My trip to Napa, Part 3: Tasting at Outpost and dinner at Terra

After an earlier tasting at Pride Mountain the rest of the day was nice but suffered by comparison.

After we left Pride Mountain, we tailed Greg down the incredibly windy roads on Spring Mountain, briefly across the valley and then up Howell Mountain. A few minutes later we arrived at Outpost for a tasting of some recent offerings and some barrel samples with Thomas Rivers Brown, the winemaker.

NOTE: I'm typing in old notes from paper nearly two months later, and only some of the wines have scores. Not sure why I didn't score them all.

• 2002 Outpost Zinfandel Howell Mountain 87 Points

  USA, California, Napa Valley, Howell Mountain

  The nose shows spicy zinberry, blueberry and some heat (16% alcohol). The palate is very spicy and peppery with nice acid and juicy red fruit. This is rather long with nice balance. In the 87-88 point range.

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• 2003 Outpost Zinfandel Howell Mountain 90 Points

  USA, California, Napa Valley, Howell Mountain

  From barrel. A juicy, slightly vegetal and brambly nose. The palate is spicy and tannic with massive structure, brawny and powerful. I liked this a fair amount.

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• 2003 Outpost Cabernet Sauvignon See Clone

  USA, California, Napa Valley, Howell Mountain

  A nose of olive and cassis. Lots of barrel spice from the 100% new oak treatment, moving to black currant. Nothing too moving here.

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• 2002 Outpost Petite Sirah The Other

  USA, California, Napa Valley, Howell Mountain

  Made from Hayne clones. Wow, this has a knockout nose of blueberry. On the palate this has dusky fruit with amazing structure.

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• 2003 Outpost Petite Sirah The Other 93 Points

  USA, California, Napa Valley, Howell Mountain

  From barrel. Wow, this is showing a lot of fresh barrel char, but it has a huge in-your-face nose of stunning fruit. On the palate this is classic iron fist and velvet glove stuff, crushing and powerful yet surprisingly lush. Awesome, 93+.

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• 1998 Outpost Zinfandel Howell Mountain

  USA, California, Napa Valley, Howell Mountain

  An initially strong note of VA blows off to show a spicy, balanced palate featuring red fruit. Nice Zin, somewhat understated.

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After Outpost we were all feeling our energy wane, so we dragged ourselves to Taylor's Refresher for a burger to tide us over before a late dinner. A little nap helped to restore my spirits, and then we were back in action and headed out to dinner at Terra. The food was nice but not quite to the level I was hoping for after hearing folks talk about it. A salad with lots of little crispy, fried shrimp was a nice way to start with a tasty German Riesling. Veal with a pair of somewhat disappointing Cabs was less inspired, but perhaps I was still feeling the burger from several hours earlier?!?

• 2002 Fritz Haag Brauneberger Juffer-Sonnenuhr Riesling Spätlese 89 Points

  Germany, Mosel Saar Ruwer

  AP# 2577 050 7 03. This shows some surprising notes of petrol already. Very soft on entry with light notes of talc, white peach and red currant. With time the acid woke up a LOT, and the acid went from soft to zingy in a matter of minutes.

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• 1995 Abreu Cabernet Sauvignon Madrona Ranch 94 Points

  USA, California, Napa Valley

  My bottle. When we first opened this it screamed of mint, cola, and sasparilla, an amazingly cool nose! On the palate this had seething intensity and was very complex and layered. And then, within a matter of 10 minutes, this shut down HARD! The lavish and complex wine turned into a brooding, structured monster, massive on the palate, barely giving up some cranberry fruit. From this point we chased the memory of what we had tasted at first, and right as we neared the end of the meal the wine started to relent. Beware though, this one clearly needs some more time.

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• 1976 Beaulieu Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon Georges de Latour Private Reserve 88 Points

  USA, California, Napa Valley

  When first opened this was a bit foul smelling with some medicinal aromas. This blew off and showed a bit of mushroom, forest floor, iron, cranberry, mineral and even some lead pencil (although Jason thought it was more like matchstick). This has very nice mouthfeel, almost Pinot like, pure, clean, fairly lively with nice balance. This was a charming older bottle.

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