WTN: The Great Sierra Car Crash Tasting (14 wines, mostly Sp

So I rarely have lunch away from desk, but today was too good to pass up. Daniel Posner at Grapes in N. White Plains invited me to join a group of geeks for lunch and a blind tasting, with the only knowledge that it would include the 2005 Sierra Carche. If anyone isn't familiar with this story, this was a "brand" wine that got a very high score from Dr Jay Miller at WA, and subsequently has led to some major disappointment among a lot (though not all) buyers.  There has been some controversy and confusion re lot numbers, production figures, and what the wine actually is.

Lunch was hamburgers for appetizers and steak for main course, a real guy lunch (there was potato salad, vegetables, and cheese too). Lineup was 14 wines (a 15th, the 2005 Pico Madama, was corked). Daniel knew the lineup, but had employees blind the bottles, so single blind for him, for the rest of us it was double blind (though we knew there was at least one 2005 Sierra Carche). About a dozen foks attended, some ITB, a couple consumers who had bought SC, and a few interested observer winegeeks.

As a disclaimer, I don't drink much Spanish wine except some Rioja, so maybe not the best judge.

Flight One - Not an auspicious start

#1 Menthol, slightly weedy, tired. Not good. C-

#2 Grenachey, jammy/hot B-/C+

#3 Porty slightly lifted nose , alcoholic, heavy in mouth but thin flavors C

Ugly flight

Flight Two

#4  Light, cherry fruit, a touch of frizzante at first, some people really hated, I thought  a simple quaffer but not awful B-/C+

#5  Horrible nose, VA meets turpentine meets weedy greenness, really terrible, Kenney (who has had Sierra Carche a number of times)  says "this is it!"  D/F

#6  Ripe, jammy, dark red fruit, sweeter than my preferred style but at least not flawed. B-

Some talk of stoning Dan and raiding the store downstairs for something to drink

Flight Three

#7 Green , some VA/shoe polish, not quite as bad as 5, but similar nose makes us think we found a second Sierra Carche. D

#8 Jammy, sweet, rich, low low acid, a charred oak component. Not my style, but at least not flawed. Actually a bit of a relieft after #5 & 7 B-/B

#9 Muted fruit, a little burnt rubber, I come around to agreeing it's corked.
NR

We're beginning to resemble the villagers in Frankenstein, luckily the upstairs of Grapes is devoid of torches.

Flight Four
#10  A bit of black fruit, a little brett, but comparatively straightforward and not flawed by my standards. C+/B+

#11 OK, I thought #5 was bad, till I tasted this. Burnt rubber and sewagey brett. Horrible wine, we tried to one-up each other with descriptors. "tires leaving skid marks as the car slides off road into the waste pond at the pig farm" was my contribution (Tyler informed me the wastepond is called the "lagoon", I'll use that next time). Fatally flawed wine. F

#12 Red berries, a bit plain but clean, one of my faves of the lunch (admittedly a bit of faint praise). It's a rare tasting where "it's clean" is one of the top superlatives of the event. B

Flight Five

#13 Red fruit, very sweet, but some balancing acids, one of the best of the day (again, faint praise).  I thought this or maybe #12 was an 01 Embruix I expected to be in lineup. B/B-

#14 Hot, disjointed, off nose (I think Adam nails it with"rotting hay." ) C-

Thank God, it's over!

Then we sent in our votes for top 3 faves, and Howard totalled while Daniel unveiled.

#1 2005 Sierra Carche (lot 8114)
#2 2005 Espectacle (Monsant) - Dan says $150
#3  2004 Pico Madama
#4 The Pepper Pot (South Africa) missed vintage, $14
#5 2005 Sierra Carche (lot 8114)
#6 2005 Pasanau (El Vell Coster) Priorat
#7 2005 Sierra Carche (lot 8114)
#8 2005 Mollydooker Carnival of Love
#9 2007 Resalso (Ribera del Duero)
#10 2007 A1 Mouvedre $12
#11  2007 Panarroz (Jumilla)
#12 2008 Oriol (Emporda) $12
#13 2001 Clos Fonta (Priorat)
#14 2005 Sierra Carche (lot 8113)

Vote totals
#2 1 1st Place Vote
#6 1 1st Place Vote, 1 2nd Place Vote, 2 Third Place Votes
#8  4 1st Place Votes, 6 2nd Place Votes, 1 Third Place Votes
#12  4 1st Place Votes, 2 2nd Place Vote, 3 Third Place Votes
#13 2 1st Place Votes, 3 2nd Place Vote, 6 Third Place Votes

OK, so #11 wasn't Sierra Carche (this was a terrible bottle, but a couple of people who know the  Panarroz  said bottle wasn't representative).

