Community Tasting Note
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forceberry wrote: 84 points
October 25, 2019 - 2006 was a very difficult vintage, but not that much because of the climatic conditions – which were remarkable by themselves, feeling like a never-ending spring with only 10 days of summer weather – but due to the conflict between Hezbollah and Israel. Although it seemed that there wouldn't be any opportunity to do harvest the fruit at all, everybody still carried on normally despite the volatile conditions and fortunately a ceasefire came before the harvest. However, unlike the vintages that normally feel ready to be released after 7 years of aging, this wine was still in shambles in 2013 when the wine was supposed to be released, which is why the winery decided to postpone the release for a year. And then another. And yet another. Finally, the wine was ready for release in the spring of 2017. 14% alcohol. Decanted for a few hours before tasting the wine.
Somewhat translucent and slightly developed dark cherry color with a hint of maroon and a pale, clear rim. Somewhat sweet-toned but otherwise rather mute nose with very little distinction - vague dark fruits and nothing much else. The wine is ripe, full-bodied and somewhat sweet-toned on the palate with quite reticent flavors of cherry marmalade, some sour cherry bitterness, a little bit of raisiny dark fruit and a slightest touch of balsamic VA. The wine is moderately high in acidity with quite soft and gentle tannins. The finish is ripe and quite sweet-toned but also somewhat underwhelming with rather short flavors of wizened black cherries, some earthy tones, a little bit of plummy dark fruit, light smoky tones and an autumnal hint of damp leaves.
A surprisingly reticent and underwhelming effort for a Musar. At first the wine was so mute that almost everybody assumed the wine was corked. However, the wine slowly opened up over the course of the evening and never once exhibited any TCA aromatics, so we chalked up the dumb nature of the wine as bottle variation, which certainly isn't unheard of when it comes to Musar. Nevertheless, it is always possible that the wine was corked so very slightly that the notes of TCA were beneath the threshold of detection, but still enough to mask the fruit. Whatever the case, this was among the least impressive wines in our vertical of Musar 2012-1997 and not really worth the price at 33,40€.4 people found this helpful 4,636 views
2 Comments
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thesternowl commented:
1/27/20, 8:29 AM - Thanks for the note on the 2006. Bummer. Hopefully the next experience is better. I wholeheartedly agree with your opinion on the 2005 BTW.
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Goodwine4ever commented:
1/27/20, 12:52 PM - Still, I think this makes a very special bottle to own due to all those facts. They still found a way to make it even in war time, History.