11/25/2023 - mikemboutiquewines wrote:

Only 99 because we drank it a year or two young. If a 100 point Pauillac & a 100 point Napa had a super child, this would be it!! :)

7/5/2023 - RPerro Likes this wine:

Yep, this is my favorite white wine this summer! Great stuff!

10/16/2021 - dhammer53 wrote:

I purchased this just after I read the NY Times article. For $60, I thought I should have been blown away; and I wasn't. Dinner at Peking Duck House in NYC with wine friends. I'll stick to California and Oregon pinot noirs.

10/30/2020 - dhammer53 wrote:

I have to agree with the others below. This 'young' Carlisle was singing. Really very smooth. Wonderful purple color. A little spice. BBQ lunch in the Catskills with my wife, Janet and Lew. Drink and enjoy or hold. I usually drink Carlisle with some age. I'm glad that I made an exception. I was pleasantly surprise how good this was. Oh, and no acid at all.

8/3/2020 - csimm wrote:

Well, I know I’m gonna get some static for this, but here-goes nuthin’…

For starters, I still sorta dig it. I think. Sorta. But after a few sips, I needed a cigarette. No…rather, a Cigar. There’s a thousand things right with this wine, and a thousand things wrong with it. If you want Big Gulp flavor and a candied blueberry and licorice smoothie full of sweet cocktail hedonism and jammy, ripe…RIPE… gaping fruit, then this debauched loose goose is gonna be your kind of shameless. Plump lusciousness: check. Fruit: check. Saturation: check. Alcohol: CHECK. Acid: …ahem…well… uh, what’s acid? Complexity: eehhhhhhh….. well…I uh… ¼ check? Weird flavor wrestling and open-mouth pass-out drunk frat party fruit: CHECK CHECK.

Let’s be frank, this wine is too much. When you seemingly pick your grapes in early December when there’s a dusting of snow on Mount St. Helena, I guess that’s to be expected. Do I still like it? Ya…kinda, in a teenager at his first real party kind of way I guess. I do grow concerned with its apparent core decentralization of foundational structure and speed (Translation: the heavy gobs of raisiny ripe fruit are imploding on any sense of perceived verve or grip – There’s just fruit and booze, and booze doesn’t really equate to structure). What’s becoming clear is that over the last couple years of sampling (and enjoying) this wine, it is doing what a lot of big ‘ol fruit bombs are doing when they don’t have much to back up their assembly – getting fat. So it’s a Honey Boo Boo when she’s 45 years old kind of wine. And if you’re in the mood for that type of thing (and I’m not mad at anyone who is – we all go there from time to time I suppose), then party-on brutha. Just make sure you don’t have a polygraph exam the next day where you might have to admit to some wacky nonsense you did the night before.

Is it 87 points or 97 points?! I haven't a clue anymore. My last bottle, so I'll let the CT community figure out the particulars on that going forward.

…Now it’s off to a scalding shower to shave the mystery glitter and lacquered hair extensions off and shed myself of the tears of a thousand lost dreams.

6/16/2020 - KenK Likes this wine:

Exactly as others have posted, this is very ripe, nearly port like with big chocolate dollop of oak. Yummy extracted nearly jammy blackberries, dark plum, and Christmas figs. Decadent and full bodied. Tasty warm primary flavors in a plush dense style. Enough structure to keep it reasonably tasty, but clearly an extreme style and nothing shy. At 13 years of age this seems young, a friendly puppy that keeps licking your face.

2/16/2020 - beau11 wrote:

After seeing recent notes i decided to open a bottle against my better judgement. This bottle was in hibernation. Unfortunately i only had 3 hours in a decanter with it. This bottle needs 3-4 years to open up. Tightly bound with heavy tannin. Black cherry and blackberry with dark chocolate and stone on the pallet. Full bodied with mouth coating tannin with a 60 second finish. In contrast to other ccs which are silky, soft and seductive, this wine was very concentrated and tight.

6/7/2019 - Quiet Lion Likes this wine:

Pop and pour. This is singing now right out of the bottle. Intense black fruit floating in sweet acid. Amazing for the low-end offering and it's still very youthful.