I'm surprised that Carnival of Love was one of my top wines, but it was a relief to have something that seemed to be what the winemaker intended.

There may be some 96 point Sierra Carches out there, but these four were sub-80 in my mental conversion

I may not be much of a judge of Spanish wines, and not the biggest fan of grenache etc, but even folks better disposed towards those wines seemed to be in agreement that the Sierra Carches were all terrible, and I didn't hear one person say "I'd buy this" about any of the wines. I could see maybe #12.

I can't say it was my favorite lineup, but the good news was since I was driving and going back to work I had no trouble spitting!

Fun time, nice group, good food, "interesting" wines, good to see some old acquaintances and meet some new people. 


Grade disclaimer: I'm a very easy grader, basically A is an excellent wine, B a good wine, C mediocre. Anything below C means I wouldn't drink at a party where it was only choice. Furthermore, I offer no promises of objectivity, accuracy, and certainly not of consistency. 

 

A most entertaining post!

Driving after this one must have been easy - can't imagine you swallowing much!

[David M. Bueker]

Now that's what I call taking one for the team.

[David M. Bueker]

But seriously - the wine was actually quite consistent, bad but consistent. I suppose that was to be (mostly) expected, but what's really too bad is the rest of the evening's entertainment.

#11 OK, I thought #5 was bad, till I tasted this. Burnt rubber and sewagey brett. Horrible wine, we tried to one-up each other with descriptors. "tires leaving skid marks as the car slides off road into the waste pond at the pig farm" was my contribution (Tyler informed me the wastepond is called the "lagoon", I'll use that next time). Fatally flawed wine. F

By the sound of that, I think you needed Manuel Camblor at the table to truly do justice for this wine.

(Completely off topic, but his reaction to a totally awful Eyrie PN and an even worse Grenache from Cali that followed it was one of the most phenomenal things I've witnessed at a wine dinner. )

OMG! You know the tasting is a bad one when a Mollydooker is the WOTN. Way to take one (perhaps two) for the team, Dale. More fan mail for Mr. Big Jay?

Mark Lipton

[Jenise]

Pretty amusing. Btw, I presume Dan staged this to show up the Sierra Carche, but did he intend the rest of the wines to be so unimpressive?

While I can't say I enjoyed the wines, I certainly enjoyed the tasting (and I can safely say my BAC was 0.01% or less as I went back to office). I thought Daniel actually did a good job of choosing wines mostly from the same areas and/or same cepages to give the SCs a fair chance. Just FYI, the 4 Sierra Carches came from separate sources (2 from PLCB, 2 from participants who bought at retail on East Coast). 2 people bought in PA and sent to Daniel at his cost I believe. He supplied all of the wines except the other 2 Sierra Carches (brought by Mark F. and R. Kenney) and one Pico Madama (I think Bob brought). I had dropped a bottle of 01 Embruix (same grapes, etc) to be included, but Tim who did the blind bagging didn't understand that it was for the tasting.

As I noted, my palate preference is not towards hot climate wines. That said, several of these bottles were just flat out flawed IMHO. I put the CoL in my top 4 wines, despite my palate preference, just because it was so clean compared to the SCs, the Pico Madama (also from Well Oiled), the Panarroz. etc. Others who like very ripe wines more than I do were just as unhappy with those wines. I've never been at a tasting where some of the top positive comments were along the lines of "hey, at least this one is clean."

Jenise,

I chose wines (besides the Sierra Carche and Pico Madama) that we sell...as embarassing as that may sound...

Here is what I just wrote on WB...

Okay, my turn. Firstly, thank you everyone who attended and were good sports. I tried to keep this event small and tried to have people attend who showed a previous interest in this whole Wine Advocate embarassment. What people lose sight of here is that a few weeks ago, Robert Parker "claims" to have tasted a good btl of Carche. Previous to that, he PROMISED to taste a btl on his video blog first. Instead, he tasted it in private with his wife, who gave the wine 93 points. We tasted 4 btls yesterday, from 3 DIFFERENT sources. And all were SHIT! That is the start of an investigation, not what Robert Parker has done.

Thank you, Jack, for your comments. I have been on the Wine Advocate's case for 2+ years now about Jay Miller and his tasting methodology. In that time, he has admitted to tasting just as Robert Parker does. This should ring serious alarm bells. Whatever Jay tasted for Carche was certainly not what anyo of us tasted yesterday and we had to do it 4 times.

