Annual birthday WWC hosting. As normal, 1 sparkler, 3 whites, 4 reds, 1 dessert, all presented blind.
Fun to open birth year wines around your birthday, especially when you can do a Bordeaux and Napa side by side. While not a great vintage, this held up well after a few hours and presented as expected. Clean and zero Brett. Great color! Deep ruby with hardly any bricking. Leather, cassis, vanilla pipe tobacco on the nose. Sporting a good bit of dusty red and black fruits (mostly tart raspberries and blackberries), there was a little savory truffle note mixed with an herbal and mocha finish. Still quite grippy. Pretty. — 16 days ago
This rating is just my taste. Not a reflection of the quality of the wine. I generally don’t care for the St Emilion region. The wine is just too austere for me. It’s 22% cab franc. It had a slight puckering dried out character without balance to me. Definitely can tell it’s a well made wine. Perhaps with a strong food pairing this would be a better experience for me but it was a wine I didn’t enjoy drinking. — 3 days ago
Love these wines. Rare to find with some age! 2011 is superb tonight, complexly aromatic wafting layers of dark fruit, olive tapenade, camphor, bacon fat and black truffle. The palate shows excellent density and concentration with balanced acids, melting tannins and a stunningly long finish. Beautiful wine. — 14 hours ago
Deep ruby in color; black cherries, blackberries, and cigar box on the nose; high acidity; high tannins; tastes like black currant, crushed gravel, and a little eucalyptus with a long finish. It needs to decant a bit longer. Very structured, but delicious. After a hyperdecant, and sitting for an hour, the tannins mellowed a little and everything tastes more integrated. I'm taking off 1 point because the eucalyptus is too strong for me, but I still love this wine! Nellie says it's ok. — 5 days ago
This should cellar longer. Maybe another 5 yrs before I try again. Decanted over 3 hrs. Tight in first hour. It needs a lot air now. Many layers and complex fruit. It lingers. Meaty after taste. Dark fruit. Earthy. I liked it very much and look forward to the next one. — a day ago
Daniel M
I was disappointed by the amarone before so I popped up this one to find a great reliable pour for the last evening of our guest and best friend from back home (and yours truly last evening before a day off).
What comes to mind is umami. The nose is full on cedar, cigar box, tar, black currant and soy sauce. The palate is massive, wide, grainy, silky, tannic in the rear with a grain, some chocolate and that umami, meat sauce touch that lingers for a very long moment. Bordeaux grand cru classé like you would like it to be every single time. 🥺 — 6 hours ago