8/15/2022 - Rjmunoz Likes this wine:

Have any of you received an allocation from Marcassin recently? My last allocation was the 13 Chard.

5/19/2022 - Cailles wrote:

Scarecrow - Complete Vertical 2003-2019 + 2x PNV: Non blind. Not decanted. It is obvious, why Scarecrow has the status it has. This is truly one of the very best Napa wines. A few observations: 1) The absolute highlight in almost all vintages is Scarecrow’s ability to combine aromatic density and intensity with absolute weightlessness. Very, very few Napa Valley wines achieve that kind of weightlessness - other than Harlan, probably no other wine that consistently over the vintages. More recent vintages are of course a touch less weightless (due to their youth) but are as light and airy as any wine in the respective vintage. 2) The wines have a lot of substance with a flavor profile with lots of red berries and floral notes complementing the dark Cabernet fruits, always lots of earthy minerality and some herbs and sensuous, luxurious oaky notes reminding me of Cheval Blanc. 3) While probably Bordeaux-esque for Napa standards in its appearance, it is still distinctively a Napa wine. In the early years, I even found a touch too much ripeness and some alcohol heat in the wines which doesn’t seem to be an issue in the vintages of this decade. 4) These wines all are great to drink, only the structured vintages of 2010, 2013 as well as the 2016 were not really open for business and would have needed decanting. All others showed great right out of the bottle.

TN: We had two ultra-rare (production of 60 bottles per vintage) Premier Napa Valley Scarecrow bottlings side by side. Both show incredible aromatic intensity and density which seems to be a touch above the regular bottling but it is also clear that these wines will require much more time to get to the weightless and absolute elegance which make Scarecrow so great. I would not exclude that the 2012 will rank among the very best Scarecrows once it did shed its baby fat. The 2014, on the other seemed a touch too ripe and bold. 2012: Intense, intoxicating nose full of ripe but not too ripe dark fruit, herbs, crushed rocks, nutty and toasty notes. Yes it is ripe but it is so layered, precise with some singularity to it. Great nose I couldn’t stop smelling, although it is a bit too ripe for my taste. On the palate this is hyper, hyper precise, so layered with blue, black and hints of red fruit, hints of floral aromas, some fine, luxurious toasty notes. This is so packed and so precise but at this point in its evolution it doesn't have the absolute weightlessness the regular bottlings have. It it still absolute weightless in Napa terms, of course, but it will need a few more years to reach the realm of the best Scarecrows, it certainly has the substance, structure and length for it. 96+ pts

Decanting: Not decanted. 2 hours would certainly help.