On to the tasting...I selected, what I thought to be a good lineup. 15 wines served blind with a filet mignon lunch.

Lets examine the lineup, before we shit on the wines...

4 btls 2005 Sierra Carche @ WA 96 points each
2005 Pico Madama (corked, never served) WA 95+
2004 Pico Madama WA 93
2001 Clos Fonta WA 94
2007 Panarroz (Unrated by JM, but RP gave 2003-2006 all WA 90)
2007 Telmo Rodriguez A1 Murvedre
2005 Pasanau El Vell Coster WA 97
2008 Edgebaston Pepper Pot unrated
2007 Emilio Moro Resalso WA 90
2005 Espectacle (unrated, but 2004 was WA 99, 2006 WA 96)
2008 Oriol Unrated
2005 Mollydooker Carnival of Love WA 99

Is this really a bad lineup of wines? It reads like something Jay Miller might have on a riverboat cruise down the Murray River, no?

Most of these wines were very highly rated, and none were poorly rated. Before Thursday, I had never had Sierra Carche before, and all 4 btls were crap. I will never forget that smell of three of those btls. Absolutely disgusting. Panarroz must have been an off btl. I tasted that wine one week earlier and it was good.

One of the things I wanted to see was whether Pico Madama 2004 suffered like Sierra Carche 2005. It was not as bad but it was univerally panned by the group. I am curious to see where the 93 point btls of this are? Maybe Robert Parker can muster one up from another bulletin board member and taste it with his wife.

Onto Espectacle...first read this...http://dat.erobertparker.com/bboard/sho ... espectacle

I had the 2004 and it sucked. 2005 was a decent wine...for $10, much like the 2004. This is another example of what happens when an importer whispers into a wine critic's ear about 100+ year old Grenache vines in Montsant. In the 45 seconds that Jay Miller presumably spent with the 2004, he called it a 99 point wine. With the 2006, it is 96 points. Assume the 2005 would be a 97-98 pointer based on that scale. This is really a shame. I have not yet heard of anyone (besides Robert Kenney) have a full btl of this stuff and call it great. It should be noted that Robert Kenney thought the wine was crap yesterday.

Blind tasting is very revealing. Critics at the Wine Advocate should try it some time. Something is wrong with Sierra Carche. As Jay Miller first said, there was fraud somewhere. It is a shame that Robert Parker has no interest in seeing where it happened. It is a shame that Jay Miller will apparently continue to taste the portfolio of wines from Well Oiled Wine Co, when they have shown no proof that they are, in fact, innocent in all of this.

Special thanks to Steve Manzi and Robert Kenney. I worked this tasting around their schedules. I think I did right by them and the wine consuming public on these bulletin boards. I would have loved to taste a good btl of Sierra Carche. That would have made for interesting debate. Instead, we tasted 4 btls of shit. More importantly, many of these wines were shit.

So, where is the fraud really being committed? [stirthepothal.gif]

I hope someone shows this post to people like John Kight, so that they can stop apologizing for the Wine Advocate. I wish Robert Parker would do the right thing, and continue his investigation into what happened with Sierra Carche. I also wish that he would change his tasting methods to those that he has preached for decades....taste blind! If not, do not tell your subscribers and the wine consuming public that you do!

To Mrs. Robert Parker,

I do not know your palate, but for you to score this wine 93 points, I do not wish to see anymore reviews from you.

Dan, Dale
Many thanks for posting the notes (and indeed putting yourselves through the pain barrier). I (and I suspect a few others) have followed this farce from afar, and would summarise my reactions to it

Palates are palates and we do differ, though even as someone who treats points with a major dose of salt, I can see something didn't (and perhaps still doesn't) stack up.

So all in all, this tasting gives a very useful perspective.

What I will say now (and no criticism is aimed at either of you - far from it), is that the story may be better played out to audiences more interested in Parker and Parker Corp. There seems on the whole a ringing indifference to WA and Parker here, which is very healthy IMO. Better IMO to focus the Sierra Carche story on sites like Wine B'serkers who I'm confident will see it through and offer greater support for the truth to out. I just doubt we'll gather much steam for the debate and efforts maybe better applied elsewhere.

So thanks again and I'll be following the continuing fallout on WB and e-bob (from a safe position in the stands, with a fresh tub of popcorn).

regards

Ian

[Jenise]

Jenise,

I chose wines (besides the Sierra Carche and Pico Madama) that we sell...as embarassing as that may sound...

Here is what I just wrote on WB...

