Susan & I tried over the weekend:
1. UrsaVnyds MajorRed SierraFoothills (14.0%; 25% Syrah/25% merlot/25% CS/21% PetiteSirah/4% Viognier; www.UrsaVineyards.com) 2007: Fairly dark color; slight tobaccoy/pungent classic earthy/ElDorado/mushroomy some blackberry/blackcurranty/slight herbal little oak some spicy rather interesting nose; soft slightly tannic rather earthy/dusty/ElDorado/mushroomy some blackberry/black curranty slight herbal light oak flavor; med.long bit tannic rather earthy/dusty/mushroomy/ElDorado light blackcurranty/blackberry finish; rather interesting wine and a very good value at $10.00
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2. Sunstone Vnyds&Wnry Syrah SBC (13.5%) 1993: Med.color w/ some bricking; attractive smoky/pungent/ozone some toasty/oak light blackberry/Syrah/spicy slight peppery fairly complex nose; tart slight metallic some astringent/dried out rather pungent/toasty/oak very slight blackberry/Syrah/peppery/spicy almost no fruit flavor; med.long tannic/astringent/dried out very slight peppery/spicy/blackberry/Syrah some toasty/charred/oak finish; rather interesting nose of old SBC Syrah but pretty shot on the palate; totally dead&gone several hrs later.
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3. Swanson Syrah NapaVlly (13.5%) 1993: Med.dark color w/ some browning; strong pencilly/oak/toasty fairly strong pungent/blackberry/Syrah/very spicy rather attractive/complex nose; soft strong pencilly/oak slight blackberry/boysenberry/Syrah/licorice slightly tannic/dried out flavor; long slight blackberry/Syrah/spicy/licorice somewhat pencilly/oak bit astringent/tannic/dried out finish; a bit more alive & fruit than the Sunstone but clinging on for life; pretty much dead&gone several hrs later. $26.00
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4. Ridge Calif Zin DusiRanch PasoRobles (14.9%; 36 brls; Bttld: Jan'97; SaH: 26 Brix; Drk: 12/96-12/00-12.01: PD) 1995: Med.color w/ some browning; rather pencilly/oak/smoke some spicy/blackberry/Zin/Paso jammy/boysenberry rather interesting elegant nose; soft/smooth PR jammy/boysenberry/Zin/very spicy some vanilla/smoky/pencilly/oak lightly tannic flavor; med.long slight tannic/dried out old Zin/pencilly/oak some blackberry/boysenberry/Zin/jammy lightly spice finish; still a bit of life on the old lady and a pleasure to drink. Pretty much shot by the next morning.
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And a wee BloodyPulpit:
1. Ursa: Just got in a shipment from this new wnry up in Fairplay of ElDoradoCnty. Their Tannat had been recommended to me by Andrew at ShakerRidgeWnry nearby. So I ordered a mixed case of the Ursa wines for a test drive for my tasting group and the MajorRed was one of extras. It hit the ground in LosAlamos on Fri, but I couldn't wait to try one, so cracked it open w/ Susan's fig & arugula pizza that the grill guy cooked. I thought it was a pretty decent red wine that spoke strongly of its ElDorado terroir. Then when I got home and saw the $10 tarif, I suddenly gained new respect for this wine. Nothing profound, but a really good drinking red that I found rather interesting. THat ElDorado earthiness made me thing of a lot of the Friuli Merlots I've tried. Looking forward to trying their other offerings, which in addition to the Tannat and a Souzao, include Chard and PinotNoir from SierraFoothills, presumably ElDorado..not an obvious location to grow those varieties.
The principals, GregStokes & Deborah Elissagaray, held equivalent positions at DavidBruce afore their move up into Fairplay.
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2. Sunstone: The early '90's were pretty heady times in SantaBarbaraCnty has a lot of new wineries were coming on-line, mostly in the SantaYnezVlly. Not much plantings yet out in the SantaRitaHills, other than Sanford&Benedict. Conventional wisdom was that it was too cold out there. Guess we know better now.
Sunstone was one of my favorites back then for their Syrah and Viognier. They had a nice run for several yrs, but then went downhill, so gave up on them. I can't for the life of me remember who their founding winemaker was...buut he was good.
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3. Swanson: The Swanson Syrahs first came on the market w/ the '92 or '93 vintage. I tried my first one at the Aspen Food&Wine Festival, back in the good/old days (by crackey) when it was a worthwhile event. I was blown away by those early one, but they don't seem to be as good as they were back then.
Winemaker was MarcoCapelli. He's no located up in ElDoradoCnty, consulting for several wineries, but I've lost touch w/ him and have not tried any of his wines up there.
In the early '90's, SeanThackerey took Syrah from a NapaVlly vnyd to make his Orion. But ClarkeSwanson bought the vnyd out from under Sean and he had to go to RossiRanch for his Orion grapes. Those early Swanson Syrahs often had a touch of eucalyptus to them (Sean's Orion, of course, had a ton of eucalyptus from his open-air wnry in the middle of his Bolinas eucalyptus grove...his expression of the Bolinas terroir), but Clarke paid the neighbors to take down that stand of eucalyptus and I think his Syrahs lost some of their character then.
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4. RidgeDusi: After the Sunstone & the Swanson were opened and found to be not very pleasurable after first cracked, I turned to my last/great hope, the RidgeDusi, Ten yrs out beyond Draper's recommended drinking window, they wine was still alive and pleasurablle to drink. Rather typical of many older Ridges, they don't often crash & burn, but just quietly ride off into the sunset w/ nary a HeighHoSilver. Maybe there's something to be said for the balance thingey that Draper seeks in his wines??
Tom