November 27, 2020 - End Nov Wine Night @ GWC!: Red fruits, leather, tobacco, slight funk. Was in two minds whether this was an Old or New World cab. Very well made. Glad to see that it is a Diamond Creek as I have been wanting to try this. In its drinking window now - open up! One of my fav for the night.
July 15, 2020 - Napa Tasting (Bistro Cocotte, Haberfield): A little funky and farty initially but this blew off to show ripe plums, a little vanilla and cream, sweet spices and, with time, cassis and and blackcurrant. Medium plus intensity acidity (adjusted or possibly a smidge of VA?), tight, chalky textured tannins close down the palate beating down some muted black and red currant fruit. Bit out of whack for me.
November 10, 2019 - Slight cork taint but this is classic '90's Cab. The big fruit for which they are famous has largely mellowed away, leaving behind tertiary notes of leather backed by subtle fruit and relatively soft structure of tannin and acidity. This is by far and away not the greatest mid-90's Cali Cab I've experienced (try Monte Bello '96) - but very nice nonetheless.
June 24, 2019 - Opened last Saturday with small group at the wine club. Bottle was consumed relatively fast as it was well received. Fruit was a bit muted but nice. Alcohol came in around 12.5%. It's fun when one of these older wines bought on auction works out.
March 2, 2019 - Q1 - 2019 Tasting - 1995 Vintage Napa Valley (NYC): 2nd/16 wines tasted double blind. Color here is more faded and much browner than wine #1. On the palate this tastes faded and dusty to me - past its prime - not a lot of fruit but not much else either. I suspect the bottle was poorly stored.
March 2, 2019 - Q1 2019 Tasting - 1995 Napa (The Apt): Wine #2: I suspect that some of the lack of love here comes from the bottle and how it was stored. This came across as much more faded than either the wine before or the wine after. Fruit almost all gone. So much more of the tobacco and again that almost balsamic quality to it. Wine Bid purchase which generally doesn't bode as well as the location we got the first bottle. That being said, I still foudn it enjoyable. Just more secondary. So it goes. (0 pennies)
December 20, 2018 - A lovely wine.
If Diamond Creek is the only wine which survives the apocalypse, dolphins �� and the space aliens �� from whom they acquire flipper-grips and other key tech will have a good understanding of Cabernet Sauvignon.
July 12, 2016 - Fantastic, nice secondary notes on the nose (including some gamey, pungent notes), palate had some great dark red fruits along with minerals, cedar and maybe a bit of leather, med+ bodied, plenty of flavor and great med-rich velvety mouthfeel, bravo, the team in Hawaii loved it
January 17, 2016 - Still has lots of fruit and smooth as silk. Very good!
December 25, 2015 - no notes but remember this being good, very good... but not outstanding / memorable... still old cali cab is the best bang for buck you can get and in my opinion wins out over bordeaux exept in some rare cases of very very old bordeaux (40's / 50's?) which turn out to be stars