4/15/2024 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Bronze hue to a pale gold wine. Semi-fine to fine mousse with pear and citrus, chalk and graham. Lot's of depth yet light on the palate. Dry.

4/15/2024 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Loved it. Super reductive, struck match and tart acid implode on your tongue and you cheeks cave in. Citrus and apple come through, and so does a lightly oxidized fino sherry element with candle wick. But the wine does not oxidize all that much before the oille forms and it finishes without O2. So you really get both the oxidation and the reductiveness -- playing with air on both ends of the spectrum. Cool wine. Not for everyone.

3/28/2024 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

This was so damn pretty. Perfume, rose, spice and potpurri, and red fruit on the nose. This dark red, somewhat but not totally, clear wine was gorgeous. Somehow there is a sweetness to the low brix, phenolically rich focused red fruit, including cherry and plum. Also, there's a lovely savory component with spice and herbs from the whole-cluster ferment. There's focused intensity of flavor, a leanness of structure, and evident restraint. So natural. So good. Truly a beautiful wine.

3/14/2024 - misterstarre wrote:

Deep gold color, decent acid, and an unctuous blend of aromatic, slightly off-dry goodness. I thinkits mostly Riesling, pinot gris, and pinot blanc, but there might be some Gewurztraminer in there too. Very versatile. Tastes even better when a hint of spice tempers the sweetness and you get some of the more savory aspects of this wine.

2/18/2024 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Dark, rich red fruit underlined with faint citrus, tar, perfect structure. Low tannin, medium plus acid, such focused, intense fruit despite nothing too ripe or alcoholic going on. It's incredible how they achieve this purity of fruit at this level without too much sugar or alcohol. Marvelous. Drink.

2/9/2024 - misterstarre wrote:

Rich flavored but light bodied red fruit. Cherry Jolly Rancher. Sage. A seductive quality and a pleasure to drink.

2/9/2024 - misterstarre wrote:

All I wanted was some good wine. This didn't work out, but I made a killer Old Fashioned. 4 dashes orange bitters, 8 dashes Angostura bitters, 2/3 oz. simple, 2 oz. Four Roses Single Barrell 100 proof. A drop of luzardo cherry syrup and a cherry. 1 expressed twist of orange.

2/5/2024 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Polished tannins remain austere, but not at all drying. There's cool, dark earth on top of muted strawberry, anise, graphite. I got the impression of Barolo trying to be Pauillac. It is rather acidic, so that plus the tannin made it a great food wine for wagyu and bernaise. Wonderful texture, tense energy that has not yielded to time, great medium plus weight, but the flavors are reserved. It may need time, or its just austere. I think the latter.

2/2/2024 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

I will not attempt to say it better than the note below, which I find very accurate.

1/23/2024 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

This was lovely with largely red fruit, mushroom, earth, and a touch of baking spice. Dark red in color and slightly hazy.

1/19/2024 - misterstarre wrote:

Breathtakingly gorgeous! This wine is built on low sugar, low alcohol, high acid, and you can totally taste the herbs and spice from the whole cluster fermentation. There's a sweetness to the red cherry and ripe strawberry notes, which are intense without any heaviness. It's got some orange rind, sweet red fruit, sage, tomato leaf, and on top of all that, it drinks easy. Showed better across the board over a 2005 Domain Fourrier Gevrey Chambertin Village.

1/15/2024 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

What Jeff said.

12/31/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

This Lafite was not nearly as loud as the vintage, known for its robust and ripe fruit. Its beauty was obvious, but delicate and restrained. It's allure, soft-spoken and effortless. The sensuality of this wine was natural. It's texture was like the smoke from an extinguished candle. It built on itself with each sniff and sip. This has such an elegance.

This wine aged marvellously. My half-bottle (yes, half-bottle) was initially tired for about ten minutes with muted fruit, but no unpleasant cellar funk or surripe anything. Ten minutes later, it was awake. On the nose, this offers hay, fresh tobacco, dark red and black berries, currant, cigar box, and mild spice. The tannins stiffened up a bit and the wine stood upright for the rest of the night, gaining some freshness. Along with the notes from the nose coming through on the palate, there was a touch of game. Dark red color with violet highlights and decent clarity. The nose was arguably the best part. The nose had impact. I drank from a standard glass, but it may as well have been whole cluster pinot from a large-bowled glass. Damn. It was -- much to my pleasure -- the only exuberant element of this wine. The nose showed the personality of a fully expressive wine at peak. The palate had less power, but echoed its complexities while adding notes of charcoal in the back end and finish.

