Community Tasting Note

Paul S wrote:

Sunday, May 10, 2020 - Zoom blind tasting #3: Guiseppe Cortese Barbaresco Rabaja vertical (At home): Decent, but not great. This smelt rather mature on first blush, with a touch of funky, oxidative aromas stalking more lifted notes of red cherries and berries, then lot of roses and smoky spice, these patted down on a bed of more savoury earth and meat. Pretty nice though. The palate was still marked by a good bit of tight, slightly powdery tannins and a chew of acidity, but the flavours were starting to get secondary shades too, with some hints of meat and earth, even a dash of balsamic emerging, and then a twist of brambly herb curling around a more vibrant core red cherries and berries. I really liked the finish on this - it was wide, generous and expansive, fanning across the backpalate in a lovely blush of warm, smoky spiciness laced with just a tiny linger of dried rose petals. Overall, there was a sense transparent vibrancy and focused definition on this - usually a mark of Cortese’s wines - but there was also something rather unyielding and not absolutely enjoyable about it. The structure more or less loomed over everything else, while the primary fruit and more secondary flavours were not coming together all that seamlessly at this point of time. A decent wine, quality-wise, but not what I have come to expect from the house. Maybe it has gone to sleep. In any case, this felt like a wine in an awkward phase that really needs to be put away for a good long time. Try again in 6-8 years.

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