Community Tasting Note

forceberry wrote:

Friday, January 29, 2016 - From a 0,72-liter bottle. 12,5% alcohol.

Developed and quite dark reddish maroon color with a little bit of translucency. Wonderfully mature nose with complex, savory and slightly oxidative aromas of sour cherries, dry leather, some raisiny tones, a little bit of tobacco, light hints dusty earth and a touch of dry-cured beef. The wine is medium-bodied, dry and crunchy on the palate with very intense, complex and quite tertiary flavors of sour cherries, stony minerality, some smoky tones, a little bit of old leather, light wizened dark fruit tones, a hint of raisiny character and a touch of earth. Overall the wine feels impressively structured even at +40 years of age with its high acidity and still very firm, grippy and relatively unresolved tannins. The savory, mouth-drying finish is very long and powerful with savory flavors of leather, crunchy dark fruits, sour cherry bitterness, some smoky tones, a little bit of beef jerky, a hint of earthy spices and a touch of cigar box.

A very impressive, still very structured and wonderfully complex Brunello that's on its plateau of maturity and has been there for some while. The wine is starting to show some first oxidative signs of old age, so I assume the wine will go nowhere from here but down. It's remarkable how very structured and tightly-knit the wine is for its age, showing more tannins than most Nebbiolos do - even much younger ones. Most likely the structure will never resolve - at least as long as there's some fruit left - so there's no point in trying to wait for the tough structure to soften. Just decant the wine off the deposit and serve with some hearty food that'll tone down the tannins. One of the most impressive Brunelli I've had. An extraordinary wine showing what a great Brunello can be with enough age.

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