Community Tasting Note

mghomula wrote:

Saturday, January 12, 2019 - While I generally agree with the scoring of this wine by the community, I have some different thoughts on where this wine stands today and perhaps why there is some variation. First, on a wine with this much age (or longer) storage conditions matter and impact the wine tremendously (as many of you know). A bottle subjected to years of UV torture in a wine shop will not show as well as one that has been properly cellar-ed. I have no idea how others stored this wine but that context is helpful to know if the taster cares to share that context. As for my bottles, they have been carefully cared for in a dark, 55* and 70% humidity wine cellar since I received them back in 2010. So, with that as context, here are my tasting notes:

The wine poured a dark garnet, a bit brooding in color really, with some amber edging on the rim. As I poured into the decanter, a pretty wonderful aroma filled the air - dried dark fruits, cedar, tobacco, and baking spice. I took a quick check in taste before decanting for 2 hours. It was SUPER tight, very tannic, average acidity, and not showing much at all. After two hours, on the nose came delightful bursts of black cherry, stewed plums, currant what were slightly beneath the secondary characteristics of leather, cigar box, and damp fertile earth. On the palate it was pretty lush actually. The tannin that was so bracing were now well integrated and there was just enough acidity to give it some brightness. More black cherry with clove, currant and a hint of raspberry again slightly overshadowed by those well aged bordeaux secondary characteristics of tobacco, leather, cigar wrapper and dusty minerals.

Others are right, the fruit is receding and, depending on the storage or bottle variation, may have receded in some bottles. That said, if you are one who enjoys the secondary notes of aged bordeaux, where the fruit is beginning to take a back seat to traditional secondary notes, this is a very nice wine.

It was medium on the finish and certainly not in the class of others with better pedigree but this is a great wine to enjoy, especially if you are trying to keep your hands off other more cellar worthy wines. I do think this has a bit of cellar time left in it, maybe 2-3 years, but I am going to drink my remaining two bottles in the next 12-18 months.

50+4+13+14+8=89

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