Compared with other 59s, 61s, and 66s I've had, this was the most solid, stable, "middle-aged" of the bunch. It's nowhere near the molasses, pine, and soy sauce notes Bordeaux tends to pick up in geriatrics. This honestly tasted, in terms of style and nearly in terms of age, like a 1990. I'm exaggerating a little, but it feels like there's lots of development ahead, and more tertiary flavors yet to emerge.

12/30/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Taught with acid and abuzz with white flowers and lemon initially, then it developed some body and green apple. It was clean, minerally, and after a day, creamy. What was so special here was adaptability. The wine is quite the chameleon, presenting very different personalities with different foods, none of them, offputting, and each of them showing character.

12/25/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Sensually, this wine is an unqualified home run. The nose is as loud and wild as a Hendrix riff, and it hits you in the face with cherry, rose, orange zest, and feral herbal feedback from all the stem inclusion - the hallmark of this bottle. It’s got a medium body, ripeness, and rusticity, but it is a touch volatile. It did not rise to the level of flaw, but a careful, slow sniff did reveal a lick of solvent under the other aromas.

12/8/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

To begin, this had dried out completely. It was riverbed, iron, and a little graphite and not much else, maybe some mild animale. Then slowly but surely a little cool, dark fruit came out...bruised plum. Then mint emerged, and finally, with about 2 hours of air, we had mature red fruit consisting of plum, prune, and red currant. Once it finished putting itself back together, it was very nice. Softened, but present tannins, a medium body, garnet red turning to orange at the rim. It started austere and never got anywhere close to plush. There was a tar component as well...something toasted or burnt.

12/4/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

This hits like a great Chablis. It's sharp, precise, and tense, and it has a lot of acid, but with some air it took on a light creaminess as the minimal (neutral) oak reigned in some of the aggressive tartness. You can feel the electricity energizing this wine. This wine is loaded with lemon and slate, plus a little lime zest. It is just now transitioning from its early, crisp drinking to a softer, weightier place as it integrates. This wine can go years and years and years. So good.

12/4/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Wow did this ever unfold over a couple of years. This was all that is great about Whitcraft. Purity of fruit. Light in body. Taught and tense. Lean. And lots else going on too. Whereas this was previously very pleasant but a bit one dimensional, it now has a garrigue-chaparral herbal sage component with a full faced aroma. The green element here is not the unpleasant pyrozine of an unruly cab franc, but the much more pleasant hillside shrub variety. The straight line of slightly sweet, tart cherry and strawberry is made complex from the stem inclusion, herbal note, and a pleasant musk. It's distinctly California but its every bit as deft as its terroir driven counterparts in Burgundy. It's medium light in body and driven by acid and fruit. Almost delicate mouthfeel.

12/4/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Concentrated, sweet red fruit including roasted strawberry, is the star of this aromatic wonder. Those flavors are lifted with orange zest and framed by an herbal shrub note that gives a stemmy quality. There's a nice background of fall spice with a hint of clove. There was a dark note of tar in the background. Yet for all the intensity of fruit and complexity of different tastes, this was an elegant focused wine. It had freshness owing to its acidity. The one criticism I have is that the fruit has started to show a little stewed quality. It's subtle, but there's some prune in there.

11/27/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Like a dilute sauternes, loaded with floral notes and orchard fruit with a healthy dose of residual sugar, but also with the acid to give it structure and balance. This is not overwrought gewurztraminer. Floral and sweet, yes, but that acidic spine does wonders for freshness. It's not razor sharp or tart, but nicely balanced to cut the sweetness.

11/26/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Delicious, fruit forward, acid driven beauj. Nice weight to it, too. Love.

11/24/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Classic, bright, with mushroom, earth, and library book. Delicate, medium bodied and resolved with red fruit. Great!

11/11/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

In a perfectly appropriate spot to drink. A more or less classic Mouton, though the volume on the fruit was turned down a bit, it has a wonderful soft elegance, forward graphite, plum, dark berry, and middle-aged tertiary development, including worn leather and bay leaf. There's some cedar and tobacco that comes through towards the mid-palate and beyond. Not an OMG Mouton, but a fine one still.

11/11/2023 - misterstarre wrote:

It was disappointing to smell the faint cork on this, but the bitter tail is what killed my hopes. That aside, I think I can tell you a thing or two about this wine. Beautiful color. There was dark red in the middle with electric fuscia at the rim. Yeah, a vibrant light red to rich dark pink color. I can also tell you that while quite resolved and gentle, this was not a delicate wine, and not particularly elegant. There is a rustic quality, pine forest, nice dark fruit, too. But that bitter cardboard flaw ate up all the flowers, brightness, and library notes that this wine would have loved to show. I'd probably take a risk on another bottle if given the chance.

