I rarely comment on what I drink, but this was a special bottle. I was reading an old article in "Wine Spectator" about Gaylon Lawrence, and it made me think about pre-Parkerized California red wine, something that I enjoyed greatly decades ago, prior to Parker's ascendancy. While this bottle had a bad cork, the wine was balanced, fresh, and vibrant. Drinking wonderfully now, with a tobacco-leather aspect, it has years of life left. I decanted the wine, and it was superb after a half hour. Very highly recommended and indicative of what was lost through the influence of Parker's distorted palate.
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Happy New Years treat. Cork was still intact. Decanted a couple hours. It’s mellowed for sure given its age, but happily & luckily still showed it’s blackberry & raspberry, still showed mild tannins. Very easy to drink & enjoy! Cheers to 2021
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Very fruit forward and still some wonderfully classy elements of waves of black and blue fruit, with some soft leather, tobacco, vanilla Oak and cassis. Very smooth but this bottle had almost no sediment and no bricking. It could have been consumed 5 years from now in top form.
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A great Bordeaux blend that is really hitting on all cylinders right now. Black, blue and red fruits, some sweet Oak. An excellent example of the transition from old world style Cali/Bordeaux to the more fruit driven modern style without being overly extracted and still retaining old world charms. 30 second finish.
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Some bricking but largely purple to the core. A ton of sweet black and blue fruits still with a refreshing level of acidity. But mocha and tobacco also are quite pronounced with some sweet Oak in the background. The wine was not quite seemless as the acidity seemed to interrupt the wine, although not disjointed, but this characteristic did take it down a point for me. This bottle clear still had at least a couple quality years left in it.
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6/30/2022 - DavidKehler wrote:
I rarely comment on what I drink, but this was a special bottle. I was reading an old article in "Wine Spectator" about Gaylon Lawrence, and it made me think about pre-Parkerized California red wine, something that I enjoyed greatly decades ago, prior to Parker's ascendancy. While this bottle had a bad cork, the wine was balanced, fresh, and vibrant. Drinking wonderfully now, with a tobacco-leather aspect, it has years of life left. I decanted the wine, and it was superb after a half hour. Very highly recommended and indicative of what was lost through the influence of Parker's distorted palate.
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12/31/2020 - sfcrushaz Likes this wine:
Happy New Years treat. Cork was still intact. Decanted a couple hours. It’s mellowed for sure given its age, but happily & luckily still showed it’s blackberry & raspberry, still showed mild tannins. Very easy to drink & enjoy! Cheers to 2021
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9/24/2016 - mxpbuy Likes this wine: 92 Points
Very fruit forward and still some wonderfully classy elements of waves of black and blue fruit, with some soft leather, tobacco, vanilla Oak and cassis. Very smooth but this bottle had almost no sediment and no bricking. It could have been consumed 5 years from now in top form.
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7/22/2016 - mxpbuy Likes this wine: 93 Points
A great Bordeaux blend that is really hitting on all cylinders right now. Black, blue and red fruits, some sweet Oak. An excellent example of the transition from old world style Cali/Bordeaux to the more fruit driven modern style without being overly extracted and still retaining old world charms. 30 second finish.
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2/17/2016 - mxpbuy Likes this wine: 92 Points
Some bricking but largely purple to the core. A ton of sweet black and blue fruits still with a refreshing level of acidity. But mocha and tobacco also are quite pronounced with some sweet Oak in the background. The wine was not quite seemless as the acidity seemed to interrupt the wine, although not disjointed, but this characteristic did take it down a point for me. This bottle clear still had at least a couple quality years left in it.
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