Last night at Albino’s place. Thanks for the great dinner!
Tokaj Pendits Tokaji Muskotály Száraz 2008
Thanks to Márta. Pale yellow-gold. Quite floral now, pure and fairly fruity, typical but with a unique tarragon top note (more herbaceous and minerally than most Muscat de Lunel, Márta says). Lightly, nicely tannic, medium-plus length. Pretty golden apple acidity, smooth yet with cut. Nice food accompaniment, balanced (if no doubt high-acid by some people’s standards), chef Albino suggests fish. Rating: 87
Tokaj Pendits Tokaji Furmint-Muscat Dialog 2008
Thanks to Márta. 20 g/l residual sugar. Fairly pale yellow-gold. Rather closed. Glyceric. Ripe pear and a fascinating little dried apricot peachiness. Salty and a bit spicy. Darker chalkiness here. Soft dried mushroom. “Best Dialog I have ever had”, says Rainer. Quite powerful, just lightly warm with its 14% alcohol. Growing longer with airing. Rating: 88+/89(+?)
Tokaj Pendits Tokaji Furmint Édes 2007
Thanks to Márta. 86 g/l residual sugar. Sweet and buttery loam, carambola, candied physalis, lots of Abate pear and apple, plus a red-fruity touch of pomegranate, soft spice and herbs. Faint white chocolate. Nicely viscous and glyceric, we also appreciate the fact that this holds only 11.5% alcohol. Slightly low, very ripe acidity. Gives pleasure, pretty, but is not as complete as e.g. a Tokaji Aszú. Rating: 88(+/-?)
Trimbach Riesling Clos Ste-Hune 2000
Contribution of mine. Medium-plus yellow-green. So closed at first that it smelled rubbery. Argillo-calcerous sea breeze and saltiness, intense lime, so complex, pistachio, highly aromatic acidity, softer pine forest floor, Thai basil, huge minerality. I am now convinced again that I did not overrate this at release, my favourite vintage since 1990 (but planning to retaste 1995, 1996 and 1998 soon, too). Extremely well balanced, had early harmony, still so harmonious, a great vintage that is neither steely nor tough. Márta and her son Stefán thought this downright perfect. Extremely long, quite palate-staining, just short of the 1990 in this regard, but so minerally, complex and finesseful. Opening up with airing all the time, increasingly bigger. Can be drunk now with great pleasure, but essentially another ageworthy CSH. Rating: 96+?
Ponsot Griotte-Chambertin 1997
Contribution of mine. Noticeably bretty. Round earthy tree bark to nicely evolved fruit and lightly exotic minerality. Fairly long. Blacker in colour, firmer and more intense in flavour and expression with airing. Now strong lightly smoky and highly individual metal and mineral notes, shellfish, smoky tobacco to partly dark raspberry and blood orange (Gevrey iron) with a suggestion of red beet. Could be fruitier, though. The tiny bitterness, murkiness and slight shortness on the finish made us think that in addition to the brett this may have been ever so faintly cork-tainted, and by the next day, it became obvious that it was. A pity, even if the wine was quite drinkable all the same... Rating: 90(+?) or: N/R
Joseph Roty Charmes-Chambertin Très Vieilles Vignes 1998
Thanks to Rainer. Lightly evolved ruby-black. Smoky tobacco ash-tinged dark raspberry. Swiss cured beef, with airing more open, less ash muteness. Firm, but not too sweet, bright or lively fruit (nor particularly “fruity” in the modern sense of the term at all). But quite intense and complex. Strong smoky minerality. Spicy and rather tannic for Pinot Noir, in fact, probably too tannic to ever achieve perfect harmony. Slightly coarse and grainy tannin. Palate-staining, fairly long, albeit not too long finish. But fractionally sweeter and longer. Rating: 93(-?)
Tokaj Pendits Tokaji Aszú 6 Puttonyos 2001
Thanks to Márta. 10.54% alcohol, 202 g/l residual sugar and 8 g/l acidity. Yellow-gold. Closed house dust botrytis, white glue and acacia honey. Oily-thick and lightly buttery. Quite long. Faint sunflower oil and peppermint tea on the finish. Even oilier on the pour the next day, like liquid butter. Botrytised, thick, richly yellow-fruity (candied mango, quince and pineapple) and gluey, and nicely full-bodied. Quite lively acidity. Rating: 91+/92(+?)
