fruit, mostly tart red berries, but it’s buried (no pun intended) under a mound of earthy minerality, dried flowers and other similar notes giving this a monochromatic feel, kinda like one of my Cain 5s put through a funnel which strained out most of the taste. I tasted this at least twice, over the course of several hours, with similar notes. Totally inconsistent with notes of others here (but not from our group) and critical reviews, which brings up the question of whether this has gone into a dumb phase, was an off bottle or whether all of our collective palates have just been blown out by so much Napa grape juice that we just can’t appreciate anything not dialed up to DEFCON 4. Anyway, I’m withholding a score, and suggesting if you have a bottle, you put it somewhere next to that ‘18 Montrose and break it out for toasting when you buy your first flying car. And if you don’t have a bottle and have the $ for the WS price, buy that ‘16 Pontet and use the remainder for Chipotle takeout for a week. Score withheld.

  Read 1 Comment / Post a Comment / 4 people found this helpful, do you? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 2016 Château Cos d'Estournel

  France, Bordeaux, Médoc, St. Estèphe

  Yet another contribution from our boundlessly generous hosts. I found this more withdrawn than many of the others, as early tastes were dominated by mixed spice, forest floor, camphor, dark florals, a bit of tobacco with light amounts of mixed dark berries and a red currant/raspberry note adding a welcome lift. I’d have found it impossible to put any score on it until my last taste, when the fruit began asserting itself more and really working in tandem with the structure. At that point, this perked up to a 93-94++ for me, but it showed signs that perhaps a couple of hours later, this could have been at least a couple of points higher, and with 5 years or more of additional bottle age, a couple of more points than that. While I had a general feeling that for most of the night, all of the night in some cases, we weren’t seeing these cuvées at their best, this wine, the Montrose and the SQN seemed to be the apogees of that. Score withheld.

  Read 4 Comments / Post a Comment / 5 people found this helpful, do you? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 2019 Maybach Family Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon Materium 97 Points

  USA, California, Napa Valley, Oakville

  Red visitor #1 to BDX night, brought by that sly A_M and T. On the nose and palate, ripe, rich black cherries, currants, all manner of berries and cassis with an almost undetectable red fruit note, rocky minerality, classic Materium char, dark florals, oak, sweet spice and just a touch of booze. Opaquely dark with the characteristics of uncut A&W syrup. Silky, medium tannins, exactly the minimum amount of acidity necessary to make sure this doesn’t trip into Mike Smith territory. VG complexity, tremendous persistence and intensity. With the force of Indiana Jones’s bull whip and the sensory shock and subtlety of blasting The Clash’s White Riot into a weekend of silent contemplation at Spirit Rock, A_M sprung this (I mean, there were twitters of others bringing non-BDX—I brought a Chablis after all—but if A_M was going to bringing a Napa analog, wouldn’t it have been a Mayacamas, Cain, Montelena, Montebello or even a Spottswoode?) into the tasting scrum, and our palates were never the same afterward. I’ve spend untold hours on CT with others telling me that if 1) I like TRB so much, I shouldn’t dislike Mike Smith, or conversely, 2) if I don’t like Mike Smith, then I shouldn’t like TRB, but I do, or I don’t, so there! We all contain multitudes, and my multitude is that this is (just!) on the right side of my divide, delicious, viscous goodness, with fabulous fruit being joined with the minimum RDA of structure to produce a bottling that straddles the border of Napa self-parody, but like Mulholland Dr tripping into yet one more digression but never entirely losing the plot thread, this somehow, some way, for me holds together in a way that most Mike Smith and Kirk Venge wines don’t (on the right side of that divide, I’d also put TRB’S Outpost Trues and most Bevan wines, ex-Ontogeny). I don’t know what A_M’s aeration ablutions, if any, were, and yet, I’m not sure that that, or even a number of years of bottle age, will make a huge difference, either up or down. This doesn’t have the sophistication for me of Ovid, Abreu or said Spottswoode, but its deliciousness is pretty much nonpareil, and as friend csimm might say, if there’s not a place for that in our wine consuming kits for that, then maybe, just maybe, it’s time to stick with said A&W syrup. There’s enough structure here so that it could probably work passably with food, but that really isn’t the point, is it? My co-winner on points with the ‘10 Angelus, but that’s really like saying that my co-favorite dance performers are Missy Copeland and lovely, lissome young lady performing double jointed splits at the local adults only dance emporium. Maybe for all of my plaints, I need to stop worrying and learn to just love, and cop to my love, the local juice. 96-97+, with lots of exclamation points, stars, fireworks, and other regalia.

