Community Tasting Note

prof b wrote:

Saturday, January 26, 2013 - Dinner with Jean Bernard Grenie of Chateau Angelus organized by Kahns Fine Wines (Seasons 52, Indianapolis): This was served along side the 96 as the other vintage made predominantly of cabernet franc. On the nose this wine revealed plenty of big red fruits (as opposed to the darker fruits of the 96). I detected none of the charcoal, leather, or tobacco I had noticed in the other three vintages of Angelus. The vegetal elements from the cabernet franc were quite clear. A very dry wine with only a moderate finish. It seemed most at my table enjoyed this wine quite a bit, but it was not to my tastes. The hot vintage clearly showed here, and not in the way I'd prefer. Jean Bernard stated the hot vintage was very difficult on the merlot in 2003 while the smaller cabernet franc fruit did not suffer as much, hence the blend for this vintage being mostly cf. He described this as "The California Wine" (which was clearly not a compliment). When pressed he offered that most cannot identify the region this wine hails from when tasted blind and that most guess California. I offered that while it was indeed a fruit-forward wine, it was clearly a quality cabernet franc driven wine with plenty of structure. In my experience, the relative rarity of quality cf wines in California made this an odd blind-tasting guess. St. Emilion seemed a much more likely point of origin to me, though I'd not have been able to distinguish it further.

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