WTN: Some New Wines...(long/boring)

We tried last night (4/11/12) some More New Wines:
1. RoyalTokaji Mezes MalyVnyd Furmint Dry Tokaji Wine (1592 btls; 13.5%) 2009: Light gold color; rather fragrant/perfumed
somewhat earthy/dusty/chalky fairly spicy/peppery light oak very interesting nose; rather dry/austere/tart quite
perfumed/floral/spicy/peppery some earthy/dusty/chalky very interesting/attractive flavor; long rather spicy/peppery/
quite floral/pperfumed/aromatic tart/dry/austere finish; a bit like a dry Semillon from HunterVlly w/o the oak;
a very interesting aromatic white w/ structure that will probably age well; fairly priced at $35.00 (CB)
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2. Iago'sWine Chinuri Chardakhi WhiteDry Georgian Wine (w/o skin contact; 11.5%; 50 yr old Chimuri vines;
150 btls/1 qvevri 300 yrs old) Iago Bitarishvili/Mtskheta/Georgia 2010: Very musty/TCA/corked nose w/ a slight
apple/pear aroma buried underneath; unredeemedly corked; replacement btl on the way. $20.00 (CB)
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3. Agharta Cataclysm NorthCoast WW (43% Marsanne/33% Viognier/24% Roussanne; 13.9%; www.AghartaWines.com)
PaxMahle 2009: Med.light gold color w/ noticible cloudiness; attracrive honeyed/honeysuckle/floral bit appley light
toasty/oak rather low-key/quiet nose; somewhat tart light floral/honeysuckle rather appley/pear slight bitter/austere
flavor; med.long rather tart/lean light floral/honeysuckle/pear/apple slight bitter/austere/tight finish; not
a bombastic white Rhone blend but rather tight and will probably age well into something pretty interesting is my
gut feeling. $45.00
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4. Arnot-Roberts OldVine WW Compagni-PortisVnyd/SonomaVlly (4.5 brls; 12.7%) 2010: Light gold color; rather light some
appley/floral/apple blossom slight earthy very quiet nose; tart/lean/screechy light apple/apple blossom/floral quite
austere/pinched/tight flavor; med.short lean/tight/schreechy/tart light apple/floral/apple blossom finish; a very
light/schreechy/pinched/lean/austere wine that you can only hope will develop into something wonderful. $30.00
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5. Carlisle Compagni Portis WW SonomaVlly (14.2%; 56 yr old vines; GWT/TrousseauGris/Riesling + others; 105 cs)
2010: Light gold color; very perfumed/aromatic/floral/GWT-like/hair oil light pencilly/oak beautiful aromatic nose;
soft/lush/ripe hair-oil/floral/aromatic/GWT-like light pencilly/oak lovely/perfumed flavor; very long soft/lush very
floral/rose petal/GWT-like/hair oil quite fragrant/perfumed lovely finish; this is how they'd make GWT in Calif if they
could; a rich/lush very perfumed/aromatic beautiful wine. $30.00
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6. BedrockWineCo Heirloom WW Compagni-PortisVnyd/SonomaVlly (Planted in 1954; Pharmed by PhilCoturri;
14.4%) 2009: Med.light gold color; slight floral/perfumed rather appley/earthy/mineral slight reduced/SO2/pungent
somewhat old-timey Calif white quite interesting nose; bit tart somewhat earthy/minerally/appley/pear more austere
quite interesting old-timey lovely flavor; very long pear/apple/earthy/mineral light floral/perfumed fairly tart
lingering finish; a rather old-timey kind of Calif white. $28.00
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7. CortiBros Blaufrankisch WashState (12.9%) SteeleWines/Kelseyville 2010: Med.dark color; some buttery/vanilla/oak
strong blueberry/licorice/plummy/grapey bit earthy/loamy/dusty quite interesting AustrianRed kind of nose; soft bit
hard/tannic/bitey strong blueberry/plummy/licorice/pungent some earthy/loamy some vanilla/Am.oak bit rustic/coarse
flavor; med.long earthy/loamy/rustic strong plummy/grapey/licorice/blueberry some vanilla/oak finish; quite a nice
drinkable red for a good price. $13.00 (CB)
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8. Familie Bauer Naturnaher Weinbau Quiltaswein Trocken Grossriedenthal BlauerZweigelt Bassgeige (13.5%)
Wagram/Austria 2007: Dark color; strong piney/forest floor/mushroomy lovely plummy/licorice/grapey slight pungent/reduced/
SO2/metallic/ozone fairly lush nose; soft rather earthy/dusty/loamy/rustic quite plummy/licorice slight chocolaty flavor
w/ slight tannic bite; med. lush/plummy/licorice/chocolaty/grapey some earthy/loamy finish w/ bit of tannic bite;
rather interesting grapey/loamy wine a bit on the rustic side. $20.00 (MX)
