2007 Cardinale
Community Tasting Note
JJYoyo Likes this wine:
Saturday, January 29, 2022 - Not going to give this a score since I really have not made up my mind about this. 2 hrs air. Nose is full of dark berries - blackberry, boysenberry - along with tobacco and a little graphite. Palate is extraordinarily dense - so much so that it is easy to dismiss this as a lush but undistinct CA cab. (And the flavor is dense even though it isn’t a particularly big wine at all). That could be a mistake: to me this tasted very Bordeaux - like , St Julien in particular , Leoville-Barton if I have to reach a bit. It has the penetrating depth of a great St Julien but lacks the delineation. I am not at all convinced, given the extreme density of the taste, that this lack of delineation is anything more than just opening it too soon. Now that of course is a big if, because I have had several 2007 Napa cabs, including Dominus, that were really open for business with a little air. 2007 in general has been for me a spectacular success for Napa. Is Cardinale really that backward in 2007? Well, it could just be.
At any rate, I would take a chance and put any of these you had at the back of the cellar for another decade on the off chance that this could be truly spectacular. Because if that pays off, wow.
A day later: plugged up with argon. This wine was more giving of blueberry and light spice than before. Overall a little more focused. Still very dense taste, maybe a matter of the fine grained tannins. Very smooth. Really quite nice. Not a big change from yesterday but just more balanced and focused. Also a little more typical of CA ( to me at least ) than initially. Maybe this just needs a decade of sleep. Ready to score it now.
Score : 93. Relative to expectations: +
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