11/11/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

This had clear, light orange-pink color resting on top of the red-brown sediment. I had this upright for 3 weeks poured the clear wine into a decanter, leaving a third of the bottle with very light sediment kicking up. I carefully poured another glass to decant, and then that glass went in the decanter too. It was a lot of work separating the sediment, but worth it. When this first hit the air, it was sweet, tart, and thin. A younger me would have been disappointed, but this was 1:00 in the afternoon and we wouldn't get to this wine until 9:30. In those several hours, the wine woke up and remembered were it left its fruit and body! Orange zest leapt from the class, and the mouth --very light bodied -- had wonderfully aged sweet cherry, rose petals, volatile orange zest spray, very light tar, and the sweetness of a very ripe tomato. This is overall a very delicate wine now, but if you treat this one with respect, you won't miss the filigreed details.

11/11/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Here it is folks, my first three digit CT score. Not from my beloved Bordeaux. Not an ancient Barolo or an obscenely priced Burg. Hat's off to the dearly departed Chris Whitcraft. I've had this wine two other times. Once flawed and once really good, but not like this. This was one of eight bottles among world class selections, and it ran away with it as WOTN. Hands down the unanimous ass kicker. There were two head-spinning aromas this night: white truffles fresh from Alba and this Whitcraft. This has a head-filling perfume, sweat, sweetness, game, earth, and spice was sexy. I parked my nose in the bowl and breathed. Wow. OK, so details: the nose hits -- HITS -- you in the face with herbacious stem that underlies the aromas and tastes here, inflecting each sip with a stemmy, textured musty herb action. Then come the florals. Pretty rose and lilac notes that get overtaken by fruit and spice. Bing cherry brings acid to this transparant, light textured silky, lifted wine, but there's some roasted strawberry darkening it up, and orange oil on the high end of the register mixing it up with cranberry. Then there's an element of beach tar bringing this thing into completely dynamic territory. The spice is less pronounced and creeps in at the end and then slips away leaving you at the finish the same place where you started -- those funky stems. The sex in a glass thing is a tired cliche. But I'll commit literary sin for this wine. Great sex in a glass.

11/11/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

I love the tartness and the piquant zest I get on this, though not my favorite vintage, lacking some of the oomph and electricity I've gotten in other tastings. Still, just delicious, clean, and intense, even if a little turned down by comparison to, say, the 2015.

11/11/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

This NV was released at some point between 2004 and 2011 based on the label. It had a deep yellow color and evident maturity. This was a big wine with mellowed acid, toast, brioche, and reduction. Better near room temp than with a chill, and the flat glass I had the next day had structure galor and may have been the best glass of the bottle. This bottle was a strong one with a stiff upper lip.

11/11/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Fresh, notes of green apple, lemon, calamantsi, and a bit of biscuit on the tail. Wonderful face filling aroma with the above and a floral note. Great acid and fine, smooth gentle bead.

11/11/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

I love when folks pick on an 'off' vintage of d'Yquem, seemingly forgetting that it still combines, acid, fruit, candy, and volatile weirdness into pure joy. This was pure joy. It is a rich, vibrant orange to light copper color that gives you vinyl as soon as it hits the glass, and then it starts giving you orange zest, orange marmalade, burnt sugar...it's got a creamy texture, but the acid cleans it up nicely and keeps it fresh and zingy. There's a caramelized nut taste in the finish. It's just starting to give off a little barely sugar, but wait several more years for a more expressive note on that front. Absolutely delicious.

10/31/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

I love this wine. It's just so pleasing and easy to love. It's juicy, fruit forward, cool, balanced, and a little minerally. It's not complex or deep, but damn is it delicious. 94 is probably one more point than it deserves, but since I subjectively enjoyed it so much, I don't care about the lack of depth or complexity.

10/30/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

There's wonderfully dark, concentrated berry splashed all over this with tar on a mineral-driven, earthy canvass. This is powerful but not loud. Tannins have lost their early sharpness, but are still quite fresh.

10/29/2023 - misterstarre wrote:

Steady. See previous note.

10/20/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

1995 Williams Selyem Hirsch Vineyard Pinot Noir. Singed orange oil. Bing cherry. Tar. Stem. There’s depth to the fruit, but this is light in body. The wine is fully expressive at this age, and Madeirized fruit is just starting to develop, barely. This is very temperature and air sensitive, and is evolving in the glass dramatically, with occasional dumb periods and then an expressive one. In it’s louder moments, there’s a sort of mild truffle. 30 second finish with aged fruit and light, cut wood. Exquisite!

10/20/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Delish. Took a minute to open, but when it did it had beautiful dense dark fruit and pepper, a bit of leather, medium acidity, and matched up with a grilled ribeye wonderfully. Comparatively light and unripe for CA. Much more Rhone like in style.

