January 1, 2024 - Savoury and delicate. Rose hips, black pepper, a bit of bacon on the nose. A stem-like green edge, too. Light on its feet, fragile, built on crisp acidity, tannin is on the lower side. Real pinosity here, in a feminin way, it’s perfumed, intense and complex yet effortless. Drinks well, too. A great wine.
Read more: https://screwcapped.com/kluch-mcdougall-ranch-pinot-noir-2020/
November 7, 2023 - We drank the bottle over a course of two days. Pretty similar to the past bottles with same core of crunchy cranberry still present. It's a mix of something plush around the edges yet still the core of tartness and some tannin that gives the wine contrast. I remain virtually the only one with notes here on the wine so as always one can take my comments with a grain of salt but I do have multiple bottles open now to date and still think the wine is fighting some within its parts.
March 5, 2023 - 4th bottle since release, and I like this one the best of them. Opened yesterday, enjoying more of it today. There is a lot of ripe flavor in this bottle, and conversely the whole cluster impact that has been a part of a few of the other bottles is just not here. Yeah, I guess there is some in the aromatic, but it's expressing more a smoky graphite right now. And being open for a full day, this seems pretty approachable to me. Plush and round, plummy, blackberry with some cinnamon red hots, which is surprising to me because I know Jamie keeps his Pinot Noir away from new oak. So not sure what to make of that brown spicy note but I like it here. Finishes with a mix of blueberry, that expresses some density, and cranberry. Overall, this seems like an early drinker vintage of McDougall, at least seen through this bottle.
January 12, 2023 - Served blind. This showed some stemminess last night. And I was in conversation and had forgot to take any notes. But, the group felt that the whole cluster was more overt in this bottle. Nothing to retaste today and all I have to show for my glass of it last night is a poor note. :(
November 13, 2022 - Last tasted this in July, when it was a composite sample that Jamie shared with us. So this past weekend, we opened one of the bottles that came in the recent shipment. I really like where this wine is already, a good push of ripeness yet possessing the same red cherry and pomegranate quality from the July composite sample. To me, the cranberry just lingers under the surface to remind you that the wine has some backbone, but then the pomegranate which reminds me a bit of a reduction sauce. Red apple and plum too. The weight here is medium and the wine was best with just a light chill. Like the 2020 Trout Gulch we tasted with it, I do think both wines are showing more open and ready right out of the release chute.
July 10, 2022 - Kutch Verticals--Trout Gulch, McDougall and Falstaff: Vertical (non-blind) of McDougall, 2010 -2021. We did not taste the 2011 (no one owned it) nor 2014 and 2018 (stupid COVID forced the owners to have to miss the tasting) and the 2021 was a tank sample that Jamie pulled for us and shipped down for the tasting (being bottled next week so it's the final composition). This was just offered this week for shipment in the Fall, Jamie sent it down for us to have an early look at the wine. Darkish colored, even a little bloody tone in the aroma. Pomegranate and cranberry with good acid. And as I taste it some more, seems more purple fruit toned, with my notes saying that the black tones comes through like the 2017, yet in the 2020 the balance, depth and power is better. Finishes juicy with a touch of brewed coffee/cocoa on the finish, which I find unusual given the emphasis by Jamie in using old wood on the wine. As I look at my notes this morning, I seem to be kinda all over the place with my descriptors and with nothing to retaste today.
July 9, 2022 - Drank as part of the Kutch vertical with Frank. This is a gorgeous wine picked before the fires so no smoke damage here. This is pure class with big cherry fruit, a long silky finish and a ton of refinement. I loved it and it should drink early with a long drinking window as well.