Monday night Blinds at Nopa

A fun little exercise in blind tasting at Nopa on a Monday night.

Food: Housemade Cotechino, Green Lentil Salad, Radish and Celery
- rich, fatty, peppery boiled sausage with earthy goodness offset nicely by crunchy, bright salad. Paired nicely with both wines, for different reasons (acidity matching / countering for the Riesling and earthiness / weight matching for the Chinon).

• 2013 Bollig-Lehnert Trittenheimer Altärchen Riesling Flagfish 90 Points

  Germany, Mosel Saar Ruwer

  (First blind)
  
  Visual:
  This is a white wine. It was served very cold (some RS perhaps? - I warmed it a bit before tasting).
  In the glass it is clear, day-bright, pale straw with reflections of green.
  No gas or sediment. Viscosity is moderate minus.
  
  [tasted before nose to check for RS - there was.]
  Off-dry. I got a hint of the moscato-like fruity detergent but I think that may just have been a “whoa! wake up, palate” aroma. I didn’t get it after.
  
  Nose:
  The nose is clean/sound, and youthful. Very light greenness - maybe a light-green dull herbaceousness (pyrazine???) sits on top of low-intensity fruit aromas: underripe melon/melon rind, green apple, pear, grapefruit bitterness. Underneath I got notes of musty furniture, bitter aromas with faint mushroomy earthy reduction. No evidence of oak aging (or large, neutral barrels).
  
  Palate:
  This wine is off-dry (moderate RS) [I need to calibrate - I have no idea where this lies on the sweetness scale.]. Medium body, moderate- alcohol, high acid! Primarily tart green-apple-malic acidity.
  On the palate return flavors of green apple skin, lemon, lemon rind, slight herbaceousness (pyrazines?! I’m not sure!). The finish goes on and on - a three-part perfect harmony of ripe Meyer lemon, tart round green-apple skin acid, and light but insistent sweetness. They last for nearly a minute then diminuendo as one.
  
  Initial conclusions:
  I’m puzzled. The lemon, the RS and the high acid suggest German or Austrian Riesling (RS rules out Alsace, alcohol isn’t high enough for Savennieres, I’m not getting any aromatic descriptors of Chenin from Vouvray). Then again, do I decide to call the “green tone” pyrazines? [here’s where I went wrong. If they are pyrazines, they are super-faint. How likely is it that there’s an off-dry Sauvignon blanc with moderate minus alcohol, ripping acidity, (i.e. a beautiful structure) and diminished-to-no pyrazines? It doesn’t exist. ] Anyhow I just said I was confused, but I thought German Riesling or Sauv Blanc from some weird region. I should have assumed typicity (it is Nopa, after all) and dismissed my “sweet sauv blanc” notion.
  
  LM’s notes:
  1) It’s just off-dry. Not moderate sweet or sweet.
  2) It’s not pyrazine. It’s more of a slight mintiness, dried herbs, herbaciousness.
  3) The reduction I’m smelling - she called it beach ball or shower curtain - is “petrol”.
  The structure and aromatics should get you to Germany or Austria.
  Slight mintiness and more green apple fruit should get you to Mosel. Other regions in Germany are more yellow fruit / stone fruit.
  4) There’s minerality here: Minerality can be lots of things - chalkiness, more of a sensation - tartness, slate/stoniness, or even maybe an iron bloody clay type thing.
  
  Bollig-Lehnert
  2013 Flagfish Riesling - Mosel
  9% Alcohol (Did I notice any alcohol? Why did I go med- vs. low?)
  $16 (steal!)
  
  In summary:
  Underripe melon, slight herbal tinge, reductive/petrol note. off-dry with ripping malic. Finish is drawn-out, pulled by ripe Meyer lemon, green apple acid, and light sweetness. I really liked this wine - the balanced finish and acidity level were super enjoyable.
  
  Score: around 9.

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• 2012 Béatrice et Pascal Lambert Chinon Les Terrasses 83 Points

  France, Loire Valley, Touraine, Chinon

  (second blind).
  This is a red wine.
  Clear, just bright.
  Moderate plus red to a garnet and violet rim. [I went back and forth over deep or opaque. It seemed dark somehow but I cold see my fingers through it. Should have stuck with moderate plus given it was dim in the room.]
  Moderate plus concentration. [I don’t know how this is distinct from color]
  No gas or sediment.
  Moderate minus viscosity.
  
