Ridge Monte Bello Dinner: 1973-2007
Chez Julie, Menlo Park, California
Tasted Sunday, June 20, 2010 by rjonwine@gmail.com with 1,838 views
Introduction
Ridge is our local Santa Cruz Mountains jewel--making world class Cabernets (and Meritage, the flagship Monte Bello) and beautifully crafted Petite Sirah, Zinfandel and other varietals for over 40 years. And they somehow pull it off even with American oak! I became a Monte Bello collector when I moved to the area four years ago, and I always enjoy the annual tastings of the Monte Bello components and final assemblage up at Monte Bello. So someone suggested, at the last Ridge Monte Bello assemblage tasting, that we do a vertical Monte Bello dinner. Julie graciously offered her place, and we did the food pot luck. The company was a sure fire hit, the food was very good, and most of the Monte Bellos showed well, although I've had better bottles of some of these vintages on other occasions. I do think of this as the night of reduction, because the '99 Monte Bello Chardonnay we started with was frightfully reductive, and the '83 Guiraud we ended with was also terribly reductive (much more so than lovely bottles I've had of the '83 in the past). Nonetheless, we lovers of Ridge were together, the Monte Bellos showed pretty well, and it was fascinating to compare vintages and weigh the impact of the cepages of different years, especially with major Santa Cruz Mountain geeks like Wes and Dave on hand.
My WOTN was the '07 Monte Bello, which I think is going to be a truly classic MB with 10 or so years in the cellar, followed by the '06, '01, '97 and '84. Our oldest, the '73, was, unfortunately DOA. For more specific comments on the flights, see below.
Flight 1 - Bubbly starter (1 Note)
With sausages and Padron Chilies to start
Flight 2 - Ridge Chard (1 Note)
This was a reductive wine. Probably the most sulfurous and reductive California wine I've ever tasted. I see that Jancis Robinison noted the high level of reduction when she tasted it in '09. I don't know what went wrong here, maybe someone slipped with the bag of SO2 for this batch, but it was not good. Beginning of the "Night of Reduction."
Flight 3 - Mature Monte Bello Flight (4 Notes)
The '84 easily took this flight. The '73 had a scary looking, soaked cork, and smelled oxidized and maderized as soon as we opened it. The '83 SCM Cabernet is declassified Monte Bello fruit from a rough year in the Santa Cruz Mountains when grapes up to Monte Bello standards weren't achieved. According to a February 1999 New York Times interview, winemaker Paul Draper explained: "We sent the [1983] wine to our mail order customers as Monte Bello, then decided it didn't live up to the standard we set for that wine. So we gave the rest of the vintage the name of our second wine, Santa Cruz Mountains. Then we wrote, to the mail order customers and told them that if they'd send back the wine labeled Monte Bello, we'd send them two cases of the same wine labeled Santa Cruz Mountains. Most did, but a few figured that the bottles labeled Monte Bello would be worth something one day, so they hung on to them. The '83 you have today is Santa Cruz, formerly Monte Bello."
The '84 was youthful, has decades more to go, and hit all the right notes, even though it wasn't the absolute best bottle of '84 I've tasted. It also contained the most Cabernet Sauvignon of any of the Monte Bellos we were to sample that night.
Flight 4 - 2nd Monte Bello Flight (4 Notes)
This was a stronger flight. The '92 and '96 were quite herbal; the '97 and '98 were rich and more blackberry/black fruit oriented. The '98 vintage was a rough one for ripening Cabernet Sauvignon, so this Monte Bello contained more Merlot than usual, and showed a lot of the plummy character one expects from California Merlot. They were all good and should continue to age and put on tertiary flavors and additional complexity.
Flight 5 - Young Monte Bello Flight (3 Notes)
This was the best flight of the night. The '06 showed the best of the few times I've had it. I've been a big fan of the '07 since I first tasted the components, and it continues to be very appealing, even at this young age, but with great structure that should make it a long ager. The '01, which was Ridge's 40th anniversary Monte Bello, is also very strong.
Flight 6 - Rivesaltes & Chocolate (1 Note)
Tom had said he was making a chocolate angel food cake for us, with capuccino ice cream, so I grabbed a sweet wine I though might work with the chocolate. This one did. Rivesaltes, of course, is a vin doux naturel, which is made in all different colors and styles, with everything from Muscat to Grenache Noir, and with or without skin contact. This one was made from Grenache, and was reminiscent of Port, but without quite the alcohol. It is fermented in cement and old barrels, then left outside to literally "weather" the storm of the elements all winter and spring before being bottled and allowed to settle for a year before release.
Flight 7 - Sauternes Finish (2 Notes)
The Suduiraut was easily the wine of the flight, and the best '90 Suduiraut I've tasted. The '83 Guiraud was cursed with reduction, so was nowhere near as good as much less reductive bottles I've tried.
Closing
Many thanks to Julie for hosting us, and everyone for their lovely food and wine contributions.
NV François Diligent Champagne Carte Blanche Brut Rosé 88 Points
France, Champagne
Light medium pink orange color; mineral, orange cream, tangerine nose; tight, mineral, tart tangerine, cream palate; medium finish
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