Tokaj Pendits Tokaji Aszú-Essencia Mád-Holdvölgy 1993
Thanks to Márta. 220 g/l residual sugar at 12% alc. A wine we have tasted many times, that is evolving nicely, but not really improving. Amber-brown colour, yellow reflections. Core of quince with airing. Touch of burnt caramel. Autumnal leaves, Rainer says. Fairly complex black tea, not too sweet Recioto-like raisins, dried date and apricot, soft orange rind. Some finesse. Really half-sweet, half dry. Fairly, but not too long. Black tea-like surface dryness (not really a rancio note) the following day. If anything increasingly shorter with airing. Rating: 91-/90(-?)
Tokaj Pendits Tokaji [Furmint Quintessence] 2000
Thanks to Márta. Medium-full yellow-gold. The lighter AE lots separated and bottled in 375 cl (thus going to be labelled something other than AE). 216 g/l residual sugar. Nicely exotic style, fruity, nice peppermint tea, nicely viscous, sweet with a lightly tannic surface, refreshing and lively, quite long. Sweet lightly floral spring butter. Exotically rubbery the next day, as well as a bit shorter. A bit more like a Ruster Ausbruch, albeit clearly with Tokaj soil notes. More pear and apple juice concentrate, more superficiality than the AE, which is ultimately much more serious, complex and deep, nor full-bodied, let alone finesseful. Rating: 90(+?)
Tokaj Pendits Tokaji Aszú Essencia 2000
Thanks to Márta. 220 g/l residual sugar. Another wine that is coming along nicely (as are all her wines, especially since the 1999 vintage), still young in this case, but a pleasure to drink. Bit fuller golden colour. More seriousness and depth, fuller-bodied, similarly buttery as the “lighter lots of the same”, bit tannic, more concentrated and structured, much more viscous and complex. More flavourful and firmer acidity. Firm chamomile tea (potential black tea finesse). Persistent, quite minerally and finesseful finish. Rating: 92+/93(+?)
Tokaj Pendits Tokaji Aszú Essencia 2006
Thanks to Márta. The pretty retro-look French 375 cl bottle (which I personally would recommend using for everything in the “expensive”, i.e. AE and E categories). Full yellow-green. 270 g/l residual sugar, backed by bright acidity. Highly complex and extremely interesting tea florality. Amazingly light on its feet. Pure and precise exotic yellow fruit, partly pit fruit such as fresh prune. Fascinating, lovely acidity. Vinosity. Sweeter and more viscous with airing. Bit tannic. Elegant. Márta’s favourite. In addition to a faint exotic rubberiness from the clean botrytis, lettuce on the nose and kiwi on the palate the following day. Fatter with airing, sufficient baby fat to buffer the lively acidity (this one has got cut!) as it evolves in bottle. But: the brightness and precision here are such that I would not hesitate enjoying a bottle now and then before it enters a likely closed phase (when such high-acid wines are best left alone). Rating: 94(+?)
Tokaj Pendits Tokaji Aszú Essencia 2003
Thanks to Márta. From 500 ml bottle this time. 330 g/l residual sugar. Bright yellow-green. Increasingly more closed each time we taste this. Great aromatic acidity currently almost drowned in oily-viscous baby fat. Exotic and superripe, heavily and cleanly botrytised tropical yellow fruit. Nice honey, green banana and Japanese green tea. Very, very long on the finish. Márta finds this an over top vintage, but this has no lack of freshness and all the baby fat to live off with bottle age of a potential modern-day legend. Extremely creamy and rich the following day, as well as more open again. Hints at potential coffee and white chocolate finesse notes. Rating: 95+/96(+?)
Úri Borok (Vince Gergely) Tokaji Aszúeszencia 1998
Thanks to Albino. From the same almost a month open bottle as last time at Rainer’s place, suffered a bit but not much since then. Amber yellow-brown. Smoky and tannic (a bit dry at the surface) Darjeeling and bee’s wax. Some dried date, autumnal fallen leaves, white chocolate. Faint tangerine rind, mace and paprika powder. Bit oily-viscous, cane sugar syrup sweetness, but now tastes more like AE again (instead of the declassified Eszencia it is). Very nice acidity, coupled to a thus far pretty little lemon rind and possibly surface rancio bitter note. Complex and attractive wine whose evolution in bottle we find hard to predict. Rating: 92+/93(-?)
Greetings from Switzerland, David.
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„J'ai gâché vingt ans de mes plus belles années au billard. Si c'était à refaire, je recommencerais.“ – Roger Conti
