Wine Type | Vintage Name Variety Locale | Date Posted Score Helpful Comments Comment Date Community Score More... |
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Red |
2014 Giacomo Conterno Barbera d'Alba Vigna Franciamore |
5/23/2019 - AJ72 wrote: 70 pointsSo bad it's not funny. Horribly affected by Brettanomyces and a dead duck. Undrinkable and it was unanimous. |
White - Off-dry |
2005 Zind-Humbrecht Gewurztraminer Goldert Vendange TardiveAlsace Grand Cru Gewürztraminer more |
8/16/2009 - AJ72 wrote: 95 pointsFantastic wine. Excellent texture, soft with good acid drive. Doesn't seem sweet. If it is then its not noticeable. Gorgeous creme brulee and sour fruits lead into an explosion of exotic spices with a balance to die for.
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Red |
2010 Cavallotto Barolo Bricco BoschisNebbiolo more |
8/31/2017 - AJ72 wrote: 86 pointsThis is a polarising wine and I confess being a winemaker for my profession sees me marking this harshly. I really don't like brett but if you don't have a problem with it then this wine may still appeal to you. It's not completely stuffed and has a good deal of fruit underneath it but to me it's been affected too much. Having seen first hand the impact Brett has on wine it's hard to understand why many producers and consumers seem to be so oblivious to it? If you have the right equipment to deal with the issue in the winery you can reduce or avoid getting it altogether. I'm not advocating squeaky clean technically made wines either but Brett is NEVER doing anything good. I see many expensive wines on these pages with Brett issues getting praise heaped upon them (Thierry Allemand etc) and wonder how long it will take the general consumer to start to notice? I can understand as it's not something that easily recognised it's only through years of analysing wine that you begin to see it and then the damage that it does to your own wines. I was once dismissive about colleagues who were "Brettcentric" but there's no turning back after you've seen the light. Maybe ignorance is bliss.
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Red |
1987 Domaine Armand Rousseau Père et Fils Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru Clos St. JacquesPinot Noir more |
9/13/2016 - AJ72 wrote: 98 pointsFrance Soir beauty (South Yarra): I think this is the highest score I've ever given to a premier cru burgundy and today it was the equal of one of the two younger Chambertin's from the same stable it was that good. I would expect given a bit more time the others will score higher but today in this condition this CSJ was nothing short of extraordinary. Surely there isn't another bottle around today which is in this good a condition. When the wine was first poured out in to the glasses even knowing that we had a thirty year old wine in the bracket it was hard to tell which wine of the four was the one with the age, even when you looked closely! Only with a few minutes of air did things become a little more apparent. Out of all the great wines we had today this was probably the most impressive because it looked so young and drank like a beautifully aged wine should. Very reductive initially oozing class out of every pore. Lovely fine bones on the palate and length that goes on forever. I would say this is one of the most perfect thirty year old wines I've ever had and if your bottle is as good as this one you're in for a real treat. Rousseau is the King of Burgundy in my book.
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Red |
2013 Domaine Jamet Côte-RôtieSyrah more |
7/8/2016 - AJ72 wrote: 82 pointsNice wines; 7/8/2016-7/9/2016 (Geelong VIC): One of the riper Jamet's and not better for it. Has some nice elements on the nose, sauvage, spicy and a lifted perfume. The palate is very high toned, sweet fruited and acidic. Unfortunately the balance has been compromised here by either growing conditions or liberal use of acid in the winery. There is a kind of overripe/underripe unpleasant sour like character which makes the wine lean very showy and not much fun to drink. Given the premium commanded here it was again (like the Allemand) a disappointment.
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Red |
1993 Domaine Dujac Clos St. DenisClos St. Denis Grand Cru Pinot Noir more |
8/26/2016 - AJ72 wrote: 91 pointsShowing a good level of maturity. I must confess I've never understood the hype behind Dujac. Sure they're well made and interesting but I don't find myself waxing lyrical about the style which is heavily accented by the stems. In my view stems are like oak, to be used sparingly as a supporting component. If you can see the stems and they're a dominant feature then there's too much. I virtually never buy the Dujac wines purely because I think their house style is dominated by stemmy characters which mask the expression of the fruit. This wine confirms this for me. Don't get me wrong it is a lovely wine, very lithe and supple, certainly Grand Cru Pedigree but after twenty years the stems are still too dominant for my liking and detract from the wine a bit. I'm being a bit picky here but a slightly green element from the stems and the rusticity that has come with maturity is accentuated by the stems for me. I like the wine though as it does show its class and typical of the vintage there is some structure there but it's melted away now showing a finer profile. I always thought the 93's were built to last. Very good maybe better bottles than this one out there.