  Post a Comment / Do you find this review helpful? Yes - No / Report Issue

• 2018 Sine Qua Non Syrah Ziehharmonika

  USA, California, Central Coast

  Ok, so funny and lovely story here. We’re at csimm’s and getting into the late innings of the BDX tasting, and he gives the guys—I mean, we were all there with our wives/partners, but this wine geekdom thing is mostly a Y chromosome thing, with apologies to DQ—one of those pssst things to come down to the wine cellar (and being real here, as one of those people, whom cs mentioned in another TN from this occasion, who has bottles metaphorically, if not literally, under sofas), which is really more of a wine closet, albeit it stuffed with the most wondrous of cuvées, and asks us what we’d like him to pop for us, leaving nothing off the table. While most of us sat there in stupefied awe, Kamryn said something along the lines of “I’ve never really liked Syrah”, which, of course, cs took as a direct challenge, and before you could say Zieharmonika! (Or figure out what a harmonica has to do with a bottle of wine), out came the cork, and I was about to drink my first SQN Syrah (I had a ‘09 Upside Grenache at a memorable wine berserkers dinners many moons ago). Wellllll, no sooner had said cork been removed than this 2’x4’ room stuffed with wine drinking male energy been filled with rich scents of dark berry pie, kalamata olives, garrigue, Asian spice, dark chocolate, violets, bacon fat, frogs, snails, puppy dog tails (sorry, Albert!) and booze, booze, and more booze! This was just drinking waaaay too much like a fortified beverage to score at this point (too much flavor? Maybe we should have mixed a dose of this in with the recalcitrant Montrose, Ducru, Poyfrere?), but unlike, say, the Myriad Crane from last week it’s apparent that, between the structure—there’s very present acidity and slightly less so tannins at this point—and savoriness here, when the alcohol is absorbed, or at least balanced, this will be sublime, so I’m not surprised in any way with csimm’s note that this was already drinking really well 24 hours later. Where it will fall when it integrates better, and I’d put this away for 3-5 years and still expect a decent decant at that point, relative to excellent, and diverse, syrahs I’ve had in the past year of so (the Andremiley, the Saxum Heartstone, the Clarendon Astralis and Ampuis come to mind), I don’t know, but I think it’s clear it will be a 95-98++ point wine, and I hope another taste may find its way toward me then.

  Post a Comment / 2 people found this helpful, do you? Yes - No / Report Issue

This was an extraordinary collection of wines, and my deepest gratitude to all for what they brought. I erred on the side of moderation, and while I had at least small tastes of all of the wines except the Sancerre and the Chenin Blanc, there were several which, both in hindsight and in reading pro reviews and TNs of others, I wish I’d gone back to. All of that said, I was left with several impressions: 1) with the likely exception of the ‘61 Lalande and the mysterious ‘00 LP, these wines were, at most, drinking early in their windows, and several weren’t in, or in a few instances, even close to said windows. If all of these wines had been in as a prime of a position as the ‘96 LC, the ‘05 VCC and the ‘10 Angelus, this would truly have been something to behold. Subject to that proviso, 2) I continue to be left with the feeling, on a secular basis, that, notwithstanding Black Swans like the ‘16 Pontet and nosebleedingly expensive quaffs like the ‘90 Montrose and the ‘00 Latour, and even with my constant caviling, I’d take Napa over BDX, and if price comes into the equation, Tuscany over either (and no, I’m still not on the payroll of the Tuscan Wine Board); 3) While my prior BDX favorites have been from the Left Bank, including the prior weekend’s ‘16 Pontet, which, at a lower price point, topped anything for me in the tasting, today the Right Bank had the close, but clear, advantage, and 4) these shindigs are extraordinary, not only for the joy I get in sharing such memorable wines and food, but for the chance to spend this time with such an interesting, eclectic and lovely group of folks. That said, and speaking just for myself, there’s almost too much good wine to have a considered opinion of everything. I don’t really have an answer for this, and God knows, it’s not as if I want to be left off the invite list the next time one of these comes around, but for readers of my TNs, I’d say take these TNs with more a relative grain of salt than you do my usual ramblings, when I’ve consumed a bottle over 2 or more days, more slowly and often on my own and have more of a chance for quiet consideration. Thanks for reading.