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9. Handcraft ArtisanCollection PetiteSirah Calif (14.5%) CherylIndelicato/Manteca 2010: Dark color; rather grapey/licorice
simple slight goaty/hot-climate rather boring nose; soft rather tannic grapey/licorice quite sour slight goaty/funky
flavor; med.short simple/grapey/licorice soft quite sour fairly tannic finish; move along, folks...nothing to see here.
$12.00 (KK)
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10. Ridge PetiteSirah LyttonEstate/DryCreekVlly/SonomaCnty (15.2%; Bttld: 3/11; 100% PS; Drk: 11/10-11/20: JO)
2009: Very dark color; very strong vanilla/pencilly/toasty/Am.oak/coconutty/toasted coconut/ZagNut bar some
blackberry/peppery/PS/black cherry/licorice/pungent slight earthy/loamy nose; soft rather gritty/tannic/hard
strong vanilla/Am.oak/toasty/toasted coconut slight peppery/black cherry/PS/licorice/pungent flavor; long light
black cherry/blackberry/PS/licorice strong Am.oak/toasted coconut/vanilla/ZagNutBar finish w/ hard/gritty tannins;
a bit lacking in aromatics and shows the oafish/clunky/stupid side of PS; pretty structured & tannic and most likely
will turn into something good; sometimes you just gotta have faith. $32.00 (KK)
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The usual BloodyPulpit:
1. Furmint: This wine, which I found at CortiBros, was easily the best dry Furmints I've yet had. From the 19-ha
Maly vnyd, which apparently has a first-growth/grand cru status. It had really lovely aromatics but quite structured.
Furmint has the highest tannin contents of any of the white varieties.
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2. Compagni-Portis: These three wines were an amazing contrast. Hard to believe they cam from the same vnyd. The
A-R was widely disliked because of its lean/strident/screechy character on the palate. "Vapid" was a term that was
oft applied to it. A-R is one of the leading proponents of the harvest early/natural wine/low alcohol style wine..
oft termed "wines of balance". This wine was not a good example to support the "wines of balance" concept. The very
high acidity of this wine made it definitely not in "balance". I did not find it a pleasant wine to taste...maybe w/
some foods, perhaps sauced in carbolic acid, this would taste much better. Just a difficult wine to love. But, that
said, it is a wine I have a sneaking suspicion will develop into something interesting. Back in the '70's, back
in the pre-Z-H days of Alsatian wines, back when Alsatian Riesling were high-acid, low-alcohol, totally dry wines;
my rule of thumb in buying Alsatian wines was the more acid/unpleasant they were in their youth, the greater potential
they held for developing into magnificant wines with age. It was a rule that stood me well....until they quit making
Rieslings of that style in Alsace. This A-R made me recall some of those Alsatian Rieslings of days gone-by. I think
this A-R will evolve into something very/very interesting with time. I've got three more bottles with which to
prove the nay-sayers wrong.
On the other hand, the Carlisle was amazing stuff. This is, of course, Mike's first white wine. From his reds,
I was sorta expecting a wine w/ a rich/lush character on the palate. What I didn't expect was the powerful aromatics
the wine showed. It spoke a lot of GWT in its character. I can hardly wait to see what he does w/ his Gruner now.
OTOH, the Bedrock was a much more earthy/mineral type of white; probably more expressive of terroir than any of
the three. A bit more of an intellectual experience and made you think about the wine. It had kind of an old-timey
Calif white wine character that reminded me of some of the white back in the '70's that were raised in large oak
ovals or redwood tanks. Or some of the old Ridge Sylvaners from the SantaCruzMtns. Again, a white wine I think will
develop nicely w/ some age.
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3. Blaufrankisch/Zweigelt: This is a grape widely grown in Central Europe/Austria. It goes by the name of Lemberger in
WashState. Jed Steele has made this wine for a number of yrs under his ShootingStar label. I thought this Corti
version was better than any of Jed's renditions. Zewigelt is another Austrian grape, a cross of Blaufrankisch X
StLaurent. I though the Corti was particularly good, reminded me a lot of Austrian versions, and very well priced.
Tom

[David M. Bueker]

Wow. I had a rather different reaction to the Arnot-Roberts.

viewtopic.php?f=3&t=43595

Hi Tom -

Thank you for yet another group of interesting notes. I had no idea that Ridge made Sylvaner back in the day.

