Our latest poker and wine get-together featured a couple of distinct phases, starting with Burgundies, moving the California Cabs and Syrahs and ending in a mish-mash of after-hours cellar diving. As usual, we drank the main tasting wines double-blind.
Blind Starters:
2004 Olivier Leflaive Chassagne-Montrachet 1er Cru Clos Saint-Marc. The nose of this wine feels compacted to me, with taut scents of green herbs, stones, and lemon slice. But, really, it isn’t giving up a whole lot aromatically at this point. In the mouth, it feels youthfully narrow, but eager. It has an acidic beam of yellow and citrus fruit and some persistent herb and mineral elements on the finish, but nothing ever really connects and the flavors never seem to fan out much—kinda boring, IMO.
2007 Sakonnet Vineyards Chardonnay Reserve Southeastern New England. Aromas of herb, sweet chalk dust, moss and mixed citrus fruits are once again tight, but generally more interesting than with the previous wine. It is rather likeable on the palate, with a ripe and rounded sweet pear and apple fruit profile that sports solid density and body. It also demonstrates a fine degree of thrust and overall breadth and finishes nice and even. A real pleasant surprise when this was unveiled.
Reds:
1997 Robert Ampeau & Fils Auxey-Duresses 1er Cru Les Ecusseaux. A touch of brownish garnet color and a fair bit of lightening at the rim initially suggests a wine of some advanced age. It smells of tanned leather, ashtray, underbrush and dried cranberries. There is not a lot of fruit to be found, as the dry earthy quality really is the dominant feature. To be honest, the same is true on the palate. The wine is extraordinarily dry and sort of sucks all the saliva right out of my mouth for seemingly the whole rest of the day. The acidity is rather pronounced from the get-go and carries along flavors of cool earth, iron, smoke, tea leaves, bark and tart cranberries on a medium-bodied, terse frame. It shows a bit of flesh from time to time, but overall it feels austere, crunchy and unwelcoming.
1972 Domaine Maillard Père et Fils Corton-Renardes Grand Cru. Appearance-wise, this is also rather faded in color and there is a really weird sort of oil slick of some kind floating around on top of it when it is in the glass. Regardless, the aromas are pretty nice—featuring savory scents of very old leather, pencil shavings, orange peel, fireplace ash, birch and dried cherry. It is super-tangy in the mouth, with flavors of crabapple, cranberry and iron ore that are carried along by a sour acidity. Even though this stays cool, a bit aloof and highly acidic, there is still more appeal all around compared to the previous wine. It is probably on the downslope, but at least offers some interesting components to ponder.
2002 Prince Florent de Merode Corton Les Bressandes Grand Cru. With its aromas of cherry pie, red berry paste and red pixie stick dust, this wine is considerably richer and more fruit-forward on the nose than the two previous offerings. In the mouth, it is nice and fresh, with appealing notes of forest floor and black earth melding nicely with rich, plush cherry and strawberry fruit flavors that feel pure and clean. Tight-grained tannins and a cool acidity bode well for a solid future ahead. This was my favorite among the 4 Burgundies on this day.
1998 Domaine Armand Rousseau Père et Fils Clos de la Roche Grand Cru. Oh boy, I really like the bouquet here, with its sweet cherry, strawberry, Swedish fish, red flowers and smoky earth aromas filling the nostrils quite nicely. But sadly, the palate is tough, inward-looking and overtly tannic. There’s a lot of black cherry and black raspberry fruit that feels cool and dry, but isn’t real giving or emphatic. Although the flavors linger well onto the finish, the wine still sort of falls flat after the promise of the bouquet. After it was revealed, I was really surprised, as I thought Rousseau’s Clos de Beze from this same vintage was fantastic and I would have expected more from his CdlR.
1993 Quilceda Creek Cabernet Sauvignon Washington. With this flight, it’s easy to tell we’ve switched gears quite a bit. This first transition wine was my clear WOTN. The nose feels creamy and absolutely full of raspberry, cassis, black earth, jalapeno, graphite and incense aromas. It is expansive, rich, sweet and sexy—a real delight to my senses. In the mouth, it is definitely full-bodied, dense and fleshy, with nary a hard edge anywhere to be found. Although there is an abundance of dark chocolate, black currant and black cherry decadence, I also find some delightful bits of savory earth, tobacco, green pepper and black olive in there to add complexity and overall Bordelaise-styled balance. It is giving and layered and just hits a lot of pleasure receptors.