Okay thanks, Dan, I get it now.

Ian, I am off to WineBeserkers now!!!

Dale, you have done a stellar job posting on this event. As a lover of most wines from Spain, this is a real eye-opener!

What amazes me is the high "Wine-Parker" scores of some of these wines. I am getting sick and tired of people/store staff etc telling me "this wine scored 93 points". I am going on the war path next time I hear that.

Dan, thanks again for a fun event, at least the food was tasty.

Ian, while folks here may be less Parker-centric than some other sites, a quick scan of tasting notes makes it clear that there are people who buy by scores (whether WA, WS, etc) An important issue here is how can you trust a score from a branded wine? Lots of people here drink branded wines such as Las Rocas, Clos de la Siete, etc. Sierra Carche is a "brand" owned by a British marketing company, produced under contract by Casa de la Ermita (whose name is nowhere on the bottle I believe). The problem is of course that the "branding agency" has no real investment. If Sierra Carche develops a bad rep, just start a new brand. If the branding agency is blamed, start a new agency. They're just contracting for juice, so no capital investment and no real need to maintain the brand. Very different from an estate or even a negociant.

As to WA, while Miller's preferences don't mesh with mine, I have trouble believing he would have liked these wines even if plastered. I personally would bet on a switch, though I have no evidence. It's too bad that Mark Clinard from Well Oiled cancelled his attendance yesterday. That said, I don't absolve WA of blame. When you allow your tasting to be "presented" by the "trusted" importer, and give huge ratings to a wine with no real identity ,you have a responsibility in my opinion to "check" the tastings later. Robert Kenney, who attended yesterday's tasting, has tastes for ripe wines and purchased 4 CASES of this wine. When he hated the wine, he sent (at his own expense, overnight!) a bottle to Miller to taste. Miller waited 10 months to taste. Sheer laziness/incompetence.

I sat next to Tyler Coleman (Dr Vino) yesterday, here's his earlier summary:
http://www.drvino.com/2009/07/22/sierra ... erra-car...

You might not have any interest in Parker ratings, and I can't say that my buying is very influenced these days. But Parker & WS scores make a big difference in the wine business in US (and in UK in certain segments) and I for one find the fact that what is scored may not be what is sold a rather big deal. WS apparently insisted on tasting blind finished bottles, and Well Oiled stopped submitting after poor/mediocre scores for some earlier wines. Josh Raynolds from IWC apparently did some due diligence, as there was no actual winery, he decided not to review.

I don't especially think there needs to be debate or discussion here, I thought the tasting was interesting. Those that don't want to read can avoid the thread, I avoid lots of them!

Dale
Indeed I was very glad you posted the notes ... My concern was just that the debate will rage on across e-bob, WB and countless other sites and I'll read the juicy stuff there (they do train crash better than us ).

I've no disagreement with the concerns - just that I get a bit fed up seeing the same arguments posted on 4 different wine fora (damn you 'cut and paste' ). Keep it tight - keep it interesting ... but if people cover the wine fora with the same copied & pasted arguments and we'll lose interest before the questions are answered.

FWIW I think Parker does have a minor influence here and don't see much mention of Parker Points in relation to wines posted on these pages. No Parker 98+ point dinners and no wines posted prefaced by '100pointer'. Maybe I'm wrong - perhaps a good poll to run?

Anyway, just to be clear:
- I'm not having a go at you posting the TNs
- I'm very much supportive of Daniel and others pressing for recognition of failings at WA, most notably what appears to be looking at Wine Advocate, with 'advocate' being very much in a legal sense (i.e wine lawyer), rather than the professed customer advocate of Ralph Nadar fame.

- All I'm asking for is to focus on the fora that are best suited to such debates.

but then I'm drifting into the wider debate myself sorry!

regards

Ian

Going forward we are searching for a different winery for this brand

This quote is particularly depressing (from the drvino article).

[David M. Bueker]

Going forward we are searching for a different winery for this brand

This quote is particularly depressing (from the drvino article).

Perhaps one they can trust to exercise good quality control?

The brand is likely dead anyway.

Going forward we are searching for a different winery for this brand

This quote is particularly depressing (from the drvino article).

Perhaps one they can trust to exercise good quality control?

The brand is likely dead anyway.

Well, when you have a brand, then go around looking for someone to supply the wine for it...probably not ever going to be real high up on the Bueker List, I think.

[David M. Bueker]

the Bueker List

Known 'round the internet.

the Bueker List

Known 'round the internet.

Surely he meant the Buecker List

Mark Lipton