Community Tasting Note

• goldendomer2001 Likes this wine:

  September 2, 2023 - I think this might have been my favorite Outpost experience ever.
  
  Enjoyed over three nights. On pop & pour there was a fabulous minerality that really set this bottle apart from what I've experienced previously acrossseveralvintagesof Outpost's various bottlings. Great depth and balance and a great finish. But also very nimble and lean. No noticeable oak (so I would guess that the regimen included no more than 25% or 30% new). Just fantastic throughout.
  
  I've seen the minerality mentioned in Outpost notes from others over the years, but I had not noticed it myself until now. So perhaps I have had a palate shift? Or maybe the altitude came into play (Taos NM ~7000 ft.)? Whatever the case, so glad I didn't decant and miss this experience, as this came off as much more of a really good right bank Bordeaux than as a California wine. Well above my expectations and quite a surprise.
  
  On night 2 the wine had bulked up considerably. The fruit was full and honestly what I was expecting on night 1. The wine was still excellent and nicely balanced, but the minerality and lean streak I loved so much had left the building.
  
  Night 3 was same as night 2.

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3 Comments

• Mark1npt commented:

  9/6/23, 11:15 AM - Wow! What a great note on this one. I also wonder, how much altitude plays into our perceptions. It always seems to affect how a wine plays out with me, when I'm in the mountains out West.

• goldendomer2001 commented:

  9/9/23, 9:28 AM - Thanks sir. I recall we've talked about altitude before. Even a couple years ago I didn't take it seriously, but as the number of lackluster showings of what should have been great wines started to pile up that changed.. I actually took it into account when choosing bottles for the trip this time. For the most part I chose wines that I didn't think would require serious decanting to show well. This bottle of Immigrant and a '19 RM Panek got the longest treatments of the week. This one just in bottle, and the RM a 2 hour decant.
  
  It worked out well. While I wished that some of them had been better, there were no downright disappointments this trip

• Mark1npt commented:

  9/9/23, 10:49 AM - Good for you! It's tough to judge these things. Normal logic leads you to think that mellower aged wines would be better,but it doesn't play out that way. It appears that young wines that are readily accessible at the pnp are the way to go, not those that need a decant. I recently read a scientific report on that very thing.

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