3/6/24, 1:57 PM - I consider the first (primary) phase to be the first few years from release. Typically you get bright fruity flavors and (if applicable) any oak aging influence. With bottle age, the fruit flavors mellow out more and any oak influence integrates to the background. Secondary phase has more balanced fruit, integrated oak (if any) and more earthy flavors. Tertiary phase has little of the bright fruit flavors. The profile switches mainly to earthy, truffle, mushroom notes with any remaining fruit notes (e.g. cherry, currant, etc) in the background. Dead wines are anything that has gone past tertiary and all you're left with are oxidative notes, soy flavors, etc. I use these phases loosely and not tied to any WSET description of winemaking. It's more of a way for me to track the evolution of wine, depending on my drinking preference. Wine can change quite a bit from 20 to 50 year of bottle age, for instance, but lumping it all into bottle age flavors isn't sufficient. I personally find that separating these phases is helpful.
12/12/19, 5:05 PM - I'm curious to know what you think, so please post a note with your experience. I hope you get a couple good bottles as I've found the older My Eden cabs can be fantastic with age. Certainly a more balanced style that retains the earthy character of cabernet, and not the overripe and overoaked style that's more common today. Cheers!
1/5/15, 11:35 AM - The distinction between gran reserva and reserva the months of barrel/bottle age and grape selection but there's huge variability between producers. The Vina Ardanza for instance was aged longer in barrel than the Faustino, and lighter on the palate despite 2005 being perhaps a more fruitier vintage than the 2001 which is concentrated and classic. I think the savvy buyer should be looking at the available quality in the same price point, and differences based on preference/palate.
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