  [Didn’t taste it first - RS is rarer in reds]
  
  Nose:
  The nose is technically faulted. Initial impressions are oxidation (acetaldehyde) and Brett, with a bit of barnyard behind these. Low-intensity fruit tones of slight overripe apple, light savory tamari and forest floor, and dried cherry emerge. No oak evidence - or very little.
  Something verging on tobacco, but it was very faint at first.
  
  Palate:
  This wine is dry. Medium + body, medium + to high alcohol, medium/medium+ acid (seems just medium in the midpalate but goes to more malic tartness on the finish.
  Mid-palate, returning flavors of earth, brett, light savory tamari, light dried cherry, slight meatiness/fleshiness.
  Low tannins.
  Low+ bitterness on the finish.
  No evidence of oak (or very large neutral barrels).
  
  Initial Conclusion:
  Possible Regions and Varietals are:
  GSM Blend: explains the med+ alcohol, fleshiness, and lack of elevated acid. But the color is a bit dark - maybe more syrah? (didn’t get black pepper though). Also it’s oxidative and bretty, which fits Grenache from Chateauneuf du Pape.
  Italy: Can’t see Nebb (acid and tannins aren’t high enough). Can’t see Sangio or Barbera or Brunello (acid isn’t elevated).
  Lebanon: Not Musar: Not enough tamari, dark fruit, cherry (also who pours Musar by the glass? I can’t believe I even considered this.)
  Oxidative… maybe Rioja? (No American Oak).
  
  Final Conclusion:
  This is an Old World wine from a moderate climate. This is a Grenache-syrah-mourvedre blend from France > Chateauneuf-du-Pape, from an older or hotter vintage (I don’t know the vintages in this region… from Bdx maybe 2003/5/9?
  
  Actually… 2012 Chinon?!?!
  
  2012 Beatrice et Pascal Lambert
  Chinon “Les Terrasses”
  13% alcohol
  $19
  
  Turns out I made a reasonable call for my tasting note, but upon retasting, my judgment was super off. It seemed like the wine transformed in the glass, but maybe it was just lack of calibration. Here’s what seemed to happen as I went back after LM told me the wine:
  
  -The nose transformed, expanding into brighter fruit tones, and in one whiff revealing some dark green bellpepper pyrazines (but then not again).
  -The palate transformed. I tasted it again and my mouth dried up with moderate tannins - fine and powdery [remember JoeG’s advice to assess tannins only after the second taste, because they take a while to build up. ]
  -Alcohol seemed to calm down, body seemed leaner, juicier, more red-fruit, more lean structure. Medium- body, medium alcohol, medium/medium+ acid.
  
  LM:
  This has only moderate alcohol.
  Tannins are more than low - they are moderate. Both oak and grape tannins. Fine grained tannins suggests from oak (I need to read up on this. I think it’s a bit more complex).
  Doesn’t get oxidization.
  Notes: dark green pyrazines, plum skins, tobacco.
  [based on these I went Right Bank bdx, because I didn’t get the pyrazines, said more merlot than Cab Franc].
  
  Other theories: I’m recovering from a cold. I didn’t smell any pyrazines on the other Loire CF I tasted. Maybe I lose my pyrazine ability with a stuffed nose.
  
  No sulfites - this wine is probably just falling apart or falling to bottle variation. It’s definitely oxidized.
  
  Summary:
  Initial impressions were all alcohol, acetaldehyde, and Brett. I blinded this as a Ch. du Pape but eventually it seemed to get leaner, tobacco-y, bright dried cherry, slight green tone (very faint for me). Very surprised by the earthiness on this Chinon. Acetaldehyde blew off after a while and it was really lovely. That said, I wonder if it would be better if they'd used sulfites. 2012 and already falling apart!
  
  It wasn't unenjoyable, but I probably wouldn't order it.
  
  Score: between 8 and 8.5.

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I think my detail is pretty good, though I needed to refer to notes to work through the whole grid. My calibration is definitely a bit poor (solution is probably more non-blind tasting). Also I have no theory for Riesling regions.