2016 Marjan Simčič Merlot Cru Selection

Community Tasting Notes (3) Avg Score: 89 points

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  4/22/2023 - forceberry wrote: 89 Points

  Made with selected fruit harvested in late September from Berič and Malno, where the average vineyard age is 20-25 years. Fermented spontaneously and macerated with the skins for 3 weeks in 5000-liter oak fermentors. Aged in oak barriques for 42 months. Bottled unfined and unfiltered. 14,5% alcohol. Tasted blind.
  
  Dark and rather opaque black cherry color that turns to lighter ruby red towards the rim. The ripe, sweet-toned nose feels quite like a modern Bordeaux with aromas of juicy blackcurrants and toasty oak tones, some vanilla overtones, a little bit of sweet red plum, light licorice nuances, woody hints of savory oak spice and a yeasty touch reminiscent of bread dough. The overall is very expressive and quite fruit-forward but not overdone. The wine feels ripe, juicy and balanced on the palate with a full body and intense flavors of sweet dark fruits and vanilla oak, some licorice, a little bit of juicy blackcurrant, light meaty notes of umami, a toasty hint of mocha oak and a tart touch of crunchy dark berries. The overall feel is pretty firm and structured, thanks to the rather high acidity and assertive, rather grippy tannins. The finish is ripe, somewhat sweet-toned and moderately grippy with a long aftertaste of ripe dark fruits, some Bordeaux-like blackcurrant tones, a little bit of vanilla, light nuances of licorice, a hint of juicy red plum and a sweet touch of toasty oak spice.
  
  A firm, structured and polished Merlot that comes across as pretty impressive, but also stylistically quite modern and polished. You can taste there is a very stern and serious wine underneath all that oak, but since the wine is quite heavily dominated by sweet notes of vanilla and toasty mocha oak, you really can't make much of nuances in the fruit department. Furthermore, all that toasty oak lends a rather sweet, glossy feel to the flavors, making the wine appear more sweetly-fruited than it actually is. While a good wine in its own right, the wine was just too modern and glossy for my preference, at least for now - hopefully the wine can integrate those oaky tones better with the fruit with additional bottle age. At least the wine feels like it is built for aging, so hopefully it will perform better after another decade or so of aging. Priced somewhat according to its quality at approx. 25-30€.

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  11/27/2022 - LucyEmmerson wrote:

  Bright fruit, blackcurrant, vibrant and fresh, lightly floral, medium bodied, high acid. Low tannins.

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  7/22/2021 - jonathanknowles Likes this wine: 89 Points

  Edi Simcic and Marjan Simcic of Goriska Brda; 7/20/2021-7/22/2021 (Goriska Brda): Blackcurrant, vanilla, liquourice, spicy and quite rich. Medium bodied and juicy, high fruit acid. Tangy finish. Very good.

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