12/26/2018 - iamandyc Likes this wine:

An epic Christmas family dinner drinking this 2015 MacDonald and a 2016 Carter The OG. Life is good. Gave this wine a slow ox for 5 hours followed by 5 hour decant and drank over 2 hours. Awesome wine with amazing potential. Still an infant - duh. Seemed to open up the best immediately following the decant and then tightened up again towards the end. Some day I'll figure out how to drink these (besides waiting 15 years) and fully experience them the way I do when Alex serves them!! The entry and mid-palate was phenomenal with walls of deep dark dry fruit, beautiful chalk/minerals, scorched earth, chocolate and tobacco and probably 10 other things I can't describe or remember! The finish was very long and a bit drying since the fine grained tannins dominated. Nose never fully developed. Mouthfeel was velvety and but not at all heavy. Finish improved with steak and later with hazelnut and current dark chocolate. Life is good! This did get beat out on this night by a 2016 Carter The OG which was completely ready for business. My gut tells me the MacDonald may be the better wine (and perhaps perfection) long term but not tonight.

8/19/2018 - dhammer53 wrote:

Some buttery notes. Tiny bubbles that danced in my mouth. Good value for the price. All were pleased. Drank with my family at a birthday celebration brunch. This was my last bottle.

6/8/2017 - odds Likes this wine:

Okay, it took me some time to decide to open this one vs. wait, and it was rewarding. Beautiful (glory, if it makes sense) bright gold color. Long long bubbles. I agree with others' notes on the citrus, spice and honey, which IMHO evolved during the course of the tasting (over few hours). Fresh and refreshing wine. Lots of minerals, floral nose of the orange, spices and lemon/citrus. On the palate (and nose) very nice orange, especially over time. The hazelnut and minerals took again some more time of slow decanting. Think about it as walking through a vineyard in Champagne on a slightly cold spring day, but when the blossom already began. This wine enhances the food and grilled meats. Finish is not only relatively long, but it got longer after an hour or so of slow decanting. I would consider it a reference point BdB for the '06 vintage. I wish I could drink more of it, or more often. It's a pure luxury. It was so enjoyable, and then the bottle was empty. I hope I'd revisit this one in the future.

95+ . It is still at the beginning of the drinking window. I would have given a higher grade, but I have to taste it at least twice before I go into the 96+ scores.

6/10/2016 - odds wrote:

I opened it on June 10th, decanted 2 hours and planned to bring to a tasting. Back to the bottle, close the bottle and to the party--never opened. A week later (6-17), I realized that and opened it at home... finally, it began tasting like I've been expecting. Hence, I guess it should have come with a long long decanting warning. Enjoyable, even very enjoyable in its price range. Nice intro OR PN. Some nice spices opened up that were not there from PnP or even after two hours of decanting. I am not sure how it will stand against other OR PN's but it certainly held better that the initial tasting in December last year. Drank nicely on Sat (6-18) as well ~89

9/6/2015 - odds Likes this wine:

A Dinner with Great Black Cats (Calistoga): A great treat for a weekend. Looking into my previous notes on the wine, I would certainly say it is a consistent 'best in class' representation of the EMH vineyard. A notch or two above. On the nose, very much in line with 'black cat' signature

On the palate, especially as the evening progressed- good representation of its aging potential, spices, vanilla taste. As with the previous times I tasted it, the earthy notes opened later. Drinking it alongside the '01 EMH was a special treat for several reasons: The '01 already shows some of the aging tastes of a great cab, and the '09 SS would certainly over time develop them. At the same time, the '09 SS on the nose it is very floral, and the fruits tastes complimented the selections for dinner very well . It has somewhat more oak notes than the '01, but the '01 does not fall behind (not surprising as the '01 had no new oak). Both of them have a nice 'chocolate' taste in the background that compliments the wine (and does not dominate the palate). A great dinner, a great company, and a great treat to have a special selection for dinner. This is a truly good weekend tasting.

To summarize- I am afraid to put the word terroir again in a note, but I think EMH shows the quality of the vineyard's grounds and detail-oriented work on the vineyard bottle by bottle. There is a continuing line from the '01 through each and every bottle tasted. I do hold the 96 for the third time, thought the '01 EMH gave it a good 'fight'. I wish all cab dinners would have such top notch wines served. I find it hard to think of a better cab in this price range.

(Fair disclosure- both notes were sketched few hours after the tasting)

6/14/2013 - tederf wrote:

Big pinot. Decanted a couple of hours before dinner. Sorry I only bought one of these when we were at the tasting room. Cherry cola, some spice on the finish. Long finish.