Hi Tom -
Thank you for yet another group of interesting notes. I had no idea that Ridge made Sylvaner back in the day.

Yup..... they made Sylvaner and WhiteRiesling from the VineHill vnyd in the SCM in the late-'60's thru early '70's.
And they originally had Chard up on the original MonteBello property/upper vnyd that they made MB Chard from.
Not from the JimsomareRanch where there current MB Chard comes from. And, in '68, they even made a tiny amount
of VineHill WR TBA as well. I tasted it in '75 and it was magnificant.
Their WR & Sylvaner were made more like a Calif Chard than a Germanic style. But they aged amazingly well and developed
somewhat of an old Germanic character.
Tom

Hi Tom -
Thank you for yet another group of interesting notes. I had no idea that Ridge made Sylvaner back in the day.

Yup..... they made Sylvaner and WhiteRiesling from the VineHill vnyd in the SCM in the late-'60's thru early '70's.
And they originally had Chard up on the original MonteBello property/upper vnyd that they made MB Chard from.
Not from the JimsomareRanch where there current MB Chard comes from. And, in '68, they even made a tiny amount
of VineHill WR TBA as well. I tasted it in '75 and it was magnificant.
Their WR & Sylvaner were made more like a Calif Chard than a Germanic style. But they aged amazingly well and developed
somewhat of an old Germanic character.
Tom

Quite interesting information from a historical perspective. I'm not surprised to hear about the great Vine Hill Riesling TBA, having had an excellent 1978 Freemark Abbey Riesling Edelwein last year (more at a BA than a TBA style). Wouldn't doubt that the TBA would still be impressive today.

Quite interesting information from a historical perspective. I'm not surprised to hear about the great Vine Hill Riesling TBA, having had an excellent 1978 Freemark Abbey Riesling Edelwein last year (more at a BA than a TBA style). Wouldn't doubt that the TBA would still be impressive today.

Ridge was ahead of their time, Andrew, and didn't really know what they were doing w/ that wine.
Calif botrytis wines didn't really come into being until the early '70's. In '72, Wente had a mild botrytis infection
in theit WR in their ArroyoSecco vnyd down in Monterey. They went ahead and made it, off dry, and labeled it "Spatlese", and it was absolutely lovely.
The next year, same thing, but more botrytis. They made it sweeter and labeled it "Auslese".
That same year, '73, a German vintner was touring the vnyds w/ FreemarkAbbey's ChuckCarpy. FA always made a dry JR, but this year, the grapes had started to rot
and they abandoned them on the vine. The German saw them and told Chuck that the grapes were infected by Edelfaule, Noble Rot. Up until that time, the feeling was
that the humidity in Calif was too low to permit the growth of Edelfaule. So they went ahead and harvested these "rotten" grapes and made their first EdelWein,
purportedly Calif's first BA level of JR. Next year, '74, they did it again and made an EdelWeinGold, Calif's first TBA. Then about '74 or '75, WalterShug/JosephPhelps
and DickArrowood/Ch.St.Jean jumped in and started making BA/TBA level JR's. And, as they say, the rest is history.
Not surprised your '78 EdelWein was still good. The Calif versions turn ugly in color fairly early (I suspect because of the low SO2 levels they use), like
the color of motor oil or PedroXiminez. But they usually smell & taste fine. I've never had a Calif BA/TBA that I thought was over the hill.
I have a pretty comprehensive collection of those early JR BA/TBA's from '73 thru early '80's. Havent figured out what to do with them, though.
Now you know the rest of the story, Andrew.
Tom

I have a pretty comprehensive collection of those early JR BA/TBA's from '73 thru early '80's. Havent figured out what to do with them, though.
Tom

Drinking them is not an option?

I have a pretty comprehensive collection of those early JR BA/TBA's from '73 thru early '80's. Havent figured out what to do with them, though.
Tom

Drinking them is not an option?

This is such a rare collection that they must be shared w/ people who would appreciate them.
I just haven't put together that gathering yet.
Tom