2019 Ridge Syrah/Grenache/Mataro Lytton Estate
Community Tasting Note
ChateauShiny wrote:
88 Points
Friday, March 11, 2022 - Decanted 90 minutes. Ruby to black in color. Bright spiced blackberry and blueberry nose. Heavy bodied, moderate acidity, dry, tannic, and fruity. Palate of blueberries, currants, blackberries, and cherries. Heavy round tannins. Moderate fruity blueberry and blackberry finish with black pepper and tarragon.
This is fruity and approachable with a decent decant, but the wine seems to be lacking personality. I rather spend the time and decant a bottle of the Lytton Estate Syrah instead of drinking this.
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2 people found this helpful, do you? Yes - No / Report Issue (931 views)
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Comment posted by TheBosWineGuy:
3/12/2022 10:12:00 AM - I agree 100% in regards to the 2019 vintage as it is a whopping 86% Syrah. Past vintages with higher percentages of Grenache were more interesting.
Comment posted by wchrisw:
3/20/2022 8:53:00 AM - Ugh. I have not purchased this yet but was planning to because of the higher percentage of Syrah. I figured it would be more age worthy because of this. I have found the previous vintages to be designed as early drinkers/bistro wines because of the greater amounts of Grenache and Mouvedre. Now I’m confused. I really don’t need these in my cellar but In 10 years it could be a different animal. AND I don’t normally like Ridge Rhône’s on the young side anyway so waiting may be the trick….?
Comment posted by ChateauShiny:
3/20/2022 12:09:00 PM - To be fair, I did open this way too young. If I had to guess, they still made this wine with an early drinking style as previous vintages had despite that much higher Syrah percentage. I think age will help it but I don't think this will develop the aspects of Syrah that I like.
Comment posted by wchrisw:
3/20/2022 1:20:00 PM - I opened the 2009 Lytton Estate Syrah last night and it’s great. Better this morning!! I’m curious if it’s the exact Syrah fruit as the future 2019 Lytton estate syrah will be and they just manipulate it to be an early drinker. I guess so since this is released much, much earlier.
Comment posted by ChateauShiny:
3/20/2022 3:50:00 PM - The Lytton Estate Syrah is a completely different beast from a winemaking perspective.
There are some stronger and cheaper contenders for a fruit forward young drinking Syrah, such as the Bedrock California Syrah, that I would be buying up if this was my stye of wine.
Comment posted by wchrisw:
3/20/2022 4:06:00 PM - This inspired me to open last bottle of the 2014 SGM. Seems there is some pushback on the SGM being too much of an everyday wine. It is simple and easy from my limited experience so perhaps a good reason to discontinue buying it.
Comment posted by ChateauShiny:
3/20/2022 7:14:00 PM - I have no issue with this bottling being an everyday early drinking wine - but it is not priced as such. If this was in the mid 20s, I feel it would be fairly priced. But the ATP member price of 34.20 a bottle is a bit too high for what I got and this is a troubling trend I have seen with the routine Ridge ATP wines. There are just better values from other members of the Rhone Rangers for this style of wine.
And I'll be honest, I did buy the full 6-bottle allocation of the 2017 Syrah after having the 2016 :)