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White |
2006 Domaine Leflaive Chevalier-MontrachetChevalier-Montrachet Grand Cru Chardonnay more |
7/17/2016 - sjwshiraz wrote: NRSummer 2016. A travesty of a Chevalier. Too fat and lacking definition. Also, the colour is worryingly dark. What is wrong with Leflaive nowadays ?
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Red |
2014 Clos Cibonne Tibouren Côtes de Provence Cuvée Spécialemore |
7/10/2016 - AJ72 wrote: 79 pointsNice wines; 7/8/2016-7/9/2016 (Geelong VIC): The only good thing about this wine is a peekaboo from behind a curtain of Brett which gives an indication of what this wine might have been. I think it would have been pretty enjoyable but for the lick of Brett and a seemingly unresolved primary ferment which has left too much sugar on the table. Between cork, premox and Brett issues I'm finding European wine a minefield to navigate. At least this one was inexpensive
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Red |
2010 Thierry Allemand Cornas ChaillotSyrah more |
7/8/2016 - AJ72 wrote: 84 pointsNice wines; 7/8/2016-7/9/2016 (Geelong VIC): It doesn't give me any pleasure writing this review as it flies in the face of previous comments. This wasn't an off bottle either. This wine is just an example of the damage which can be done when a wine is affected by brettanomyces spoilage. It's not that obvious at first, on the nose anyway, but the pallet is a good indicator. I've had some excellent bottles over the years from Allemand but I think lately they've got an issue.
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Red |
2013 Mount Mary QuintetYarra Valley Red Bordeaux Blend more |
7/9/2016 - AJ72 wrote: 84 pointsNice wines; 7/8/2016-7/9/2016 (Geelong VIC): I normally love these wines but not this one. Very pithy and lacking elegance. Atypical for this producer, a bit astringent and seems quite acidic which further narrows an already lean palate. Not unexpected as it wasn't a great year for the Yarra. See the 2010, 06 or the 04 if you want the real thing.
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Red |
2008 Giacomo Conterno Barolo Cascina FranciaNebbiolo more |
6/12/2015 - AJ72 wrote: 91 pointsA nice wine to be sure but didn't fall in love with it. A nice level of tarry sweet fruits with a raw grape character that slightly detracted from things a bit. As I get older I'm noticing that a bit with Nebbiolo in particular and it's making me less enamored with it. It did follow an awesome bottle of Chave so maybe I'm being a bit unfair? This was a nice but simpler wine and not because it was too young either. This is my favourite producer so expected more but maybe older age is causing a declining interest in the style as it was more of a wrestle than a priviledge.
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White |
2010 Coche-Dury MeursaultChardonnay more |
8/10/2013 - AJ72 wrote: flawedGreat Dinner Wines (Healesville Victoria): First casualty of the night. Not completely gone but definitely a casualty of the cork. Lean too lean. Damn!
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Comment posted by AJ72:
5/24/2019 4:45:00 AM - Hi Andreas
I have thought about this before but at the present time Brett is not considered a fault. If I were to mark it as a fault then a lot of European wines would be faulty. I choose to mark the score down considering the severity of the Brett. This gives an indication to future purchasers of "caveat emptor" when seeing my review. At this stage I am in the minority given that other tasters don't share the same views but with time I believe this won't be the case. We tasted this wine in a tasting and everybody agreed, whether they noticed Brett or not that they didn't like it. I'm a winemaker by profession and believe brett will be the next thing the general consumer will become aware of in time. When this happens much work will be done to minimise the incidence in wine. This will be better for everyone.
At the moment I see at least 50% of all European wines showing at least threshold levels of Brett. This isn't just in the lesser wines but also in the very best. I have seen so many wines having praise lavished on them on this forum because of the label they display. People have said that I don't know what I'm talking about. Without being arrogant I do know. My job gives me an insight that is at the frontline of production.
As far as I'm concerned it's unacceptable that this is going unchecked so I use this forum to try and call it out. Yes it's the sound of one hand clapping at the moment but the wheel will turn.
Comment posted by AJ72:
5/24/2019 2:32:00 PM - It doesn't feel right to me that it should be lumped in the flawed category? That is giving the wine an excuse for being bad like cork taint or poor storage? This would be deceiving as it's actually a problem the producer can address if they choose to do something about it. Flawed is relating to an external event that transpires which is out of the winemakers control after the wine has been bottled in my opinion. At the time of bottling the Conterno Domaine has assessed this wine as being of an acceptable level of quality to release to the public under their label. Therefore the score I give is sending a message that they are choosing to release wine of sub standard quality (in my opinion of course).
I conducted some extensive testing on a 2010 Cavallotto Barolo Bricco Boschis so have a look at my comments which support my analysis.