1997 Chappellet Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon Pritchard Hill Estate Vineyard. This one smells of dark mountain berries, cassis, tar and charred cedar wood. In the mouth, it is dark and slinky on the entry, with a ton of chalky black fruit extract and obvious but fine-tuned tannins. It is a holistic and well-constructed wine with a draped texture, but also a lot of density and youthful character on the chewy finish. Although it was decanted at 8:30 in the morning, it felt like it could still use more air—so I would suggest cellaring it away for a few more years.
1999 Fisher Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon Coach Insignia Napa Valley. This wine features a youthful bouquet of rich coffee, green pepper, gardenia flowers and creamy red currants that feels slinky and modern. It has a core of sweet fruit on the chewy but pure and forward palate. Black currant, blackberry and plum fruit flavors are nice, but the wine just doesn’t stand out next to the previous two wines. I think it is still showing pretty young, but is more ready to drink than say the 2001, though not nearly as fine-drinking and complex as the outstanding 1996.
2004 Rhys Alesia Syrah Chileno Valley Sonoma Coast. This is a murky and stanky wine on the nose, with root vegetables, burnt green pepper skins, horse stable and smoke intermingling with over-ripe and treacled dark fruit and slightly briery bits. It is really big and heavy-duty in the mouth, with too much alcohol running through it at all levels. It does have a nice silky texture and a smooth sheen that is surprisingly nice in light of the weight and intensity, but it isn’t enough to save this wine from the dump bucket.
2005 Rhys Alesia Syrah Fairview Ranch Santa Lucia Highlands. This one is thick and dense on the nose, with aromas of black soot, blackberry and toasted wood, veering more toward wild berries and rhubarb over time. It is really polished, smooth and spicy, providing a big mouthful of boysenberry and woody flavors. It also shows some slivers of heat, but overall is better balanced and much more drinkable than the ’04 Chileno. Still needs time, for sure.
After hours (not blind):
2005 Inman Family Pinot Noir Olivet Grange Vineyard Russian River Valley. This was dusted off quickly by others before I got to it. I heard it was great, as usual.
2002 Domaine Fourrier Gevrey-Chambertin Vieille Vigne. This was also guzzled down before I had a chance to try it.
2006 David Duband Nuits St. Georges. Some toasted stem notes lead the way to pretty candied red fruit on the nose that feels young, but pure and pretty despite those savory bits. In the mouth, it is silky smooth and lithely light, but does have some sneaky tannins on the finish. There is a lot of red berry and cherry fruit showing fine exuberance, but a few years of additional polish should help this along.
2003 Domaine Michel Lafarge Bourgogne. Despite being a bit simple, I still like the sappy bouquet of crushed cherries, red flowers and gentle spices. On the palate, it is light and airy, with lots of red berry fruit and dusty ash notes that make for some nice sipping despite surprisingly drying tannins that pop up unexpectedly after a while.
2004 Château Branaire-Ducru St. Julien. I’ve had this wine about four other times and this particular bottle was not quite as appealing on the nose as I am used to. It does have some nice notes of menthol, white pepper, cherry syrup and mixed currants but also a bit of industrial rubber aroma I don’t much like. On the palate, it continues to be a somewhat lighter-bodied offering that doesn’t yet show a ton of depth—coming across as solid but not special with its black currant and black raspberry fruit, leathery texture and tight structure. I’m curious to see where this wine goes, but it is just OK at this moment in its evolution.
1977 Ferreira Vintage Porto. Finally, we have a lovely old port nose to savor, with its aromas of dried rose petals, light caramel, soft old leather couch, dry fruitcake, mellow molasses and classy spirits. It is gently warming and finely spiced on the palate. It has a nice elegance about it, with great length and persistence of flavor. It is smooth and shows no harsh edges. The spicecake and roasted cherry flavors are warming, but show no heat. It may lack that one final gear to take it to the upper echelon, but I could be quite happy drinking a fair bit of this. A nice cherry to top off my poker victory!
-Michael