9/29/2023 - misterstarre wrote:

This bottle was probably lightly corked, but I'm not all that sensitive to TCA, so I got all the goodness you'd expect with a veneer of bitterness. There was also TCA on the nose but not so much in taste, besides the bitterness. Interestingly, the decanter sat on the table overnight and the next morning after all that air, the wine shed the bitterness and more or less tasted like it should, but oxidized.

10/16/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Green n meaty with dark fruit and softening adolescent tannins.

10/8/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Beautiful dark, clear ruby color and a dynamite nose of red fruit, herbs, hay, and barnyard. When this beauty hits the palate, that nose just unfolds and the volume of flavor on a mid-weight frame expands. There's grip, but nothing harsh. This has an elegant texture, but the flavor is rustic. It's got slate-like minerality, softness, wet haw, evergreen forest, and animal funk. You can go ahead and dive in. It's ready and not holding back, but it's also young and has a lot of time left.

10/6/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

This has integrated oak providing structure but not imparting anything remotely close to vanilla or butter, so no worries with that. High acidity balanced with medium body, citrus, a touch of grass. Below, someone said they noted passionfruit, and I totally get that. The wine is integrated, but not resolved. Plenty of time left. Not yet embarking on a tertiary voyage.

10/2/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

An easy entry on a gentler Les Clos that, while by no means an acid bomb, carries its lemon and limestone on a lighter weight frame for a Grand Cru, given some presence by a not quite creamy creaminess. (Yeah, I'm a real word smith!). This was lovely and had some orchard fruit in the background, a finish with the sea on it, and a nice finesse.

9/30/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

The bright ruby glowed, no sign of age, and the bouquet was strutting as soon as we pulled the cork. This bottle was in excellent shape! Medium bodied with a juicy mouth. The color, nose, and palate were all boisterous, springing to life from the get-go, and only improving with time in the glass. This had dark cherry, orange oil, an herbaceous stem quality, and background baking spice. The wine, while elegant in structure, had a rustic, feral, sexy note. Hallelujah.

9/24/2023 - misterstarre Does not like this wine:

VA on the nose along with ripe cherry, tar, and mint. Higher in alcohol. On the palate, this is mostly voluminous cherry with a menthol hit, some singed flavor, a little pine, and baking spice. Didn't have the deftness for which this producer has become famous.

9/15/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Elegance, restraint, cool fruit, meat, olive paste…and a lot more to come. Note below gets it right, but it’s no crime to open now. West Coast Rotie, if you ask me.

9/4/2023 - misterstarre wrote:

What a disappointment. Great structure. It’s tight. It’s got a somewhat resolved elegance to it. But that’s all it is. It’s structure with wet stone. There’s some iron, some graphite. But that’s it. No fruit. No volume. No rounded corners.

8/31/2023 - misterstarre Does not like this wine:

High toned but heavily oaked. Surripe strawberry and plum on the nose with some clovey action, all of which comes through on the palate, but the fruit hidden under a heavy oak fog that muddles the wine with campfire and seems out of place with the underlying brightness and red fruit. Not balanced. Decent. In it's youth, this must have relied on overpowered fruit and oak to please, but it's out of balance and its faults are showing.

8/28/2023 - misterstarre wrote:

Still making it happen. See prior notes below.

8/21/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Wonderfully juicy, open and fruit forward, yet still in line with the tart, floral, stemmy house style. Perhaps a bit softer and richer and less herbacious than your typical Whitcraft offering. 459 is the plushest of the Whitcraft Pinots. It's intensely fruit driven while still quite light in texture. This is easy enough to drink to quaff, but slow down a bit and you can hear the bees buzzing in the vineyard.

8/18/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Tight, tart, salty, minerally, and reductive. Brilliant.

8/6/2023 - misterstarre Likes this wine:

Salty, electric, biting lime, and so much minerality you'd think there's dissolved schist in the glass. This wine is as much about texture and impact as flavor. The second it hits your tongue, you know that the experience is focused on the terroir, and the winemaking is focused on showcasing every last bit of it. At this age, there's loquat, lime zest, ginger, there's grip like I've only experienced on monumental Haut Brion blancs, and there's zippy acid. On top of what's tart and minerally, there's a complication of age, but it's not the oxidized note of a sherry yet. It's the forerunner to that kind of age -- the nuttiness of a green almond is peaking through. I see that I'm scoring this higher than most. So be it. This wine was better than most. A special wine that makes me think, when I see the 91s and 92s below, lots of y'all are missing something. Damn. Bow down to Thibaud.

7/29/2023 - misterstarre wrote:

Great fill. Gorgeous color. Corked beyond enjoyment. :(