Community Tasting Note

csimm wrote:

Friday, April 7, 2023 - A few days in Napa with fellow CT'r Cristal2000: A new project by Jack Bittner, with Graeme Macdonald as winemaker, the 2019 001 (double-O[oh]-one) will be the inaugural wine from prime plots on the Ecotone site. Jack was gracious enough to meet us for lunch and bring along a bottle of this gem. It’s hard not to draw parallels to MACDONALD since knowing who is the consulting winemaker here, but the 001 has its own unique personality that I can only guess is an expression of the vineyard and Jack’s deft influence over the farming and ultimate production of the wine. It’s a stately and classically regal wine in the sense that it maintains outstanding poise and frame. The dark, asphalt-laced fruit is elevated and layered by flavors of purple plum skin, menthol, herbs de Provence, and gravel. This thing LOVES air, eating O2 like a 1-year-old in a face-full o’ mayonnaise. Allowing it to breathe is like allowing Elton John to play the piano. Expansiveness and succulence on the palate continues to unfold. The tune starts out unpretentious and austere, and then slowly builds and builds, bridging mineral with fruit, tension with accessibility, frame and body with weight and breadth. The finish is stoooopid long and especially refined.

Some new project is the last thing I need in my life, but gosh darn it if I can’t help but jump on the bandwagon and see what adventures lie around the corner with this wine. I’d feel lucky to be part of it, and recommend aficionados try to snatch this up when it makes its rounds; but of course, I’m shooting myself in the foot with hopes of nabbing a decent allocation by recommending others pile on. So, in that vein, don’t buy it. Forget about it. I’ll take it from here :)

In 5-7 (perhaps more like 10) years, this thing will be on fire. It is a wine for the patient indeed, but not without amazing promise right now with some coaxing. This is my kind of juice all day long and a wine that will likely earn an even higher score (perfect score?) down the road. 97-98+ points.

NOTE #1: It’s worth mentioning that we had the 2018 Abreu Thorevilos a few days later; that wine does share some striking similarities with the 2019 001, especially in the minerality department. The dark and cool asphalt profile of the 001 is akin to the Abreu, if but a bit more restrained and chiseled than the 2018 Thorevilos.

NOTE #2: Also worth mentioning, we had the 2019 Vice Versa Mysterons (Ecotone) a few days later as well (alongside the Abreu). To no surprise, Melka’s take on this site with Vice Versa is stylistically more flashy and opulent by comparison, but again, with a beautiful bead of minerality and black fruit that spoke a similar dialect to the Abreu and 001. The Mysterons is more party-ready than the others, so if you wanted to pop one of the three right now, the Vice Versa would be better suited in that regard.

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