After a lovely week visiting my wee daughter in NY, I’m back in the USSR (of wine, if nothing more). Having enjoyed the 2002 Cazin a few weeks ago, I brought with me two bottles of the 1996 (buttressed by positive recent sightings from Jeff and others) and decided to open one right away, in defiance of travel shock. For comparison, the second will be opened in six months. Since Maureen STILL hasn’t reported back on whether leaf days etc. are the same in the southern hemisphere, the second maiden will be sacrificed, like the first, three days after the new moon, to make sure the comparison is scientific, not to mention conclusive, from both the allopathic and BD viewpoints.
1996 François Cazin Cour-Cheverny Cuvée Renaissance 13.0%
First, relief that there’s no premox. Second, darn, there goes my experiment, this smells rivetingly lovely, a heady mix of limestone, nectarines and limes, shorn of baby fat. Bracingly acidic, with some of the strongest (and most pleasing) salinity I have ever tasted this side of cod, both in perfect counterpoint with a toothsome fruit sweetness that verges on the off-dry, reminiscent of some Vouvrays. Paired perfectly with a creamy Rivers Edge “Up in Smoke” smoked chèvre from Oregon, wrapped in smoked maple leaves. Life is good.
While travel shock is most often used to designate the effects of rolling in the ocean for thirty days, I always fear that two car rides and nine hours on a plane might have been a frontal lobotomy to the bottle in front of me.