casual dinner with friends

Jordan, Steve, Torsten and I met up at Le Titi for what turned out to be another great dinner of high class wine and food. I knew that the wines would be good, and it lived up to it

• 1995 Arrowood Cabernet Sauvignon Réserve Spéciale 92 Points

  USA, California, Sonoma County

  nose: a wonderfully rich nose of black cherries, red and black fruits, with pine tones and drops of cassis interspersed to add extra complexity. A wonderful showing of what california cabernet can be with a bit of age on it as its not showing its age, but showing the depth that sideways time can bring to a wine on the nose
  
  taste: beautiful rich fruit flavors of cassis, black cherry, red fruits, and slight hints of oak poking through to give the california pedigree
  
  overall: a really beautiful wine with serious class and elegance that I just love from cabernet with age. While not in that high class elegance area, this was just pure silk and enjoyment in a glass with a beautiful attack of black fruits and a silky finish of black cherries

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• 1992 Dominus Estate Napanook Vineyard 94 Points

  USA, California, Napa Valley

  nose: very rich nose of black fruits with somke tones, mint, cassis, red cherries, along with bits of roasted herbs that start to poke through. A very deep nose that is very young at the same time
  
  taste: very deep with tones of black fruits, cassis, rockish minerals, roasted herbs, smoke along with some bits of pencil lead on the mid palate that add a tinge of bordeaux to the wine
  
  overall: a wonderful and beautiful wine that still needs more time to shed its baby fat. Its really starting to come into its own with a really deep and sumptuous nose and the flavors just being pure, but melded together with a great black fruit attack and herbal+smokey finish. This is one to buy and just let sleep for more years as it just wonderfull demonstrates what california terroir is about without being overtly fruity or trying to be science project

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• 1986 Dominus Estate 95 Points

  USA, California, Napa Valley

  nose: a very rich and elegant nose of dark cherries, pencil lead, creme de cassis, and cherry liqeur tones. very elegant and long on the nose bringing some serious class that would be confused with a st julien
  
  taste: long and elegant on the palate with tones of rich dark cherries, pencil lead, creme de cassis, along with tones of leather and some liqeur tones
  
  overall: what this wine reminded me of was a top notch old school Ducru Beaucaillou. While the floral elements weren't presant, that class and elegance that they brought certainly was with a lot of length on both the nose and palate. The entire transitions were just seamless and for this bordeaux fan, this really hit the mark for me taking me back to the 80s and 70s ducrus that you can buy. This would make a fun vertical of old school ducru vs old school dominus

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• 1983 E. Guigal Côte-Rôtie Brune et Blonde 90 Points

  France, Rhône, Northern Rhône, Côte-Rôtie

  nose: a bit tired and worn at the begining that took on more weight with air that eluded tones of green olives, tapenade tones, black cherries, with crushed violets tones. Roasted herbs would start to take on hold with additional tones of spices
  
  taste: loads of black pepper tones with olive tapenade, green olives, black cherries, and crushed violet tones
  
  overall: for me, this wine was on the downside(but I didn't revisit it the way I did others). Still, this wine worked wonderfully with the veal chop that was served and was very harmonious with it, and really just re-affirmed my budding love for cote rotie wines

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• 1990 Château de Beaucastel Châteauneuf-du-Pape 95 Points

  France, Rhône, Southern Rhône, Châteauneuf-du-Pape

  nose: this was like a barely tamed animal when it opened up. A big wild streak to this nose(and this would be a theme with this bottle) with beauty at the same time providing tones of exotic red fruits, leather, animal hides, perfumes, along with bits of herbs and spice tones
  
  taste: very exotic with a serious wild streak that is hard to tame with loads of red fruits, leather, animal hides, and herbal tones. This makes me say, ooohhhh what a rush ala 80s era Road Warriors
  
  overall: This bottle had a serious wild streak to it that was hard to tame. Lots of exotics that existed in this bottle that is hard to fully explain in either written words or in spoken words. This was a very interesting bottle that lead you on an adventure, but didn't take me to that next intellectual level that the last 90 I had did. The exotic red fruit attack presented so many interesting flavors, and the animalistic finish was gripping, but it was almost that this bottle fully needed to be tamed to really get to those heady heights

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• 1982 Domaine Jean-Louis Chave Hermitage 96 Points

  France, Rhône, Northern Rhône, Hermitage

  nose: this wine changed so much over the entire evening that it was almost night and day. At first it seemed tired with tones of mushrooms, olive paste, black truffles, pepper tones, gun flint, and mineral tones. When revisited later in the evening, it had turned around and added depth, color, and just more oomph in general with crushed floral tones added, deep tones of mixed berries, leather, along with the tones of black truffles, gun flint, and mineral tones
  
  taste: again, two different wines almost, as the palate earlier on was nice, but it was the nose that made it, but now on the palate integration was paramount with seamless tones of mushrooms, black truffles, crushed flowers, leather, and very deep tones of mixed berries. when this got paired with some chocolate mousse, it became transcendant as you couldn't tell where the wine ended and the food started(and vice-versa)
  
  overall: a tale of two wines, that happened to be the same one. This was jordan's bottle and he had to leave before the final taste got poured, and I felt bad that he missed out like this. Like the last time I had this wine, it was later in the evening where it really showed itself, and it just became nothing but a memorable wine that one has to try once(and in my lucky case, now twice) in their life. Its this wine that has me almost jaded towards other Rhone wines as its just so hard for syrah to be this tremendous. I guess I now have to look forward to the 90 and 61 la Chapelle's. It's just amazing to see how a Hermitage that is two years younger then I am holding up like this, and being this transcendant when given the proper time

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• 1995 Domaine René Engel Grands-Echezeaux 91 Points

  France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, Grands-Echezeaux Grand Cru

  nose: very tightly wound nose at first(and I had opened this bottle up a good 3 hours before pouring) that finally gave way to deep cherry tones, pine forrest, asian spices, hi floral tones, mushrooms, and truffles
  
  taste: very acidic which kills the mid palate(quite frankly I would've guessed this to be a 96 with the acidity if blind) but provides tones of black cherries, asian spices, truffles, and some mushroom tones
  
  overall: I wish to god that I had more bottles of this. Just brutally young, though as it aired, color concentrated towards the center and it picked up more aromatics. Very acidic with a black cherry attack and a truffle based finish, but if you have any of these, wait a good 6-10 years before opening the next one. I'm just hoping that I can get my hands on another 2 so I can compare in the future

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What a first impression of Le Titi. Top notch service with amazing food to go with it. This was on the belt loosening level and the food just kept on being rolled out while we drank to our heart's content. As always, the conversation and people made the dinner as teh wine turned secondary after a while. Good people, good food, good wines, what else can you ask for